The Uncanny

Sigmund Freud says that the uncanny "is undoubtedly related to what is frightening-- to what arouses dread and horror; equally certainly, too, the word is not always used in a clearly definable sense, so that it tends to coincide with what excites fear in general. Yet we may expect that a special core of feeling is present which justifies the use of a special conceptual term" (825). In other words, the uncanny is something that appears in real life but is presented in such a way that evokes a feeling of dread and discomfort-- it is the return of repressed memories/experiences.

In our world, I think one of the most uncanny things that has happened in recent history is the Jewish Holocaust during World War Two. It is uncanny because, although we see and hear about killings day in and day out, seeing such horrible brutality happen in real life made our families then and makes us today so uncomfortable that some people find it easier to ignore that it happened altogether. As much as people deny it, most people are somehow racist/xenophobic/prejudiced, and we DO NOT want to identify with the Nazis. In a way, the memories of the Holocaust in the minds of many people in the world have become repressed, and when those memories resurface... no one wants to confront them; confronting them would mean acknowledging them.

http://www.history.com/topics/the-holocaust/photos#

This is the famous gate from Auschwitz: "Work will make you free." This, to me, is very uncanny because it is a motto we have all sort of adopted. While most diligent people don't believe that work might make them physically free, as in liberated, they do believe that work will set them free from the stress of taking out loans, having to use food stamps, being on unemployment. "Work will set you free" is something we all tell ourselves when we need motivation to keep on keeping on, to work harder than we did yesterday because harder work means more freedom. What's uncanny about this gate is that work did not set the victims free. Work bought them time, maybe... and in some cases, work killed them. Many of them worked themselves to death because their bodies didn't have adequate nutrition to work as hard as they were. Something that is generally thought of in a positive light turns into something that wears a mask; you're told work will make you free, so you work, but it only ends up making you exhausted. And then you die anyway.