{"id":13350,"date":"2015-09-26T13:26:03","date_gmt":"2015-09-26T17:26:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/?p=13350"},"modified":"2015-09-26T14:45:18","modified_gmt":"2015-09-26T18:45:18","slug":"zizek-subject-divided","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/2015\/09\/26\/zizek-subject-divided\/","title":{"rendered":"zizek will have been"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u017di\u017eek, S. (2015). Afterword: The Minimal Event: From Hystericization to Subjective Destitution.\u00a0 In A. Hamza (Ed.), Repeating \u017di\u017eek<\/em>. (pp. 269-285). Durham: Duke University Press.<\/p>\n

The void filled in by fantasmatic content (by the \u201cstuff of the I,\u201d as Lacan called fantasy) is opened up by the ultimate failure of the subject\u2019s symbolic representation:<\/p>\n

it is not that every symbolic representation simply fails, is inadequate to the subject it represents (\u201cwords always betray me . . .\u201d); much more radically, the subject is the retroactive effect of the failure of its representation<\/span><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

It is because of this failure that the subject is divided<\/strong>\u2014not into something and something else, but into something (its symbolic representation) and nothing, and fantasy fills in the
\nvoid of this nothingness.<\/p>\n

And the catch is that this symbolic representation of the subject is primordially not its own: prior to speaking, I am spoken, identified as a name by the parental discourse<\/strong>, and my speech is from the very outset a kind of hysterical reaction to being-spoken-to: \u201cAm I really then, that name, what you\u2019re saying I am?\u201d<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

The speaking subject persists in this in-between: prior to nomination, there is no subject<\/strong>, but once it is named, it already disappears in its signifier\u2014the subject never is, it always<\/span><\/strong> will have been<\/span><\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n

I am the enigma for the Other, so that I find myself in the strange position (as in detective novels) of someone who all of a sudden finds himself persecuted, treated as if he knows (or owns) something, bears a secret, but is totally unaware what this secret is.<\/p>\n

The formula of the enigma is thus: \u201cWhat am I for the Other?<\/strong> What as an object of the Other\u2019s desire am I?\u201d<\/p>\n

Because of this gap, the subject cannot ever fully and immediately identify with his or her symbolic mask or title<\/strong>; the subject\u2019s questioning of his or her symbolic title is what hysteria is about: \u201cWhy am I what you\u2019re saying that I am?<\/span><\/strong>\u201d Or, to quote Shakespeare\u2019s Juliet: \u201cWhat\u2019s in a name?\u201d (Romeo and Juliet<\/em>, Act II, scene 2).<\/p>\n

We are dealing here with what Louis Althusser called \u201cideological interpellation\u201d: the symbolic identity conferred on us is the result of the way the ruling ideology \u201cinterpellates<\/strong>\u201d us\u2014as citizens, democrats, or patriots.<\/p>\n

Hysteria<\/span><\/strong> emerges when a subject starts to question or to feel discomfort in his or her symbolic identity: \u201cYou say I am your beloved\u2014 what is there in me that makes me that? What do you see in me that causes you to desire me in that way?\u201d<\/p>\n

The hysterical subject is the subject whose very existence involves radical doubt and questioning, his or her entire being is sustained by the uncertainty as to what he is for<\/strong>
\n th<\/strong>e Other<\/span><\/strong>; insofar as the subject exists only as an answer to the enigma of the Other\u2019s desire, the hysterical subject is the subject par excellence.<\/p>\n

In contrast to it, the analyst stands for the paradox of the desubjectivized subject<\/span><\/strong>, of the subject who fully assumes what Lacan calls \u201csubjective destitution<\/span><\/strong>,\u201d that is, who breaks out of the vicious cycle of intersubjective dialectics of desire and turns into an acephalous being of pure drive<\/span><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

With regard to this subjective destitution, Shakespeare\u2019s Richard II has in store a further surprise in store for us: not only does the play enact the gradual hystericization of the unfortunate king; at the lowest point of his despair, before his death, Richard enacts a further shift of his subjective status that brings him to subjective destitution …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u017di\u017eek, S. (2015). Afterword: The Minimal Event: From Hystericization to Subjective Destitution.\u00a0 In A. Hamza (Ed.), Repeating \u017di\u017eek. (pp. 269-285). Durham: Duke University Press. The void filled in by fantasmatic content (by the \u201cstuff of the I,\u201d as Lacan called fantasy) is opened up by the ultimate failure of the subject\u2019s symbolic representation: it is … Continue reading “zizek will have been”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[76,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13350","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sub-destitute","category-subjectivity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13350","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=13350"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13350\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13355,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13350\/revisions\/13355"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}