Discourse
French: discours |
Discourse of the Other
The term "discourse" is used by Lacan to emphasize the transindividual nature of language, the fact that speech always implies another subject, an interlocutor.
The unconscious is the "discourse of the Other", the effect on the subject of speech that is addressed to that subject from elsewhere, by another subject (who has been forgotten), by an other scene or psychic locality.
Social Bond
In 1969, Lacan begins to use the term "discourse" to denote a "social bond, founded in language."
He identifies four types of social bonds, four articulations of the symbolic network which regulates intersubjective relations.
Four Discourses
These "four discourses" are
- the discourse of the master,
- the discourse of the university,
- the discourse of the hysteric, and
- the discourse of the analyst.
Four Algorithms
Each of the four discourses is represented by an algorithm which contains four algebraic symbols.
The four discourses correspond to four algorithms: each algorithm contains four algebraic symbols.
The four discourses correspond to four algorithms, each of which contains four algebraic symbols.
Four Symbols
The algorithms of the four discourses contain four algebraic symbols in four different positions.
The positions of the four symbols in each algorithm is what distinguishes the four discourses from one another.
What distinguishes the four discourses from one another is the positions of the four symbols in each algorithm .
The four discourses are distinguished from one another by the positions of these four symbols in each algorithm .
Four Positions
Each discourse has four positions, which stand in a fixed relationship to one another.
There are four positions in each discourse, which stand in a fixed relationship to one another.
There are four positions in the algorithms of the four discourses, each of which is designated by a different name.
Four Names
The first position (with which each discourse starts) is called the agent.
The second position is called the other.
The third position is called the product.
The four position is called the truth.
The names of the four positions are shown below.[1]
- ↑ Lacan, Jacques. Le Séminaire. Livre XX. Encore, 1972-73. Ed. Jacques-Alain Miller. Paris: Seuil, 1975. p. 21