Are Archetypes Essential?

Abstract

This paper distinguishes between Jung's theoretical discourse regarding the archetypes and his phenomenological account of numinous experience. For this author, the initial attraction of 'my Jung' came from both the vivid Romanticism of his descriptions of the anima and the apparent 'ground of being' offered by his theory of archetypes. However, the essentialism inherent to archetypal theory in general and the anima in particular has necessitated a re-evaluation of Jung's theory in terms of emergence theory. My own version of this emphasises the role of symbols in the constitution of affect through collective human action in the world. In this reconfiguration, the visceral energy of numinous experience is retained while the problematic theory of archetypes is no longer needed.