1 Lacan & The Purloined Letter

 notoriously elusive text

o Lacan’s strategy was to have a discourse similar to the discourse of the unconscious
 impossibility for the human being to grasp meaning
o not only argues for it but performs it as well
 context
 Lacan appeared on the critical scene of the 50s
 structuralist movement (language, culture)
 it ended the dominance of the HUMANISTIC approaches to lit & cult
o human being in the centre
o understanding is possible -> the human being is an active agent of knowledge, capable
of it
o individual who thinks logically
o capable of ‘moral judgement’
o capable of complete self-control, the subject knows what it wants
o independence -> self-governing individual
 this approach changed here -> “post-humanistic”
 the structure replaces things that used to belong to the individual
 important in psychoanalysis -> unconscious
o Freud deconstructs this humanistic subject
o not individual (has parts)
o unconscious -> knowing? understanding? control? rationality?
o unconscious desires, judgement influenced by unconscious
 linguistics + psychoanalysis
o passive human subject who is not the master of meaning
 repetition automatism
o system, no control
o eg. lecturing nightmare
 anti-humanistic vocabulary
o human being is shaped, open to metaphorisation
o fluid subject molded into a shape -> types of subjectivity
o answer: extreme- human being does not have freedom at all
o (humanism is also extreme)
 existence
o human subject is excentric -> it has its centre elsewhere (unconscious)
o there is an unconscious, a centre of the subject but we do not have it, do not possess
it
 this excentric place in me is alien to me yet more familiar than myself
 what I think of as myself
 my socially acceptable identity
 my socially produced self, like a mask
 if there is a true self, this is certainly not that
o experience the unconscious but not know it
o alienation in contemporary societies -> we do not feel at home in ourselves
 imaginary – symbolic - real
o first realm a child steps in – language - real
o world of language is meaningful but this meaning is tricky it does not have anything to
do with the real
o when you see the meanings you do not see the thing itself -> that is identity
o once you name it the wonder is gone, you kill the moment, sign takes place of exp

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 the real is what has no meaning -> we do not know much about real
o human world is not real
o can come only as trauma
 the symbolic order is constitutive for the subject
o it shapes the subject and not the other way around!
o wakings of the signifier
o Lacan demonstrates this with literature
 STORIES
o by this time literature was pushed aside by new technologies
 replace literature and human being
o the key to understanding is through words, the unconscious is like a linguistic structure
o ironic
 les non-dupes errent: those who do not let themselves be caught in the symbolic
deception/fiction and continue to believe their eyes are the ones who err most
 le non-du pere = az apa neve
o ez tartja össze össze a szimbolikus rendet és ejti pofára azokat, akik azt hiszik, mindent
tudnak
 OTHER – distrupts this (oedipal triangle)

 oedipalisation

(castration)

 the basic family situation is the model of subjectivisation

o mirror stage: imaginary completeness of identity
o everything that is complete belongs to the imaginary
 language, culture -> we step into symbolic order
o the unity, the nice coherent thing breaks
o there is always lack
 what language does to us
o language – subjectivity – death
o when we are constructed through language as we know, lack and death are always
there
 birth of the sign is at the cost of the death of the thing
 sign: supplementary character, it can take the place of the thing
 language arranges the world -> gives a symbolic world instead of the
real world

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 o three glances -> intersubjective connections of meaning and seeing
o by pretending that she does not want to hide it, she can hide it
o the letter as a signifier
o characters have roles, positions in this structure
o locate us somewhere in the signifying system
 in Poe this becomes an allegory for Lacan (structure, knowledge, power, meaning)
o there is a structure of intersubjectivity, like a game with set positions
o these positions are connected to certain knowledges but these are always limited
o each perspective includes some kind of blindness
o the “ostrich principle”
 when we look in one direction or close our eyes, we leave te realm of
unprotected
 vision and blindness -> each direction we look at, there is something we do
not see
 intersubjective knowledge -> all the positions include some kind of knowledge and some kind
of blindness
o we imagine that we know all, but there is always lack in the symbolic order
 the letter travels on -> the subject cannot be a master of meaning
o allegory of interpretation
o we all like these characters and we want to steal true meaning from texts
o fantasy of having no blindness
 game of knowing, game of power, game of sexuality
 we don’t undertand the structure in which we take positions -> that would be meta-knowledge
o the subject imagines that we see other’s blindness but the blindness of the subject is
always seen by others
 identity decieves us -> we are fooled by the system
 the positions are displaced
o displacement: the positions we fill are prescribed for us -> not really ours
o always a position of displacement
o it is not our proper place because there is no such thing as proper place ->
o within the symbolic order there is no proper place -> the human subject can never feel
at home in the symbolic order ->
o restlessness: we are not sure that elsewhere would be better but it is not good here -
> that is why we have repetition and desire

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2 Barbara Johnson: The Frame of Reference

 Lacan
o mastery over meaning -> the human being is not a master of meaning or itself ->
removed from the centre (post-humanist paradigm)
o new position of the human being
 human’s relation to language
 issues of the text
 repetition
 death
 desire
 language
o the characters think they are masters but there is always someone else who knows
better
o if you stop reflecting your own place in the system, you can be tricked (intersubjective
system) ->
o never absolute truth, we have relative knowledges
o there can be always another person that exceeds ours -> we can be fooled
o the best knowledge we can have is the knowledge that we do not know all (Socrates)
-> we should know that we do not know ->
o reason: human being’s involvement in the symbolic order, such systems work like that
 triangles, Lacan likes them because they resemble oedipal stuff

 human beings necessarily fulfil roles (positions) in the system according to the rules of
signification
 being castrated means that there is always someone else who knows more, the subject by
definition is a lacking subject (does not have it all)
 the letter becomes a fantasy object
o fantasy of full knowledge -> fantasy of the lack of lack
 allegory of interpretation
o interpretation is about understanding and when you write an essay using secondary
materials, you see what they see and also what they are blind to and you think you
have the meaning ->
o nobody can have the system, the system has you, you’re positioned in the system
o this never stops, no point when all questions of a text are interpreted
o this is how meaning works
o people think at one point of the process that they have the letter, so the letter cannot
be had
o language tricks us into fantasies (logic of self-misunderstanding) ->

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 o like the mirror phase when you think that coherence is you ->
o a homogenous thing is a fantasy (like in a superhero movie)
 why is it hard to resist fantasy?
o if we are masters we can relax
o narcissism -> love for an ideal self
o we have to love ourselves to a certain extent, it is necessary
o desire (of the ideal self) -> because the subject is castrated -> it wants to be more
(ideal), it wants to be master ->
o the chain of interpretation becomes ironic
o impossible not to desire the mastery -> even Socrates’ position has this self-fooling
fantasy
 truth?
o it is a fantasy which is always with the Other -> at least we think the Other has it
o Lacan: it is always elsewhere
o fantasy of the sublime Other who has it, eg. God
 -> repetition
o sign that you are no master
o takes us beyond the humanistic way of thinking
 stupid repetitions (the stealing from each other is like that -> they could know
how it works)
o forms of repetition that can be destructive (eg. when you always take too many jobs
& exhaust yourself) ->
o you are caught in a system and you recreate that system for you, this system is larger
 for some reason you want to do this even if you are complaining all the time
(unconscious desire)
 something is in us that is larger than us
o mechanical -> inorganic (machines are the best at repetition, we never repeat the
same way)
o connected to death (Freud) -> repetition expresses an unconscious desire to return to
the inorganic, a way to get out of the human condition
o driven not by pleasure principle -> gives up on the monistic theory of instincts for a
while -> they are not for fun -> there is another principle – DEATH DRIVE
o repetition expresses this desire to return to a previous state (of mind)
 it is not only for fun (pleasure principle)
 darker shadow in us
 eg. ww2 soldiers -> re-experiencing the battle again and again (reoccurring
nightmare)
 it cannot be explained with the pleasure principle
 repetition throws you out of normal human subjectivity (normal stuff involves
change) ->
 in these dreams there was no change
 fantasy: S->->->->->S = on the way to fulfilment
 objects of desire ^
 you think you are closer to sg when you get there
 basis of consumer society
 repetition: going in circles, no progress -> idea of the death drive -> throws us off the track
o the subject gets disillusioned and loses the fantasy that keeps it moving towards sg
o you can break the sense of time
o fantasies shatter
o Lacan: symbolic order involves this mindless, endless repetition (actually it is it itself)
but gives us fantasies so we think that it is not

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 signifier as killer
o meaningful objects -> identities -> these are dead things replacing the living objects -
> when we feel so alive this meaning is not so in your mind (sheer jouissance)
 concept of meaning that is never proper, always displaced
o symbolic order
o meaning is never true and can never be grasped -> always displaced
o where is meaning? continuous sliding
o no proper meaning, no proper identity -> it is always dynamic, nobody has it
o we are never fooled if we think we cannot have it
o we find ourselves in intersubjective structures but you cannot know where you are in
the system -> the subject continuously misunderstands its place in the system
 meaning – frame
o both meanings in connection with frame
o the stories frame the previous ones to transfer guilt (lack onto the previous one)
o meaning always exist in frame in both senses of the word -> meaning is not proper /
true
o narratives about us -> we should know the narratives in order to know our place in the
system
o it is impossible to do and know what we do at the same time because knowing should
be out of the system
 concept of gift
o phallus: fantasy of completeness -> this is sg nobody has
o but this can be given as a gift
o phallus exists and we can give it to each other as a gift of love
o it exists only in the act of giving (intersubjectivity in Lacan)
o cannot be part of a business agreement

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3 Barthes: The Pleasure of the Text

o 1973, post-structuralist literary theory

o deconstruction was born (Derrida), Lacan, Foucault
o crucial point of theory: gender, body, etc.
o recontextualisation is used to replace old tradition
o old way: pleasure, blidd, body, erocisim, coherence, logic, consistency
o -> new aesthetics is created
o what is a text and the purpose of a text according to the old tradition?
o storing information? religious books & teaching ppl about God’s message
o the text is important because of its context
o laws and the message of God
o the importance of the text is in its transcendental nature
o it has an absolute truth
o without this feature it does not have any sense
o text is a means of getting metaphysical truth
o the task of the reader:
 to follow God’s commandments & live a life according to these rules
 to understand the original message and truth
o human being = ordinary world
o truth = metaphysical world
o however, this model was preserved and used for philosophical writings
o eg. understanding the intention of the author
o -> transporting this Biblical paradigm to literature
o what matters is the intention of the author
o this is a tradition against which this text is written
o it is difficult to change the old way of thinking because almost any words are
connected to this old paradigm
o we do not have any words to use
o instead of ultimate truth we have to deal with body & pleasure
o our experiences of reading, enjoying reading, truth does not matter
o The Pleasure of the Text
o the text is fragmented
o Barthes does not build up a pyramid of knowledge
o the relationship between the paragraphs is not always clear
o Hegelian dialectic
o thoughts are built up like:
o thesis -> antithesis -> synthesis
o (kis háromszögekből nagy háromszög) Auftreibung
o knowledge gets more and more perfect, nothing is lost in the process, higher truth is
reached
o “megszüntetve megőrizni” – the truth is preserved while the two points no longer
exist
o BUT Barthes thinks otherwise
o fragments do not build up like that
o difference is lost in Auftreibung bu it becomes the most important in 70s theories???
o in the truth, difference is lost
o 70s: reversal in thinking
o what matters is the difference between ideological positions and not the absolute
truth
o the text does not want to be one.
o introduction

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o a new theory of reading is formed against common sense values and laws
o logical contradiction / consistency
o when we enjoy reading we feel inconsistency
o we mix languages and do not care about contradictions
o we behave in a way that would be unacceptable in polite conversation
o eg. can you explain why you enjoy a novel?
o there is no logical explanation
o it is an individual experience so you cannot explain
o we participate in reading with our whole being
o tastes, body, not only logic
o you can’t explain why you cry or why you are sexually aroused by parts of the text
o these things are individual and subjective
o when we read we lose our well-composed social and logical identity
o it is key to the pleasures of reading
o it is partly influenced by psychoanalysis
o Freud thought that civilisation and unhappiness go hand in hand
o this well structured self leads to unhappiness as the conscious does not follow the
pleasure principle
o when we read the loss of the rigidly composed self means pleasure
o constitution of languages
o it is needed for this kind of pleasure
o different languages are good to have this kind of pleasure
o human beings are self-contradictory: desire and shame if you have fun
o pleasure you can have with your well-composed self
o bliss: radical enjoyment
o Lacan: jouissance – bliss
o radical enjoyment when you read
o it is the everyday word for orgasm in French
o not well-composed self but loss of self
o extreme joy and pain may disintegrate the person for a while
o religious experience
o losing one’s self and being one with God
o enjoyment and blidd
o “neurosis is a makeshift”
o in-between concept
o sane – neurotic – mad
o sane: order, system, prewritten, prescribed, creativity
o neurotic: in-between
o mad: uncontrolled, unpredictable, cannot be understood, completely different
o psychoanalytic terms
o neurosis: you know that you are neurotic, you know what you are doing is strange
o mad: you do not know that you are mad, madness cannot communicate with
normality, complete otherness
o neurosis
o creative domain: opening up boring sanity but it is not lost in madness
 literature, the pleasure of reading
o erotic: sg in which you can find pleasure
o Barthes claims that texts seduce us the way the narration unfolds
o eg. foreshadowing things
o creating flashes of knowledge that bring us closer to the real truth
o sexuality is used as a paradigm: getting closer and closer to the beloved’s body
o reading works like that: those flashes keep us interested in the text

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o there are different modes to keep the readers interested
o corporeal striptease or narrative suspense
o oedipal pleasure
 Noah’s story (symbolic function of the father ends)
o striptease or narrative suspense
o text of pleasure, causes pleasure but nothing special
o you get closer and closer to the ultimate truth
o detective fiction, Oedipus’ story
o texts of pleasure
o popular literature
o the process is what is pleasurable
o the gap: when you suddenly have a flash of meaning and the text goes on
o the surface is broken now and then
o text of bliss
o distrupts us, discomforts us, shocking
o state of bliss
o it is closer to madness
o modernism and high literature
o the normal subject want something more
 lacking subject, not complete
o this subject has the will to the radical other or meaning
o in jouissance, there is no lack as there is no subject
o the text’s will to bliss, to reach sg radically other
o aesthetic enjoyment, truth effect (Foucault’s idea)
o radical otherness: the text wishes to reach it
o the text of pleasure never reaches it
o the text of bliss is motivated by the will and promise to jouissance
o rapture
o jouissance: catharsis, goosebumps, silence – effects of the text of bliss
o ideology
o borrowed from Neo-Marxism
o it is a constitutive fantasy connecting the subject to the system / society
o they are not true but they are necessary for human beings (ideologies)
o it can become a playful element of literature
o mixing, constituting ideology
o a kind of perversion: the text playing with ideologies

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4 Foucault & Butler

o human subject’s relation to power

o conventional notion of power: control coming from above, some ppl have power and use it on
others -> ‘they’ have power – old school idea
o Foucault
o first step in Hegel’s master-slave dialectic: allegory of different positions -> power is
needed for human being’s self-recognition to become ourselves -> self-consciousness
arises in intersubjective connection where power is present, there are roles which we
internalise
o next step is Foucault: constructive and performative aspect of power
 twist to the old school idea -> the individual may oppose the powered
someone (us vs. them)
 Foucault says that this concept of the individual is already a form of
enslavement -> power is imposed on us because we think about ourselves as
individuals (PARADOX 1)
 power: sg that turns human beings into subjects
o what does it mean to turn into a subject?
o subjectivisation, assujetisement
o subjected to: under the power / influence of someone else (grammatical category:
alany)
o objectivisation: the human being is objectified and through that one becomes subject
(PARADOX 2)
o eg. mirror phase: image in the mirror is an object and you identify with it -> you
objectify yourself ->
o this works with social concepts as well
 the very concept of identity is already self-objectification
o objectification: people are placed into boxes (roles, functions) -> society would not
work without it and we are eager to put ourselves into boxes ->
o dividing practices: ideologies, roles, identities
o Butler: she claims that the subject is passionately attached to his/her own subordination
o we become subjected to power through becoming subjects and we are attached to
this identity
o we enslave ourselves and love it
o freedom
o law
o concepts -> can you be free from concepts
 inside your head
 power defines what you think you can or cannot do -> power creates desire
 even in thinking about freedom, power is already there
o we are subjects, once we are subjects, freedom would be to unmake ourselves as
subjects
o only: freedom of choices within a matrix of power
o Foucault: subject is an effect of power -> Butler: why do we like it?
o it is a normal condition within a society
1. we become individuals (thinking we are)
2. through this (we imagine ourselves as free individuals) we become subjects (no
freedom)
3. we enjoy this
o the individual is a fantasy that is offered to the subject as a narcissistic bait and we accept, buy
and through buying into it -> narcissistic pleasures -> we become attached to the identity ->
we are attached to something

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 o prescribed by power ->
o self fashioning is when you see your radical freedom and join the social matrix
o all the elements you can use while self-fashioning
o all created by culture
o fantasy of free individual, it’s a fantasy that we can enjoy - fetish objects
o -> we are subjected, it is like a work of art – we work on it to make it nicer -> this is a
narcissistic joy that guarantees that we are parts of the social matrix
o power is always connected to knowledge
o power must be logical, rational, come with a world view ->
o the things that power makes you do must be seen as normal, rational decisions
 impossible to notice - usually unconsciously (we get it from our parents)
o modern form of power has a history
o many of its functions was not invented by government but Christianity
o PASTORAL POWER
 it starts caring about each and every individual
 care for the self, each individual is looked after ->
 salvation important for the church and the individual
 you can ask for help
 you are not simply threatened by some punishment
 the whol process is internalised
 self-discipline replaces the old fear of punishment
 it becomes an internal drama of self-fashioning according to the concept
 you do not have to be punished because it is inside of you, conscience
 taming in a more professional way
 the modern state inherits this
o we have more freedom than before but also we have less
o it is just impossible for us to do certain things
o “maybe the target nowadays is to refuse what we are”
 discovering ourselves is a fake project: the “I” is a concept of culture
 if you want to be here, you have to reject this
o power is not an abstract thing -> you cannot have power, there are only effects of power but
they are there in everything we do
o power is exercised on free subjects only insofar as they are free
o you have to think you are free – precondition
o idea of freedom is there in Christianity ->
o you are constituted as someone that the whole system can use
o you think you can make decisions and think that you do make these decisions
o involves the fantasy of resistance -> never tyrannical, monolithic -> incorporates ways of
resistance, more flexible system
o you are still within the system
o people want to have the feeling of freedom but even if you resist you are within the
same system
o interpellation (Althusser)
o policemen & policeman - “hey you” you identify with the position of someone
addressed by the law - you place yourself into a position - you think yourself as a
subject to law - the I starts existing only through this gesture - agency: possibility of
free acting – what the human being is capable of doing
o social norms are incorporated through repetition, physical reiteration
o not only cognitive process
o behaviour patterns
o performative, constitutive, reiteration
o power is in the body

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Brooks: Freud’s Masterplot

 contemporary psychoanalytic literary critic

 psychoanalytic literary criticism + narratology
 he treats the text as sg. to be analysed and not the author ->
 analogies between texts and human psyche
 mutual co-dependence -> people are formed by, through texts ->
 we can analyse literary texts similarly as analysts analyse patients ->
 as a field of desire, repression, etc.
 Beyond the Pleasure Principle
o Freud is arguing with himself
o death drive is confused / confusing
 narrative – metaphor – metonymy
o metaphor: based on similarity eg. love is rose
o metonymy: spatial or temporal continuity
 eg. the White House declared war
 there can be several logical connections
 narrative needs both principles
o metaphor: essential similarity -> chain of events (essential sameness)
 we want to tell one story
 metaphor holds it together
 metaphor chooses the one story
o metonymy: temporal sequence of events
 it moves forward connected to desire (Lacan)
 chain-forward
 unfolding narrative like desire moving forward to its goal
 when we read on we are driven by desire
 openness to the future -> it has sg for us we lack in the present moment
 in narrative it is epistemological desire (for information)
 different art forms
 if no narrative, it is more metaphorical (poetry, painting)
 in photography, body parts are synecdoche for the human body
 performance art -> no narrative but body is metonymical
 films are also both
 passion for meaning
o Aristotle: beginning – middle – end -> twist in psychoanalysis
o middle is the movement -> thrown into time
o end: stasis (no more movement), time is suspended
 passion for the end -> in the end we supposedly get all the information -> completeness,
understanding
o this knowledge is hard to get in real life
o we have this fantasy that at the end we look back and understand everything
o we cannot see but we understand why we cannot see -> closure is denied for us
o we are in the process of understanding and making stories
o but supposes that moment when time stops and we can reflect
o a moment when signification stops: a knowledge which is not necessarily symbolic
(linguistic) but conceptual
o fantasy of meaning that goes beyond language and concepts
o time stops so as to give us time for retrospection -> a drive that drives us towards the
end, passion for the anticipated retrospection
 what makes a story a story is a structure that is limited: stories have an end ->

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 o it is the ending that structures the story
o TV series: no ending, they just go on – meaning?
 tiny little closures, episodes but teaser elements
 only a promise of the ending
o different desires -> not the desire for an end but how the narrative gets to the end
o desire for the end is not the only drive -> we can enjoy the middle without the
anticipation for the end, eg. soap operas, cartoons
 repetition of the same forever
 interminable, you enjoy the middle, different paradigm
 literature & death -> we need death / end to have stories
o life gets meaning only because of death (existentialist thinkers)
o death is the drug that pumps some energy into life -> feed importance to the present
o it quickens meaning
 narrative and repetition
o importance of repetition in traumatic events -> traumatised soldiers (confused Freud)
o pleasure principle -> this is not pleasurable
 fort / da game: toy and grandson -> the mother often went away, he kept throwing out the
toy when the mother was away
o trauma and repetition: the mother is not there
o mother’s presence and absence
o active repetition: the child repeats the trauma in order to overcome it, to master the
situation
o passive is suffering -> we re-enact it so as to actively gain mastery
o repetition: we get control over meaning -> through repeating stories we make them
ours
o repetition with slight modifications eg. genres
o repetition is a movement from passivity to mastery (being active)
o in life we have a threat of an imposed end (we are passive, no control)
o different art forms relate to this differently
 pop culture: repetition
 modernism: death is meaningless
o ending is not something sublime
o no big conclusions, no totalised meaning ->
o acceptance of the lack of totalised meaning -> it denies us this kind of meaning
 safeguard from existential anxiety: cult of the individual
o it is itself a work of art and Is unique
o permanent because of art
o you do not have this in pop culture
 repetition and death -> repetition that leads to terminable meaning -> death - terminable
 pleasure principle and death drive
o PP: life, desire, middle of the narrative, lack of complete meaning, metonymy logic, a
story
o DD: death, the point when time stops, desires fulfilled, completeness of meaning, not
narratible, metaphorical meaning, essential
o binary opposition, both work in human life, in each narrative we have both waking
o basic pulsation: death drive, the wish to end stories created by the individual
o wish to stop time
 incest and shortcircuit
o taboo -> that Is the moment where culture starts
o we need the detour (the middle), you have to find substitutive objects of desire
o that is why narrative is important in human life

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Kristeva: Approaching Abjection
 Bulgarian origins, but moved to Paris
o psychoanalyst, also studies literature
o influenced by Lacan but left his school of psychoanalysis
o revised psychoanalysis in a less phallic way – dejection, rejection, kicked out
 first book: on poetry, desire in language
o aspects of poetic language beyond conceptual meaning: those that cannot be
explained by words and concepts -> rhythm and body
 Powers of Horror (1982)
o theoretical and poetical at the same time
 The Abject
o being a subject
o culture
o film studies
o contemporary art
 the improper / unclean
o food loathing
o filth & waste
o vomiting
o strange phobias
o the abject is the thrown out subject, the jettisoned (cast out)
 middle ages
o a ship is struck by several storms because sy has sinned or there is a woman on board,
so they throw out the abject
o self-cleaning and purifying
o radical otherness may enter the body – it may be inside us so we have to throw it away
 Kristeva says that abject is part of the human being
 what is the abject like?
o the I is both opposed to the object and the abject
o you relate to both of them
 with desire to the object
 repulsion, revolt, violence towards the abject
o relation to objects: normal behaviour
 the object of desire motivates us the most
 it is meaningful
 object of desire is fantasy, we imagine it
o the abject threatens us of the collapse of meaning
 not because physical destroying but it brings about the collapse of the self
 meaning is over and there is physical response to it
 phobias are metaphors for mental projections and problems
 human beings have these problems by definition
o meaning and the proper self-made self collapses
o temporal end of the self
 this is the jettisoned object
 it is the superego that casts it out (agency that decides what is right or wrong)
 what is really cast out is the thing they symbolise
 they stand for something that is abject and you throw it out
o what we really want to throw out is within ourselves so we cannot do it
o we try to keep these mental things in a distance
o there is a point when you can connect the mental thing with the abject but it is an
unconscious thing

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 abjection within or of the self
o the I can also be an abject but it is also an object of desire
o potentials of the human psyche: we are not able to cast ourselves out
o the more abject things you have, the stronger these jettisoned objects become, eg.
othering techniques, social othering – often irrational
 why do we expel the self? what is wrong with it?
o the position of active and passive turn around easily
o mystical Christendom
o the self is expelled
o the pure Other: God & Jesus
o the self is organised in relation to the other
o the self is improper and unclean
o the human self is realised in relation to others, intersubjective eg. God, parants, love,
friendship
o we want love and acceptance from these figures
o it is possible that we are not good enough for them and the self becomes cast out
o if the other does not accept me, I am nothing
o in Romantic stories: the lover is rejected
 not being worthy, rejection, not being whole
 suicide is the ultimate answer to it
 it brings out the collapse of the self
o when everybody you love rejects you, you feel abject and abjected
o the human being is a social being and needs affirmation all the time
o feeling of worthlessness -> abjection
 the self is created at the price of casting out / rejecting the pre-Oedipal world
o the mother
o the danger of the price being to high
o the self may not worth that rejection as it is not as big and full as that previous state
o loving ourselves and being loved by others
 they become abjects when they are not loved enough
 “lives are based on exclusion”
o there are two kinds of repression
o less radical: denial
o more radical: rejection connected to abjection
o total collapse of meaning and self -> psychosis
 falling subject of the symbolic order
 you cannot communicate with others
 there is no desire in it
 not only certain aspects / objects of desire are denied but desire itself
 beyond the human world
 the abject is also connected to some sort of radical enjoyment
o violent enjoyment of the outcast eg. monster films
o radical otherness entering the human world
o radical enjoyment
 the abject
 the monster’s enjoyment is radical and beyond the human world
 meaning lessens, falling apart
o or when outcast people want to make others suffer and they enjoy it
o Others: what is true? how is it experienced?

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Lauretis: Through the Looking Glass

 cinema, subjectivity, meaning ->

 Laura Mulvay (working class background)
o narrative (Brooks, Barthes) and visual pleasures (scopophilia, voyeurism)
o cinema is gendered -> woman as a spectacle, man as voyeur in the film or outside
spectator – masculine, male position
o masculine desire drives the narrative ->
 the object of desire is gendered as feminine
o masculine, sadistic, voyeuristic gaze vs. feminine, masochistic, narcissistic,
exhibitionist attitude
o this is a problem for feminism
 C. Metz
o connects psychoanalysis and semiotics in cinema studies
o spectator is constructed by the cinematic apparatus
o subjectivity or spectator is constructed through semiotic and technological devices ->
 different technologies of subjectivity and gender
o 2 kinds of identification: symbolic and imaginary
 imaginary: when you identify with the character
 symbolic: when you identify with the cinematic apparatus
 you have to step into the technological apparatus -> the spectator takes the
position of the camera and the projector
o focal point of vision
 we are in the middle
 we do not have to move
 -> our vision is the vision of the camera
o the spectator’s position is characterised by hallucination and regression
 when the person goes back in his/her development (step back)
 we know it is just a movie yet we react to it, we behave as if it were real
 we believe that the events are real but we know it is not
 disavowal of knowledge – you know sg but behave as if you did not
 ‘I know it very well but still’ (unconscious involved)
 the willing suspension of disbelief
 like in fetishism, similar strategy
 I know it is just her skirt, but still
 object gaining meaning because of their connections to sg else
 cinema is sg we fetishize -> the movie star is a fetish object ->
 the rare opportunity of the lack of lack
o presence of meaning
o coherence
o narrative closure
o fantasy of completeness
 woman is the ground of representation
o representation tries to fill in a lack -> fantasy
 that is why it is the origin
 cultural productivity
 woman – ad hoc object of desire -> lack has to be filled with representation
 representation is the guarantee that the lack will not be filled
 representation can never become the real thing
 lack creates semiotic productivity

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  representation separates us from the real -> when we learn languages (Lacan
–symbolic oedipalisation)
o cinema produces subjects: social technology
 shapes people’s minds
 ideology
 idea of what is normal -> involves the definitions
 idea of normalcy is the most ideological point (sacred messages) ->
 we are conditioned in social practices to act in a certain way
 nobody tells you this is what you must do
 novels, films -> norm (you want to be normal!)
o subject is not a stable unity
 subject in process -> human being is made and remade
 not finished
 always questioned
 cinema is a technology for making people and this making never ends
 plurality of positions in a cultural matrix
 your identity in this moving matrix is always actively negotiated
 limited freedom to negotiate
 goes through cultural apparatus
o subject process: processes through which subjectivity is (re)formed
o female spectatorship & female desire
 Levi Strauss: aboriginal tribes -> basic structures
 desire is a property of me,n
o is the economy of male gaze chaning
o breaking the code
o different kind of looking
o male heterosexual gaze is disturbed
o tactical act -> new kinds of enjoyment

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Judith Butler

 body, subjectivity
 1990s: body comes back into discourse
 in 80s deconstruction any corporeal stuff discredited
o “there is no outside text” Derrida
o what is not textual is not accessible to us -> body becomes a taboo in humanities
o misunderstanding
 Butler and the feminist background brought the body back in a more reflective way (it is naïve
to think that body is given and natural
 we have cultural meanings inscribed with values, gender, race, age, beauty, desire
 it is hard to perceive the body otherwise
 written on bodies
 equally reductive to think of the body as without matter -> “bodies matter”
 question of agency: if the body is meaning then who writes the meanings on the body? can it
be rewritten?
o body signifies -> if you change these does not mean that you change the code, the
meaning ->
o you use the codes given by culture but some of these you cannot change eg. skin
colour, sex (at least hard to change)
o can we redefine the meaning?
o change: institution, ideology and people to believe in that ideology
o culture offers a repertoire of choice of identifications
 BUT! identity is not just a matter of choice
o identity cannot be separated from bodily inscriptions – complex situation
o we have choices but identity is not a matter of choice
 Silverman: cultural screen (meanings we are used to)
 eg. black people identifying with culturally idealised images (Silverman)
 rosy checks after running home -> physically they do not have them but they
believe they do -> fake?
o speech act theory: words do not only communicate things but words also do things
 performative aspect of language
 what we say can change things
 perform identities
 model for identity making
 they change reality -> performative identitiy theory
 identity is performance (words, clothes, hair…)
 gender is performance
 bodily as well
 not necessarily conscious
 identity is like a theatrical role, only we forget that we are performing ->
learned
o avoid extremes: materialism vs. discoursive idealism
 materialism: everything is naturally given
 discoursive idealism -> everything is meaning, culture has all freedom to
construct you
 Butler gets dangerously close to this BUT
 concept of reiteration (iterability): it is through repeated
performances that inscriptions become “natural” to us, become us
o performativity is not a singular and deliberate act but a
reiterative practice

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 o you borrow the meanings but you make it your own and
forget that it is citation
 Foucault: regulative ideals are that we truly embody
o concept of gender is a regulative ideal: what is a woman?
o repeated performative acts
 sex vs. gender
o retroactive logic of thinking
o sex is a retroactively created construct that we create to found gender as such ->
o sex is always gendered
o how we imagine a male body (on which cultural stuff will be written) is already
culturally inscribed, affected
o there is no human being without gender
o all concept of biological sex is gendered
o we have no access to sex

Kaja Silverman

 tries to re-read psychoanalysis in order to create a contemporary theory of identification,

including cinematic identification, visuality and subjectivity
 Lacan’s mirror stage – she worked on it
o visual image is not the only source of identification
o ego is first and foremost bodily
o BUT! it is not as simple as Lacan’s mirror phase
o not only visuality but also physical perceptions contribute to the formation of the ego
o visual type (specular image, visual image)
 visual identification leads to self as other (you interject it) -> self based on
otherness, not completely homelike
 “I is the other” (Lacan)
 the mind is not exactly you (like in cinema)
 cultural intervention
o tactile sensation (based on touch)
 sensational body
 one-ness is easier
 self-sameness is less problematic
 ego – bodily
 cultural is also there in some way, what is touched and how is culturally
codified
o bodily ego is both other and self-same
o our relationship with the ego is problematic because of this
 gaze and screen
o when we identify, there is another gaze in this process which belongs to culture (the
symbolic Other) ->
o you never look at yourself but through the eyes of this Other
o how do I look for this Other?
 symbolic father, God, culture
 Lacan: gaze vs. look – belongs to the big Other
 we want the Other to like us -> we always want others to like us (fantasy)
 even the anarchists have these unconscious motivations
o identification is not a question of free will
 ideal vs. not ideal: what you see in the mind is always contextualised by this
cultural matrix
o screen: reservoir of cultural images through which you look at yourself

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  the screen defines the meaning of images
 cultural field through which the mirror image comes back to you
o what the big Other finds ideal changes with the screen (time) ->
o what we see in the mirror also changes (race, gender, age, weight)
 different kinds of identification
o idiopathic, heteropathic ->
o how ideal you find your bodily image
o how we relate to cinematic images
 idealisation is part of construction of human being
o we want to look good for the gaze of the Other
o we serve the possibilities of idealised identifications ->
o it brings euphoria when the sensational body can coincide with the idealised visual
image

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