The Father: Historical, Psychological and Cultural Perspectives

by Luigi Zoja

Overview

Countless children throughout the world grow up without fathers. In this revised and updated edition of The Father, accompanied by a new preface, Luigi Zoja studies the reasons for this and assesses the contribution of this phenomenon to social and psychological problems.

Using examples from classical antiquity to the present day, Zoja views the origins and evolution of the father from a Jungian perspective. He argues that the father’s role in bringing up children is a social construction that has been subject to change throughout history, and goes on to examine the consequences and consider the crisis facing fatherhood today. No other existing book faces the subject of fatherhood from such a broad and multidisciplinary perspective. Covering these issues from historical, sociological and psychological points of view, this revised edition of The Father includes a complete reworking of the final part of the book, focusing on the condition of the father in today’s globalized world, and with a particular look at the role historical trauma and grief play in family relationships.

The book will be of special interest to analytical psychologists and Jungian psychotherapists in practice and in training, academics and students of Jungian and post-Jungian studies, sociology, anthropology, gender studies, and history.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781138500914
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	02/07/2018
Edition description:	Revised
Pages:	346
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.19(h) x (d)

About the Author

Luigi Zoja is an analytical psychologist in private practice in Milan who lectures internationally. He is a former training analyst of the C. G. Jung Institut, Zurich, past president of CIPA (Centro Italiano di Psicologia Analitica) and former president of IAAP (International Association of Analytical Psychology). He has taught at the University of Insubria and at Beijing Normal University. The previous edition of The Father received the Gradiva Award in the USA and the Premio Palmi in Italy and has appeared in 12 languages.

Table of Contents

Contents

List of figures

Acknowledgments

Permissions

Preface to the new edition

Introduction

PART I

Prehistory

1 The mammals: the animals’ retreat from fatherhood

2 The sexuality of the great apes

3 The prehistoric horizon of the father

4 The paternal revolution

5 Lucy grows

PART II

Myth and the classical age

6 Patriarchy and matriarchy

7 The historic horizon of the father

8 The mythic origins of the father

9 Hector

10 Ulysses

11 The myth of the father as the sole progenitor

12 Aeneas

PART III

Towards modern times and decadence

13 From the Roman father, to the Son, to the French Revolution

14 From the French Revolution to the Industrial Revolution

15 The disenchantment of war

16 The reversal of the public father

17 The voyage of the Joads

PART IV

The father today

18 The rarefaction of the father

19 The abdication of the father: in flight toward the past

20 The abdication of the father: in flight toward the future

21 The disappearance of elevation

22 The breadwinner

23 The search for the father

PART V

A final reflection

24 A final reflection

References

Index