My Confusion behind The Protestant Era

By Hayley Turner 

Chapter 14 of Norman O. Brown’s book Life Against Death: The Psychoanalytic Meaning of History, titled the Protestant Era attempts to use psychoanalysis of anal character and uses it to connect Protestantism and Capitalism to each other. I must say that I find the psychoanalytical aspect of this chapter very difficult to understand. I do believe there is a connection between Protestantism and Capitalism but I am not sure how the anus representing the devil has much to do with it. 

The chapter explains, Freud’s theory of infantile sexuality and its sublimation. The theory states that there is some hidden connection between higher spiritual activity and lower organs of the body – i.e. the anal region. Freud’s theory shows that three traits are concentrated from the anal region of the body. These three traits are orderliness, parsimony and obstinacy. These traits make up the anal character.  This information can be used to understand the connection being made between Martin Luther’ illumination on the privy but much be changed to fight in the confines of Capitalism. For Capitalism the anal character was changed to the authoritarian character.  The authoritarian character is someone who believes there are rules and the rules should be followed.

Following this information in the chapter I get very confused because psychoanalyst believe changing the association to the anus takes away simulation and this remove the understanding that body parts are associated certain traits. I believe psychoanalyst believe that defeats the point of psychoanalyzing . However, those who believe in the change to authoritarian character do not understand why the anal character classification is that important because the anus is not the thing being researched.