ABSTRACT
When we are concerned with the function of personal, symptomatic actions in contrast to communicative gestures, we tend strongly to conceive of the acts as individualistic, rather than as interpersonal. For example, we tend to follow Freud in emphasizing the individualistic, masturbatory reference of Dora’s finger activity (Freud 1905/1953b; Chapter 2, p. 9) and not to consider the possibility that she was also enacting an unconscious wish for intercourse with Freud, or other unconscious phantasies involving other people as well as herself. (Other events did lead Freud to infer that she wished for them to kiss.)
