Changes

=Sigmund Freud===Phallusand Penis== [[Freud's work abounds in references to ]] did not distinguish between the [[penis]] as an actual ([[anatomical]]) [[body|bodily organ]] and the [[phallus]] as a [[signifier]] of [[sexual difference]].

==Phallic Phase==[[Freud ]] called the [[development|period]] between [[development|three and five years of age]] the "[[phallic phase]]." The [[phallic phase]] denotes a [[stage]] in [[development]] in which the [[child]] ([[boy]] or [[girl]]) [[knows]] only one [[biology|genital organ]] - the [[phallus|penis]]. At this stage, infants of both [[sexes]] are dominated by the question of who possesses a penis and the related issue of its masturbatory jouissance ([[gratification]]). [[Freud]] argues that [[children ]] of both [[sexual difference|sexes ]] set great [[value ]] on the [[phallus|penis]], and that their discovery that some [[human beings ]] [[being]]s do not possess a [[phallus|penis ]] leads to important [[psyche|psychical ]] consequences (see . Up to this point, the mother is imagined as having a penis, and the discovery that she [[lacks]] a penis, after an initial [[denial]], precipitates the [[Castration Complex|castration complex]]).

However<!--Freud had his first intuition of the primacy of the phallus as early as 1905 in "[[Three]] essays on the theory of sexuality"; it is explicitly discussed in "The [[infantile]] genital organization," which Freud offered in 1923 as a complement to "Three Essays." In this later [[text]], the term predominance of the phallus is linked to the problematic of castration in the following way:<blockquote>The main characteristic of this 'infantile genital organization'is its [[difference]] from the final genital organization of the [[adult]]. This consists in the fact that, for both sexes, only one genital, namely the male one, comes into account. What is [[present]], therefore, is not a primacy of the genitals, but a primacy of the phallus' rarely appears . [ Freud 1923, p. 142 ]</blockquote>The fact that the essential [[role]] of only one genital organ is recognized at a certain stage in infantile [[sexual]] development implies that this primacy, from the outset, is not located in the realm of anatomical reality or on the level of organs, but precisely on the level of what a lack of the organ might [[represent]] subjectively.Freud ( 1923) makes the same radical [[distinction]] by linking castration to the phallic [[order]] and not to the penis.<blockquote>The lack of a penis [my italics] is regarded as a result of castration, and so now the child is faced with the task of coming to [[terms]] with castration in relation to himself. The further developments are too well known generally to make it necessary to recapitulate [[them]] here. But it seems to me that the [[significance]] of the [[Castration Complex|castration complex]] can only be rightly appreciated if its origin in the [[phase]] of phallic primacy is also taken into account. [ Freud's workitalics] [p. 144]</blockquote>In fact, and when it does sexual difference is constituted from the outset on the basis of this [[notion]] of lack: the [[feminine]] genital organ is different from the [[masculine]] one only because it lacks something. In addition, the product of observation (perceptual reality) is used immediately elaborated on the [[subjective]] level as a synonym conception: Freud writes "the lack of 'a penis'is regarded as." As Freud ( 1923) puts it, this lack confronts the child "with the task of coming to terms with castration in relation to himself" (p. 144).--><!-- It is in the [[domain]] of these [[Freudian]] references that Lacan systematizes the problematics of the phallus as foundational to [[psychoanalytic]] theory. Specifically, Lacan establishes the phallus as the primordial signifier of desire in [[oedipal]] triangulation. The [[Oedipus]] complex plays itself out around locating the [[position]] of the phallus in relation to the desire of the mother, the child, and the father. A [[dialectical]] [[process]] develops in two modes: that of being the phallus and that of having the phallus. -->

Freud does use =Jacques Lacan=The term [[phallic]] occupies an important [[place]] in [[Lacanian]] [[speech|discourse]]. The [[phallus]] plays a central role in both the adjective 'phallic' more frequently, such as [[Oedipus complex]] and in the expression theory of [[sexual difference]].<!-- Although not prominent in [[Lacan]]'s [[Works of Jacques Lacan|work]] before the phallic phase'mid-1950s, but again this implies no rigorous distinction between the terms 'term "[[phallus' and 'penis', since the phallic phase denotes a stage ]]" occupies an ever more important place in development in which the child (boy or girl) knows only one genital organ his [[discourse]] thereafter. - the penis.->

===Signifier===For [[Lacan generally prefers to use ]] focus on the term 'function of the [[phallus]] as a [[signifier]] of [[lack]] and [[sexual difference]]. The [[phallus' rather than 'penis' ]] in order to emphasise the fact that what concerns psychoanalytic [[Lacan]]ian [[theory is ]] should not be confused with the [[male ]] [[genital ]] [[organ ]], although it clearly carries those connotations. The [[phallus]] is first and foremost a [[signifier]] and in [[Lacan]]'s [[system]] a particularly privileged [[signifier]]. The [[phallus]] operates in its biological reality but all three of [[Lacan]]'s [[register]]s - the role [[imaginary]], the [[symbolic]] and the [[real]] - and as his system develops it becomes the one single indivisible [[signifier]] that this organ plays in fantasyanchors the [[chain]] of [[signification]]. Indeed, it is a particularly privileged [[signifier]] because it inaugurates the process of [[signification]] itself.

Hence Lacan usually reserves ==Oedipus complex==The [[phallus]] is one of the three elements in the [[imaginary]] [[structure|triangle]] that constitutes the term 'penis' for [[preoedipal phase]]. It is an [[imaginary]] [[object]] which circulates between the biological organother two elements, the [[mother]] and the [[child]].<ref>{{S3}} p. 319</ref> The [[mother]] [[desire]]s this [[object]] and the [[child]] seeks to [[satisfy]] her [[desire]] by [[identifying]] with the [[phallus]] or with the [[phallus|phallic mother]]. In the [[Oedipus complex]] the [[father]] intervenes as a fourth term in this [[imaginary]] [[structure|triangle]] by [[castration|castrating]] the [[child]]; that is, he makes it [[impossible]] for the [[child]] to [[identify]] with the [[phallus|imaginary phallus]]. The [[child]] is then faced with the [[choice]] of accepting his [[castration]] (accepting that he cannot be the [[mother]]'s [[phallus' for ]]) or rejecting it. ((For Lacan, the phallus is not to be equated with the penis, and as a signifier it performs a different function in each of the three [[orders]]: [[The Imaginary|the imaginary]] and , [[Symbolicthe symbolic]] functions of this organand the real.))

While this terminological distinction is the [[phallus|imaginary phallus]] and the [[phallus|symbolic phallus]] are discussed more extensively by [[Lacan]] than the [[phallus|real phallus]], he does not found entirely ignore the latter. On the contrary, the [[phallus|real penis]] has an important role to play in Freud's workthe [[Oedipus complex]] of the little boy, for it responds is precisely via this [[biology|organ]] that his [[sexuality]] makes itself felt in infantile [[masturbation]]; this intrusion of the [[real]] in the [[imaginary]] [[preoedipal]] [[structure|triangle]] is what transforms the [[structure|triangle]] from something [[pleasure principle|pleasurable]] to something which provokes [[anxiety]].<ref>{{S4}} p. 225-6; {{S4}} p. 341</ref> The question posed in the [[Oedipus complex]] is that of where the [[phallus|real phallus]] is located; the logic implicit answer required for the [[resolution]] of this [[complex]] is that it is located in Freud's formulations on the penis[[real]] [[father]].<ref>{{S4}} p. 281</ref> The [[phallus|real phallus]] is written Π in [[Lacan]]ian [[algebra]].

For example==The Imaginary Phallus==When [[Lacan]] first introduces the distinction between [[phallus|penis]] and [[phallus]], when Freud speaks of a the [[phallus]] refers to an [[imaginary]] [[symbolicobject]] equation between .<ref>{{S4}} p. 31</ref> This is the "[[phallus|image of the penis and ]]",<ref>{{E}} p. 319</ref> the baby [[phallus|penis]] imagined as a [[part-object]] which allows may be detached from the girl to appease her penis envy [[fragmented body|body]] by having a child[[castration]], it is clear that he is not talking about <ref>{{E}} p. 315</ref> the real organ"phallic [[image]]".<ref>Freud, 1917c{{E}} p. 320</ref> The [[phallus|imaginary phallus]] is perceived by the [[child]] in the [[preoedipal phase]] as the [[object]] of the [[mother]]'s [[desire]], as that which she [[desire]]s beyond the [[child]]; the [[child]] thus seeks to [[identify]] with this [[object]]. The [[Oedipus complex]] and the [[Castration complex]] involve the renunciation of this attempt to be the [[phallus|imaginary phallus]]. The [[phallus|imaginary phallus]] is written φ (lower-[[case]] phi) in [[Lacan]]ian [[algebra]], which also represents [[phallus|phallic signification]]. [[Castration]] is written -φ (minus lower-case phi).

It As we saw above, the child slowly comes to realise that it is not identical to, or the sole object of, the mother's [[desire,]] as her desire is directed elsewhere. He/she will therefore attempt to once again become the object of her desire and [[return]] to the initial [[state]] of blissful union. The simple dyadic relationship between the mother and child is thus turned into a [[triangular]] relationship between the child, the mother and the object of her desire. The child attempts to [[seduce]] the mother by becoming that [[object of desire]]. Lacan calls this [[third]] term the [[imaginary phallus]]. [[The Imaginary|The imaginary]] phallus is what the child assumes someone must have in order for them to be the object of the mother's desire and, as her desire is usually directed towards the father, it is assumed that he possesses the phallus. Through trying to satisfy the mother's desire, the child [[identifies]] with the object that it presumes she has lost and attempts to become that object for her. The phallus is imaginary in the sense that it is associated in the child's [[mind]] with an actual object that has been lost and can be arguedrecovered. The [[Oedipus Complex|Oedipus complex]], for Lacan, involves the process of giving up the identification with this imaginary phallus, thenand recognizing that it is a signifier and as such was never there in the first place. What Freud called castration, therefore, is a symbolic process that involves the [[infant]]'s [[recognition]] of themselves as '[[lacking]]' something - the phallus. For Lacan, castration involves the process whereby boys accept that they can [[symbolically]] 's terminological innovation simply clarifies certain distinctions have' the phallus only by accepting that were already implicit they can never actually have it 'in Freudreality' and girls can accept 'not-having' the phallus once they give up on their 'phallic' identification with their mothers (we will discuss this very complicated [[idea]] in more detail in the chapter on sexual difference). This is the function of [[The Oedipus Complex|the Oedipus complex]] in Lacan.<!-- According to Lacan, the phallus at the outset represents what else the mother desires is in addition to the [[baby]]. Thus, a [[pre-oedipal]] [[triangle]] of mother, phallus, and infant arises. At first the infant tries to be the phallus for the mother until the [[moment]] of a crucial transformation when the child, after identifying the phallus as a static image of [[completeness]] and sufficiency, sees it as representing the mother's workdesire, and thus her lack. From then on, the phallus takes the [[form]] of something [[missing]] (-') within any imaginary, and hence [[libidinal]], [[frame]] of reference. Thus the phallus comes to [[signify]] desire, Lacan says.-->

These arguments are stated in their most definitive form in [[Lacan]]'s paper on "[[The Signification of the Phallus]]".<ref>{{L}} "[[The Signification of the Phallus|La signification du phallus]]." ''[[Écrits]]''. [[Paris]]: Seuil, 1966 [1958c]: 685-95 ["[[The Signification of the Phallus|The signification of the phallus]]". Trans. [[Alan Sheridan]] ''[[Écrits: A Selection]]''. London: Tavistock, 1977; New York: W.W. Norton & Co, 1977: 281-91].</ref><blockquote>The phallus is not a fantasy, if by that we mean an [[Imaginary]] effect. Nor is it as such an object (part--, [[internal]], [[good]], bad, etc.). It is even less the organ, penis or clitoris, that it [[symbolises]]. . . . The phallus is a signifier. . . . It is the signifier intended to designate as a [[whole]] the effects of the [[signified]].<ref>{{E}} p. 285</ref></blockquote>

Although not prominent in Lacan's work before Whereas the [[Castration complex]] and the [[Oedipus complex]] revolve around the mid-1950s[[phallus|imaginary phallus]], the term 'question of [[sexual difference]] revolves around [[phallus|symbolic phallus]]. The [[phallus]] has no corresponding [[woman|female]] [[signifier]]; "the phallusis a symbol to which there is no correspondent, no equivalent. It' occupies an ever more important place s a matter of a dissymmetry in his discourse thereafterthe signifier.'"<ref>{{S3}} p. 176</ref> Both [[sexual difference|male]] and [[sexual difference|female]] [[subject]]s assume their [[sexual difference|sex]] via the [[phallus|symbolic phallus]].

The Unlike the [[phallus plays |imaginary phallus]], the [[phallus|symbolic phallus]] cannot be [[negation|negated]], for on the [[symbolic]] plane an [[absence]] is just as much a positive entity as a central role [[presence]].<ref>{{E}} p. 320</ref> Thus even the [[woman]], who [[lack]]s the [[phallus|symbolic phallus]] in both one way, can also be said to possess it, since not having it the [[symbolic]] is itself a form of having.<ref>{{S4}} p. 153</ref> Conversely, the assumption of the [[Oedipus Complexphallus|symbolic phallus]] by the man is only possible on the basis of the prior assumption of his own [[castration]]. [[Lacan]] goes on in 1961 to state that the [[phallus|symbolic phallus]] is that which appears in the place of the [[lack]] of the [[signifier]] and in the theory [[Other]].<ref>{{S8}} p. 278-81</ref> It is no ordinary [[signifier]] but the [[real]] [[presence]] of [[sexual differencedesire]] itself.<ref>{{S8}} p. 290</ref> In 1973 he states that the [[phallus|symbolic phallus]]is "the signifier which does not have a signified".<ref>{{S20}} p.75</ref>

==The [[phallus|symbolic phallus and ]] is written ф in [[Lacan]]ian [[algebra]]. However, [[Lacan]] warns his students that the complexity of this [[symbol]] might be missed if they simply identify it with the Oedipus complex== [[phallus|symbolic phallus]].<ref>{{S8}} p. 296</ref> The [[symbol]] is more correctly [[understood]] as designating the "[[phallus is one |phallic function]]."<ref>{{S8}} p. 298</ref> In the early 1970s [[Lacan]] incorporates this [[symbol]] of the three elements [[phallus|phallic function]] in his [[sexual difference|formulae of sexuation]]. Using predicate [[logic]] to articulate the problems of [[sexual difference]], [[Lacan]] devises two [[algebra|formulae]] for the [[sexual difference|masculine position]] and two [[algebra|formulae]] for the [[Imaginarysexual difference|feminine position]] triangle that constitutes . All four [[algebra|formulae]] revolve around the [[phallus|phallic function]], which is here equivalent with the function of [[preoedipal phasecastration]].

<!-- desire and signification. It is an desire that [[drives]] the process of [[Imaginarysymbolization]] . The phallus is the ultimate [[Object of Desire|object which circulates between of desire]] that we have lost and always [[search]] for but never had in the first place. --><!-- To summarize, before we explore this complex idea further, the phallus stands for that moment of rupture when the child is [[forced]] to recognize the desire of the other two elements; of the mother. 'The mother is refused to the child in so far as a [[prohibition]] falls on the child's desire to be what the mother desires' (Rose 1996a: 61). The phallus, therefore, always belongs somewhere else; it breaks the mother /child [[dyad]] and initiates the order of symbolic exchange. In this sense the phallus is both imaginary and symbolic. It is imaginary in that it represents the object presumed to satisfy the mother's desire; at the same [[time]], it is symbolic in that it stands in for the recognition that desire cannot be [[satisfied]]. By breaking [[The Imaginary|the imaginary]] couple 'the childphallus represents a moment of [[division]] [that “lack-in-being”] which re-enacts the fundamental [[splitting]] of [[The Subject|the subject]] itself' (Rose 1996a: 63).<ref>S3As a presence in absence, a 'seeming' value, 319</refthe phallus is a fraud . -->

<!-- It is through the [[intervention]] of the [[Name]]-of-the-Father that [[The Imaginary|the imaginary]] [[unity]] between child and mother is broken. The father is assumed to possess something that the child lacks and it is this that the mother desires . It is important here though not to confuse the [[Name-of-the-Father]] with the actual father. The [[Name-of-the-father|Name-of-the-Father]] is a symbolic function that intrudes into the [[illusory]] [[world]] of the child andbreaks [[The Imaginary|the imaginary]] dyad of the mother and child. The child assumes that the father is one that [[satisfies]] the mother's desire and possesses the phallus. In this object and sense, argues Lacan, the child seeks [[Oedipus Complex|Oedipus complex]] involves an element of [[substitution]], that is to satisfy her say, the substitution of one signifier, the desire by identifying with of the mother, for [[another]], the [[Name-of-the-father|Name-of-the-Father]]. It is through this initial act of substitution that the process of signification begins and child enters the [[symbolic order]] as a subject of lack. It is also for this [[reason]] that Lacan describes the process of symbolization itself as 'phallic'. It is through the [[Name-of-the-father|Name-of-the-Father]] that the phallus is installed as the central organizing signifier of the [[unconscious]]. The phallus is the 'original' [[lost object]], but only insofar as no one possessed it in the first place. The phallus , therefore, is not like any other signifier, it is the signifier of absence and does not '[[exist]]' in its own [[right]] as a [[thing]], an object or with the phallic mothera [[bodily]] organ. Let us look at this more closely. -->

In <!-- Lacan equates the process of giving up the imaginary phallus with Freud's account of [[castration anxiety]], but he argues that the process of castration in Freud is more complicated than [[people]] generally [[think]]. Castration involves not just an anxiety [[about]] losing one's penis but simultaneously the recognition of lack or absence . The child is concerned about losing its own penis and simultaneously recognizes that the mother does not have a penis. The idea of the penis, therefore, becomes metonymically linked to the recognition of lack . It is in this sense that Lacan argues that the phallus is not simply the penis; it is the penis plus the recognition of absence or lack . Castration is not the [[fear]] that one has already lost, in the case of girls, or will lose, in the case of boys, one's penis but rather [[The Symbolic|the symbolic]] process of giving up the idea that one can be the phallus for the mother. The intervention of the father distances the child from the mother and also places the Oedipus complex phallus forever beyond its reach. If [[The Symbolic|the symbolic]] father intervenes as is seen to possess the phallus, then the child can only become a fourth term subject itself in [[The Symbolic|the symbolic]] order by renouncing the imaginary phallus. The problem for Lacan is how does one symbolically represent 'lack' - something that by definition is not there? His solution is the idea of the '[[veil]]'. The presence of the veil suggests that there is an object behind it, which the veil covers over, although this is only a presumption on the part of [[The Subject|the subject]]. In this way the veil enables the perpetuation of the idea that the object [[exists]]. Thus, both boys and girls can have a relationship to the phallus on the basis that it always remains veiled and out of reach. The phallus provides the vital link between --><!-- ==Phallic Jouissance== In his seminar on [[Imaginaryfemale]] triangle sexuality (1998), Lacan further specified what he meant by castrating the child; term "[[phallic jouissance]]." He used the phallic signifier (Φ) in [[writing]] his "[[formulas]] of [[sexuation]]," which posit that every human being has to be on one side or the other of the sexual [[divide]]. A woman always has something of the phallus (she isnot entirely [[castrated]]), and the man is only supposed to "have" the phallus when he makes it impossible for fantasizes his castration. In Lacan's symbolic notation, the phallus takes on the [[formal]] role of a [[supplement]], which adds to the [[Castration Complex|castration complex]] the child fact that "there is no sexual relation," as Lacan said, referring to identify with the [[Imaginaryimpossibility]] of writing an equation of the relationship between the sexes. --><!-- ===Criticisms of Lacan===Of all [[Lacan]]'s [[ideas] ], his concept of the [[phallus]] is perhaps the one which has given rise to most controversy. Objections to [[Lacan]]'s concept fall into two main groups.

The child is then faced with Firstly, some [[feminist]] writers have argued that the privileged position [[Lacan]] accords to the [[phallus]] means that he merely repeats the choice patriarchal gestures of accepting his castration [[Freud]] (accepting e.g. Grosz, 1990). Other feminists have defended [[Lacan]], arguing that he cannot be his distinction between the [[phallus]] and the mother's [[phallus|penis]] provides a way of accounting for [[sexual difference]] which is irreducible to [[biology]] (e.g. Mitchell and Rose, 1982) or rejecting it.

==The phallus and sexual difference== second main objection to [[Lacan argues that both boys and girls must assume their castration, in the sense that every child must renounce the possibility ]]'s concept of being the [[phallus for the mother; this 'relationship to the phallus ]] is that put forward by [[Jacques Derrida]]. <ref>Derrida, Jacques. (1975) "Le facteur de la vérité. is established without regard " ''The Post Card: From [[Socrates]] to the anatomical difference of the sexesFreud and Beyond''.<ref>{{E}} 282Trans. Alan Bass, Chicago and London: [[University]] of Chicago Press, 1987 [1975]: 413-96</ref> and echoed by [[others]]. [[Derrida]] argues that, despite [[Lacan]]'s protestations of anti-transcendentalism, the [[phallus]] operates as a [[transcendental]] element which [[acts]] as an [[ideal]] [[guarantee]] of [[meaning]]. How can there be such a thing as a "privileged signifier", asks [[Derrida]], given that every [[signifier]] is defined only by its differences from other [[signifier]]s? The [[phallus]], in other [[words]], reintroduces the [[metaphysics]] of [[presence]] which [[Derrida]] denominates as [[logocentrism]], and thus [[Derrida]] concludes that, by articulating this with [[phallocentrism]], [[Lacan]] has created a [[phallocentrism|phallogocentric system of thought]].-->

The renunciation by both sexes of identification with the =See Also={{See}}* [[imaginaryAlgebra]] phallus paves the way for a relationship with the * [[symbolicBiology]] phallus which is different for the sexes; the man has the ||* [[symbolicCastration complex]] phallus (or, more precisely, 'he is not without having it' * [''il n'est pas sans l'avoir''[Desire]]||* [[Development]]* [[Father]]||* [[Imaginary]]* [[Lack]]||* [[Mother]]* [[Oedipus complex]]||* [[Part-object]]* [[Preoedipal]]||* [[Sexual difference]]), but the * [[WomanSymbolic]] does not. {{Also}}

This is complicated by =External Links=* Hook, Derek (2006). [http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/960/1/Lacanthemeaning.pdf Lacan, the fact that the man can only lay claim to the [[symbolic]] phallus on condition that he has assumed his own castration (has given up being meaning of the [[imaginary]] phallus), and by the fact that the [[woman‘sexed’ subject]]'s lack of the [[Symboliconline]] phallus is also a kind of possession.<ref>{{S4}} 153<London: LSE Research Online. Available at: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/ref>960

The status of the phallus=References=<div style="font-size: [[Real]], [[Imaginary]] or [[Symbolic]]? 11px" class="references-small"><references/></div>

  ==The real phallus== As has already been observed, Lacan usually uses the term 'penis' to denote the [[realCategory:Psychoanalysis]] biological organ and reserves the term 'phallus' to denote the [[imaginary]] and [[symbolic]] functions of this organ.  However, he does not always maintain this usage, occasionally using the term '[[real]] phallus' to denote the biological organ, or using the terms '[[symbolic]] phallus' and '[[symbolic]] penis' as if they were synonymous.<ref>{{S4}} p.153</ref>  This apparent confusion and semantic slippage has led some commentators to argue that the supposed distinction between the phallus and the penis is in fact highly unstable and that 'the phallus concept is the site of a regression towards the biological organ'.<ref>Macey, 1988Category: p.191</ref> --- While the [[imaginary]] phallus and the [[symbolic]] phallus are discussed more extensively by Jacques Lacan than the [[real]] phallus, he does not entirely ignore the latter.  On the contrary, the [[real]] penis has an important role to play in the Oedipus complex of the little boy, for it is precisely via this organ that his sexuality makes itself felt in infantile masturbation; this intrusion of the [[Real]] in the [[ImaginaryCategory:Dictionary]] preoedipal triangle is what transforms the triangle from something pleasurable to something which provokes anxiety.<ref>S4, 225-6; S4, 341</ref> The question posed in the Oedipus complex is that of where the [[realCategory:Sexuality]] phallus is located; the answer required for the resolution of this complex is that it is located in the [[real]] father.<ref>S4, 281</ref>  The [[real]] phallus is written H in Lacanian algebra. ==The [[Category:Imaginary]] phallus==When Lacan first introduces the distinction between penis and phallus, the phallus refers to an [[Imaginary]] object.<ref>S4, 31</ref>  This is the 'image of the penis',<ref>E, 319</ref> the penis imagined as a part-object which may be detached from the body by castration,<ref>E, 315</ref> the 'phallic image'.<ref>E, 320</ref>  The [[Imaginary]] phallus is perceived by the child in the preoedipal phase as the object of the mother's desire, as that which she desires beyond the child; the child thus seeks to identify with this object.  The Oedipus complex and the [[Castration Complex]] involve the renunciation of this attempt to be the [[Imaginary]] phallus.  The [[Imaginary]] phallus is written 9 (lower-case phi) in Lacanian algebra, which also represents phallic signification.  Castration is written -e (minus lower-case phi).   ==The [[Category:Symbolic]] phallus== The [[Imaginary]] phallus which circulates between mother and child serves to institute the first dialectic in the child's life, which, although it is an [[Imaginary]] dialectic, already paves the way towards the [[SymbolicCategory:Concepts]], since an [[Imaginary]] element is circulated in much the same way a signifier (the phallus becomes an '[[Imaginary]] signifier').  Thus Lacan's formulations on the [[Imaginary]] phallus in the seminar of 1956-7 are accompanied by statements that the phallus is also a [[SymbolicCategory:Terms]] object<ref>S4, 152</ref> and that the phallus is a signifier.<ref>S4, 191</ref>  The idea that the phallus is a signifier is taken up again and further developed in the 1957-8 seminar and becomes the principle element of Lacan's theory of the phallus thereafter; the phallus is described as 'the signifier of the desire of the Other',<ref>E, 290</ref> and the signifier of jouissance.<ref>E, 320</ref>  --  These arguments are stated in their most definitive form in Lacan's paper on 'The signification of the phallus'.<ref>Lacan, 1958c</ref> The phallus is not a fantasy, if by that we mean an [[Imaginary]] effect. Nor is it as such an object (part-, internal, good, bad, etc.). It is even less the organ, penis or clitoris, that it symbolises. . . . The phallus is a signifier. . . . It is the signifier intended to designate as a whole the effects of the signified.<ref>E, 285</ref> Whereas the [[Castration Complex]] and the Oedipus complex revolve around the [[Imaginary]] phallus, the question of sexual difference revolves around [[symbolic]] phallus.  The phallus has no corresponding female signifier; 'the phallus is a symbol to which there is no correspondent, no equivalent. It's a matter of a dissymmetry in the signifier.'<ref>{{S3}} p.176</ref>  Both male and female subjects assume their sex via the [[Symbolic]] phallus. --- Unlike the [[Imaginary]] phallus, the [[Symbolic]] phallus cannot be negated, for on the [[Symbolic]] plane an absence is just as much a positive entity as a presence.<ref>see E, 320</ref>  Thus even the [[Woman]], who lacks the [[Symbolic]] phallus in one way, can also be said to possess it, since not having it the [[Symbolic]] is itself a form of having.<ref>S4, 153</ref>  Conversely, the assumption of the [[Symbolic]] phallus by the man is only possible on the basis of the prior assumption of his own castration.  Lacan goes on in 1961 to state that the [[Symbolic]] phallus is that which appears in the place of the lack of the signifier in the Other.<ref>S8, 278-8 1</ref>  It is no ordinary signifier but the [[Category:Real]] presence of desire itself.<ref>S8, 290</ref>  In 1973 he states that the [[Symbolic]] phallus is 'the signifier which does not have a signified'.<ref>S20, 75</ref>  ---   The [[Symbolic]] phallus is written <fi in Lacanian algebra.  However, Lacan warns his students that the complexity of this symbol might be missed if they simply identify it with the [[Symbolic]] phallus.<ref>S8, 296</ref>  The symbol is more correctly understood as designating 'the phallic function'.<ref>S8, 298</ref>  In the early 1970s Lacan incorporates this symbol of the phallic function in his formulae of sexuation.  Using predicate logic to articulate the problems of sexual difference, Lacan devises two formulae for the masculine position and two formulae for the feminine position.  All four formulae revolve around the phallic function, which is here equivalent with the function of castration.