Sudhir Kakar

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Sudhir Kakar (born 1938 in Nainital, Uttarakhand, India) is a Freudian psychoanalyst and writer. He studied in Gujarat, Mannheim, Frankfurt am Main and Vienna. Kakar received a Bachelor in Mechanical Engineering, a Master’s degree (Diplom-Kaufmann) in business economics and became Doctor of Economics.[1] He begun his training in psychoanalysis at the Sigmund-Freud Institute in Frankfurt, Germany in 1971.

Contents

[edit] Kakar on Ramakrishna

Kakar’s 1991 The Analyst and the Mystic deals with Ramakrishna. [2] Gerald James Larson, writing in the Journal of the American Academy of Religion, described it thus:

Indeed, Sudhir Kakar...indicates that there would be little doubt that from a psychoanalytic point of view Ramakrishna could be diagnosed as a secondary transsexual.

Kakar sought a meta-psychological non-pathological explanation that connects Ramakrishna's mystical realization with creativity. Kakar also argues that culturally relative concepts of eroticism and gender have contributed to the Western difficulty in comprehending Ramakrishna.[3]

In Kakar’s 2003 novel, Ecstasy, an aspiring sadhu endures sexual molestation as a child, and has a feminine appearance and ambiguous sexuality. According to the author, the characters were based on Ramakrishna and Vivekananda.[4]

[edit] Books

Sudhir Kakar has sixteen non-fiction and four fiction works to his credit:

Non-fiction

  • Mad and Divine: Spirit and Psyche in the Modern World
  • The Inner World
  • Shamans, Mystics, And Doctors
  • Tales Of Love, Sex And Danger
  • Intimate Relations
  • The Colors Of Violence
  • The Indians
  • Kamasutra
  • Fredrick Taylor
  • Understanding Organizational Behavior
  • Conflict And Choice
  • Identity And Adulthood
  • The Analyst And The Mystic
  • La Folle Et Le Saint
  • Culture And Psyche
  • The Indian Psyche
  • The Essential Writings Of Sudhir Kakar

Fiction

  • The Ascetic Of Desire
  • Indian Love Stories
  • Ecstasy
  • Mira And The Mahatma

[edit] Bibliography

  • Die Inder. Porträt einer Gesellschaft (2006)

[edit] References

  1. ^ Renée Zucker (2006-10-07). Das System der Klaglosigkeit. die tageszeitung. Retrieved on 2008-01-01.
  2. ^ In The Indian Psyche, 125-188. 1996 New Delhi: Viking by Penguin. Reprint of 1991 book.
  3. ^ Kakar, Sudhir, The Analyst and the Mystic, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991), p.34
  4. ^ "The characters are modelled on Ramakrishna and Vivekananda." The Rediff Interview/Psychoanalyst Sudhir Kakar Date accessed: 1 April 2008

[edit] External Links

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Persondata
NAME Kakar, Sudhir
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION Indian psychologist and writer
DATE OF BIRTH 1938
PLACE OF BIRTH Nainital, India
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH
Languages