biology

Raymond de Saussure

Raymond de Saussure is a biology topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Raymond de Saussure rather than just read about it. In short: Raymond de Saussure (French: [ʁɛmɔ̃ də sosyʁ]; 2 August 1894 – 29 October 1971) was a Swiss psychoanalyst, the first president of the European Psychoanalytical Federation. He is the son of the famous linguist Ferdinand de Saussure, and a student of Sigmund Freud.

Key takeaways

Raymond de Saussure belongs to biology; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Raymond de Saussure to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Raymond de Saussure from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Raymond de Saussure (French: [ʁɛmɔ̃ də sosyʁ]; 2 August 1894 – 29 October 1971) was a Swiss psychoanalyst, the first president of the European Psychoanalytical Federation. He is the son of the famous linguist Ferdinand de Saussure, and a student of Sigmund Freud.

Life Raymond de Saussure was born in Geneva, the son of the linguist Ferdinand de Saussure. He underwent analysis with Sigmund Freud. He was a founding member of the Paris Psychoanalytic Society before spending time at the Berlin Psychoanalytic Institute undergoing analysis with Franz Alexander. During and after the Second World War he lived in New York City, where he predicted Adolf Hitler's suicide in 1942, due to Hitler's paranoid hysterical state; in 1952, Saussure returned to Switzerland from the United States. He founded the Geneva Museum of the History of Science with Marc Cramer and others in 1955. He founded the European Psychoanalytic Federation with Wilhelm Solms-Rödelheim in 1966, and Saussure served as its president until his death from prostate cancer. He died in Geneva in 1971 at the age of seventy-seven years.

Works La Méthode psychanalytique (préface de Sigmund Freud), Payot, Lausanne-Genève, 1922 « Métapsychologie du plaisir », 1958, (rééd. in Psychothérapie, vol 1, n02, éd.: Médecine et Hygiène, 1981) Avec Léon Chertok, Naissance du psychanalyste. De Mesmer à Freud, Paris, Payot, 1973, (rééd. Les Empêcheurs de penser en rond / Synthélabo, 1997 ISBN 2-908-60288-1) (1914). De quelques aberrations. Bull. Soc. Lépidopterol., 3: 77–80. (1919). À propos d'un disciple d'Unternährer. Arch. Psycho., 17: 297–308. (1920). Literature Française. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 1, 424–426. (1924). La valeur scientifique de la psychanalyse. L'Encéphale, 19: 509–517. (1929a). Les fixations homosexuelles chez les femmes nevrosees. Rev. Franç. Psychanal., 3: 50–91. (1929b). Fragments d'analyse d'un pervers sexuel. Rev. Franç. Psychanal., 3: 631–689. 1930–31). Note sur la pluralité du surmoi. Rev. Franç. Psychanal., 6: 364–403. (1933). Psychologie génétique et psychanalyse. Rev. Franç. Psychanal., 6: 364–403. (1934). The Psychology of Laughter. Zeitschrift Für Sozialforschung, 3(3), 435–436. https://doi.org/10.5840/zfs19343327 (1934). Psycho-analysis Today. Zeitschrift Für Sozialforschung, 3(2), 281–281. https://doi.org/10.5840/zfs19343293 (1937). Léopold de Saussure (1866–1925). Isis, 27: 288–305. (1939). Le miracle grec. Paris: Denoel. (1942). The psychopathology of Adolf Hitler. Free World, 3, 1, June 1942: 2–6. (1943). Collective neurosis in Germany. Free World, 5, February 1943: 121–126. (1943). Transference and Animal Magnetism. The Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 12(2), 194–201. https://doi.org/10.1080/21674086.1943.11925524 (1950). Tendances actuelles de la psychanalyse. In Évolution et tendances de la psychanalyse. Paris: Hermann, pp. 138–166. (1954). Mechanisms of Defence and their Place in Psycho-Analytic Therapy: Discussion. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 35(2), 199–201. 1956). Centenaire de la naissance de Freud. Schweiz Zeitschrift fur Psychologie und ihre Anwendungen, 15: 136–139. (1958). Métapsychologie du plaisir. Rev. Franç. Psychanal., 22: 3-27. (1965). Les sources subjectives de la théorie du narcissisme chez Freud. Rev. Franç. Psychanal., 29: 473–485. (1969). The magnetic cure. British Journal of Medical Psychology, 42(2), 141–163. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2044-8341.1969.tb02066.x & Léon Chertok (1979). The Therapeutic Revolution, From Mesmer to Freud. New York: Brunner/Mazel.

References

Secondary Literature of Note Rudolph Loewenstein: Obituary: Raymond de Saussure (1894–1971). In: International Journal of Psychoanalysis. Bd. 54 (1973), S. 111 f. Alexander Moser: Switzerland. In: Peter Kutter (Hrsg.): Psychoanalysis International. A Guide to Psychoanalysis throughout the World. Bd. 1: Europe. Frommann-Holzboog 1992, ISBN 3-7728-1509-X, S. 278–313, hier S. 298 f. Marcel Naville, Roger Mayer: Histoire de la Société médicale de Genève, 1823–1993. Genf 1994, 34 f. Henri Vermorel (d. 2020). Raymond de Saussure (1894–1971): Un des fondateurs de la SPP. In: Revue française de psychanalyse. Bd. 61 (1997), H. 2, S. 673–683.

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Raymond de Saussure

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Raymond de Saussure claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In biology, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Raymond de Saussure before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Raymond de Saussure ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Raymond de Saussure

In research: Raymond de Saussure appears in biology research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Raymond de Saussure in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Raymond de Saussure is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1894 births, 1971 deaths, 20th-century medical doctors, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Raymond de Saussure outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Raymond de Saussure in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Raymond de Saussure means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Raymond de Saussure out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Raymond de Saussure in simple terms?

Why does Raymond de Saussure matter?

Because it connects several biology ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Raymond de Saussure?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Raymond de Saussure.