  collective unconscious is a term of analytical psychology, coined by carl jung. it is proposed to be a part of the unconscious mind, expressed in humanity and all life forms with nervous systems, and describes how the structure of the psyche autonomously organizes experience. jung distinguished the collective unconscious from the personal unconscious, in that the personal unconscious is a personal reservoir of experience unique to each individual, while the collective unconscious collects and organizes those personal experiences in a similar way with each member of a particular species. ==jung's definitions== for jung, âmy thesis then, is as follows: in addition to our immediate consciousness, which is of a thoroughly personal nature and which we believe to be the only empirical psyche (even if we tack on the personal unconscious as an appendix), there exists a second psychic system of a collective, universal, and impersonal nature which is identical in all individuals. this collective unconscious does not develop individually but is inherited. it consists of pre-existent forms, the archetypes, which can only become conscious secondarily and which give definite form to certain psychic contents.âc. g. jung, the archetypes and the collective unconscious (london 1996) p. 43 jung linked the collective unconscious to 'what freud called "archaic remnants" - mental forms whose presence cannot be explained by anything in the individual's own life and which seem to be aboriginal, innate, and inherited shapes of the human mind'.c. g. jung, man and his symbols (london 1978) p. 57 ===archetypes and collective representations=== jung considered that 'the shadow' and the anima/animus differ from the other archetypes in the fact that their content is more directly related to the individual's personal situation',walter a. shelburne, mythos and logos in the thought of carl jung (1988) p. 150 and less to the collective unconscious: by contrast, 'the collective unconscious is personified as a wise old man'.c. g. jung, mysterium coniunctionis (london 1963) p. 106 jung also made reference to contents of this category of the unconscious psyche as being similar to levy-bruhl's use of collective representations or "reprÃ©sentations collectives," mythological "motifs," hubert and mauss's "categories of the imagination," and adolf bastian's "primordial thoughts." ==minimal/maximal interpretations== in a minimalist interpretation 
Analytical_psychology Crowd_psychology Jungian_archetypes Occult_collective_consciousness Psychoanalysis