God representations : A psychological and cultural model

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

This dissertation proposes the need for building a critical and constructive model that more adequately addresses the formation of God representations in cultures other than Europe and America. Careful consideration of the role of cultural experience is central to this enterprise. This study assesses the way in which current psychoanalytic interpretations of God representations limit cultural experience to internal, individual, and pre-linguistic processes. This dissertation presents a challenge to this traditional approach by examining the crucial role of language and the collective interaction with culture that is manifested in Korean culture. For example, the Korean terms for God signify a cultural symbol of Korean Confucianism (i.e., heaven). This dissertation revises current object relations theory by developing a model that incorporates psychological and cultural dimensions.
This dissertation critically examines Donald W. Winnicott's object relations theory to assess its theoretical applicability to cultural as well as psychic realms. This study also explicates two different theories of God representations - Ana-Maria Rizzuto's object relations method and Melford Spiro's psychological-anthropological method - in order to examine the viability and value of bringing these disciplines together to develop an expanded model of God representations as influenced by "collectively shared" cultural experience. The development of God representations in the Korean cultural context is explored for the purpose of assessing the significance of this interdisciplinary model for the interaction of mental and collective representations of God.
The thesis of the dissertation states that a holistic understanding of one's God representations must include a consideration of the relationship between the mental images constructed through pre-linguistic interactions with primary care givers and cultural constructs that are collectively represented and symbolically shared through the use of language. This study points to the further need of articulating an understanding of cultural experience reflective of both individual and collective representational processes in the studies of God representations. In addition. this study points to the heuristic value for those who seek to avoid mono-cultural assumptions about God representations to offer culturally competent pastoral care and counseling.

목차 (Table of Contents)

• ABSTRACT = i
• ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS = iii
• CONTENTS = v
• INTRODUCTION = 1
• CHAPTER ONE MAPPING THE TERRAIN: CULTURE, SELF, AND RELIGION
• I. Issues and Questions = 6
• Culture and Cultural Experience : Psychoanalytic Definitions
• Investigative Questions : Beyond "Individual" Cultural Experience
• II. The Psychoanalytic Movement and Culture = 13
• Imago : Culture and Religion
• Imago : God-Images and Self
• III. Understanding Different Cultures = 21
• The Construction of the Self in Korean Culture
• Family Rotations and God Representation in Confucian Culture
• IV. Methodological Contour : Self, Culture, and God Representations = 29
• Self and Its Cultural Experience : Winnicott
• Culture and God Representations : Rizzuto and Spiro
• CHAPTER TWO THE SELF AND ITS CULTURAL EXPERIENCE: THE WORK OF WINNICOTT
• I. Background : Different Views on the Self = 34
• The Legacy of the Kantian Self
• Theories of Many Selves
• II. Winnicott's Notion of the Self : Between the "Me" and "Not-me" = 41
• Development of the Self in the "Good Enough" Environment
• Ego-relatedness: "Object-Rotating" Function of the Self
• The Self and Its Object in the Intermediate Area
• III. Playing : Cultural Experience of the Self = 51
• Play versur Playing
• Intersubjective Function of illusion
• The Search for the Self : Clinical Implications of Playing
• IV. Representational Experience : Relations of the Self to Objects = 60
• Primary Psychic Creativity : The Basis of Representation
• Representational Experience : A Third Intermediate Area or Experience
• CHAPTER THREE MENTAL AND COLLECTIVE GOD REPRESENTATIONS: RIZZUTO AND SPIRO
• I. Mental Representation or God : Rizzuto = 67
• Self and Object Representations
• God As a Special Transitional Object
• The First Representation of God and Beyond
• God Representation in Western Culture and Beyond
• II. Mental and Collective Representations of God : Spiro = 80
• Korean Culture and Cod Representation
• Culture and Personality in Anthropology
• Psychoanalytical-Anthropological Approach to God Representations
• Culturally Constituted Mechanism and Representations
• CHAPTER FOUR CRITICAL AND CONSTRUCTIVE COLLABORATION: KOREAN GOD REPRESENTATIONS
• I. Interdisciplinary Nature of the Method = 92
• Characteristics of the Method : Borrowing, Solving, Expanding, and Constructing
• Theoretical Construct : Winnicott, Rizzuto, and Spiro
• II. Case Study : God Representations in Korean Context = 97
• Personal Narrative : A Korean Term for God
• Ch'on (天; Heaven) As a Korean Cultural Symbol
• Collective God Representation: Created and Found in Korean Culture
• Cultural Meanings of Ch'on : Transcendent and Immanent
• God As Rice in Korean Minjung Theology
• III. Collaborative Understanding of the Case = 118
• Integrating Winnicott's and Spiro's Models
• Contribution of this Method to Theology
• CONCLUSION = 125
• BIBLIOGRAPHY = 132