Gilmore Girls vs. Freud

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The creator of Gilmore Girls, Amy Sherman-Palladino, thought mother-daughter relationships would make a compelling television series. She had always been fascinated by the “everyone knows each other’s business” characteristic of small towns. When she decided to combine the two, Gilmore Girls was born. On the surface, it is a simple show about a self-absorbed single mom trying to raise a daughter while coping with her own overbearing mother. By more closely analyzing each character’s witty banter, one can see the philosophical aspects of the show. One of Sherman’s main goals was to create unique characters. As a result, she gave them all extreme personalities. Lorelai, the single mother, usually only thinks of herself. Her daughter, Rory, exhibits the voice of reason. She employs logic in her every day life and uses it to counteract Lorelai’s impulsiveness. Emily, Lorelai’s people-pleasing mother, engrosses herself with society’s views and rarely considers her own or anyone else’s happiness. When examining these characters, one can see that they closely relate to conflicts that arise in our own mind on a day-to-day basis. The main characters in Gilmore Girls parallel Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalysis of the mind.

Sigmund Freud believes the id is innate in younger children; they seek pure immediate pleasure without considering the consequences of their actions. As children grow older, they develop the regulatory ego which confronts the self-indulgent id with logical choices. As some people age, their ego might not fully develop as expected. Lorelai Gilmore embodies Freud’s idea of the id. When confronted with a decision, she forgoes logic and almost exclusively considers her own happiness. Throughout the series, Lorelai has a dee...

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...(Ganguly). Emily’s morals often clash with Lorelai’s quest for personal happiness. Emily epitomizes the superego because of the stress she places on moral standards.

Through careful examination, one can see that the characters in Gilmore Girls represent Sigmund Freud’s id, ego, and superego. Lorelai Gilmore demonstrates the id because of her rash decision-making and conscious drive for her own happiness. Whether she does so by disregarding other’s requests, or by not considering their feelings. Next, Rory Gilmore’s logical approach to problem-solving shows that she best symbolizes the ego. Last, because she only considers what others think, Emily Gilmore’s personality resembles the superego. By watching Gilmore Girls, the extremeness of how each character solves her problems can help us be certain that our decisions include a balance of the id, ego, and superego.

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