Austrian-born psychologist (1903-1990)
The unrealistic nature of these tales (which narrowminded rationalists object to) is an important device, because it makes obvious that the fairy tales' concern is not useful information about the external world, but the inner process taking place in an individual.
BRUNO BETTELHEIM
The Uses of Enchantment
But as for morality being based on fear, nowadays we want to remove fear from the life of the child. And as for the content of morality, we often insist that it should not be self-interest. In short, we want the child to obey a morality whose fundamental motives we do our best to remove.
BRUNO BETTELHEIM
Moral Education: Five Lectures
The ability to read becomes devalued when what one has learned to read adds nothing of importance to one's life.
BRUNO BETTELHEIM
The Uses of Enchantment
The security of the parent about being a parent will eventually become the source of the child's feeling secure about himself.
BRUNO BETTELHEIM
A Good Enough Parent
While the morality taught by home, church, and community (up to roughly the start of World War II) gave direct support to the school in its efforts to teach the young in traditional ways, this is no longer so in all cases. On the contrary, the morality now taught to many children before they come to school, and while there, is often largely at variance with the school's educational efforts.
BRUNO BETTELHEIM
Moral Education: Five Lectures
There are many ways of dealing with a desire that is socially unacceptable or that for one reason or another the person himself cannot accept. One way is for the individual to dramatize it, act it out, and, through intense but in the long run only token satisfaction, try to rout it forever.
BRUNO BETTELHEIM
Symbolic Wounds