Siblings: Sex and Violence

by Juliet Mitchell

Siblings and all the lateral relationships that follow from them are clearly important and their interaction is widely observed, particularly in creative literature. Yet in the social, psychological and political sciences, there is no theoretical paradigm through which we might understand them. In the Western world our thought is completely dominated by a vertical model, by patterns of descent or mother or father to child, or child to parent. Yet our ideals are ‘liberty, equality and fraternity’ or the ‘sisterhood’ of feminism; our ethnic wars are the violence of ‘fratricide’.
When we grow up, siblings feature prominently in sex, violence and the construction of gender differences but they are absent from our theories. This book examines the reasons for this omission and begins the search for a new paradigm based on siblings and lateral relationships.
This book will be essential reading for those studying sociology, psychoanalysis and gender studies. It will also appeal to a wide general readership.

Genres: Psychoanalysis, Psychology, Feminism

272 pages, Paperback

First published November 3, 2003

About the author

Juliet Mitchell, FBA (born 1940) is a British psychoanalyst and socialist feminist.

Mitchell was born in New Zealand in 1940, and moved to England in 1944. She attended St Anne's College, Oxford, where she received a degree in English, as well as doing postgraduate work. She taught English literature from 1962 to 1970 at Leeds University and Reading University. Throughout the 1960s, Mitchell was active in leftist politics, and was on the editorial committee of the journal, New Left Review.

She was a fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge and Professor of Psychoanalysis and Gender Studies at Cambridge University, before in 2010 being appointed to be the Director of the Expanded Doctoral School in Psychoanalytic Studies at Psychoanalysis Unit of University College London (UCL).

She is a retired registrant of the British Psychoanalytic Council.

(from Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Fallen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mitchell provides invaluable insights into siblingship being distinct in and of itself, as opposed to an alternative or surrogate for oedipal theory. Her comprehensive, concise perspective on historical psychoanalytic case studies and theories is articulated in accessible language and respects that are relevant to both classic theorists and contemporaries. The deconstruction of narcissism, self-concept, and self-reference is key here as Mitchell demonstrates a significance that is not simply clinical, but discursive. This enables readers to grasp the importance of siblings whose esteems underlay our egos and sociological imagination.

[×× ri ×× · Rating 3 out of 5]

how shall i put it..... whenever i read psychoanalytic literature it feels as if I'm being trapped on a train with an erratic uncle who spews his wildest takes and every now and then i can't help but go "huh??? what are you talking about?...." but it's indeed sometimes interesting and it Makes You Think ("siblings provide a way of learning to love and hate the same person", etc. Mitchell's writing is pretty straightforward which i appreciated 👍👍👍

[Carrie McGath · Rating 5 out of 5]

Especially excellent if interested in psychology of aggression.