The term ‘contrasexual’ designates those psychic elements whose gender-coloring stands opposite to the biological sex of the individual — most centrally the anima in man and the animus in woman, but extending to any psychic structure that carries the quality of the other sex. Within the Jungian corpus the term performs double duty: it supplies a quasi-biological warrant (Jung’s appeal to contrasexual genes) for positing inner figures of opposite sex, while simultaneously pointing toward an archetypal substrate that transcends mere physiology. Samuels traces the standard Jaff é-derived formulation — that a minority of contrasexual genes produces a corresponding contrasexual character that remains largely unconscious — and presses for a more structurally conceived reading in which anima and animus function as archetypal bridges between consciousness and the collective unconscious. Hillman, characteristically, interrogates the contrasexual framework itself, noting that syzygial thinking compels gender-categories and tracing the hazard of collapsing archetypal figures into literal men and women. Beebe distinguishes the contrasexual coloring of the anima from that of the ‘opposing personality,’ arguing that each carries a different relational potential. Papadopoulos convenes the post-Jungian debate, where Springer’s clinical critique of the contrasexual construct from lesbian case material opens a space for questioning whether the framework can accommodate non-normative sexualities without pathologizing them. The concept thus sits at the intersection of archetypal theory, gender, individuation, and clinical practice.
No man is so entirely masculine that he has nothing feminine in him…. The repression of feminine traits… causes these contrasexual demands to accumulate in the unconscious.
Jung’s foundational claim that suppression of contrasexual traits forces them into unconscious accumulation, establishing the clinical rationale for the anima concept.
, Anima: An Anatomy of a Personified Notion, 1985thesis
the smaller number of contrasexual genes seems to produce a corresponding contrasexual character, which usually remains unconscious
Samuels rehearses and critically frames the biological warrant Jung’s circle used to ground the contrasexual construct, arguing that an archetypal-structural reading is theoretically superior.
, Jung and the Post-Jungians, 1985thesis
we consider the contrasexual archetypes, animus and anima, said by Jung to express what is psychologically masculine in a woman and psychologically feminine in a man… these contrasexual archetypes act as a bridge or connection between consciousness and the unconscious
Samuels situates the contrasexual archetypes within the layered structure of the psyche, emphasizing their mediating function between ego-consciousness and the unconscious.
, Jung and the Post-Jungians, 1985thesis
Springer criticises the contrasexual construct of anima and animus… Braun and Wilke do not want to give it up, but to differentiate it.
Papadopoulos maps the post-Jungian debate over whether the contrasexual construct should be abandoned, retained, or differentiated in light of clinical work with homosexual patients.
, The Handbook of Jungian Psychology: Theory, Practice and Applications, 2006thesis
anima and animus undoubtedly represent the contrasexual components of the personality, their kinship character… point[s]… to the integration of personality.
Jung, via Hillman’s dossier, links contrasexual components to the kinship libido and argues their integration is constitutive of individuation.
, Anima: An Anatomy of a Personified Notion, 1985thesis
The other place in the psyche that has a contrasexual coloring is the anima… The anima, however, holds a potential for leading the man toward integrity.
Beebe differentiates the contrasexual coloring of the anima from that of the opposing personality, assigning the former a distinctive integrative potential absent in the latter.
, Energies and Patterns in Psychological Type: The Reservoir of Consciousness, 2017supporting
the anima and animus, which are the more or less unconscious contrasexual elements in the psyche… This honor falls to the anima and animus
Hollis applies the contrasexual framework to romantic projection, treating anima and animus as the unconscious contrasexual elements that govern partner selection.
, The Middle Passage: From Misery to Meaning in Midlife, 1993supporting
Qualities that are culturally defined as inappropriate to the sexual identity of the ego tend to be excluded even from the shadow alter-ego and instead constellate
Hall describes the mechanism by which culturally proscribed gender-qualities are split off from the shadow to form the contrasexual structures anima and animus.
, Jungian Dream Interpretation: A Handbook of Theory and Practice, 1983supporting
women are more individually related and monogamous in consciousness, men more indiscriminately related and polygamous; these attitudes find compensation in unconscious contrasexual positions.
Hillman conveys Jung’s socio-historical account of why the contrasexual compensation takes different forms — unity versus multiplicity — in anima and animus respectively.
, Anima: An Anatomy of a Personified Notion, 1985supporting
contrasexual figures in dreams
Beebe’s index entry confirms that contrasexual figures in dreams constitute a recognized analytic datum within his eight-function, eight-archetype model.
, Energies and Patterns in Psychological Type: The Reservoir of Consciousness, 2017supporting
the persona, the anima and animus figures, and the shadow… are produced by the differentiation processes we have already described, which occur during the first half of life.
Neumann situates anima and animus — the primary contrasexual structures — within a developmental schema of psychic differentiation in the first half of life.
, The Origins and History of Consciousness (Princeton, 2019aside
the feminine figure of the anima… requires a different evaluation and position…. a personalistic interpretation always reduces her to the personal mother or some other female person.
Hillman’s Jungian dossier cautions against collapsing the contrasexual archetype into biographical reductions, insisting on its transpersonal dimension.
, Anima: An Anatomy of a Personified Notion, 1985aside