castration complex (complexe de castration)
== Freud ==
Freud first described the castration complex in 1908, arguing that the child, on discovering the anatomical difference between the sexes (the presence or absence of the penis), makes the assumption that this difference is due to the female's penis having been cut off.<ref>Freud, 1908c</ref>
The castration complex is thus the moment when one infantile theory (everyone has a penis) is replaced by a new one (females have been castrated).
The consequences of this new infantile theory are different in the boy and in the girl.
The boy fears that his own penis will be cut off by the [[father]] ([[castration]] [[anxiety]]), while the girl sees herself as already castrated (by the [[mother]]) and attempts to deny this or to compensate for it by seeking a child as a substitute for the penis ([[penis envy]]).
The castration complex affects both sexes because its appearance is closely linked with the [[phallic phase]], a moment of psychosexual [[development]] when the child, whether boy or girl, knows only one genital organ - the male one.
This phase is also known as the infantile genital organisation because it is the first moment when the partial drives are unified under the primacy of the genital organs. It thus anticipates the genital organisation proper which arises at puberty, when the subject is aware of both the male and the female sexual organs (see Freud, 1923e).
Freud argued that the castration complex is closely linked to the [[Oedipus Complex]], but that its role in the Oedipus complex is different for the boy and the girl.
In the case of the boy, the castration complex is the point of exit from the Oedipus complex, its terminal crisis; because of his fear of castration (often aroused by a threat) the boy renounces his [[desire]] for the mother and thus enters the [[latency period]].
In the case of the girl, the castration complex is the point of entry into the Oedipus complex; it is her resentment of the mother, whom she blames for depriving her of the penis, that causes her to redirect her [[libido|libidinal]] desires away from the mother and onto the father.
Because of this difference, in the case of the girl the Oedipus complex has no definitive terminal crisis comparable to the boy's.<ref>Freud, 1924d</ref>
Freud came to see the castration complex as a universal phenomenon, one which is rooted in a basic 'rejection of femininity' (Ablehnung der Weiblich-keit).
It is encountered in every subject, and represents the ultimate limit beyond which psychoanalytic treatment cannot go.<ref>Freud, 1937c</ref>
