Abstract

This dissertation sought, in the spirit of a psyche-centered depth psychology, to move beyond a personal investigation of the psyche to a broader understanding of the contemporary soul manifest within culture and world. It related the evolutionary advances in computer technology, culminating in the human-computer interface, to the pattern of psychic transformation associated with the alchemical subtle body and its energetic chakra system. ;Cyberspace and virtual reality imagined as subtle body embody the soul's desire for a place and form of expression which dissolves the boundaries delineated by Western dualities---those between real/not real, material/immaterial, sacred/profane, body/spirit, self-other---and which restores the mediatory soul, the Archetypcal Feminine. Whereas technology has historically played a predominant role in the banishment of soul from the natural world, contemporary computer technology demonstrates the potential to re-ensoul matter and heal the splits in Western consciousness. ;Utilizing a hermeneutic method, the nature of the archetype of the subtle body grounded the exploration of cyberspace and virtual reality through a variety of perspectives, including: the technology itself, hermeneutic phenomenology, Western philosophy, traditional psychoanalytic and object relations psychology, and Jungian/archetypal psychology. Analysis of electronic technologies found them to further the embodiment of soul when they function, in accordance with the characteristics of subtle body, to restore an intermediary place for the imaginal, reveal the eros and mythos of soul-making, and demonstrate a transformation of energy and consciousness leading to the emergence of a new self/creation. Conversely, they perpetuate disembodiment, and subsequent wounding to soul and subtle body when their purpose and design are restricted to the paradigms of metaphysical transcendence, information storage, and artificial reality. ;Immersion in the imaginatrix of cyberspace gives birth to the human-machine hybrid, the cyborg, whose shifting ontology potentially reunites psyche, soma, and logos, and engages the mythic imagination. Herein, Eros' desire for connection, Hermes' transgression of boundaries, and Ariadne's sense of the labyrinth lead to an awareness of the interdependence and co-creative nature of reality. Rediscovering soul's subtle body, we experience ourselves as a unified field of subtle energy centers distributed across the planet and affecting an evolution in consciousness of cosmic proportion