배트맨, 외상 그리고 자기: 외상에 의해 야기된 나르시시즘의 문제
Batman, Trauma and the Self: The Hidden Narcissism Caused by Severe Trauma
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Batman is one of the most often referenced movie characters in psychoanalytic inquires because of the character’s complicated personality traits. Bruce Wayne, Batman’s alter ego, is a rich bachelor who experienced parental loss during his childhood. With his eagerness for seeking vengeance, he becomes Batman, willing to fight evil personified. Many claim that the character of Batman in part, represents the major aspects of a traumatized neurotic personality, including a harsh superego, maladaptive defense mechanisms, and an unsolved homosexual tendency caused mostly by repressed patricidal fantasy. With this perspective, however, the majority of essential aspects of Batman remains unexplained. Since Kohut accorded great importance to the concept of the self, it has been widely recognized that childhood trauma has a profound impact on the stability of the self. Trauma makes the self incohesive and vulnerable in that the individual experiences a defective sense of self, an inability to modulate emotions, difficulty in modulating primitive fantasies, and disturbing alterations in relations with others. With the splitting of the self, demands of the self to develop are negated and repressed so that the self suffers from shame and emptiness. This causes outbursts of unsoothed aggression and anger in a quest for realizing the primitive and grandiose fantasy, which otherwise would have been channeled into more plausible goals. In terms of relationships and intimacy, the self tries to bond with seemingly powerful and almighty individuals whom it feels insecure without, and yearns for an idealized parental image throughout life. In this investigation, we chose the film <Batman Begins> as a source for the analysis since the film outstandingly depicts the core characteristics of what is occurring in the mind of the traumatized self. Through the analysis of Batman, we illustrate the effect of trauma on the self in terms of splitting, primitive affects, grandiosity, and idealizing tendencies.
Abstract
Batman is one of the most often referenced movie characters in psychoanalytic inquires because of the character’s complicated personality traits. Bruce Wayne, Batman’s alter ego, is a rich bachelor who experienced parental loss during his childhood. With his eagerness for seeking vengeance, he becomes Batman, willing to fight evil personified. Many claim that the character of Batman in part, represents the major aspects of a traumatized neurotic personality, including a harsh superego, maladaptive defense mechanisms, and an unsolved homosexual tendency caused mostly by repressed patricidal fantasy. With this perspective, however, the majority of essential aspects of Batman remains unexplained. Since Kohut accorded great importance to the concept of the self, it has been widely recognized that childhood trauma has a profound impact on the stability of the self. Trauma makes the self incohesive and vulnerable in that the individual experiences a defective sense of self, an inability to modulate emotions, difficulty in modulating primitive fantasies, and disturbing alterations in relations with others. With the splitting of the self, demands of the self to develop are negated and repressed so that the self suffers from shame and emptiness. This causes outbursts of unsoothed aggression and anger in a quest for realizing the primitive and grandiose fantasy, which otherwise would have been channeled into more plausible goals. In terms of relationships and intimacy, the self tries to bond with seemingly powerful and almighty individuals whom it feels insecure without, and yearns for an idealized parental image throughout life. In this investigation, we chose the film <Batman Begins> as a source for the analysis since the film outstandingly depicts the core characteristics of what is occurring in the mind of the traumatized self. Through the analysis of Batman, we illustrate the effect of trauma on the self in terms of splitting, primitive affects, grandiosity, and idealizing tendencies.
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