Freud, Sigmund

Sigmund Freud (1856–1939), creator of what is now known as Freudian psychoanalysis, developed clinical practices, special vocabulary, and methods of interpretation that form the backdrop theories for the study of depth psychology. His influence is found in studies of children’s sexuality, in the field and topics of children’s literature, with the interpretation of fairy tales and, to some extent, in educators’ pedagogy and approaches to interpreting life in the nursery. Freud’s depth psychology refers to the workings of the mind in contiguity with the unconscious history of impressions from early life joined with the accidents, experiences, and cultural dispositions thought to compose the course of character. His wide-ranging theories of neurosis centered sexuality, infantile life, and family relations as forces of human problems of love, ...