Hysteria today, why?

Abstract

This theoretical study aims at discussing hysteria nowadays and considers the cultural changes that might have occurred from the foundation of Psychoanalysis until today. The discussion is based on the thoughts of Charles Melman, a psychoanalyst who has studied the position of the subject in the conditions of the current Western culture. We highlighted aspects and consequently elaborated a reflection on how hysterical neurosis arises in the contemporary context, based on the principle that a cultural mutation occurred - a culture prone to neurosis was transformed into one prone to perversion. Owing to this conception, we deal with subjects that function under the order of a new psychic economy. Moreover, we see the expression of a collective hysteria that would be the space for the claims of the subjects, which aim at demanding a place and reinventing a father which is already destituted.