Let’s Spit on Freud

The study challenges Freud’s view of human development as a male-centered process and for its focus on the presence or absence of the penis. In pamphlet style, the study traces the critiques of patriarchalism, androcentrism, and phallocentrism raised by feminist thinkers Lonzi, Irigaray, and Rubin, and psychoanalysts such as Torrey, in light of Federici’s gender attribution studies, as well as neuroscience and evolutionary studies. The result is that the process of sexual and gender identification requires both a historical memory of the cultural processes, within which meanings of sexuality are negotiated, and an awareness of the psychological mechanisms underlying the salience of sexual characteristics through which gender attribution is understood and mediated. The study concludes by acknowledging the complexity of human sexuality and the importance of cultural and ethical considerations.