From outrage to normalization: Uses of psychoanalysis by the Spanish sexual reform movement (1920-1939)

Silvia Lévy,Rafael Huertas

doi:10.5209/chco.60321

Abstract

The aim of this article is to analyze how psychoanalytic ideas were received within the context of the debate around sexuality which took place in Spain during the 1920s and 1930s. While this reception was initially marked by a questioning of the role that Freud assigned to sexuality, psychoanalytic discourse would later make an appearance in various proposals for reforming sexual customs and overcoming bourgeois morality. The paper also considers the use of psychoanalysis in normative environments such as sexual education and marriage legislation, highlighting the different uses of psychoanalysis in the movement for sexual reform on a scientific basis which culminated during the socio- political context of the Second Republic.

Highlights

In other times, it would have seemed daring to speak objectively about the problems of sexuality: but today this subject is part of the public domain
The aim of this article is to analyze how psychoanalytic ideas were received within the context of the debate around sexuality which took place in Spain during the 1920s and 1930s
While this reception was initially marked by a questioning of the role that Freud assigned to sexuality, psychoanalytic discourse would later make an appearance in various proposals for reforming sexual customs and overcoming bourgeois morality

Summary

Introduction

It would have seemed daring to speak objectively about the problems of sexuality: but today this subject is part of the public domain. Based on eugenic, social defense and mental health criteria, arguments were put forward supporting the need to implement educational measures aimed at preventing mental disorders presumed to be related to the sexual repression and social vices associated with the modern city.[12] In this context, from the point of view of positions considered to be progressive, it was understood that psychoanalytic ideas were an element of the scientific avant-garde and sexual liberation, while more conservative voices focused their criticism on what they considered a danger and a perversion of thought. Plotkin, Mariano: Freud en las pampas, Buenos Aires, Sudamericana, 2003 In this regard, within the transnational history of psychoanalysis, our work would find its place as a specific case of reception, reinterpretation and reappropriation of psychoanalytic ideas based on certain historical, social and cultural coordinates. Some previous studies provide a preliminary and useful introduction to this subject,[16] it is our goal to highlight how doctors, psychiatrists and jurists used, interpreted and reformulated psychoanalytic ideas in the debate around sexuality taking place in Spain during the first third of the 20th century in a context of social change

Background of the reception of Freudian Theory on sexuality

Administering sexuality: education and legislation during the Second Republic

Findings

Conclusions