See Madonna-whore complex on Wiktionary
{
"etymology_text": "Madonna here refers to the Virgin Mary.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "Madonna-whore complexes",
"tags": [
"plural"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {},
"expansion": "Madonna-whore complex (plural Madonna-whore complexes)",
"name": "en-noun"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "noun",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
"parents": [
"Entries with incorrect language header",
"Entry maintenance"
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"source": "w"
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{
"kind": "topical",
"langcode": "en",
"name": "Psychoanalysis",
"orig": "en:Psychoanalysis",
"parents": [
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"Social sciences",
"Sciences",
"Society",
"All topics",
"Fundamental"
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],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1973 November 18, Gene Siskel, quoting Martin Scorsese, “Along the ‘Streets’ of Little Italy …”, in Chicago Tribune, section 6, page 6:",
"text": "‘Who’s That Knocking at My Door?’ [1967] was a film that dealt with a simple theme, one basic idea—a young guy trying to deal with his madonna-whore complex about women—plus a slight indication of what Little Italy was like.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "1981 June 20, “Nurses: think like a man, work like a dog, smile like an angel”, in The Sydney Morning Herald, number 44,765, page 33:",
"text": "The female nurse, however, still fulfils a public stereotype, according to the nurses The Sydney Morning Herald spoke to. She suffers from the Madonna-whore complex – she is a Madonna in the ward because she “helps” people, but socially she’s a Nurse and everybody’s heard of nurses’ parties, haven’t they?",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2005, The American Psychiatric Publishing Textbook of Psychoanalysis, American Psychiatric Publishing, →ISBN:",
"text": "The analyst clarifies the enactments into reality of a defensive dissociation of the intimate object from the sexual object, a classic Madonna-and-Whore complex.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2008, Hester Browne, The Little Lady Agency and the Prince, Pocket Books, →ISBN, page 375:",
"text": "“Just got here. Saw the light on my way up to the loo—then I saw your fat arse sticking up investigating Nanny’s drawers so I thought I’d pop in. I see her taste in quasi-nun’s outfits hasn’t changed since 1985,” she observed, flicking through the hangers. “Think she’s got a Madonna and whore complex?”",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2013, Andrew Hudgins, “Morning, Ladies!”, in The Joker: A Memoir, Simon & Schuster, →ISBN, page 246:",
"text": "Under the Madonna-whore complexes that plagued me and most boys, there was a deep Christian fear of ourselves as animals, creatures of flesh more than spirit.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2017 June 4, Barbara McMichael, “Two views of life from Bellingham”, in Kitsap Sun, page 4D:",
"text": "As we’re well into the 21st century, we might have hoped that all of that Freudian hooey about the Madonna-Whore Complex could have been ditched by now, but [Rena] Priest’s work suggests that our society is still impacted by those archetypes.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2020, Mikki Kendall, “Of #FastTailedGirls and Freedom”, in Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women White Feminists Forgot, Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN, page 48:",
"text": "Like other expressions of Madonna-whore complexes, there is an idea that bad things don’t happen to good girls.",
"type": "quote"
}
],
"glosses": [
"A complex said to develop in men who see women as either saintly \"Madonnas\" or debased prostitutes, potentially leading to the inability to maintain sexual arousal within a committed, loving relationship."
],
"id": "en-Madonna-whore_complex-en-noun-QmIESS0u",
"links": [
[
"psychoanalysis",
"psychoanalysis"
],
[
"saintly",
"saintly"
],
[
"debased",
"debased"
],
[
"prostitute",
"prostitute"
],
[
"inability",
"inability"
],
[
"sexual",
"sexual"
],
[
"arousal",
"arousal"
],
[
"committed",
"committed"
],
[
"loving",
"loving"
],
[
"relationship",
"relationship"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(psychoanalysis) A complex said to develop in men who see women as either saintly \"Madonnas\" or debased prostitutes, potentially leading to the inability to maintain sexual arousal within a committed, loving relationship."
],
"synonyms": [
{
"word": "Madonna/whore complex"
}
],
"topics": [
"human-sciences",
"medicine",
"psychoanalysis",
"psychology",
"sciences"
]
}
],
"word": "Madonna-whore complex"
}
{
"etymology_text": "Madonna here refers to the Virgin Mary.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "Madonna-whore complexes",
"tags": [
"plural"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {},
"expansion": "Madonna-whore complex (plural Madonna-whore complexes)",
"name": "en-noun"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "noun",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
"English countable nouns",
"English entries with incorrect language header",
"English eponyms",
"English lemmas",
"English multiword terms",
"English nouns",
"English terms with quotations",
"Pages with 1 entry",
"Pages with entries",
"en:Psychoanalysis"
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1973 November 18, Gene Siskel, quoting Martin Scorsese, “Along the ‘Streets’ of Little Italy …”, in Chicago Tribune, section 6, page 6:",
"text": "‘Who’s That Knocking at My Door?’ [1967] was a film that dealt with a simple theme, one basic idea—a young guy trying to deal with his madonna-whore complex about women—plus a slight indication of what Little Italy was like.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "1981 June 20, “Nurses: think like a man, work like a dog, smile like an angel”, in The Sydney Morning Herald, number 44,765, page 33:",
"text": "The female nurse, however, still fulfils a public stereotype, according to the nurses The Sydney Morning Herald spoke to. She suffers from the Madonna-whore complex – she is a Madonna in the ward because she “helps” people, but socially she’s a Nurse and everybody’s heard of nurses’ parties, haven’t they?",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2005, The American Psychiatric Publishing Textbook of Psychoanalysis, American Psychiatric Publishing, →ISBN:",
"text": "The analyst clarifies the enactments into reality of a defensive dissociation of the intimate object from the sexual object, a classic Madonna-and-Whore complex.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2008, Hester Browne, The Little Lady Agency and the Prince, Pocket Books, →ISBN, page 375:",
"text": "“Just got here. Saw the light on my way up to the loo—then I saw your fat arse sticking up investigating Nanny’s drawers so I thought I’d pop in. I see her taste in quasi-nun’s outfits hasn’t changed since 1985,” she observed, flicking through the hangers. “Think she’s got a Madonna and whore complex?”",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2013, Andrew Hudgins, “Morning, Ladies!”, in The Joker: A Memoir, Simon & Schuster, →ISBN, page 246:",
"text": "Under the Madonna-whore complexes that plagued me and most boys, there was a deep Christian fear of ourselves as animals, creatures of flesh more than spirit.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2017 June 4, Barbara McMichael, “Two views of life from Bellingham”, in Kitsap Sun, page 4D:",
"text": "As we’re well into the 21st century, we might have hoped that all of that Freudian hooey about the Madonna-Whore Complex could have been ditched by now, but [Rena] Priest’s work suggests that our society is still impacted by those archetypes.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2020, Mikki Kendall, “Of #FastTailedGirls and Freedom”, in Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women White Feminists Forgot, Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN, page 48:",
"text": "Like other expressions of Madonna-whore complexes, there is an idea that bad things don’t happen to good girls.",
"type": "quote"
}
],
"glosses": [
"A complex said to develop in men who see women as either saintly \"Madonnas\" or debased prostitutes, potentially leading to the inability to maintain sexual arousal within a committed, loving relationship."
],
"links": [
[
"psychoanalysis",
"psychoanalysis"
],
[
"saintly",
"saintly"
],
[
"debased",
"debased"
],
[
"prostitute",
"prostitute"
],
[
"inability",
"inability"
],
[
"sexual",
"sexual"
],
[
"arousal",
"arousal"
],
[
"committed",
"committed"
],
[
"loving",
"loving"
],
[
"relationship",
"relationship"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(psychoanalysis) A complex said to develop in men who see women as either saintly \"Madonnas\" or debased prostitutes, potentially leading to the inability to maintain sexual arousal within a committed, loving relationship."
],
"topics": [
"human-sciences",
"medicine",
"psychoanalysis",
"psychology",
"sciences"
]
}
],
"synonyms": [
{
"word": "Madonna/whore complex"
}
],
"word": "Madonna-whore complex"
}
Download raw JSONL data for Madonna-whore complex meaning in All languages combined (4.1kB)
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable All languages combined dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-01-10 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2025-01-01 using wiktextract (df33d17 and 4ed51a5). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
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