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{{Infobox_Scientist
| name = Jacques Lacan
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| birth_date = [[13 April]] [[1901]]
| birth_place = [[Paris]], [[France]]
| death_date = [[9 September]] [[1981]]
| death_place = [[Paris]], [[France]]
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| citizenship = France
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| field = [[Psychology]]
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[[Jacques Lacan|Jacques-Marie Émile Lacan]] ([[Jacques Lacan:Chronology#1901|13 April 1901]] – [[Jacques Lacan:Chronology#1981|9 September 1981]]) was a [[French]] [[psychoanalyst]] and [[psychiatrist]] who made prominent contributions to psychoanalysis, [[philosophy]], and [[literary]] [[theory]]. Giving yearly [[seminars]] in Paris from 1953 to 1981, Lacan influenced France's intellectuals in the 1960s and the 1970s, especially the post-[[structuralist]] [[philosophers]]. His interdisciplinary [[work]] is [[Freudian]], featuring the [[unconscious]], the [[castration]] [[complex]], the ego, [[identification]], and [[language]] as [[subjective]] [[perception]]. His [[ideas]] have had a significant impact on [[critical theory]], [[literary theory]], twentieth-century French philosophy, [[sociology]], [[feminist]] theory and [[clinical]] psychoanalysis.
== def Biography== <blockquote>''[[Chronology|Click here for a more complete chronology of '''Jacques-Marie-Émile Lacan''' (April 13, 1901 – September 9's life]].''</blockquote>;1901:13 April, Jacques-Marie-Émile Lacan is [[born]] in Paris, 1981) was to a French [[psychoanalystfamily]] and of solid [[psychiatristCatholic]]. His work, like most psychoanalytic work[[tradition]]. He is educated at the collège Stanislas, owes a heavy, explicit debt to Jesuit school. After his ''baccalauréat'' he studies [[Sigmund Freudmedicine]], but also drew from a number of other fields, including and later [[linguisticspsychiatry]], .;1927: Starts clinical [[philosophytraining]], and works at [[mathematicsSainte-Anne's hospital]]. This interdisciplinary focus A year later he works in his work has led him to be an important figure in many fields beyond the Special Infirmary Service where [[[psychoanalysisClérambault]] - particularly within had a [[critical theorypractice]]. ;1932His central idea was that the human subject is a creation of its use of language. From this understanding Lacan develops :Awarded doctorate for his study of psychoanalysis and his treatment strategies. His work[[thesis]], while controversial, continues to influence the development of psychoanalysis worldwide. In France and elsewhere various "schools" of Lacanian thought have emerged''[[De la psychose paranoïaque dans ses rapports avec la personnalité]]''. ;1933Although there exist various competing emphases on Lacan's work among these "schools":The richness of his thesis, all agree in especially the fundamental importance [[analysis]] of the unconscious. By structuring the options available to any speaking subject in the articulation [[case]] of his or her desires[[Aimée]], makes him famous with the unconscious determines [[Surrealist]]s. BEtween this year and 1939 he takes [[Kojève]]'s course at the very fabric of human life as we may come to know itEcole Pratique des Hautes [[Etudes]], according an "Introduction to Lacan. ==Career==Lacan took up the study [[reading]] of medicine in 1920 and specialised in psychiatry from 1926. He undertook his own analysis around this time with [[Rudolph LoewensteinHegel]] and this continued until 1938. Lacan was very active in the world of Parisian writers, artists and intellectuals of the time.";1934: he was a friend of He [[André Bretonmarries]][[Marie-Louise]] Blondon, [[Salvador Dalímother]] and of [[PicassoCaroline]]{{fact}}, [[Thibaut]] and attended the ''mouvement Psyché'' founded by [[Maryse ChoisySibylle]]. He made contributions to several Surrealist publications and was present at the first public reading of While in analysis with Rudolph [[James JoyceLoewenstein]]’s , Lacan becomes a member of the ''[[Ulysses (novel)[Société Psychanalytique de Paris|UlyssesSociété psychanalytique de Paris]]]]''. In his studies he had a particular interest in the philosophic work of ([[Karl JaspersSociété psychanalytique de Paris|SPP]] and [[Martin Heidegger]] and).;1940:Works at Val-de-Grâce, alongside many other Parisian intellectuals of the time, he also attended military hospital in Paris. During the famous seminars on [[HegelGerman]] given by [[Alexandre KojèveOccupation, he does not take part in any [[official]] [[activity]]. ;1946:In 1946, the [[SPP]] resumes its activities and Lacan presented his first analytic paper on ‘The Mirror Phase’ at the 1936 Congress of the International Psychoanalytical Association in Marienbad. He was called up to serve in the French army after the German occupation , with Nacht and Lagache, takes charge of France training [[analyses]] and was posted to the Val-de-Grâce military hospital in Paris. After the end of the war Lacan visited England for a five week study trip, meeting English analysts supervisory [[control]] and plays an important [[Wilfred Biontheoretical]] and John Rickmaninstitutional [[role]]. He was much influenced by Bion’s analytic work with groups and this contributed ;1951:The [[SPP]] begins to his own later emphasis on study groups (in Franceraise the issue of Lacan's [[short sessions]], cartels) as a structure with which opposed to advance theoretical work in psychoanalysis. the standard analytical hour.;1953:In 1951 January Lacan started to hold a weekly seminar at is elected President of the St-Anne Hospital Paris, urging what [[SPP]]. Six months later he described as ‘a return to Freud’ and, in particular, resigns to Freud’s concentration upon the linguistic nature of psychological symptomatology. Very influential in Parisian cultural life as well as in psychoanalytic theory and clinical practice, the seminars drew large crowds and continued for nearly thirty years. Lacan was a member of join the ''[[Société Parisienne Française de Psychanalyse ]]'' (SPP[[SFP]])with D. Lagache, F. Dolto, which was a member body of the J. Favez-Boutonier among [[International Psychoanalytical Associationothers]] (IPA). In 1953, after a disagreement about analytic practice methodsRome, Lacan and many of delivers his colleagues left the SPP to form a new group the report, "''[[Société Française Fonction et champ de Psychanalysela parole et du langage]] (SFP)''". One On 17 July he marries [[Sylvia]] Maklès, mother of the consequences of this move was to deprive the new group of membership within the IPA[[Judith]]. In That autumn Lacan starts his [[seminar]]s at the following years a complex process of negotiation was to take place to determine the status of the SFP within the IPA[[Hôspital Sainte-Anne]]. Lacan’s practice;1954:The first ten [[seminar]]s elaborate fundamental notions [[about]] [[psychoanalytic]] [[technique]], with his controversial innovation the essential [[concepts]] of variable-length sessions[[psychoanalysis]], and its [[ethics]]. During this period Lacan writes, on the critical stance he took towards much basis of the accepted orthodoxy of psychoanalytic theory his seminars, conferences and practice led, addresses in 1963colloquia, to a condition being set by the IPA major [[texts]] that the registration of the SFP was dependent upon Lacan being removed from the list of training analysts with the organisationare found in ''[[Ecrits]]'' in 1966. Lacan refused such a condition and left the SFP ;1956:Celebrities are attracted to form his own school which became know as the seminars ([[École Freudienne de ParisJean Hyppolite]] (EFP). Leaving the St-Anne Hospital where he had delivered his seminar up to this point Lacan began to give it instead at the elite higher education establishment the 's analysis of [[École Normale SupérieureFreud]]. Lacan began to set forth his own teaching 's article on psychoanalysis to an audience of colleagues who had joined him from ''Dé[[négation]]'', given during the SFP. His lectures also attracted many of the École Normale’s students. Many students of Lacan became important psychoanalysts and/or wrote influential contributions to philosophy and other fieldsfirst seminar, is a well-known example). [[Michel FoucaultAlexandre Koyré]], Claude Lévi-[[Jacques DerridaStrauss]], Maurice [[Louis AlthusserMerleau-Ponty]], [[Jacques-Alain Millerand ethnologist Marcel Griaule, Emile Benveniste among others attend his courses.;1962:[[SFP]], members [[Luce Irigaraywant]], to be recognized by the [[Jean LaplancheInternational Psycho-Analytical Association]], and even ([[Claude Levi-StraussIPA]], for example, all attended Lacan's seminars at some point). The [[IPA]] issues an ultimatum: Lacan's first seminar in 1964 was later published in English as ''[[The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysisname]] must be crossed off the [[list]]''. Lacan continued to deliver his public exposition of analytic theory and practice for the next seventeen yearsdidacticians.;1963==The 'Return to Freud'==Following Freud's death:Two weeks before the expiry of the deadline set by the IPA (31 October), psychoanalytic practice split into many differing schools the committee of didacticians of thought. Against the backdrop [[SFP]] gives up its courageous stand of these divergent currents 1962 and pronounces in favour of psychoanalytic theory, the ban: Lacan called for a 'return to Freud'. Lacan accused later psychoanalysts of a superficial understanding of Freud, claiming they had so cautiously adhered to his ideas that they had served to block rather than to induce scientific investigation is no longer one of the mental processdidacticians. Lacan wanted to return to Freud's thought;1964:Lacanians [[form]] a Study Group on Psychoanalysis organized by Jean Clavreul, and expand it in light of its own tensions and currents. In fact, near until Lacan official founds the end of his life he remarked to a conference''[[Ecole Française de Psychanalyse]]'', "It is up to you to be Lacanians if you wish; I am Freudian." It should also be emphasised that Lacan insisted that his work was not, in his eyes, an interpretation but a ''translation'' of Freud into structuralwhich soon becomes the ''[[Ecole Freudienne de Paris]]'' ([[EFP]]). With [[Lévi-linguistic terms. Freud's ideas of 'slips of the tongue', jokes Strauss]] and suchlike – Lacan insisted – all emphasised the agency of language in subjective constitution, such that had Freud lived contemporaneously with [[Claude Lévi-Strauss|Lévi-StraussAlthusser]]'s support, he is appointed lecturer at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes.;1965:In January Lacan begins his new seminar on "[[[Roland Barthes|BarthesThe Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis]] and, principally, had Freud been aware of " at the work of Ecole Normale Supérieure. His audience is made up of [[Ferdinand de Saussure|Saussureanalysts]], he would have done and young students in philosophy at the same as him. In his famous essay, "Freud and Lacan"ENS, fellow structuralist notably [[Louis AlthusserJacques-Alain Miller]] makes this point particularly well:.;1966<blockquote>"In his first great work ''The Interpretation of Dreams'' :[[…Ecrits]], Freud studied the ‘mechanisms’ and ‘laws’ of dreamsParis: Seuil 1966. The book draws considerable attention to the [[EFP]], reducing their variants to twoextending far beyond the intelligentsia.;1967: Lacan presents the ''displacement[[Acte]] de Fondation'' and ''condensation''. Lacan recognized these as two essential figures of speech, called in linguistics of the [[respectivelyEFP]] metonymy and metaphor. Hence slips, failures, jokes and symptoms, like ; its novelty lies in the elements procedure of dreams themselves, become ''signifiers[[passe]]'', inscribed in the chain . The ''[[passe]]'' consists of an unconscious discourse, doubling silently, i.e. deafeninglytestifying, in the misrecognition front of ‘repression’two ''passeurs'', the chain of the human subject’s verbal discourse. to one's [[…experience]] Hence the most important acquisitions of de Saussure as an analysand and of the linguistics that descends from him began especially to play a justified part in the understanding crucial [[moment]] of passage from the process [[position]] of the unconscious as well as [[analysand]] to that of the verbal discourse of the subject and of their inter-relationship, i[[analyst]].e. of their identical relation and non-relation in other words, of their reduplication and dislocation ( The ''décalagepasseurs'')." are chosen by their [[analyst]]s (Althusser, ‘Freud generally analysts of the EFP) and Lacan’ should be at the same [[stage]] in their [[analytic]] experience as the ''Lenin and Philosophy and other essayspassant'', trans. Ben Brewster (London: New Left Books They listen to him and then, 1971)in turn, pp. 191 – 192. </blockquote> The 'return they testify to Freud'what they have heard in front of a committee for approval composed of the director, thereforeLacan, is primarily the realisation that the pervading agency and of the unconscious is to be understood as intimately tied some AE, ''[[analyste]] de l'école'' (analyst of the school). This committee's function is to select the analysts of the functions School and dynamics of language, where, for exampleto elaborate, after the signifier is irremediably divorced from the signifiedselecting [[process]], ultimately resulting in Lack. It is here that Lacan began his a 'work on "correcting" Freud from withinof [[doctrine]]'. As Malcolm Bowie puts it:;1969<blockquote>"For Lacan, Freud:The issue of the ''passe'' keeps invading the EFP's central insight was not [[life]]...] that the unconscious exists, but that it has structure, that this structure affects in innumerable ways what we say and do, and that in thus betraying itself it becomes accessible to analysis "''Le quatrième groupe''". (Malcolm Bowie, 'Jacques is formed around those who resign from the EFP disputing over Lacan' in John Sturrock (ed.), s methods for the analysts''Structuralism training and Since: From Lévi-Strauss to Derrida'' (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979), paccreditation. 118).</blockquote> (The 'return to Freud' in the full sense of the term, Lacan takes a stand in the crisis of the [[university]] that follows May [[1968]]: "If psychoanalysis cannot be articulated as briefly explained above, begins with his paper ‘The agency of the letter a [[knowledge]] and taught as such, it has no [[place]] in the unconscious or reason since Freud’ (''Écrits''university, ppwhich deals only with knowledge. 161 - 197).) " The ENS director finds a pretext for telling Lacan's principal challenge to Freudian theory that he is no longer welcome at the ENS at the privilege that it accords to beginning of the ego in self-determinationacademic year. The central pillar of Jacques Lacan Moreover, the journal ''Cahiers pour l's psychoanalytic theory is that "[[the unconscious is structured like a languageAnalyse]]]". The unconscious, he argued, was not a more primitive or archetypal part of the mind separate from the conscious, linguistic ego'' has to cease publication, but rather, a formation every bit [[Vincennes]] appears as complex and linguistically sophisticated as consciousness itselfan alternative. If the unconscious is structured like a language, Michel [[Foucault]] asks Lacan argues, then to create and direct the self is denied any point Department of reference Psychoanlaysis at Vincennes. Thanks to which to be 'restored' following trauma or 'identity crisis'. In this wayLévi-Strauss, Lacan's thesis moves his seminars to the law school of the structurally dynamic unconscious is also a challenge to the ego psychology that Freud himself opposedPanthéon.;1974==Major concepts===== The mirror stage (''le stade du miroir'') === :The Vincennes Department of Psychoanalysis is renamed "[[mirror stageLe Champ freudien]] is described in " with Lacan's essay, "The Mirror Stage as formative in the function of the ''I'' as revealed in psychoanalytic experience"its director and [[Jacques-Alain Miller]] its president.;1980:On 9 January, Lacan announces the first [[dissolution]] of his ''Écrits'', which remains one of his seminal papers. Some have crudely put this as the point at which the child 'recognises' the EFP and asks those who [[wish]] to continue [[working]] with him- or herself to [[state]] their intentions in the mirror image[[writing]]. He receives over one thousand letters within a week. On 21 February, but this is unfaithful to what Lacan has in mind and also confuses his terminology. Lacanannounces the founding of the school 's emphasis here is on '[[La Cause freudienne]]'', later renamed the process of ''identification[[Ecole de la Cause freudienne]]'' with an outside image or entity induced through.;1981:9 September, as he puts it, "insufficiency to anticipation – and which manufactures for the subject, caught up in the lure of spatial identification, the succession of phantasies that extends from a fragmented bodyLacan dies in Paris.<!--;1901 -image to a form of its totality that I shall call orthopaedic – 1938:[[Lacan]] studies medicine and [[psychiatry]] and, lastly, to the assumption of the armour of an alienating identity, which will mark with its rigid structure completes his [[De la psychose paranoiaque dans ses rapports avec la personalité|doctoral thesis]] on [[paranoia|paranoid]] [[psychosis]]. He presents a paper on the subject’s entire mental development" (Lacan, ''Écrits'' (rvd. edn., 2002), 'The mirror stage', p. 5). It is significant that this process [[mirror stage]] - his first theoretical contribution to [[psychoanalysis]] - at a conference of identification is the first step towards the manufacture of the subject because all that follows it [[International Psycho- the transition into the Imaginary and the Symbolic order Analytical Association]] in [[Marienbad]].;1938 - is based on this misrecognition (1953 :[[Lacan]] is a member of the ''méconnaissance[[Société psychanalytique de Paris]]''): this is until he resigns to join the process that Lacan detects as manifesting itself at every subsequent identification with another person, identity (''not'[[Société Française de Psychanalyse]]' to be confused with 'identification') or suchlike throughout the subject's life. This is the start of a lifelong process of identifying the self in terms of the Other. What is also occasionally overlooked is the experiential basis of ;1953 - 1963:[[Lacan's early paper. As one writer has observed: "To evidence concerning the role of the other in childhood – the situation known as "transitivism," for instance, where the child ]] begins his first [[public]] [[seminar]] (which he will impute continue to give annually until his own actions [[death]]). Thereafter, he rises to another – Lacan adds evidence from animal biology, where it has been experimentally shown that a perceptual relationship to another of the same species is necessary become a renowned and controversial [[figure]] in the normal maturing processinternational psychoanalytic [[community]]. Without the visual presence of others, the maturing process is delayed, although it can be restored to a more nearly normal tempo by placing a mirror in ;1963 - 1980:[[Lacan]] leaves the animal’s cage." ([[Anthony WildenSFP]] and founds his own [[school]], "Lacan and the discourse of the Other" in Lacan, ''The Language [[École Freudienne de Paris]]'' . Following the publication of the Self: the Function [[Écrits]], there is an explosion of Language interest in Psychoanalysis'', trans. Anthony Wilden (London his work in France and Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1981), ppabroad. 159 – 160.)--><!--{| class="wikitable" width="100%" cellpadding=The Other"2" align="center" bgcolor="ffffff" style=In contrast to the dominant Anglo"background:#ffffff;width:100%; height:200px; text-American [[egoalign:center; line-psychologist]]s of his time, Lacan considered the self as something constituted in the height:2.0em;"Other| width=", that is, the conception of the external. Lacan argues that the psychoanalytic movement towards understanding the ego as a coherent force with dominion over a person's psyche was rooted in a misunderstanding of Freud. In Lacan's view, the self remained in eternal internal conflict and that only extensive self50px" style="valign:top;" | [[{{Y}}|1901]]<BR>-deceit made the situation bearable. His developmental theory of the objectified self was inspired by <BR>[[Ferdinand de Saussure{{Y}}|1938]]'s insights into the relationship of the signifier and the signified - the role of language and reference in thought were central to his formulations, particularly the Symbolic.<BR>| align="[[left]]" style==The Real, the Imaginary, and the Symbolic===Lacan also formulated the concepts of "padding: 0.2em 0.2em 0.2em 0.5em; margin: 0.5em 0 1em 0;" | [[the RealLacan]], studies medicine and [[the Imaginarypsychiatry]], and completes his [[the SymbolicDe la psychose paranoiaque dans ses rapports avec la personalité|doctoral thesis]] on [[paranoia|paranoid]], which he used to describe the elements of the [[psychic structurepsychosis]]. Lacan's notion of He presents a paper on the Real is a very difficult concept which he, in [[mirror stage]] -- his later years, worked first theoretical contribution to present in a structured, set-theory fashion, as [[mathemepsychoanalysis]]s. The Imaginary, or non-linguistic aspect - at a conference of the psyche, formulates human primitive [[selfInternational Psycho-knowledgeAnalytical Association]] while the Symbolic, his term for linguistic collaboration, generates a ([[communityIPA]]) in Marienbad.|-wide reflection of | width="50px" | [[primitive{{Y}}|1938]] self<BR>-knowledge and creates the very first set of rules that govern behavior<BR>[[{{Y}}|1953]]<BR>| align="left" style="padding: 0. The Real is the unspeakable reality, always present but continually mediated through the imaginary and the symbolic2em 0.2em 0.2em 0.5em; margin: 0. The Imaginary 5em 0 1em 0;" | [[Lacan]] is the realm a member of spatial identification that begins with the mirror stage (see above[[IPA]] affiliated), and is instrumental in the development of psychic agency. As discussed, it is here that the emerging subject is able to ''identify[[Société psychanalytique de Paris]]'' ([[SPP]]) until he resigns to join the '' his or her mirror image as [[Société Française de Psychanalyse]]'self', as distinguished from 'other'([[SFP]]). However, this process entails a certain structural alienation in that what is designated as 'self' is ''formed through'' what is Other – namely, the mirror image. What becomes the Subject proper is made through inception into the Symbolic order, which is when the infant acquires the ability to use language – that is, to realise his or her desire through speech. ===Other important concepts===* |-| width="50px" | [[{{Y}}|1953]]<BR>-<BR>[[The Name of the Father{{Y}}|1963]]<BR>*Oedipal drama and the Oedipal signification* | align="left" style="padding: 0.2em 0.2em 0.2em 0.5em; margin: 0.5em 0 1em 0;" | [[Objet Petit aLacan]]* begins his first public [[Signifier]]/ [[Signifiedseminar]](which he will continue to give annually until his death). *DesireThereafter, he rises to become a renowned and controversial figure in the international psychoanalytic community.*The Drive|-*| width="50px" | [[Jouissance{{Y}}|1963]]*The <BR>-<BR>[[Phallus{{Y}}|1980]]<BR>*Das Ding* the [[gaze]]* the | align="left" style="padding: 0.2em 0.2em 0.2em 0.5em; margin: 0.5em 0 1em 0;" | [[four discoursesLacan]]* leaves the [[graph of desireSFP]]* the (after his "[[Borromean clinicexpulsion]]* " from the [[Anamorphism| AnamorphosisIPA]] ==Writings ) and seminars==Although Lacan is a major figure in the history of founds his own [[psychoanalysisschool]], he made his most significant contributions not in the traditional form of books and journal articles, but through ''[[seminarÉcole Freudienne de Paris]] lectures - in fact, he explicitly disclaimed publication in his later life. ''The Seminar ([[EFP]]). Following the publication of Jacques Lacan''the [[Écrits]] (1966), conducted over a period of more than two decades, contains the majority there is an explosion of interest in his life's work, though several of these remain unpublishedin France and abroad. Furthermore, the accuracy of the transcriptions of the seminars is disputed, with |-| width="50px" | [[Sherry Turkle{{Y}}|1980]] claiming that <BR>-<BR>[[Jacques-Alain Miller{{Y}}|1981]], <BR>| align="left" style="padding: 0.2em 0.2em 0.2em 0.5em; margin: 0.5em 0 1em 0;" | [[Lacan's son]] single-in-law, made extensive changes to add clarity to handedly dissolves the [[EFP]] and creates in its stead the material (Turkle, ''Psychoanalytic Politics: Jacques Lacan and Freud's French Revolution[[École de la Cause freudienne|Cause freudienne]]'', p. 254-255). His only major body of writingHowever, [[Lacan]] soon dissolves the ''Écrits[[École de la Cause freudienne|Cause freudienne]]'', is notoriously difficult to read. and replaces it with the ''Seminar XX[[École de la Cause freudienne]]'' remarks that his ''Écrits'' were not to be understood, but would produce a meaning effect in the reader similar to some mystical texts. Part of the reason for this, it should be emphasised, are the repeated [[Hegelian]] allusions (themselves derived from [[Alexandre Kojève|Kojève]]'s lectures on Hegel, which Lacan attended) and similar unheralded theoretical divergences and not, first and foremost, Lacan's obscure prose style, as some have alleged. == Lacan and his discontents ==Although Lacan is often associated with it, he was not without his critics from within the major figures of what is broadly termed [[postmodernism]]. (Several writers, such as [[Slavoj Žižek]], have argued specifically against considering Lacan a poststructuralist theorist.) Along these lines, [[Jacques Derrida]] (though Derrida did not endorse nor associate himself with postmodernism) made a considerable critique of Lacan's analytic writings, accusing him of taking a [[structuralism|structuralist]] approach to psychoanalysis, but this is hardly surprising. In particular, Derrida criticises Lacanian theory for an inherited Freudian ''phallocentrism'', exemplified primarily in his conception of the ''phallus'' as the 'primary signifier' that determines the social order of signifiers. It could be said that much of Derrida's critique of Lacan stems from his relationship with Freud: for example, Derrida deconstructs the Freudian conception of 'penis envy', upon which female subjectivity is determined, to show that the primacy of the male phallus entails a hierarchy between phallic presence and absence that ultimately implodes upon itself. Nonetheless, Lacan can be said to enjoy an awkward relationship with feminism and post-feminism in that, while he is much criticised for adopting (or inheriting from Freud) a phallocentric stance within his psychoanalytic theories, he is also taken by many to provide an accurate portrayal of the gender biases within society. Some critics accuse Lacan of maintaining the [[sexism|sexist]] tradition in psychoanalysis. Others, such as [[Judith Butler]] and [[Jane Gallop]] have offered readings of Lacan's work that opened up new possibilities for [[feminism|feminist]] theory, making it difficult to seriously reject Lacan wholesale due to sexism - although specific parts of his work may well subject to criticism on these grounds. In either case, traditional feminism has profited from Lacan's accounts to show that society has an inherent sexual bias that denigratingly reduces womanhood to a status of deficiency. Within the world outside the humanities and critical theory, criticism of Lacan tends to dismiss him/his work in a more or less wholesale fashion. [[François Roustang]], in ''The Lacanian Delusion'', called Lacan's output "extravagant" and an "incoherent system of pseudo-scientific gibberish". In ''[[Fashionable Nonsense]]'' (1997), [[Alan Sokal]] and [[Jean Bricmont]] accuse Lacan of abusing scientific concepts. Defenders of Lacanian theories dispute the validity of such criticism, and point out that Sokal has explicitly stated that he does not understand Lacan's texts. According to Lacanians, the dismissal by Sokal and his allies precludes any valid criticism of his theories, and is instead motivated by a desire to "police the boundaries" of what constitutes an appropriate use of scientific terminology. ==Sources==*[http://www.lacan.com/rolleyes.htm Chronology of Jacques Lacan]*[http://www.lacan.com/seminars1a.htm The Seminars of Jacques Lacan]* [http://www.lacan.com/bibliographyxx.htm Jacques Lacan's Complete French Bibliography]*[http://www.lacan.com/kantsade.htm Jacques Lacan; Kant with Sade]*[http://www.lacan.com/hotel.htm Of Structure as the Inmixing of an Otherness Prerequisite to Any Subject Whatever] Johns Hopkins University - 1966.*[http://www.lacan.com/purloined.htm The Seminar on "The Purloined Letter"]|}* [http://cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/chomsky-on-postmodernism.html Chomsky's remarks]>
==Bibliography==
==References=Theory===*[http://www.lacan.com/lacan1.htm Lacan Dot Com]*[http://www.hydra.umn.edu/lacan/index.html Lacan Online]*[http://www.ubu.com/sound/lacan.html UBUweb] - radio features and interviews w<references/ Lacan on ubu.com>
<!--===Criticism=See Also=={{See}}* [[Psychoanalysis]]* [[Psychology]]||*[http://www.dylan.org.uk/lacan.pdf From Lacan [Return to Darwin (PDF)Freud]]* [[International Psycho-Analytical Association]]||* [[Ego-psychology]]* [[Kleinian psychoanalysis]]||* [[Object-relations theory]]{{Also}}-->
==External Links==
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Lacan Wikipedia Entry]
