ABSTRACT
‘The Significance of Masochism in the Mental Life of Women’ was first read at the Eleventh International Psycho-Analytical Congress on 27th July 1929 at Oxford. It appeared in English one year later.
Deutsch examines here ‘the genesis of femininity’, i.e., the feminine, passive and masochistic disposition, in the mental life of women by focusing on the relation of the function of feminine instinct’ to the function of reproduction. She also discusses the related topic of frigidity.
Although Deutsch first sums up and reinforces Freud’s views on the masculinity complex, particularly about erotogenicity and the supremacy of the phallic zone, she then shifts her argument towards an investigation of woman’s ‘anatomical destiny’. Deutsch’s question is, ‘What, then, does happen to the actively directed cathexis of the clitoris in the phase when that organ ceases to be valued as the penis?’ Her answer is that the hitherto active-sadistic libido attached to the clitoris regressively cathects points in the pregenital development while it is deflected (also regressively) towards masochism and gives rise to the masochistic fantasy of castration (which is identified with rape and parturition). This, she argues, is the foundation of the passive-feminine disposition which determines the development of femininity. Frigidity arises out of the vicissitudes of this infantile masochistic libidinal development while the girl’s identification with motherhood is masochistic in character.
