Superheroes and Superegos: Analyzing the Minds Behind the Masks: Analyzing the Minds Behind the Masks

Sharon Packer MD

Dec 2009 · ABC-CLIO

About this ebook

This comprehensive collection of essays written by a practicing psychiatrist shows that superheroes are more about superegos than about bodies and brawn, even though they contain subversive sexual subtexts that paved the path for major social shifts of the late 20th century.

Superheroes have provided entertainment for generations, but there is much more to these fictional characters than what first meets the eye. Superheros and Superegos: Analyzing the Minds Behind the Masks begins its exploration in 1938 with the creation of Superman and continues to the present, with a nod to the forerunners of superhero stories in the Bible and Greek, Roman, Norse, and Hindu myth. The first book about superheroes written by a psychiatrist in over 50 years, it invokes biological psychiatry to discuss such concepts as "body dysmorphic disorder," as well as Jungian concepts of the shadow self that explain the appeal of the masked hero and the secret identity.

Readers will discover that the earliest superheroes represent fantasies about stopping Hitler, while more sophisticated and socially-oriented publishers used superheroes to encourage American participation in World War II. The book also explores themes such as how the feminist movement and the dramatic shift in women's roles and rights were predicted by Wonder Woman and Sheena nearly 30 years before the dawn of the feminist era.

Ratings and reviews

Awesome concept and execution. This is the first time that a book is just as good as its cover. I admit that I was interested in the "subversive sexual subtexts" when I bought the book--but I learned a lot about other things in the process, especially about Jung and the Shadow Self. This is a great reference for term papers, and the perfect place to get ideas for term papers for many courses

Hasnain

Superheroes and Superegos

About the author

Sharon Packer, MD, is a practicing psychiatrist and an assistant clinical professor of psychiatry and behavioral science at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University, Bronx, NY.