Jungian archetypes examples

Their fears may revolve around creative blockage or the fear of their creations being unappreciated. Flaws such as being overly critical or perfectionistic make them complex and relatable. Creators possess skills like artistic talent, ingenuity, or the ability to think outside the box. Jungian archetypes provide a rich framework for understanding the human experience and the narratives that shape our lives.

These archetypes, as illustrated through examples in literature and film, offer profound insights into our desires, fears, flaws, and skills. By recognizing and exploring these archetypes, we gain a deeper understanding of ourselves and the universal themes that connect us all. Stay inspired and informed! Subscribe to our newsletter to receive updates every time we publish a new article.

Grab the best novel writing software for authors and dive into a world of creative writing. Great article. His book Man And His Symbols could maybe be a guide for laymen to start plumbing their personal unconscious via their nightly dreams as a source for characters too. That was an interesting summary, and the examples of personalities both fictional and actual that you used are quite useful.

I believe that despite the carefully crafted PR from the church, regarding her persona and behavior, the reality was far different. Your email address will not be published. Jungian Archetypes Examples and Overview. Saving the day, conquering evil, achieving a noble quest. Self-doubt, arrogance. Hubris or over-reliance on strength. Courage, determination, and leadership.

Uncovering hidden truths, unlocking the mysteries of existence Fears. Abuse of power, consequences of revealing too much knowledge. Arrogance, tendency to manipulate others. Mastery of magic, advanced scientific knowledge. Maintaining innocence, creating a better world through actions. Disillusionment, loss of childlike wonder. Vulnerability, lack of awareness of the dangers in the world.

Unwavering faith, ability to see beauty in the simplest things, power to inspire others.

Jungian archetypes examples: The wise old man / sage.

Broadening horizons, seeking new experiences, uncovering hidden treasures, or unraveling mysteries. Stagnation, fear of the mundane. Impulsiveness, tendency to prioritize exploration over personal relationships. Survival instincts, adaptability, expertise in a specific field. Prioritizing the needs of others, providing support and protection. Inability to help, fear of being taken advantage of.

Overprotectiveness, neglecting self-care. Empathy, patience, ability to provide comfort. Bringing joy to others, challenging societal norms through wit. Being misunderstood, fear of humor being unappreciated. Tendency to avoid responsibility, lack of focus. Quick thinking, comedic timing, ability to create laughter. Misuse of knowledge, their own fallibility.

Tendency to be detached, overly analytical. Finally, the Jester is an archetype that brands use when humor is a part of their marketing scheme. Old Spice, a deodarant company, has gone viral online by using this type of branding in their commercials. The Hero and the Shadow are two of Jung's most well-known archetypes. Getty Images. Mandala: Meaning And 5 Simple Coloring Pages 10 Archetypal characters The most common archetypes are characters or figures that represent specific social roles or mental states.

Persona Along with the Shadow, the Anima, and the Animus, the Persona is one of the most critical archetypes mentioned in his book and Jungian therapy. Shadow The Shadow is comprised of repressed thoughtsinstincts sexual, aggressive, and other typesdesires, and weaknesses, to name a few. Anima and Animus On a superficial level, the Anima and the Animus represent the feminine and masculine archetypes respectively.

Father The father archetype stands for authority, protection, law, and discipline, just to name a few facets of this figure. Mother The mother archetype embodies unconditional love, someone who is both nurturing and compassionate. Child The child can take many different forms, from the eternal child or puer aeternuslike Peter Panor the orphan Oliver Twist or the injured child, linked to childhood traumas -for example, Regan, the protagonist of The Exorcist.

Wise old man The wise old man is knowledge, truth, and morality, personified. Hero The hero, also known as the 'warrior,' has both positive and negative characteristics. Maiden The maiden is linked to the innocence, purity, and chastity expected of women, and particularly young women, in many cultures. Trickster The Trickster shows up as the jester, magician, or sometimes even as a character that's gone mad.

Postpartum Depression: Symptoms And Treatment 3 Archetypal events Besides characters, certain archetypal events repeat themselves in mythology as well as other works created by many different groups of human beings. The creation Creation myths are a fundamental part of practically all religions. The apocalypse The apocalypse archetype the end of the world is something that most people have on their minds and is often used in fictional narratives of all kinds.

The flood This event is closely connected to the apocalypse. Hero Brands like Nike represent the Hero by showing characters that achieve the impossible with their strength and skillfulness in their commercials. Outlaw The outlaw archetype stands for rebellion against established norms. Creator Brands that want to emphasize the creativity and perfection of their product tend to follow this archetype.

Ruler The Ruler is similar to the Father or king archetype that we mentioned before. Sage Universities, the media, and multimedia content companies like Google may choose to use the image of the Sage to strengthen their brand. Magician Brands that jungian archetype examples to "make dreams come true," go for this archetype. Innocent The Innocent archetype focuses on achieving an image of simplicity, optimism, and nostalgia as a part of this marketing method.

Archetypes have been cited by multiple scholars as key figures within both ancient Greek and ancient Roman culture. Examples from ancient history include the epic works Iliad and Odyssey. Specifically, scholar Robert Eisner has argued that the anima concept within Jungian thought exists in prototype form within the goddess characters in said stories.

He has particularly cited Athenafor instance, as a major influence. In the context of the medieval periodBritish writer Geoffrey Chaucer 's work The Canterbury Tales has been cited as an instance of the prominent use of Jungian archetypes. The Wife of Bath's Tale in particular within the larger collection of stories features an exploration of the bad mother and good mother concepts.

The given tale's plot additionally contains broader Jungian themes around the practice of magic, the use of riddles, and the nature of radical transformation. In British intellectual and poet John Milton 's epic work Paradise Lostthe character of Lucifer features some of the attributes of an archetypal heroincluding courage and force of will, yet comes to embody the shadow concept in his corruption of Adam and Eve.

Like the two first humans, Lucifer is portrayed as a created being meant to serve the purposes of jungian archetype examples. However, his rebellion and assertions of pride set him up philosophically as a dark mirror of Adam and Eve's initial moral obedience. As well, the first two people function as each other's anima and animustheir romantic love serving to make each other psychologically complete.

Archetypes abound in contemporary artistic expression such as films, literature, music, and video games as they have in creative works of the past. These projections of the collective unconscious serve to embody central societal and developmental struggles in media that entertain as well as instruct. Works made both during and after Jung's lifetime have frequently been subject to academic analysis in terms of their psychological aspects.

The very act of watching movies has important psychological meaning not just on an individual level, but also in terms of sharing mass social attitudes through common experience. Films function as a contemporary form of myth-making. They reflect individuals' responses to themselves as well as the broader mysteries and wonders of human existence.

Jung himself felt fascinated by the dynamics of the medium. Film criticism has long applied Jungian thought to different types of analysis, with archetypes being seen as an important aspects of storytelling on the silver screen. A study conducted by scholars Michael A. Faber and John D. Mayer in found that certain archetypes in richly detailed media sources can be reliably identified by individuals.

They stated as well that people's life experiences and personality appeared to give them a kind of psychological resonance with particular creations. Actors such as James Dean and Steve McQueen in particular have been identified as rebellious outcasts embodying a particular sort of Jungian archetype in terms of masculinity. Contemporary cinema is a rich source of archetypal images, most commonly evidenced for instance in the hero archetype: the one who saves the day and is young and inexperienced, like Luke Skywalker in Star Wars[ 65 ] or older and cynical, like Rick Blaine in Casablanca.

Jungian archetypes examples: The mother / caregiver. This archetype

Atticus Finch of To Kill a Mockingbirdnamed the greatest movie hero of all time by the American Film Institute[ 66 ] fulfills three roles in terms of archetypes: the father[ 67 ] the heroand the idealist. A classic example of Jungian archetypes can be found in the story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. The shadow, ego, and persona are exemplified through Jekyll's internal struggle with the other facet of his personality, Mr.

In marketing, an archetype is a genre to a brand, based upon symbolism. The idea behind using brand archetypes in marketing is to anchor the brand against an icon, already embedded within the conscience and subconscious of humanity. In the minds of both the brand owner and the public, aligning with a brand archetype makes the brand easier to identify.

Feminist critiques have focused on aspects of archetypal theory that are seen as being reductionistic and providing a stereotyped view of femininity and masculinity. Carl Jung has also been accused of metaphysical essentialism. His psychology and particularly his thoughts on spirit lack a scientific basis, making them mystical and based on assumption rather than empirical investigation.

Another criticism of archetypes is that seeing myths as universal tends to abstract them from the history of their actual creation, and their cultural context. Modern scholarship has characterized archetypes as an Eurocentric and colonialist device to level the specifics of individual cultures and their stories in the service of jungian archetype examples abstraction.

Others have accused him of a romanticized and prejudicial promotion of 'primitivism' through the medium of archetypal theory. Archetypal theory has been posited as being scientifically unfalsifiable and even questioned as to being a suitable domain of psychological and scientific inquiry. Jung mentions the demarcation between experimental and descriptive psychological study, seeing archetypal psychology as rooted by necessity in the latter camp, grounded as it was to a degree in clinical case-work.

Because Jung's viewpoint was essentially subjectivisthe displayed a somewhat Neo-Kantian perspective of a skepticism for knowing things in themselves and a preference of inner experience over empirical data. This skepticism opened Jung up to the charge of countering materialism with another kind of reductionism, one that reduces everything to subjective psychological explanation and woolly quasi-mystical assertions.

Post-Jungian criticism seeks to contextualize, expand and modify Jung's original discourse on archetypes. Michael Fordham is critical of tendencies to relate imagery produced by patients to historical parallels only e. A patient who produces archetypal material with striking alchemical parallels runs the risk of becoming more divorced than before from his setting in contemporary life.

Contents move to sidebar hide. Article Talk. Read Edit View history. Tools Tools. Download as PDF Printable version. In other projects. Wikimedia Commons Wikidata item. Psychological concept. Introduction [ edit ]. Early development [ edit ]. Later development [ edit ]. Analogies [ edit ]. The analogy illustrated by Jung. The electromagnetic spectrum.

Freud's diagram. Examples [ edit ]. Actualization and complexes [ edit ]. Stages of life [ jungian archetype examples ]. General developments [ edit ]. Ethology and attachment theory [ edit ]. Biology [ edit ]. Psychoanalysis [ edit ]. Melanie Klein ; age Neurology [ edit ]. Literary criticism [ edit ]. Psychology [ edit ]. Pedagogy [ edit ].

Applications of archetype-based thinking [ edit ]. In historical works [ edit ]. In modern popular culture [ edit ]. Criticism [ edit ]. See also [ edit ]. References [ edit ]. Jefferson, NC: McFarland. ISBN The ruler is a classic leader. They believe they should be the one to bring order to any situation. The ruler is stable, strives for excellence, and wants everyone to follow their lead.

They tend to have plenty of reasons why everyone should listen to them. This is one of the 12 Jungian archetypes related to power. The ruler, in their desire to impose their will on others, can easily become a tyrant. The creator has a profound desire for freedom because they love novelty. They love to transform things in order to make something completely new.

The creator is clever, non-conformist, and self-sufficient.

Jungian archetypes examples: The child / innocent.

However, they can also be inconsistent and spend more time thinking than actually doing. The caregiver feels stronger than other people. Consequently, they offer maternal protection to those around them. In extreme cases, the caregiver turns into a martyr who constantly reminds everyone of their sacrifices. The magician is like a great revolutionary.

They regenerate and renew not just for themselves, but for others as well. The negative side of the magician archetype is that their mood can be contagious.