Changes

==Aggression==[[Lacan]] draws a distinction between [[aggressivity ]]and [[aggressivity|aggression]].

[[Aggression]] refers only to [[violence|violent]] [[act]]s whereas [[aggressivity]] is a fundamental relation which underlies not only such acts but many other phenomena also.<ref>{{S1}} p.177</ref>

==Ambivalence==[[Lacan]] argues that [[aggressivity]] is just as present in apparently [[love|loving acts ]] [[act]]s as in violent ones; it "underlies the activity of the philanthropist, the idealist, the pedagogue, and even the reformer.<ref>{{E}} p.7</ref>

[[Lacan]] is simply restating [[Freud]]'s concept of [[ambivalence (]] -- the interdependence of [[love]] and [[hate]]), which [[Lacan]] regards as one of the fundamental discoveries of [[psychoanalysis]]. ---

In the [[mirror stage]], the [[infant]] sees its [[reflection]] in the [[mirror]] as a [[wholeness]], in contrast with the uncoordination in the [[real]] [[body]]: this contrast is experienced as an [[aggressivity|aggressive tension ]] between the [[specular image]] and the [[real]] [[body]], since the [[wholeness]] of the [[image]] seems to threaten the [[body]] with disintegration and [[fragmentationfragmented body|disintegration]] (see and [[fragmented bodyfragmentation]]). --- 

===Identification===The consequent [[identification]] with the [[specular image]] thus implies an [[ambivalence|ambivalent ]] relation with the [[counterpart]], involving both [[eroticism]] and [[aggressivity|aggression]].

This '"[[aggressivity|erotic aggression' ]]" continues as a fundamental [[ambivalence]] underlying all future forms of [[identification]], and is an essential characteristic of [[narcissism]]. [[Narcissism]] can thus easily veer from extreme self-love to the opposite extreme of 'narcissistic suicidal aggression' (''agression suicidaire narcissique'').<ref>{{Ec}} p.187</ref>

==Narcissism== [[Narcissism]] can thus easily veer from extreme [[love|self--love]] to the opposite extreme of "[[narcissism|narcissistic suicidal aggression]]" (''agression suicidaire narcissique'').<ref>{{Ec}} p. 187</ref>

==Imaginary==By linking [[aggressivity]] to the [[imaginary]] [[order]] of [[eros]], [[Lacan]] seems to diverge significantly from [[Freud]], since [[Freud]] sees [[aggressivity]] as an outward manifestation of the [[death drive]] (which is, in [[Lacan]]ian terms, situated not in the [[imaginary ]] but in the [[symbolic ]] [[order]]).

This [[aggressivity]] directed towards the [[analyst]] then becomes "the initial knot of the analytic drama."<ref>{{E}} p.14</ref> This [[phase]] of the [[treatment]] is very important since if the [[aggressivity]] is handled correctly by the [[analyst]], it will be accompanied by "a marked decrease in the patient's deepest resistances.<ref>Lacan, 1951b: 13</ref>