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Après-Coup

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Template:Infobox psychoanalytic concept

Après-coup (French: après-coup; German: Nachträglichkeit, translated as afterwardsness, deferred action, or retroaction) is a fundamental concept in psychoanalysis introduced by Sigmund Freud. It describes the process by which earlier experiences acquire retroactive sexual, traumatic, or unconscious significance through later events, restructuring memory, desire, and thought.[1][2]

The term has been elaborated by Jacques Lacan and contemporary theorists, influencing understandings of temporality, causality, and the psyche's non-linear structure. It underpins Freudian metapsychology, linking psychic trauma, repression, the formation of the unconscious, and infantile sexuality.[3]

History

Freudian Origins

Freud first employed Nachträglichkeit in his Project for a Scientific Psychology (1895) and the Studies on Hysteria (1895), where it denotes how an initial event gains traumatic meaning only after a subsequent experience provides the necessary context for retroactive processing.[4] In the Wolf Man case (1918), Freud illustrated après-coup through the primal scene, reinterpreted in adulthood.[5]

Lacanian and Post-Lacanian Developments

Lacan integrated après-coup into his return to Freud, emphasizing its role in the signifier chain and the Real's intrusion. French psychoanalysis, particularly post-1960s, expanded it semantically and clinically.[6] Bernard Chervet positions it as organizing human thought, desire, and libido regeneration.[7]

Theoretical Orientation

Après-coup structures core Freudian processes:

  • Psychic trauma: Initial impressions become traumatic via later retroaction.[8]
  • Repression and the unconscious: Failed translations of drive residues form unconscious sources, reactivated après-coup.[9]
  • Infantile sexuality: Sexual drives emerge from two-step translation-repression, seeking meaning retroactively.[10]
  • Temporality and causality: Challenges linear time, as past is rewritten by future events.[11]

It relates to dream-work, perceptual identity, and defenses like undoing.[12]

Clinical Applications

In analysis, après-coup manifests in sessions where early memories gain meaning through transference. It explains evolving situations, dream saturation, and bodily erogeneity.[13] Theorists link it to superego formation and feelings of lack.[14]

Publications

  • Chervet, Bernard. Après-coup in Psychoanalysis: The Fulfilment of Desire and Thought (Routledge, 2019).[15]
  • House, J. "The Ongoing Rediscovery of Après-Coup as a Central Psychoanalytic Concept" (2017).[16]

See also

References

  1. ↑ House, J. (2017). "The Ongoing Rediscovery of Après-Coup as a Central Psychoanalytic Concept", PubMed Central.
  2. ↑ Chervet, B. (2019). Après-coup in Psychoanalysis: The Fulfilment of Desire and Thought, Routledge.
  3. ↑ House (2017).
  4. ↑ "Afterwardsness". Wikipedia. Retrieved 2026-01-31..
  5. ↑ Chervet (2019), ch. 3: "The work of Freud and his followers as a clinical illustration of the operation of après-coup".
  6. ↑ Chervet (2019), ch. 2: "Semantic and semiological vicissitudes of the term Nachträglichkeit".
  7. ↑ Chervet (2019).
  8. ↑ House (2017).
  9. ↑ House (2017).
  10. ↑ House (2017).
  11. ↑ Chervet (2019), ch. 5: "Metapsychological approach to the concept of après-coup".
  12. ↑ "Après Coup: A Comment". European Journal of Psychoanalysis. .
  13. ↑ Chervet (2019), chs. 4, 7–8.
  14. ↑ Chervet (2019), ch. 10.
  15. ↑ Chervet, Bernard (2019). Après-coup in Psychoanalysis. Routledge..
  16. ↑ House (2017).

Further reading

  • Afterwardsness (Wikipedia entry).
  • European Journal of Psychoanalysis articles on après-coup.
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