Archetypal Taxonomy

Archetypal Taxonomy
You might consider fairy tales as the essence of all story forms which include myths, legends and sagas. Like the prima materia, they are to be found everywhere, cross culturally though they are not tinged by the coloring of culture but rather, serve to mirror the patterns of the psyche (Interpretation of Fairy Tales
pg.1). Fairy tales give us an x-ray vision into the structures of the collective unconscious and a
comparative study of the anatomy of the psyche (Interpretation of Fairy Tales pg.15). This x-ray gives us
insight into the psyche of the storytellers themselves who conveyed fairy tales both orally and through
writings. Each storyteller is a communicator of the psyche, and through the telling of a tale, expresses the
collective archetypal templates possible within each individual. Therefore, the mainstream and scientific
study of fairy tales gives the Jungian a vehicle to drive down into the “never-never land” of the
unconscious and helps find common patterns or reoccurring motifs (Interpretation of Fairy Tales pg.6)
that arise in the psyche.
The scholars of the mainstream, aren’t really interested in the healing of the psyche but the scientific
taxonomy of fairy tales contributes to the building of an “archetypal taxonomy” of psychic imagery which
may be called up and used for healing. The dissection and splitting the story up into parts, creates a
system and structure that provides shape to the formless unconscious. The word cuts and penetrates
from mouth to ear and these shapes are originally and firstly produced by the words that come out of the
mouth of the story teller. Though the structure of fairy tales is still as vaporous as the breath that
accompanies the word, when it is told, it still contains a zoe or life which brings an emotional or archetypal
charge for the possibilities psychic education and healing. Von Franz says “We read Plato’s writings that
old women told their children symbolic stories-mythoi. Even then fairy tales were connected with the
education of children (Interpretation of Fairy Tales pg.3).” The very etymology of psychology is “Psyche-
Logos” which is to say that the psyche or soul that speaks. Therefore, fairy tales are the stories the soul
speaks as coming through the voice of storyteller and the mainstream methods of taxonomy, shows us
the many ways in which it is spoken.
We may be at the mercy of the story or a tale, which by itself the mainstream study of fairy tales and the
thinking function taxonomy cannot make sense of. We need all four functions to understand a fairy tale
(Interpretation of Fairy Tales pg.14-15) so that we can start building an archetypal map (with the thinking
function) and mainstream methods so that other three functions can join in to create a whole picture. This
helps us to properly navigate the patterns of the story or “our story” that we are living out.
Once we have classified and broken down all the different tales into categories, we can give the other
functions room to enter. The sensation function gains ammunition for amplification of a psychic image
arising from dreams and active imagination. This can provide more shape to those archetypal vapors
fuming up from the unconscious. The then classified sensation “facts” can make the stories more “real,”
and “loud” enough for us to realize the symbol. With the symbol, we can then move to understand the
overall message of the story pattern with our intuition, and where it is taking us perhaps see what is at the
end of the tale. How does the story end? And lastly, once we know where we are going, we realize that it
is our own unique path, and therefore we can derive value (feeling) from this path and what it means to us
personally for our growth and healing. The scientific study and intellectuals overlook the feeling function
with fairy tales (Interpretation of Fairy Tales pg.12), however, we may not recognize what it means to us,
if it weren’t for the initial study of the structure in the first place. For example, just as the “thigh bone” is
connected to your “hip bone,” with an archetypal taxonomy, we might find that in the “fox bone (archetypal
image structure)” in the psyche, is connected to the “witch bone,” and a relationship between the
destructive mother (witch) and the trickster (fox) can be seen as a reoccurring motif in tales and in
dreams. This may be relevant to people coming from certain backgrounds (Interpretation of Fairy Tales
pg.24) or to someone with a mother complex.
In the spirit of Jung’s example of his patient and the beetle, I had an interesting synchronicity the morning
I read about the fox and the witch. Later on in the day, as I was driving, I saw a fox run into the fields. I
thought, what does this mean for me? Could this mean that I may be living out a pattern of the fox and the
witch?
To conclude, the mainstream methods of fairy tales is useful for the Jungian because cataloguing
knowledge gives a ready access for parallels when images come up, and can be used for healing and for
our mental health. As Anthony Steven’s laws of psychodynamics tells us, psychopathology happens

because the archetypes can’t actualize themselves and satisfying their goals keeps us well (the two
million year old self). With the mainstream method of the taxonomy of fairy tales, we can have at our
hands, a storehouse of material that can be potentially used as psychic medicine.

Resources:
Franz, M.-L. von, & Franz, M.-L. von. (1996). The interpretation of fairy tales. Boston: Shambhala.
Stevens, A., & Rosen, D. H. (2009). The two-million-year-old self. College Station: Texas A & M
University Press.

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