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JOAP 33(1):39-64 (1988)

Archetypal Foundations of Projective Identification

Author: Nathan Schwartz-Salant

I. Introduction

In Melanie Klein published ‘Notes on some schizoid mechanisms’ (19), in which she coined the term projective identification. Klein's paper employed the mother/infant object-relation and outlined a conception of parts of one person being put into and identified with another person. In the same year, , Jung published the ‘The psychology of the transference’ (13), in which he used the arcane symbolism of alchemy to explore the same phenomenology as Klein. Klein's paper, as Donald Meltzer has noted, had an ‘electrifying impact [upon] the analysts who were closely working with her’ Meltzer (22, p. 20). Jung's hardly had such an impact. For most Jungians, let alone analysts of other schools of thought, his alchemical model often seems too abstract for ‘here and now’ clinical practice. Yet inherent in Jung's study of the transference lies an approach to the phenomenology of projective identification which richly elaborates the findings of Klein and other psychoanalysts, as well as deepening our understanding and widening the possibilities for clinical usage. Jung's work also helps delineate the limitations of employing the concept of projective identification.

Klein describes how

the phantasied onslaughts on the mother follow two main lines: one is the predominantly oral impulse to suck dry, bite up, scoop out and rob the mother's body of its good contents … The other line of attack derives from the anal and urethral impulses and implies expelling dangerous substances (excrements) out of the self and on to the mother or, as I would rather call it, into the mother. These excrements and bad parts of the self are meant not only to injure but also to control and to take possession of the object. In so far as the mother comes to
Page 39
contain the bad parts of the self, she is not felt to be a separate individual but is felt to be the bad self.
Much of the hatred against parts of the self is now directed against the mother. This leads to a particular form of aggression w

JOAP 33(1):39-64 (1988)

Archetypal Foundations of Projective Identification

Author: Nathan Schwartz-Salant

I. Introduction

Klein describes how

the phantasied onslaughts on the mother follow two main lines: one is the predominantly oral impulse to suck dry, bite up, scoop out and rob the mother's body of its good contents … The other line of attack derives from the anal and urethral impulses and implies expelling dangerous substances (excrements) out of the self and on to the mother or, as I would rather call it, into the mother. These excrements and bad parts of the self are meant not only to injure but also to control and to take possession of the object. In so far as the mother comes to
Page 39
contain the bad parts of the self, she is not felt to be a separate individual but is felt to be the bad self.
Much of the hatred against parts of the self is now directed against the mother. This leads to a particular form of aggression w