Zum psychoanalytischen Verständnis transgenerationaler Übertragungen

Psychoanalytic understanding of transgenerational transmission. This article first describes the background that led to comprehensive knowledge and systematic exploration of transgenerational transmission, in particular in the fields of psychoanalytic practice and theory formation. At the same time as knowledge was gained from the therapeutic work conducted with descendants of Shoah survivors, our understanding about the transgenerational transmission of attachment patterns improved within attachment theory. This article also discusses different theoretical concepts of traumas that partially emerged from psychoanalytic work with descendants of Shoah survivors, and then focuses on the specific mechanisms and content of the trauma transmission and its consequences. Psychic processes such as scenic transmission, re-enactive transfer and projective identification will be discussed, and then specific aspects of relationships in perpetrators’ families and their transgenerational entanglements will be considered. In conclusion, the generalisability of these findings will be discussed.