Difference between revisions of "Imaginary"
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<!-- In his 1936 essay "Au-delà du 'principe de réalité"' (Beyond the reality principle), Lacan noted that Freud discovered a meaning in patients' complaints that other physicians considered imaginary and thus illusory. In his first reading of Freud's work, Lacan emphasized the notion of the image by highlighting its function: reflecting the subject's discrete behaviors in unified images. In the mirror stage, the subject identifies with these images and develops an ego concept in relation to another. --> | <!-- In his 1936 essay "Au-delà du 'principe de réalité"' (Beyond the reality principle), Lacan noted that Freud discovered a meaning in patients' complaints that other physicians considered imaginary and thus illusory. In his first reading of Freud's work, Lacan emphasized the notion of the image by highlighting its function: reflecting the subject's discrete behaviors in unified images. In the mirror stage, the subject identifies with these images and develops an ego concept in relation to another. --> | ||
===Ego=== | ===Ego=== | ||
| − | The [[imaginary|imaginary order]] is based on the [[formation]] of the [[ego]] in the [[mirror stage]] | + | The [[imaginary|imaginary order]] is based on the [[formation]] of the [[ego]] in the [[mirror stage]] by [[identification]] with the [[counterpart]] or [[specular image]]. |
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| + | The basis of the [[imaginary|imaginary order]] is the [[mirror stage]], in which the [[subject]] [[identification|identifies]] with its [[counterpart]] or [[specular image] and develops an ego concept in relation to another. | ||
The [[ego]] is [[formation|formed]] by [[identification|identifying]] with the [[counterpart]] or [[specular image]]. Thus, [[identification]] is an important aspect of the [[imaginary|imaginary order]]. The [[ego]] and the [[counterpart]] form the prototypical [[dual relation]]ship. | The [[ego]] is [[formation|formed]] by [[identification|identifying]] with the [[counterpart]] or [[specular image]]. Thus, [[identification]] is an important aspect of the [[imaginary|imaginary order]]. The [[ego]] and the [[counterpart]] form the prototypical [[dual relation]]ship. | ||
Revision as of 13:58, 7 November 2006
| French: imaginaire |
| German: Imaginäre |
Contents
Jacques Lacan
History
Lacan's use of the term "imaginary" as a substantive dates back to 1936.[1] The term relates to the dual relation between the ego and the specular image. From 1953 on, the imaginary becomes one of the three orders which constitute the tripartite scheme at the center of Lacanian thought, being opposed to the symbolic and the real.
Ego
The imaginary order is based on the formation of the ego in the mirror stage by identification with the counterpart or specular image.
The basis of the imaginary order is the mirror stage, in which the subject identifies with its counterpart or [[specular image] and develops an ego concept in relation to another.
The ego is formed by identifying with the counterpart or specular image. Thus, identification is an important aspect of the imaginary order. The ego and the counterpart form the prototypical dual relationship.
This relationship whereby the ego is constituted by identification with the little other means that the ego, and the imaginary order itself, are both sites of a radical alienation; "Alienation is constitutive of the imaginary order."[2]
The dual relationship between the ego and the counterpart is fundamentally narcissistic, and narcissism is another characteristic of the imaginary order. Narcissism is always accompanied by a certain aggressivity.
Image
The imaginary is the realm of image and imagination, deception and lure. The principal illusions of the imaginary are those of wholeness, synthesis, autonomy, duality and, above all, similarity.
The imaginary exerts a captivating power over the subject, founded in the almost hypnotic effect of the specular image. The imaginary is thus rooted in subject's relationship to his own body (or rather to the image of his body). This captivating/capturing power is both seductive (the imaginary is manifested above all on the sexual plane, in such forms as sexual display and courtship rituals)[3] and disabling: it imprisons the subject in series of static fixations.
Psychology
The imaginary is the dimension of the human subject which is most closely linked to ethology and animal psychology.[4] All attempts to explain human subjectivity in terms of animal psychology are thus limited to the imaginary. Although the imaginary represents the closest point of contact between human subjectivity and animal ethology,[5] it is not simply identical; the imaginary order in human beings is structured by the symbolic, and this means that "in man, the imaginary relation has deviated [from the realm of nature]."[6]
Criticism
Lacan accused the major psychoanalytic schools of his day of reducing psychoanalysis to the imaginary order: these psychoanalysts made identification with the analyst into the goal of analysis, and reduced analysis to a dual relationship.[7] Lacan sees this as a complete betrayal of psychoanalysis, a deviation which can only eveer succeed in increasing the alienation of the subject.
See Also
References
- ↑ Lacan, Jacques. Écrits. Paris: Seuil, 1966. p. 81
- ↑ Lacan, Jacques. The Seminar. Book III. The Psychoses, 1955-56. Trans. Russell Grigg. London: Routledge, 1993. p. 146
- ↑ Lacan, Jacques. "Situation de la psychanalyse et formation du psychanalyste en 1956." Écrits. Paris: Seuil, 1966 [1956b]: 272
- ↑ Lacan, Jacques. The Seminar. Book III. The Psychoses, 1955-56. Trans. Russell Grigg. London: Routledge, 1993. p. 253
- ↑ Lacan, Jacques. The Seminar. Book II. The Ego in Freud's Theory and in the Technique of Psychoanalysis, 1954-55. Trans. Sylvana Tomaselli. New York: Nortion; Cambridge: Cambridge Unviersity Press, 1988. p. 166
- ↑ Lacan, Jacques. The Seminar. Book II. The Ego in Freud's Theory and in the Technique of Psychoanalysis, 1954-55. Trans. Sylvana Tomaselli. New York: Nortion; Cambridge: Cambridge Unviersity Press, 1988. p. 210
- ↑ Lacan, Jacques. Écrits: A Selection. Trans. Alan Sheridan. London: Tavistock Publications, 1977. p. 246-7
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