The cinema and psychology: an analysis of subjectification processes in contemporary times

Abstract

Since the early twentieth century, cinema and psychology have become a constant presence in capitalist societies and, particularly, in big cities, being part of people’s everyday lives. Which effects film exhibition has produced and produces in the constitution of subjects? Where does psychology stand regarding the subjective transformations that the cinema causes? The objective of this article is to examine the trajectory of Psychology, which, systematically reaffirming the unity of the subject in the concept of personality loses sight of the multiplicity inherent to the subjectivity that the cinema evidences. Additionally, it is also worth identifying the subjectification processes that gain support as the cinema grows popular. The analysis of this relationship between the cinema and psychology is justified by the strong presence of the former in contemporary societies, affecting subjectification processes. Such processes can be characterized as a multiplicity of effects that are irreducible to unification, since the cinema enables multiple simultaneous identifications with different characters. To carry out this study, the qualitative research procedure was adopted, aiming at understanding the relationship between the cinema and psychology from a historical perspective. As a partial result of this theoretical research, it was possible to come to the conclusion that in the course of the twentieth century Psychology transformed itself, adopting conceptions of personality in which multiplicity prevails. Thus, there is the emergence of theoretical perspectives admitting that the heterogeneity and the complexity of subjects are not compatible with the unifying focus of personality that prevailed in Psychology since the beginning of the century.