Subject supposed to know
The term sujet supposÈ savoir (often abbreviated to S.s.S.) is difficult to translate into English.
Sheridan translates it as 'subject suppposed to know', and this is the translation adopted in most English works on Lacan.
However, Schneiderman suggests the alternative translation 'supposed subject of knowledge', on the grounds that it is the subject, not just the knowledge, which is supposed.[1]
The phrase is introduced by Lacan in 1961 in order to designate the illusion of a self-consciousness (Ger. Selbstbewufltsein) which is transparent to itself in its act of knowing (see consciousness).
This illusion, which is born in the mirror stage, is put into question by psychoanalysis.
Psychoanalysis demonstrates that knowledge (savoir) cannot be located in any particular subject but is, in fact, intersubjective.[2]
In 1964, Lacan takes up the phrase in his definition of transference as the attribution of knowledge to asubject; 'As soon as the subject who is supposed to know exists somewhere there is transference'.[3]
This definition emphasises that it is the analysand's supposition of a subject who knows that initiates the analytic process.rather than the knowledge actually possessed by the analyst.
The term 'subject supposed to know' does not designate the analyst himself, but a function which the analyst may come to embody in the treatment.
It is only when the analyst is perceived by the analysand to embody this function that the transference can besaid to be established.[4]
When this occurs, what kind of knowledge is it that the analyst is presumed to possess?
'He is supposed to know that from which no one can escape, as soon as he formulates it - quite simply, signification.'[5]
In other words, the analyst is often thought to know the secret meaning of the analysand's words, the significations of speech of which even the speaker is unaware.
This supposition alone (the supposition that the analyst is one who knows) causes otherwise insignificant details (chance gestures, ambiguous remarks) to acquire retroactively a special meaning for the patient who 'supposes'.
It may happen that the patient supposes the analyst to be a subject who knows from the very first meinent of the treatment, or even before, but it often takes some time for the transference to become established.
In the latter case, 'when the subject enters tlie analsysis, he is far from giving the analyst this place [of the subject supposed to know]';[6] the analysand may initially regard the analyst as a buffoon, or may withold information from him in order to maintain his ignorance.[7]
However, 'even the psychoanalyst put in question is credited at some point with a certain infallibility';[8] sooner orlater some chance gestiire of the analyst's is taken by the analysand as a sign of some secret intention, some hidden knowledge.
At this point the analyst has come to embody the subject supposed to know; the transference is established.
The end of analysis comes when the analysand de-supposes the analyst of knowledge, so that the analyst falls from the position of the subject supposed to know.
The term 'subject supposed to know' also emphasises the fact that it is a particular relationship to knowledge that constitutes the unique position of the analyst; the analyst is aware that there is a split between him and the knowledge attributed to him.
In ´her words. the analyst must realise that he only occupies the position of ome who is presumed (by the analysand) to know, without fooling himself that he really does possess the knowledge attributed to him.
The analyst must realise that, of the knowledge attributed to him by the analysand, he knows nothing.[9]
However, the fact that it is a supposed knowledge that is the mainstay of the analytic process, rather than the knowledge actually possessed by the analyst, does not mean that the analyst can therefore be content with knowing nothing; on the contrary, Lacan argues that analysts should emulate Freud in becoming experts in cultural, literary and linguistic matters.
Lacan also remarks that, for the analyst, the analysand is a subject supposed to know.
When the analyst explains the fundamental rule of free association to the analysand, he is effectively saying; 'Come on, say anything, it will all be marvellous'.[10]
In other words, the analyst tells the analysand to behave as if he knew what it was all about, thereby instituting him as a subject supposed to know.
