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The term "[[cultural ]] transmission" does not appear in Sigmund [[Freud]]'s [[work]], but the [[idea ]] is implicit in such notions as <i>cultural heritage</i> and <i>phylogenetic inheritance</i>. Freud believed that the (since abandoned) [[biological ]] precept, according to which "ontogenesis recapitulates phylogenesis," could be applied to [[human ]] [[psychic ]] [[development]]. The [[notion ]] of cultural transmission refers to the possibility that the acquisitions of an [[individual ]] or of a [[culture ]] can be transmitted to descendents and [[form ]] the basis of cultural development.Freud addressed the topic for the first [[time ]] in <i>[[Totem ]] and [[Taboo]]</i> (1912-13a), where he advanced the hypothesis that the [[feeling ]] of [[guilt ]] over the [[murder ]] of the [[primal ]] [[father ]] had persisted over the centuries and still affected generations that could [[know ]] [[nothing ]] directly [[about ]] it.In Freud's later works, the main [[mechanism ]] of transmission was said to be [[identification]], which ensconced the lost [[object ]] in the ego, as described in "[[Mourning ]] and [[Melancholia]]" (1916-17g [1915]), and finally produced an alteration in the ego that gave rise to the [[superego]], as described in <i>The Ego and [[the Id]]</i> (1923b). In the <i>New Introductory Lectures</i> (1933 [1932]) Freud observed that the superego could be viewed as the outcome of successful identification with the parental [[agency]], and as the [[natural ]] and legitimate heir to the [[Oedipus ]] [[complex]]. As the bearer of [[tradition]], the superego was a [[true ]] [[agent ]] of cultural transmission from one generation to the next. In <i>[[Moses ]] and [[Monotheism]]</i> (1939a [1934-38]) Freud returned to the idea of an archaic heritage and compared such inherited acquired characteristics to [[instincts ]] in animals—an inheritance on par with [[symbolism]].After Freud, the idea of phylogenetic transmission was seemingly relegated to the background, as an explanation of last resort, and the emphasis shifted toward a detailed and expanded study of identifications. The point of departure for this was Freud's remark in the <i>New Introductory Lectures</i>, in which he observed that the [[child]]'s superego was not formed in the [[image ]] of the [[real ]] or [[imaginary ]] [[parents]], but instead modeled on the parents' superego. The main focus soon moved beyond direct parental and intergenerational identifications to more distant identifications, such as those with grandparents, ancestors, or [[mythical ]] characters in [[family ]] [[history]], who re-emerge amid the descendents as a kind of actualization of family [[prehistory]]. The theme of the intergenerational (or transgenerational) appears in psychotherapeutic work with families, [[children]], and adolescents, and sometimes gives the impression that this sphere ofobservation is [[being ]] invaded by the study of archaic identifications. The [[other ]] area where this theme comes to the fore is work with survivors or descendents of survivors of the [[Holocaust ]] or other genocides, such as those committed by [[Latin ]] American dictatorships. In these two areas, the importance of secrets, the unspoken, or ancestral crimes that the family has decided to bury, is much in evidence. In the [[case ]] of the survivors of genocide, there is an attempt to make the [[traumatic ]] [[situation ]] [[disappear ]] by denying it [[representation]]. But the buried [[material ]] reappears two or [[three ]] generations later, as a [[ghost ]] that occupies the [[place ]] where the concealment of important aspects of the ancestor's [[life ]] has produced a "blank" in the descendant's [[psyche]]. In such cases, we [[speak ]] of "[[alienating ]] identifications." A [[particular ]] aspect of this type of intergenerational transmission was studied by Nicolas [[Abraham ]] and Maria Torok (1972/1978), in relation to the problem of grief.We thus see that a [[number ]] of [[ideas ]] are related: in Freud's work we encountered identification, phylogenetic heritage, and intergenerational [[process]]; in other authors, the notions of transgenerational transmission, "[[fantasies ]] of identification" (de Mijolla, 1986), and "alienating identifications."In [[summary]], we may say that the [[concept ]] of phylogenetic heritage has gradually been reconsidered, to the benefit of more detailed study of the mechanisms of possible transmission, notably identification, the core of the issue. The uncovering of alienating factors in the [[subject]]'s prehistory, factors that can go back several generations, has come to the fore, replacing the ideas of "[[family romance]]" and "mythical descent," so well known to us since Freud. But emphasis on the intergenerational may push [[analytic ]] work in the direction of applied [[psychoanalysis]], so distancing it from a deeper [[understanding ]] of the configurations and [[processes ]] of the [[analytic situation]], which is the prime locus of [[psychoanalytic ]] discovery. This [[danger ]] may even be exploited by the ever-renewed faces of [[resistance ]] to psychoanalysis.

# [[Freud, Sigmund]]. (1912-13a). Totem and taboo. SE, 13: 1-161.

# ——. (1933a [1932]). New introductory lectures on [[psycho]]-[[analysis]]. SE, 22: 1-182.