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A French word which derives from the verb jouir meaning to have pleasure in, to enjoy, to appreciate, to savour; with a secondary meaning, as in English, of having rights and pleasures in the use of, as in the phrases .she enjoyed good health., .she enjoyed a considerable fortune., and .all citizens enjoy the right of freedom of expression.. The derived noun, jouissance, has three current meanings in French: it signifies an extreme or deep pleasure; it signifies sexual orgasm; and in law, it signifies having the right to use something, as in the phrase avoir la jouissance de quelquechose. The word becomes relevant to cultural and literary studies through its usage by the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan to signify the condition or bliss, arrival, merging with the other, which can be associated with orgasm but also the obtention of any particularly desired object or condition - for the explorer, arriving at the North Pole perhaps. Jouissance, for Lacan, is not a purely pleasurable experience but arises through augmenting sensation to a point of discomfort (as in the sexual act, where the cry of passion is at times indistinguishable from the cry of pain), or as in running a marathon. Such experiences, as Freud recognised in his essay .Beyond the Pleasure Principle. (1920), seem to come close to death, and in Freud.s theory imply an urge to regress to the inorganic state that preceded life. For Lacan, on the other hand, jouissance seems to imply a desire to abolish the condition of lack (la manque) to which we are condemned by our acceptance of the signs of the symbolic order in place of the Real.
JOUISSANCE AND DESIRE
His most explicit statement on the matter comes in the lecture of 26 March 1958, when he claims that 'the subject does not simply satisfy a desire, he enjoys [ jouit ] desiring, and this is an essential dimension of his jouissance.' 21 In other words, desire is not a movement towards an object, since if it were then it would be simple to satisfy it. Rather, desire lacks an object that could satisfy it, and is therefore to be conceived of as a movement which is pursued endlessly, simply for the enjoyment (jouissance) of pursuing it. Jouissance is thus lifted out of the register of the satisfaction of a biological need, and becomes instead the paradoxical satisfaction which is found in pursuing an eternally unsatisfied desire. It is no surprise, then, that Lacan immediately links it with the phenomenon of masochism. These first remarks on the relationship of jouissance and desire suggest that jouissance is what sustains desire, since it is the enjoyment of desiring for desire's sake that keeps one desiring in the absence of satisfaction.
The [[prohibition]] of ''[[jouissance]]'' (the [[pleasure principle]]) is inherent in the [[symbolic]] [[structure]] of [[language]], which is why "''jouissance'' is forbidden to him who speaks, as such."<ref>E 319</ref>
The [[subject]]’s entry into the [[symbolic]] is conditional upon a certain initial [[renunciation]] of ‘’[[jouissance]]’’ in the [[castration complex]], when the [[subject]] gives up his attempts to be the [[imaginary phallus]] for the [[mother]].
The [[symbolic]] [[prohibition]] of enjoyment in the [[Oedipus complex]] (the [[incest]] [[taboo]]) is thus, paradoxically, the [[prohibition]] of something which is already impossible.
Its function is therefore to sustain the [[neurosis|neurotic]] [[illusion]] that enjoyment would be attainable if it were not forbidden.
The very [[prohibition]] creates the [[desire]] to [[transgression|transgress]] it, and ‘’jouissance’’ is therefore fundamentally transgressive.
JOUISSANCE AND DRIVE
FEMININE JOUISSANCE
However in 1973 [[Lacan]] admits that there is a specificially feminine jouissance, a ‘supplementary jouissance’, which is beyond the pahllus’. A ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ of the Other.<ref>S20, 58, 69)</ref>
This feminine ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ is ineffable.
In order to differentiate between these two forms of jouissance, [[Lacan]] introduces different algebraic symbols for each; Jd designates phallic jouissance, whereas JA designates the ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ of the Other.
In <i>[[The Ethics of Psychoanalysis]]</i>, [[Lacan]] based ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ on the [[law]].
If ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ consists in breaking the barrier of the [[pleasure principle]], if it can only be attained through a [[transgression]], then only a [[prohibition]] opens the path toward it.
As for the "[[other]]," he is already implicated in [[Freud]]'s analysis of [[sadism]]: when we inflict pain on others, "we enjoy by identifying with the suffering object." From his reading of <i>[[Civilization and Its Discontents]]</i>, [[Lacan]] concluded, "Jouissance is evil . . . because it involves suffering for my neighbor" (1992, p. 184). Moreover, he noted that love of one's neighbor seemed absurd to Freud. Each time that this Christian ideal is stated, "we see evoked the presence of that fundamental evil which dwells within this neighbor. But if that is the case, then it also dwells within me. And what is more of a neighbor to me than this heart within which is that of my ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ and which I don't dare go near?" (Lacan, 1992, p. 186).
In "The Subversion of the Subject and the Dialectic of Desire" (2002), [[Lacan]] inscribed ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ in the topography of his graph of desire. At the upper level of the graph, ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ is indicated by signifying lack in the Other, S(A?). This is phallic jouissance, which is related to castration as lack. Traditionally, the erectile organ, the phallus, represents the object of jouissance, not so much by itself, but rather as the missing portion of a desired image. Phallic ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ is inscribed in the diagram at the level of a vector that starts out from S(A?), the Other's lack, and goes toward (S? ? D), the drive as articulated by the subject and the demand of the Other. Thus ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ is "of the Other" and at the same time operates on the level of the drive. Recognizing the Other's lack produces a fantasy in the subject's unconscious. In this fantasy, the object represents what the subject imagines that the Other is deprived of.
In everyday life, the mother, as primordial Other, is prohibited from making up for her lack with her child. Thus the Other remains prohibited. In his diagram, [[Lacan]] located ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ at the place of the barred Other, S(A?) this is also where [[Lacan]] inscribed the superego that orders the subject to enjoy, "Jouis!" To this command, the subject can only respond, "J'ouis!" ("I hear!"), for such ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ is structurally prohibited. [[Lacan]] repeated that while the superego prohibits and punishes, it also requires that the subject experience jouissance. For Lacan, the requirement to enjoy is directly related to a taboo. But what is prohibited, what must remain unsatisfied, is only the subject's jouissance. Giving the Other an experience of ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ does not seem to be prohibited.
The Other is barred in the diagram only by being marked by the loss of object <i>a</i>. Thus if a subject assumes the position of the Other's missing object and if this can make the Other whole, then "It would enjoy," as [[Lacan]] said (2002, p. 311). He thus introduced a ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ outside the phallic order, a mystic jouissance, which he defined as a nonphallic, feminine ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ (1998). For being not whole, a woman "has a supplementary ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ compared to what the phallic function designates by way of jouissance. . . . Y]ou need but go to Rome and see the statue by [Gianlorenzo] Bernini [the Ecstasy of St. Teresa] to immediately understand that she's coming. There's no doubt about it" (1998, pp. 73, 76).
But what did [[Lacan]] mean when he said that a woman, for being "not whole," was capable of a supplementary, nonphallic jouissance? With the "formulas of sexuation," he proposed dividing subjects not according to their biological sex, but according to their relation to the phallus. On the masculine side would be those subjects who take object <i>a</i> as the cause of their desire and depend upon their phallic nature to attain it. Subjects on the feminine side have one eye on the phallus and one eye on the ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ of the Other, S(A?). The male or female mystic—a designation independent of biological sex—is situated on the feminine side. Supplementary jouissance, strictly speaking, is feminine. But to attain it, the subject must stop looking both ways—toward phallic ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ and ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ of the Other—and become devoted only to the latter. Such an experience was attained by St. John of the Cross, for example, who was familiar with a mystical ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ "outside sex," and thus beyond the mark of difference and beyond lack. The moment of ecstasy arrives when the mystic, entirely desubjectified and merged with object <i>a</i> of the Other's desire, becomes one with the Other, who in turn no longer lacks. The result is that to represent the Other's jouissance, "A" is rewritten as unbarred, S(A). In <i>Civilization and Its Discontents</i>, [[Freud]] referred to the "oceanic feeling" of being at one with the greater Whole. Such is the feeling of mysticism, and also of trances and ecstasy.
Whereas [[Freud]] discussed the dark relationship between mysticism and suffering with great hesitation, [[Lacan]] spoke of them more positively by remarking that on the cultural level, adoration of Christ suffering on the cross naturally sustains jouissance. If certain mystics directly experience ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ by looking at the Other's face—by looking at the face of God—others can attain it only by allowing the ever so broken body of Christ on Calvary to sustain it. They partake of a vicarious ‘‘[[jouissance]]’’ from Christ's mutilated body offered up to God. Commenting on Catholicism, [[Lacan]] wrote, "That doctrine speaks only of the incarnation of God in a body, and assumes that the passion suffered in that person constituted another person's jouissance" (1998, p. 113)
== [[Kid A In Alphabet Land]] ==
[[Image:Kida_j.gif |right|frame]]
'''Kid A In Alphabet Land Jumps Another Juicy 'Jaculator - That Jerk-Off, Jouissance!'''
You Displease Me, And You Think I Gain Pleasure From That! Heh! You Must Take Me For Some Masochistic Francophile! And You're The Substance I'm Paid With By My Lack Of Substance? You're Impossible! I'm Coming To Get You! - Fuck You, Jouissance!
==See Also==
* [[Autism]]
* [[Castration of the subject]]
* [[Dark continent]]
* [[Formula of Fantasy]]
* [[Fetishism]]
* [[Graph of Desire]]
* [[Heredity and the Aetiology of the Neuroses]]
* [[Kantianism and psychoanalysis]]
* [[Masochism]]
* [[Matheme]]
* [[Narcissistic elation]]
* ''[[Object a]]''
* [[Phallus]]
* [[Phobias in children]]
* [[Repetition compulsion]]
* [[Formulas of Sexuation]]
* [[Subject's desire]]
* [[Subject of the drive]]
* [[Suffering]]
* [[Symptom]]
* ''[[sinthome]]''
* [[Voyeurism]]
==References==
<references/>
# Freud, Sigmund. (1920). Beyond the pleasure principle. SE, 18: 1-64.
# ——. (1930). Civilization and its discontents. SE, 21: 57-145.
# Lacan, Jacques. (1991). Le séminaire. Book 17: L'envers de la psychanalyse (1969-1970). Paris: Seuil.
# ——. (1992). The seminar of Jacques Lacan. Book 7: The ethics of psychoanalysis (1959-1960) (Dennis Porter, Trans.). New York: W. W. Norton.
# ——. (1998). The seminar of Jacques Lacan. Book 20: On feminine sexuality: the limits of love and knowledge, encore (1972-1973) (Bruce Fink, Trans.). New York: W. W. Norton.
# ——. (2002). The subversion of the subject and the dialectic of desire in the Freudian unconscious. In his Écrits: A selection (Bruce Fink, Trans.). New York: W. W. Norton. (Original work published 1960.)
[[Category:Desire]]
[[Category:Kid A In Alphabet Land]]
[[Category:Jacques Lacan]]
[[Category:Terms]]
[[Category:Concepts]]
[[Category:Psychoanalysis]]
[[Category:Sexuality]]
{{Footer Kid A}}
== [[Kid A In Alphabet Land]] ==
[[Image:Kida_j.gif |right|frame]]
