The author approaches the Dora case and especially Dora's first dream in analysis from the point of view of anthropology and attempts to integrate this view with earlier psychological and linguistic interpretations. By claiming that the Dora case contains elements of the incest taboo, the exchange of women, and rules of kinship and marriage, Banks challenges the premise that the distance between psychological and cultural realms cannot be bridged. The theme of the relation between sexual taboos and the exchange of women is detailed in the work on kinship of Lévi-Strauss, who states that women are the most precious gifts exchanged between families and groups when a marriage takes place. Freud's choice of the name Dora to conceal his patient's identity further corroborates the idea of the woman's being