ASD 2000 Conference 17 Abstracts

Millennial Dreaming: Washington, D.C.

It is widely supposed in the scientific and popular literature on dreams that flying in dreams is of mostly delightful character. Domhoff (1996) recently emphasized the highly positive feelings experienced in flying dreams although he mentions a turn to apprehension later in the dream ("crashing", "coming down").  In my research (an interview-sample of flying dreams) I met flying experiences in contexts of nightmares which are seldom mentioned and never thoroughly discussed in interdisciplinary dream research. Flying can be a means of escape when being chased. In such cases anxiety can melt into the joy of flying and even cover it. Not seldom the act of flying is accompanied by strong sensations of effort in these cases. On the other hand there are cases where the uncanny feeling of haunting presence arises during flying and floating without preceding chase.

Even if seldom mentioned and rarely discussed theses findings parallel with reports scattered in the literature on dreams. As for the "escape" pattern, e. g., Mallon (1987) found that in women escape is a common trigger for flying in dreams; Arnold-Forster (1921) reports that her 'career' as a lifelong dreamflyer started with escape; Hubbard (1971) reports several cases of recurring dreams of that kind (cf. also Schmëing, 1938).  As for the "haunting presence" pattern Ellis (1910) quotes a case where levitation is accompanied by an "agonizing fear of evil presence" and simply states: "This seems to be an abnormal type of the dream of flight". On the other hand uncanny feelings of presence are, according to Hunt (1989), a common feature of flying dreams and altered states of consciousness.

How to make sense about this interwovenness of flying dream and nightmare? - To nightmares can be attributed experientially a heightened feeling of "reality," i.e. an intensived awareness, and physiologically a kind of "hyperarousel" (cf. Bearden, 1994). The same seems to be the case in flying dreams (cf. Barret, 1991). Beyond this rather abstract parallel the following speculations, inspired by Barret (1991), Hunt (1989) and Kuiken (1995), could be a step to a better understanding of the mentioned patterns. Perhaps the escape-pattern makes sense as a further intensification of awareness/arousal causing at the same time vestibular stimulation and heightened attention for the physiological state of the body; the sense of effort could be interpreted as the intention to maintain this shift in dream consciousness (of the body). The evil-presence-pattern could be understood as an autosymbol of emerging wake consciousness haunting the sleeping mind; this shadow-consciousness (sometimes appearing as double) can be interpreted as a complementary phenomenon to OBEs (a prelucide split in dream single-mindedness looked at from the inside perspective). In both patterns, thus, dream metaphors seem to be related to a specific state of dream consciousness.

The presentation will corroborate the plausibility of these speculations by phenomenological indepth analysis of selected case reports as well as by triangulation with outlooks on a broader range of results of interdisciplinary inquiry of dreaming.

RAINTER SCHOENHAMMER, School of Art and Design, Halle, Germany

The presenter works since 1994 as a professor for Psychology at the school for art and design in Halle, Germany. Education as a psychologist (including Diplom, Ph. D. and Habilitation) at the University of Munich, Germany. Involvement with dreaming grew out of aesthetic issues, especially the (phenomenological) inquiry into the experience of the moving body and interests for the anthropology of media (dreams of motion; motion pictures and dream).

Contact information: 

Rainer Schoenhammer
School of Art and Design, Halle
Halle, Germany
Email:schoenha@burg-halle.de
 

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