Professor Shelden’s blog on psychoanalysis sheds a new light on psychoanalytic theory. She makes many valid and interesting points throughout her blog and I wish I had the time to talk about all of them in detail, but that would take far too long, so I have picked three that stood out the most to me. The first would be the idea of “slippage”. Secondly is the relationship between desire and language. Finally is the concept of the “death drive”. These three ideas allowed me to understand psychoanalytic theory in a new way.
This idea of slippage is very interesting. To understand it one must realize that Lacan has changed Saussure’s theory of the signified. In Saussure’s theory the signified is the privileged term, but in Lacan’s theory the signifier becomes the privileged term. Lacan is suggesting that language just gives the illusion of words having meaning. All language is doing is referring one signifier to the next and so on and so forth. Slippage is just that; passing one signifier to the next, with no end it sight. Slippage is the illusion of meaning. When slippage and metonymy come together we are thrown into a search for meaning that will never end. This meaning becomes a missing puzzle piece in the human body and we, as humans, interpret it as desire.
Every human exist within language without language no human would exist. Within language there is an absence and that is desire. An example that Ashley used which helped me was the idea of language being a puzzle and desire was the missing piece that is needed to complete the puzzle. In order for one to exist within language one must continually circle the absence trying to fill the hole or desire. Lacan sees language and desire as the same thing. We are constantly trying to find the meaning of language but we can’t find it; just like how we constantly desire new things, like shoes, computers, or vacation. Just like in the search for meaning once we achieve what we desire we are not satisfied, and we start the search all over again. We can only approach the object which we desire we can never reach it because once you reach the object you will find that it is not as good as you thought.
Death Drive is contradictory to Lacan’s whole theory. There are many phrases and words for death drive but the most common is orgasm. The death drive allows you to abandon the search for meaning and identity for a short time. This is possible because in order to reach orgasm one must completely let go of everything. The death drive strives to preserve the void in the puzzle. “The death drive thus directs human subjects away from Symbolic and Imaginary coherence and towards the single goal of sexual satisfaction.” This means that sexuality has nothing to do with identity. The thought of “sexual identity” is actually false. There is no sexual identity since they are so different.
What I have concluded from Professor’s Shelden’s blog that psychoanalytic theory sees life as a circle. Humans are always on the search for meaning and can only escape the search when on a “death drive”. Also there is no meaning to language that each signifier just slips to the next signifier. In my opinion psychoanalytic theory is a large circle.
I agree with a lot of the points in this post, however I feel that Psychoanalytic Theory could be described using a slightly different example than stated in Inquisitive Literatos' post.
ReplyDeleteIn a strange way the passing from signifier to signifier can be related to hunger. We move from signifier to signifier and although it may be what we desire and may fulfill this desire for a bit of time, we inevitably will desire more again. It is a repetitive cycle causing an endless journey, where satisfaction can never fully be reached.
When one is hungry they desire some type of food to satisfy the hunger. Even though the hunger is satisfied after eating, we will always desire more and become hungry again. Our hunger is never fully satisfied as the feeling returns again.
The way that Inquisitive Literatos described language and desire as being the same was clarified nicely in this post. I understood this before but the way it was articulated made a lot of sense to me. We are always searching for the meaning of language and words as they are interpreted differently in different languages, just as we always have feelings of desire. Even when we possess many objects we always want more. For example, even when someone has more clothing than they know what to do with they are always desiring the newest trends.
I like your connection to psychoanalytic theory being a circle. It's a never ending process of searching for something, and never achieving it, but still continuing that search.
ReplyDeleteI think we can relate this circle to post-structuralism. In regards to slippage, we are always substituting signifier for signifier, but what allows for us to do so? When there is no defined meaning or center to a signifier, the process will be endless.
As for the connection between desire and language, as humans, we are always searching for something and never satisfied, because what we want will continually change. There is no set reasoning behind this desire.
Finally, with the death drive, actions and feelings are completely unpredictable, meaning there is no set response to how a person will feel. This is disconcerting to many as it is not the loss of control, but the realization that control does not exist in the first place.