How Anger Is Displayed in Sandplay: A Hermeneutic-Phenomenological Study

Harb, J. (2008). How Anger Is Displayed in Sandplay: A Hermeneutic-Phenomenological Study (Doctoral dissertation, Pacifica Graduate Institute, 2008).

ABSTRACT

In this comparative study on how anger is displayed by clients in sandplay, the origins of anger are examined from the perspectives of the psychoanalytic theory of Sigmund Freud, the school of object relations formulated by Melanie Klein and furthered by Winnicott and Otto Kernberg, and the theory of self-psychology developed by Heinz Kohut. The affect of anger is also explored from the perspective of Carl G. Jung’s “analytical psychology.” Following Jung’s theory of the archetypes of the collective unconscious, this study includes a hermeneutic analysis of the archetypes of Kali, Pele, Ares (war god), Achilles (warrior), and the crocodile, all known to be used in sandplay work that represents anger and its complexity. Post-Jungian theory on development drawn from Jungian theory by Erich Neumann and Michael Fordham is compared in relation to anger. Donald Kalsched’s theory on trauma, the archetypal defenses, and aggression is explored in relation to anger. The writing of several sandplay practitioners is reviewed in relation to understanding how anger is displayed in sandplay through representations of symbols and archetypes of the collective unconscious, demonstrating how the psyche’s symbolic language reveals anger, rage, and aggression in sandplay and allows its transformation.


A phenomenological approach was taken regarding the interviews on the emotion of anger conducted with four sandplay therapists in order to gain an understanding of the lived experience of their clients’ display of anger in sandplay. The analysis of data from therapists’ reports of their clients’ use of the symbols, archetypes, and patterns in their sandplay work reveals a bridge between Freud’s theories and defense mechanisms, Klein’s object relations, and Jungian analytical psychology. A pillar of this bridge is the concept that the developmental phases of clients and their anger, rage, and aggression are displayed in the symbols, archetypes, and defense mechanisms they use in sandplay. These same symbols and archetypes of fairy tales, dreams, and myth are the original prototypes of human behavior.