Freud, S. on the Theory of Sexuality from his article The...

Sigmund Freuds Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality, written in 1905, attempted to trace the course of the development of the sexual instinct in human beings from infancy to maturity. This instinct is not simply an animal instinct but is specific to both human culture and the form of conscious and unconscious life we live within it. For Freud sexuality is infinitely complicated and far-reaching in its effects and forms the basis of self-identity and interactions. His Third Essay discusses the transformations of puberty in both males and females. Part four of this essay focuses on the differentiation between male and female sexuality. Freud states in this part that as far as the autoerotic and masturbatory manifestations of sexuality†¦show more content†¦It is at puberty that the sexual nature of girls becomes feminine, that is, passive or receptive. Puberty for girls is marked by a fresh wave of repression in which it is precisely clitoral sexuality that is affected, thus overtaking the heretofore-active nature of a little girls sexuality, and replacing it with a passive non-clitoral leading sexual zone focused on the vaginal orifice. The clitoris retains a role in sexual excitement but its task is in transmitting the excitation to the adjacent female sexual parts and is not the primary sexual zone as experienced in boys. Before women can transfer their leading zone from the clitoris to the external genitalia an interval must occur during which the young woman is anaesthetic, that is unresponsive sexually. This period occurs at the very time that the pubertal male libido is growing and seeking a sexual object. The pubertal repression of females acts as a kind of stimulus to the libido of men and causes an increase in its activity. The repression of pubertal girls leads the male libido to a sexual overvaluation of its chosen object, which is unobtainable. When a woman has successfully transferred the erotogenic zone from the clitoris to the vaginal orifice, it implies that she has adopted a new leading zone for the purposes of her later sexual activity. This is in contrast to the male erotogenic zone, which remains unchanged from childhood. Freud notes that it is precisely this