The Psychoanalytic Concept of Narcissiam, Part I: Some Neglected Aspects in Freud's Work

The concept of narcissism is one of the most frequently used in contemporary psychoanalytic thought. During the last few decades, increasing interest, both theoretical and therapeutic, in so-called pregenital, borderline and psychotic pathologies, has played a great part in its prominence. Since these pathologies directly involve issues concerning self, identity, and ego defects, the term “narcissism” often comes up. But what is its exact meaning? How does it relate to the terms “self,” “identity,” and “ego”? The answers given up to now are far from convergent: one may measure the distance, even the gap of misunderstandings, that separates Kernberg (1975), who analyzes narcissism in the framework of an ego-psychological object relations theory, from Kohut (1971, 1977), who develops it in his new psychology of the self. Moreover, in France we find Grunberger (1971),