The Oedipus Complex: Focus of the Psychoanalysis-Anthropology Debate

The Oedipus complex encapsulates the difficult relationship between psychoanalysis and anthropology. Smadja explores the complicated historical and epistemological conditions leading up to the emergence of this debate, taking into consideration the beginnings of both sciences, the ＂creation＂ of the Oedipus complex, and the place, role and influence of Totem and Taboo, both in the history of psychoanalysis and as a junction with anthropology internationally. The author compares and contrasts the historical, epistemological and methodological features of both anthropology and psychoanalysis and presents an evaluation of the new disciplines emerging from the junction between them.