Century of the Self

Century of the Self

Introduction

Psychoanalysis is primarily a human experience and a set of theories that attempt to better account for intra psychic conflicts that give rise to particular symptoms, dreams, psychic disorders, etc. Sigmund Freud, founder of psychoanalysis, changed the perception of the human mind and its workings profoundly (Sztompka & Burawoy, 2011). His influence on the 20th century is widely regarded as massive. The documentary describes the impact of Freud's theories on the perception of the human mind and the ways public relations agencies and politicians have used this during the last 100 years. No one can deny the fact that individual perceptions are found in varieties that are usually based on the number of factors present in the environment of an individual. In addition, the individual perceptions also have significant influence on the individuals. In fact, it is difficult to categorize the scale in relation to the experiences of individuals (Reeve, 2008).

The Century of the Self is a series of four documentaries from the BBC in which Adam Curtis dissects the influence of mass psychology and propaganda in the creation of the consumer society and the Power itself twentieth century. Let's say, beyond secret societies, the documentary takes us into the bowels of power over the masses, advertising, advertising, public relations and the media (Schor, 2005). When an individual watches this documentary, he or she will know why it is so vital to produce a global change that people know how power manipulates them.

Discussion

The Documentary

Part 1 of the documentary dissects the influence of mass psychology and propaganda for the creation of a consumer society in the twentieth century. The documentary features Sigmund Freud's nephew Eduard Barneys and his theories on democratic consumer relationship. It can be seen in part one that it offers a vision of advertising, propaganda and the media as a way to control and manipulate the masses, the hand that applied psychoanalysis to convince American society about the U.S. involvement in World War II (Information Liberation, 2006).

Second part of the series highlighting the serious psychological problems of U.S. troops involved in World War II. In this part it can be seen that how psychological strategies are used to manipulate the population. Similarly, the third part of the series focuses on the theories of Reich and Marcuse that suggests that an individual should be motivated to express him/herself in a social context and company of individual may develop fears. Further, fourth series of the documentary follows the political campaigns of Reagan and Margret Thatcher and illustrate that how these leaders have fully absorbed and applied the techniques of Bernays in the conviction to create a better and fuller democracy (Information Liberation, 2006).

Psychoanalysis

The construction of the theoretical model is marked by major works between 1896, 1905, 1914, 1920 and finally 1938. The first is a theoretical writing: The Project for a Scientific Psychology then comes a clinical writing written by Freud and Breuer: The Studies on Hysteria and The Interpretation of Dreams laid the foundation ...