When you have a blog that covers three different topics, albeit all related to my family's history, it's not always easy to use prompts that alert other bloggers in the same niche that you share their interests. For example, Geneabloggers, an extremely helpful site that brings together more than 2,800 (!) genealogy bloggers, offers a series of daily blogging prompts that
Psychology
Freud to Gestapo: Drop Dead!
Almost everything Sigmund Freud did has been analyzed endlessly -- and why wouldn't the Analyzer-in-Chief be subjected to such scrutiny? But the diverging opinions on Freud's behavior say as much about the analyzer as they do about analysand. I was particularly intrigued by the different responses to one incident: Freud's metaphorical finger to the Gestapo upon his departure
10 Things I Want to Know About My Family & Freud
Focus, focus, focus. That's been my mantra ever since I realized my genealogical research was meandering in all directions. So I came up with a couple of goals: To flesh out the lives of my mother's immediate family members -- both to understand my mother better and to make the acquaintance of relatives I never met -- and to figure out the family's place in history. The
Freud & Dogs, III: Princesses, Pups & Playwrights
In Part I of this series, I discussed Freud's late life arrival at puppy love, including how my great uncle's butcher shop provided meat for Yofi, Freud's culturally Jewish -- if not observant -- chow. In Part II, I talked about the role the family dogs played in Anna and Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytic practice. Here I explore Freud's final months in Vienna and the final
Freud & Dogs, II: A Dangerous Method (If You Fear Dogs)
In Part I of this series, I explored Freud's late life case of puppy love, inspired by his daughter Anna's first dog. Here I discuss the impact his bond with dogs had on his treatment sessions -- and on Anna's. Oddly, Freud's pre-eminent biographer, Peter Gay, minimized the role dogs played in his subject's life and his practice. In the sole page devoted to the topic in
Freud & Dogs, I: A Case of Late Life Puppy Love
In December 2011, when I learned that the butcher shop of my great uncle shared an address with the home and offices of Sigmund Freud, I was blogging regularly about pets at Will My Dog Hate Me. Not surprisingly, I became interested in the question of how Freud felt about canine companions. I discovered a wealth of information on the topic, which I incorporated into a
Psychoanalysis, the Comic Book
Throughout his lifetime, Sigmund Freud was far better known and respected abroad than he was in Vienna, where he lived and practiced for most of his years. He was especially celebrated in America, where he was welcomed enthusiastically as early as 1909. His theories became a mass phenomenon in the U.S. after World War II. According to a Newsweek retrospective of Freud on his