Rodolfo Kusch and Carl Gustav Jung: Contributions to a Symbolic Understanding of the Andean Worldview

Abstract

We propose to investigate the existing relationships between the work of Carl Gustav Jung and the thought of the Argentine philosopher Rodolfo Kusch. This inquiry is based on the explicit references that Kusch repeatedly makes to different texts by the Swiss psychiatrist.

We take for granted that there is an effective and verifiable link that can be understood through the category of “reception” in the sense of Gadamer-Jauss. For this reason, this reception of Jung in Kusch becomes a dialogue rather than an uncritical reproduction.

Kusch’s work suspends the pursuit of originality characteristic of academic science. Above all, it seeks to articulate concepts from the Western tradition—mainly from the fields of philosophy, anthropology, and psychology—with a view to understanding the cultural horizon in which the thought of the Inca amautas was forged.

This overall objective therefore invites us to recast, modify, and phagocytize the Jungian proposal in order to make possible a creative dialogue rather than a simple application. To carry out this task, we will focus with special interest on the notions of “symbol,” “opposite,” and “equilibrium.” We will also attempt to verify whether the idea of “geoculture,” proper to Kusch’s work, has some antecedents in Jung.