ABSTRACT
Freudian discourse regarding the Oedipus complex proposes to explain processes by which a boy or girl is inserted into a symbolic context of social bonds. The Oedipus complex takes a Greek myth that S. Freud uses as a metaphor to explain construction of castrationivity in boys and girls. According to the expected resolution the boy chooses as his sexual and love object a woman other than his mother and also identifies with his father. The castration complex is intimately linked to attraction to the mother and rivalry with the father. Freud describes an extended pre-oedipal phase in the girl and theorises that she faces two additional tasks on her libidinal journey: a change of object and of erotogenic zone. In Freud’s works, the castration complex is absolutely linked to the Oedipus complex; in the boy because castration anxiety with its threat to narcissism provokes resolution-dissolution of the complex.
