Jacques Lacan:Real

Summary

Lacan's concept of 'the real' is among his most fascinating concepts. The category of the real developed from an early marginal status to beign the central category of Lacan's later work. The real si that which resists symbolization; it is the trauamtic kernel at the core of subjectivity and the symbolic order.

The real is thus associated with the death drive and jouisssance as the ultimate, unspeakable, limit of human existence. Jouisssance is opposed to desire - it si the dissatisfaction that we experience with the failure of our desire - and it is through fantays and the objet petit a that the subject sustains themselves in this impossible scenario.

With these concepts Lacan revolutionized the practice of psychoanalysis and its implications for other disciplines.