{"id":10135,"date":"2012-12-18T18:48:41","date_gmt":"2012-12-18T23:48:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/?p=10135"},"modified":"2012-12-18T18:55:29","modified_gmt":"2012-12-18T23:55:29","slug":"analyst-discourse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/2012\/12\/18\/analyst-discourse\/","title":{"rendered":"analyst discourse"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bryant, Levi R. \u201c\u017di\u017eek\u2019s New Universe of Discourse: Politics and the Discourse of the Capitalist\u201d International Journal of \u017di\u017eek Studies<\/em> (Vol 2, no. 4) 1-48.<\/p>\n

Discourse of Critical Theory<\/p>\n

a\u00a0–>\u00a0S1<\/strong>
\nS2\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 $<\/strong><\/p>\n

As \u017di\u017eek writes in the introduction to The Sublime Object of Ideology,<\/p>\n

In contrast to [the] Althusserian ethics of alienation in the symbolic \u2018process without a subject\u2019, we may denote the ethics implied by Lacanian psychoanalysis as that of separation. The famous Lacanian motto not to give way on one\u2019s desire [ne pas c\u00e9der sur son desir]– is aimed at the fact that we must not obliterate the distance separating the Real<\/span> from its symbolization: it is this surplus of the Real<\/span> over every symbolization that functions as the<\/span> object-cause of desire<\/span>. To come to terms with this surplus (or, more precisely, leftover) means to acknowledge the fundamental deadlock (\u2018antagonism\u2019), a kernel resisting symbolic integration-dissolution<\/strong> (\u017di\u017eek 1989: 3). 34<\/p>\n

Are analysis and engaged political activity consistent with one another? As Lacan remarks at the end of The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis<\/em>, \u201c[t]he analyst\u2019s desire is not a pure desire. It is a desire to obtain absolute difference, a desire which intervenes when, confronted with the primary signifier, the subject is, for the first time, in a position to subject himself to it\u201d (Lacan 1998: 276).<\/p>\n

The analysand begins analysis in the dimension of the imaginary, treating everything and everyone as the Same. Over the course of analysis what emerges is an absolutely singular constellation of signifiers, specific to this subject and this subject alone as determinants of his unconscious (hence Lacan\u2019s reference to
\nthe subject being in a position to subject himself to this primary signifier).<\/p>\n

Lacan goes so far as to suggest that the primary signifiers uncovered in analysis are pure non-sense. \u201c\u2026[T]he effect of interpretation is to isolate in the subject a kernel, a kern<\/em>, to use Freud\u2019s own term, of non-sense\u2026\u201d (Ibid: 250). If this primary signifier has the status of non-sense, then this is precisely because it is not common<\/em> but particular to the subject and no other.<\/p>\n

It is thus difficult to see how it is possible to get a politics out of the<\/span> discourse of the analyst<\/span>, for the discourse of the analyst does not aim at collective engagement or the common– which is necessary for politics –but the precise opposite.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, there is a kernal of truth in \u017di\u017eek\u2019s characterization of his own position in terms of the discourse of the analyst<\/span>. Unlike the politics of the discourse of the master premised on the fantasy of imaginary organic totality, any revolutionary politics must speak not from the position of totality, but from the standpoint of the<\/span> Real<\/span>, of antagonism, of the remainder, or of that which the other social ties function to veil or hide from view<\/span>.<\/p>\n

In other words, revolutionary political engagement differs from the politics of the State and master in that it approaches the social from the perspective of the<\/strong> Real<\/span>, treating this as the truth of social formations.<\/p>\n

As \u017di\u017eek remarks, All \u2018culture\u2019 is in a way a reaction-formation, an attempt to limit, canalize \u2014 to cultivate this imbalance, this traumatic kernel, this radical antagonism through which man cuts his umbilical cord with nature, with animal homeostasis<\/span>.<\/p>\n

It is not only that the aim is no longer to abolish this drive antagonism,<\/span> but the aspiration to abolish it is precisely the source of totalitarian temptation: the greatest mass murders and holocausts have always been perpetrated in the name of man as harmonious being, of a New Man without antagonistic tension (\u017di\u017eek 1989: 5).<\/p>\n

Where the politics of the master treats this imbalance or traumatic kernel of radical antagonism as an accident<\/em> to be eradicated and overcome, the critical-revolutionary politics treats the tension as the truth that allows a whole set of social symptoms to be discerned and engaged.<\/p>\n

For example, Marx does not treat discontent among the proletariat as an anomalous deviation disrupting the social to be summarily dismissed, but rather as the key to the systematic organization of capitalism and the perspective from which capitalist production is to be understood, and as the potential for revolutionary transformation.<\/p>\n

The mark of any critical-revolutionary political theory will thus be that <\/span>objet a<\/span>, the remainder, the gap, the traumatic kernel,<\/span> occupies the position of the<\/strong> agent<\/span> in the social relation.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bryant, Levi R. \u201c\u017di\u017eek\u2019s New Universe of Discourse: Politics and the Discourse of the Capitalist\u201d International Journal of \u017di\u017eek Studies (Vol 2, no. 4) 1-48. Discourse of Critical Theory a\u00a0–>\u00a0S1 S2\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 $ As \u017di\u017eek writes in the introduction to The Sublime Object of Ideology, In contrast to [the] Althusserian ethics of alienation in the symbolic … Continue reading “analyst discourse”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[124,65,142,72,106,41,70,20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-4-discourses","category-dia-mat","category-nightworld","category-objet-a","category-the-act","category-the-real","category-traversing-the-fantasy","category-zizek"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10135"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10135\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10137,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10135\/revisions\/10137"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}