Talk:Sinthome

From No Subject
Jump to navigation Jump to search

The sinthome is a concept introduced by French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan in the final period of his teaching, most fully elaborated in Seminar XXIII: Le sinthome (1975–76). The term revives an archaic French spelling of symptôme (“symptom”), but Lacan repurposes it to designate a singular, irreducible mode of jouissance that stabilizes the subject beyond symbolic interpretation.

Unlike the classical psychoanalytic symptom, understood as a coded message of the unconscious to be deciphered, the sinthome refers to a non-meaningful kernel of enjoyment that resists analysis and functions as a structural support for subjectivity.


From Symptom to Sinthome

Early Lacanian Conceptions of the Symptom

In Lacan’s early teaching, the symptom is conceived in linguistic terms, as a formation of the unconscious structured like a language. In Écrits, Lacan describes the symptom as:

“a metaphor in which flesh or function is taken as a signifying element.”[1]

As early as 1957, however, Lacan complicates this view by stating that the symptom is “inscribed in a writing process,” already suggesting that it cannot be reduced to semantic interpretation alone.[2]

Symptom as Jouissance

A decisive shift occurs in the 1960s. In Seminar X: L’angoisse (1962–63), Lacan distinguishes the symptom from acting out, asserting that the symptom is not a message addressed to the Other:

“The symptom, unlike acting out, is not a call to the Other; it is a pure jouissance addressed to no one.”[3]

This position is radicalized in Seminar XXII: RSI (1974–75), where Lacan offers a late definition:

“The symptom can only be defined as the way in which each subject enjoys [*jouit*] the unconscious, insofar as the unconscious determines him.”[4]

This reconceptualization—understanding the symptom as a fixed mode of enjoyment rather than a bearer of meaning—culminates in the introduction of the term sinthome.

Seminar XXIII and Topology

Lacan introduces sinthome as the title of Seminar XXIII (1975–76), which continues his topological turn and extends his work on the Borromean knot. In this topology, the Real, Symbolic, and Imaginary are linked such that the removal of any one ring causes the entire knot to unravel.

In Seminar XXIII, Lacan argues that these three orders may fail to remain knotted and proposes the sinthome as a fourth ring, whose function is to bind them together:

“What I call the sinthome is what gives consistency to the Borromean knot.”[5]

This fourth ring is not a metaphor but a non‑signifying real function. Since meaning (sens) already arises at the intersection of the Symbolic and the Imaginary, the sinthome’s function—knotting Real, Symbolic, and Imaginary—lies beyond meaning:

“A knot before which the imagination fails.”[6]

Sinthome and Jouissance

The sinthome designates a kernel of jouissance immune to the efficacy of the symbolic. Rather than calling for dissolution, it is what allows the subject to persist:

“The sinthome is what allows one to live.”[7]

In one of Lacan’s final formulations of the end of analysis, the analytic task is no longer the elimination of the symptom but identification with the sinthome—the subject’s assumption of their singular mode of enjoyment.

James Joyce and the Sinthome

A central reference in Seminar XXIII is James Joyce, whose writing Lacan reads as a paradigmatic sinthome. Lacan argues that Joyce suffered from a radical deficiency in the Name‑of‑the‑Father, a structural absence that would ordinarily expose the subject to psychosis. Joyce avoided psychotic disintegration by using his literary practice as a suppléance (supplementary support):

“Joyce made a name for himself, precisely by replacing the Name‑of‑the‑Father.”[8]

Joyce’s writing—from early epiphanies to Finnegans Wake—is read as a destructive refashioning of language, an invasion of the symbolic by private jouissance. Lacan’s pun synth‑homme (“synthetic man”) suggests a form of artificial self‑creation through the sinthome.

---

Žižek’s Interpretation

The Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Žižek emphasizes the non‑semantic dimension of the sinthome, describing it as a fragment of enjoyment irreducible to interpretation:

“Such a fragment of the signifier permeated with idiotic enjoyment is what Lacan, in the last stage of his teaching, called le sinthome.”[9]

Žižek characterizes the sinthome as a meaningless letter that directly produces jouis‑sense (“enjoyment‑in‑meaning”), rather than a message to be deciphered.

Clinical Implications

In Lacan’s late theory, psychoanalysis does not aim at symptom resolution through interpretation. Instead, treatment seeks to modify the subject’s relation to jouissance — what Lacan describes as learning “how to make do with one’s sinthome.”[10]

This perspective has particular importance in cases of psychosis, where the sinthome may function as a stabilizing substitute for the Name‑of‑the‑Father, but it also applies to neurosis as the limit of analytic work.

See also

References

  1. ↑ Lacan, J. (2002a [1953]). Écrits, p. 228.
  2. ↑ Lacan, J. (1957). Écrits, p. 445.
  3. ↑ Lacan, J. (1962–63). Seminar X, session of 23 January 1963.
  4. ↑ Lacan, J. (1974–75). Seminar XXII, session of 18 February 1975.
  5. ↑ Lacan, J. (1975–76). Seminar XXIII, session of 13 January 1976.
  6. ↑ Lacan, J. (1975–76). Seminar XXIII, session of 9 December 1975.
  7. ↑ Lacan, J. (1975–76). Seminar XXIII.
  8. ↑ Lacan, J. (1975–76). Seminar XXIII, session of 18 November 1975.
  9. ↑ Žižek, S. (1991). Looking Awry, p. 129.
  10. ↑ Lacan, J. (1975–76). Seminar XXIII.

Cite error: <ref> tag defined in <references> has no name attribute.

Retrieved from "https://nosubject.com/index.php?title=Talk:Sinthome&oldid=60027"