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Law
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=====Symbolic Order=====
Since the most basic form of [[anthropology|exchange]] is [[communication]] itself, the [[law]] is fundamentally a [[linguistic]] entity -- it is the [[law]] of the [[signifier]]:
<blockquote>This law, then, is revealed clearly enough as identical with an order of language. For without kinship nominations, no power is capable of instituting the order of preferences and taboos that bind and weave the yarn of lineage through succeeding generations.<ref>{{E}} p. 66</ref></blockquote>
This [[legal]]-[[linguistic]] [[structure]] is in fact no more and no less than the [[symbolic order]] itself.
Following [[Lévi-Strauss]], [[Lacan]] argues that the [[law]] is essentially [[human]]; it is the [[law]] which separates [[man]] from the other [[nature|animal]]s, by regulating [[sexual relationship|sexual relations]] that are, among [[nature|animal]]s, unregulated:
<blockquote>"([[Human]] [[law]] is) the primordial Law... which in regulating marriage ties superimposes the kingdom of culture on that of a nature abandoned to the law of mating. The prohibition of incest is merely its subjective pivot."<ref>{{E}} p. 66</ref></blockquote>
=====Oedipus Complex=====
=====Regulation of Desire=====
The [[Oedipus complex]] represents the regulation of [[desire]] by the [[law]]. =====Pleasure Principle===== It is the [[law]] of the [[pleasure principle]], which commands the [[subject]] to "Enjoy as little as possible!", and thus maintains the [[subject]] at a safe distance from the [[Thing]]. =====Dialectical Relationship between Law and Desire===== The relationship between the [[law]] and [[desire]] is, however, a [[dialectic]]al one; "desire is the reverse of the law."<ref>{{Ec}} p. 787</ref> If, on the one hand, [[law]] imposes limits on [[desire]], it is also true that the [[law]] creates [[desire]] in the first place by creating interdiction. =====Desire to Transgress===== [[Desire]] is essentially the [[desire]] to [[transgress]], and for there to be [[transgression]] it is first necesary for there to be [[prohibition]].<ref>{{S7}} p.83-4</ref> =====Desire Born Out of Regulation===== Thus it is not the case that there is a pregiven [[desire]] which the [[law]] then regulates, but that [[desire]] is born out of the process of regulation.
<blockquote>"What we see here is the tight bond between desire and Law."<ref>{{S7}} p. 177</ref></blockquote>
<!-- =====Murder of the Father=====--><!-- If the [[law]] is closely connected to the [[father]], this is not only because the [[father]] is one who imposes the [[law]], but also because the [[law]] is born out of the murder of the [[father]]. =====Myth of the Father of the Primal Horde===== This is clearly illustrated in the [[myth]] of the [[father]] of the [[primal horde]] which [[Freud]] recounts in ''[[Totem and Taboo]]''. In this [[myth]], the murder of the [[father]], far from freeing the sons from the [[law]], only reinforces the [[law]] which [[prohibit]]s [[incest]].-->
==See Also==