The Anna Freud Lectures in America — 1950

During her visit to America in April, 1950, at the invitation of Clark University, Anna Freud presented many interesting papers, some of which are to be published. Dr. Freud was very kind to prepare summaries of the papers she presented during her visit. We are very grateful to her for having done this since we know that the members would like to have a record of the remarks she made.

The following are summaries of the papers presented by Anna Freud during her visit to America.

This paper was presented before the New York Society and Institute on April 17th, 1950. In her presentation Anna Freud enlarged on her communication concerning the same subject, given at the XVIth International Psychoanalytic Congress, 1949, in Zurich. In the Congress lecture which formed the core of the paper, Anna Freud had pressed towards a different classification of homosexuality, not on the basis of manifest behavior but on the basis of the conscious or unconscious phantasies which accompany the homosexual act. She had pointed out that such classifications are made more difficult by the fact that the patient's identification with the active or passive partner may change over from one side to the other in the middle of the act.

The speaker showed a new parallel to the well-known finding that active homosexuals find their own selves represented in their passive partners, while they themselves play the role of the active, phallic mother. She showed that, similarly, apparently passive homosexuals in their phantasies identify with the strong man whom they choose as a partner and who represents their own lost masculinity. She showed further that the interpretations given to the patient concerning this identification with the active or passive partner respectively mark turning points in the treatment.

The extension of the paper beyond the limits of the points raised in Zurich concerned, above all, those phases of t