Philosophy in an Age of Anxiety: Freud and Nietzche
Sigmund Freud and Friedrich Nietzsche were highly influential and dominant thinkers during the Age of Anxiety. While they
wrote many of their most of their important works at the beginning of the 20th century, their pessimistic ideas become
attractive during the 1920s and 1930s. Freud, an influential psychologist, proposed the idea that humans have unconscious
and animalistic urges. Nietzsche criticized modern society and modern human beings and proposed the idea of a superman or
“overman” – an idea that was highly influential to rising politicians like Hitler. These academic language in these
documents can be difficult, however, you are well equipped (as document experts) to understand the general
meaning.
Read the documents by Freud – The Unconscious and Civilization and its Discontents - and Nietzche – The Will to Power and the
Antichrist. Use binder paper to answer the following:
1. For each document - choose 2 quotes that stand out to you or seem to represent what the author is saying and write them
down.
2. For each quote: Explain what it means and why you chose it.
3. Summarize the ideas of each thinker – 1 paragraph per thinker.
4. Create a “catch phrase” or “nickname” that sums up the beliefs of this person. For example, my nickname for Otto Von
Bismarck: “A Blood and Iron kind of guy.” (Just go with it, I promise it is useful to your understanding).
Philosophy in an Age of Anxiety: Freud and Nietzche
Sigmund Freud and Friedrich Nietzsche were highly influential and dominant thinkers during the Age of Anxiety. While they
wrote many of their most of their important works at the beginning of the 20th century, their pessimistic ideas become
attractive during the 1920s and 1930s. Freud, an influential psychologist, proposed the idea that humans have unconscious
and animalistic urges. Nietzsche criticized modern society and modern human beings and proposed the idea of a superman or
“overman” – an idea that was highly influential to rising politicians like Hitler. These academic language in these
documents can be difficult, however, you are well equipped (as document experts) to understand the general
meaning.
Read the documents by Freud – The Unconscious and Civilization and its Discontents - and Nietzche – The Will to Power and the
Antichrist. Use binder paper to answer the following:
1. For each document - choose 2 quotes that stand out to you or seem to represent what the author is saying and write them
down.
2. For each quote: Explain what it means and why you chose it.
3. Summarize the ideas of each thinker – 1 paragraph per thinker.
4. Create a “catch phrase” or “nickname” that sums up the beliefs of this person. For example, my nickname for Otto Von
Bismarck: “A Blood and Iron kind of guy.” (Just go with it, I promise it is useful to your understanding).