From: Scott Chase (ecphoric@hotmail.com)
Date: Thu 26 Feb 2004 - 15:19:08 GMT
In his book _Totem and Taboo_ Freud is discussing some of the same
topics re: totemism which Durkheim addresses in _The Elementary Forms of
Religious Life_, but Freud puts a psychoanalytical spin on them by
looking at so-called "savages" (eg- native Australians) in similar terms
as neurotics.
Freud also addresses incest avoidance and mentions Westermarck.
Anyway, here's a quote memeticists might want to ponder. Freud reflects
(page 42):
(bq)"Anyone who has violated a taboo becomes taboo himself because he
possesses the dangerous quality of tempting others to follow his
example: why should *he* be allowed to do what is forbidden to others?
Thus he is truly contagious in that every example encourages imitation,
and for that reason he himself must be shunned"(eq)
ref:
Sigmund Freud. 1950. Totem and Taboo: Some Points of Agreement Between
the Mental Lives of Savages and Neurotics. WW Norton & Company. New York
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