When speaking about famous psychoanalysts, the first one who must come to mind is Sigmund Freud, the actual father of psychoanalysis. Dr. Freud was born in 1856 to Jewish parents in Freiburg, Moravia, Austria-Hungary. This is now the Czech Republic. He is considered to have the most influence on 20th century psychological theories. His theories were based on the fundamental thinking that all people were given an unconscious where lived strong aggressive and sexual drives, ways to defend them, and supremacy struggle. Dr. Freud’s theories, which include the Oedipus complex, have greatly influenced literature, social thinking and art throughout the years.

Another of the famous psychoanalysts, Swiss psychiatrist Carl Gustav Jung, was born in 1875 in Kesswil, Switzerland. He is considered to be one of the founders of modern depth psychology. His most famous concept was that of the collective unconscious. Jung put personalities into 2 groups: introverted and extroverted. These were classified according to the person’s attitude toward the outer world. He first met Dr. Freud in 1907 after his study on The Psychology of Dementia Praecox. They hit it off and Jung travelled to the United States with Freud, lecturing and meeting other well known psychiatrists.

Jacques Lacan, born in 1901 in Paris, France, is also considered to be one of the famous psychoanalysts. A very influential man in the world of psychiatry, he developed the concept of The Three Orders. These consisted of The Imaginary, The Symbolic, and The Real. He also had a concept that he called “The Return to Freud.” This drew attention back to the original concepts and writings of Dr. Freud.

It is clear that while each psychoanalyst had their own contributions to be made to the world of psychiatry and understanding the mind and personalities of human beings, Dr. Sigmund Freud was the clear leader. He got everyone thinking and studying, whether in agreement of the doctor’s concepts, or to dispute them. Over the years, it has been felt that some of Freud’s concepts were not as great as they were considered to be at the time. However, without Freud’s dream interpretation concept, there may be no method to base dream interpretations upon currently.