ABSTRACT
Josine Müller’s paper was read at a meeting of the German Psycho-Analytical Society on 10th November 1925. The author died suddenly at the close of the year 1930, and this piece was published posthumously in 1932 with an introduction by Carl Müller-Braunschweig, her husband.
Like Homey, Josine Müller argues that the vagina has a greater significance than any other erotogenic zone: since libidinal cathexis of the vagina occurs during the infantile genital period, it makes no sense to privilege the clitoris as erotic site. On the basis of the observation of children and of the analysis of patients she demonstrates that there is a ‘vigorous instinctual impulse’ associated with the vagina. She links the repression of this impulse with penis envy and clitoral excitation with urethral fantasies. Worth noting is that Müller lays particular stress upon Horney’s distinction between primary and secondary penis envy.
