Alice Miller
Alice Miller, Ph.D., (12 January 1923 in Piotrków Trybunalski, Poland – 14 April 2010 in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, France)
The late Dr. Alice Miller was a preeminent child psychologist of the 20th and early 21st centuries.
Early life
Alice Miller was born in Piotrków Trybunalski, Poland to Jewish parents.
Young Alice Miller lived with her parents in Berlin, Germany until Adolf Hitler was appointed chancellor of Germany in 1933. After that they were forced to return to Poland, where they went into hiding to avoid being sent into the Warsaw ghetto.[1]
Miller relocated to Switzerland in 1946 where she had been accepted into the University of Basel.[1]
Miller started to study at the University of Basel in 1946. Miller received her doctorate in philosophy, psychology, and sociology in 1953.[1]
Work
Miller's work has been described in detail at Wikipedia and need not be repeated here.
Views on infant circumcision
Miller lived and worked in Europe where only boys born into Jewish and Muslim families are circumcised, so protection of boys from circumcision was not a prominent part of her work, however she made her intactivist views very clear in a letter to Marilyn Milos, dated 14 January 1994.
"The damage done by circumcision to infants and consequently to the later adults is an extremely important issue. It is still widely minimized because the effects are ignored by most people. … In all my books, I tried to explain that the earlier in life a harm is done, and the more its effects are denied by parents and society, the more a person will be damaged, not only physically but also psychically. If parents know of the child's suffering, they can help as enlightened witnesses by giving support and compassion. If they deny the reality of suffering, the children will deny it as well and later inflict the same pain on their own children ... out of pure ignorance."
Selected quotes
The editors at AZ Quotes have selected significant quotes from Dr. Miller's publications. Please see:
Alice Miller Quotes
, AZ Quotes. Retrieved 27 May 2026.
Articles
The Natural Child Project has collected an extensive list of articles by Alice Miller.
Books
Miller, Alice (1981): Prisoners Of Childhood. Basic Books. ISBN 10 0465063470. Retrieved 25 May 2026.- Miller, Alice (1991): The Untouched Key: Tracing Childhood Trauma in Creativity and Destructiveness. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. ISBN 10 0385267649. Retrieved 25 May 2026.
- Miller, Alice (1991): Banished Knowledge: Facing Childhood Injuries. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Grou. ISBN 10 0385267622. Retrieved 25 May 2026.
- Miller, Alice (1997): The Drama of the Gifted Child: The Search for the True Self, Revised Edition. Basic Books. ISBN 10 0465016901. Retrieved 25 May 2026.
- Miller, Alice (1998): Thou Shalt Not Be Aware: Society's Betrayal of the Child. ISBN 10 0374525439. Retrieved 26 May 2026.
- Miller, Alice (2006): The Body Never Lies: The Lingering Effects of Hurtful Parenting. W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 10 0393328635. Retrieved 25 May 2026.
Circumcision letter
Dr. Miller sent this letter, dated 14 January 1994 to Marilyn Milos, R.N., who was then the executive director of NOCIRC in the United States.
- Miller, Alice (14 January 1994).
Letter to Marilyn Milos, R.N., of NOCIRC.
, Facebook. Retrieved 27 May 2026.
Video
There are a very large number of videos available on YouTube about Alice Miller. See Alice Miller (psychologist).
Here are a few selected videos:
Alice Miller Interview 1988 : L'Origine du Mal dans l'Enfance
Wie entsteht emotionale Blindheit? - Alice Miller - (engl. subs)
Interview with Alice Miller, November 1992 [interview]
Interview with psychologist Alice Miller's son, Martin Miller -- about his book on her life
Motion picture
Death
Alice Miller was diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer. She elected to end her life by assisted suicide at the age of 87, which occurred at her home in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, France on 14 April 2010.[1]
See also
- Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs)
- Anna Freud
- Carl Gustav Jung
- Child circumcision
- Circumcision and violence
- Hanny Lightfoot-Klein
- Pain
- Sigmund Freud
- Trauma
External links
- Official website. Retrieved 26 May 2026
- Wedge, Marilyn (14 April 2021).
Reflections on Alice Miller
, Psychology Today. Retrieved 27 May 2026. - Anonymous.
Alice Miller
, Famous Psychologists. Retrieved 27 May 2026. - Chapin, Georganne (14 April 2026).
“Banished Knowledge”: Alice Miller and the Blind Spot at the Heart of Circumcision
, Intact America. Retrieved 25 May 2026.
References
- ↑ a b c d Wikipedia article: Alice Miller (psychologist)