ABSTRACT
This chapter concerns the self as Fordham came to conceive it after a conceptual analysis of Jung’s use of the term. Fordham identified a contradiction in Jung’s usage and resolved it by reserving ‘self’ for a definition of the psychosomatic entirety of the individual and using a separate term for referring to expressions of the self in human experience (e.g. symbols). Fordham tentatively suggested that the latter be termed the ‘central archetype’, although this was neither developed nor dropped by him. This chapter includes an exploration of the value of this term from a developmental perspective and more specifically in terms of the deintegration of psyche out of an early psychosomatic unity. Illustrations will be provided through alluding to both infant research and an observation of a 4-month-old boy. Finally, further developments are briefly described and illustrated to clarify how pre-symbolic expressions of the central archetype become symbolic and come to reflect what was for Jung the ‘ultimate’, ‘Formation, Transformation, Eternal Mind’s eternal recreation’.
