Lacan Today Psychoanalysis, Science, Religon

by Leupin, Alexandre

• ISBN13: 9781892746900
• ISBN10: 1892746905
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2004-11-17
• Publisher: Other Press

Summary

Lacan Today: Psychoanalysis, Science, Religionoffers a lucid overview of the French psychoanalyst's work. In five sections--"The Structure of the Subject," "Epistemology," "Four Discourses," "There is No Sexual Rapport," and "God is Real,"--the book maps out Lacan's thought for the lay reader with unmatched clarity. It does this by building from Lacan's graph and formulas, which are often misunderstood. This formalization acts as a pedagogical tool of wonderful economy, offering a broad overview without neglecting the essential details. The chapters are summarized by a general graph that visually demonstrates Lacan's rigor and coherence. The book examines often-neglected aspects of Lacan's work, like problems in the history of science, epistemology, and religion, in order to show Lacan's relevance to today's world. It makes the case for Lacan as one of the most important thinkers of the twentieth century, whose reach extends beyond the discipline of psychoanalysis. Indeed, Lacan's thought should lead readers into a reexamination of philosophy, literature, art, politics, economy, and desire. In his introduction, Alexandre Leupin writes: "If the unconscious exists, then Lacan is the only twentieth-century thinker who has drawn the consequences of Freud's discovery to their ultimate limits. I propose here what some will take as bombastic hyperbole: Lacan's radical reevaluation of human thinking is comparable to Einstein's." Though Lacan's thought is making tremendous inroads in countries of Latin culture, it has been slowly fading from public awareness in the English-speaking world. Often Lacan has been nothing more than a pawn in the bundling of contradictory doctrines labeled as "French thought"; or he has been reduced to a means of exchange between psychoanalysts or specialists in the humanities. Leupin's contention is that what Lacan said or wrote is of interest to the general public and that his consignment to oblivion is reversible. This book demonstrates that Lacan's thinking has vast implications, not only for college professors or practicing psychoanalysts, but also for scientists, epistemologists, and every man and woman.

Author Biography

Alexandre Leupin

Alexandre Leupin, a native of Geneva, Switzerland, is Gregorie Professor in French at Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, where he teaches French literature, art, epistemology, and psychoanalysis. In addition to numerous articles, his works include Le Graal et la littèrature, Barbarolexis, Fiction and Incarnation, La Passion des idoles, and Phallophanies.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	xi
Introduction	xiii
1 The Structure of the Subject	1	(30)
The Schema L	1	(11)
The Schema R	12	(9)
The Graphs of Desire	21	(3)
Topology	24	(3)
The Borromean Knot	27	(4)
2 Epistemology	31	(36)
Epistemology of Science, Epistemology of the Humanities	31	(5)
Lacan's Theory of Language	36	(16)
A Unified Epistemology	52	(12)
An Impossible Ethics	64	(3)
3 The Master, the Academic, the Psychoanalyst, and the Hysteric: Four Discourses	67	(20)
The Master's Discourse	70	(7)
The University's Discourse	77	(3)
The Psychoanalyst's Discourse	80	(2)
The Hysteric's Discourse	82	(5)
4 "There Is No Sexual Rapport"	87	(18)
5 God Is Real	105	(20)
Conclusion	125	(4)
Appendix I: The Bar Defined	129	(6)
Appendix II: Possible Extensions of the Schema L	135	(2)
Bibliography	137	(6)
Index	143