Month: August 2013

Notes: Zizek. How to read Lacan.

Chapter: The perverse subject of politics: Lacan viewer of Mohammad Bouyeri

Keywords: perversion, politics, totalitarianism, responsibility, dirty job, Nazi, Others’s will, ethical, religious fundamentalism, letter, sadomasochistic, fear, truthfulness, Foucault, truth, lie, conceal, deception, appearance, feign, Zeuxis and Parrhasions, illusion, doctor’s plot.

 Toshio Saeki

THE PERVERT

 

In this last chapter Zizek confront us with the perverse attitude of symbolic authorities and totalitarian politics-from fascism to stalinistic authoritarianism and explains how this perversion is identified into the subject which makes itself an instrument that follows the orders and the will of the big Other (where Other=God, Nation, Historical Necessity); a kind  schizophrenic attitude driven by the formula: “I know well, but nevertheless…”; lack of coherence and dissociation of  actions,  feelings and rationalization. An example of this behavior is the Stalin-subject that claims that behind the cruel, dis-human action of  murder lies the sense of duty and it becomes the instrument for he dark enjoyment of  their God or leader.  The same mechanism and behavior  is noticed in the modern Greece, where  the members of the fascist party , “Golden Dawn”, claim with conviction that theis (atrocious) political (re)actions are motivated by their sense of national duty! This is supposed to justified the conversion of “Enjoy” to “Punish”, both anyway ordered bz the big Other.

The flag and the country becomes the symbolization of the big Other:

“This is a battle for the flag, the country and for no other reason” (Ilias Kassiadis).

 

This perverse logic characterize also religion fundamentalism. Zizek uses as example the case of Mohammed Bouyeri, who murdered the Dutsch filmmaker Theo van Gogh (2004) and stabbed into his dead body a letter threatening  Ayaan Hirsi Ali. The assassination becomes a public performance driven by Bouyeri’s political and religious convictions. In the letter, death is mentioned as the moment of the truth, the moment  “at which every  creature confronts its truth  and is isolated from all its link”. His intention was to use the letter in order to  challenge the “unbelieving extremist” (Hirsi Ali) to proof her truthfulness and at the same time to transmit her  the fear of death: a fear induced by the confrontation with the omnipotent God, the divine big Other. This brings us to Lacan’s depiction of the pervert:” the pervert displaces division onto the Other” (p.110).

The only thing that can separate truth from lie is the readiness to die for your beliefs proving like that their truthfulness.  But as Zizek writes, there is a falsity in pervert’s attitude, the fact that resides in his attachment on truth.

But where is the distinctive line between the lie and the truth? Shakespeare’s All’s Well that Ends Well gives an insight to the entanglement of truth and lie; a story, in which marriage (law), in order to be “asserted  has to be consummated in the guise of an external marital affair” (p.113) .  An affair that is not a sin  but still a sinful act that involves a “cheating”. That is linked with Lacan’s paradox proposition: “There is no sexual relationship”- where Zizek will explain that the actual sex relationship has to be sustained bz the phantasmatic supplement.

The game of feigning to feign is related to Lacan’s appearance that occurs when we feign to be something that we are not, when we put this mask that conceals the Real behind creating a convincing illusion. An example is that of the painter Parrhasion who in competition with the painter Zeuxis  who can paint the most convincing illusion, painted a curtain that symbolize the hidden truth. A strict parallel can be the fake pennis that a women wears,  an action that represents of mimicry, an attempt to imitate something that reveals  behind a hidden reality.

This bring us back to the concept of perversion, where Zizek add that  the pervert contests that has a direct access to some figure of the big Other. (like the case of Osama bin Laden and President Bush who claim to be directed by the divine will).

 

The last reference of Zizek regards the case of Sophia Karpai as an example of opposition to Other’s will. Refusing to admit any guilty in relation to the “doctor’s plot),  she contribute to be prevented another catastrophe in politics generally and to save the life of thousand of people. (http://ml-review.ca/aml/BLAND/DOCTORS_CASE_FINAL.htm)

This means that like for any rule there is an exception, also in Human history exists individuals able to resist in big Other and fight against its will.

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Additional material.

– Perversion is associated to sadomasochistic behavior.

[T]he S&M game is very interesting because it is a strategic relation, but it is always fluid. . . . Or, even when the roles are stabilized, you know very well that it is always a game. Either the rules are transgressed, or there is an agreement, either explicit or tacit, that makes them aware of certain boundaries. This strategic game as a source of bodily pleasure is very interesting. . . . It is an acting-out of power structures by a strategic game that is able to give sexual pleasure or bodily pleasure.

–Michel Foucault, Ethics: Subjectivity and Truth

 

ARTISTS

• Toshio Saeki (佐伯俊男) is an illustrator from Japan, famous for his paintings and drawing focusing on erotica, violence, and perversion. It has been suggested that his highly original erotic creations have been influential on some of Japan’s most well known contemporary artists including Aida Makoto and Takashi Murakami

 

• Vladimir Nabakov Lolita.

http://www.newrepublic.com/article/books-and-arts/nabokov-the-art-the-perverse

• Martin O’ Brien

Martin O’Brien’s practice focuses on physical endurance and hardship
in relation to the fact he suffers from cystic fibrosi. He was artist in residence
at ]performance s p a c e[ London from January- June 2012 during which he realised the project ‘Regimes of Hardship’ consisting of three 12 hour performance installations, with the third a collaborative work with the legendary performance artist and dominatrix Sheree Rose.

martinobrienperformance.weebly.com

http://www.google.de/imgres?imgurl=http://martinobrienperformance.weebly.com/uploads/2/9/3/0/2930719/7439765.jpg%3F572&imgrefurl=http://martinobrienperformance.weebly.com/about.html&h=401&w=572&sz=54&tbnid=Mu83__Q8yNk49M:&tbnh=90&tbnw=128&zoom=1&usg=__zEIx2UzfB4rcelsomyEXvH71tp8=&docid=V1-17q92Vc0ZCM&sa=X&ei=ud8EUqq5JInPOd6mgSg&ved=0CEUQ9QEwBA&dur=689

• BOB FLANAGAN.

• Mapplethorpe

By the mid-1970s, Mapplethorpe had acquired a medium format camera and began documenting New York’s gay S&M community.Mapplethorpe’s elegant prints representing portraits, nudes, flowers, and erotic and sadomasochistic subjects dominated photography in the late 20th century.

• Documentary

• Disney and perversion

<
• Film: Secretary:Maggie Gyllenhaal stars as the title character in this black comedy/drama about a mentally fragile young woman who goes to work as a secretary. Her demanding boss (James Spader) crosses the line into downright sadism, and the two begin a strange relationship that fills a need for both of them. They agree to keep their relationship secret, but it begins to influence the rest of their lives. Directed by Steven Shainberg. Categories: Comedy, Drama, Romance. Year: 2002.

• Madonna: Open your heart

Perversion and animation

ZIZEK: The pervert”s guide in cinema

LINKS
http://www.lacan.com/covers.htm

http://www.lacan.com/usepervf.htm

 

 

Notes: Zizek. How to read Lacan.

Chapter: God is Dead, but He Doesn’t Know It”: Lacan Plays with Bobok.

Key words: God, Atheism, father, unconscious, belief, faith, dead, commodity fetishism, Marx, prohibition, permition, magic object, Bobok, Gnosticism, externality of truth, Judaism-Christianity, cyberspace, cybersex, necrophilia, corpse, harassment, tolerance, proximity, narcissistic subjectivity, enjoyment, obsession, denegation, “saying it all”.

In this chapter, Zizek examines superego and the role of big Other in relation to Religion (Atheism-Judaism) versus  Lacan’s thesis that “If God is dead but he doesn’t know it”, and to the Marxian theory about commodity.He  will extend his analysis to the field of literature by taking as example Dostoevsky and Kafka. This discourse will be linked with the Cyberspace ideology and the Gnostic cyberspace dream, a space without constrains and where nobody is harassed.  According Zizek,  “harassment” has an ambiguous function; from one hand the fear of “harassment” brings the  condemnation of brutal and violent actions against others and on the other hand encourage the  distance from the others and the creation of prohibitions regarding  risky enjoyments. As a result “Enjoy” becomes more a strange ethical duty and the individual feel guilty for not being able to enjoy. Therefore, psychoanalyst assumes the role to release the patient from this kind of pressure to enjoy.

 

“God is dead” claims the atheist but Lacan argues that this declaration doesn’t kill Him but he always survives in the unconscious and thus atheism is not operative. The fact that atheist reassert God’s death actually what they are doing is to reaffirming his existence. In the modern western society the subject is presented as a tolerant hedonist that express its doubts but his mind is full of repressed prohibitions. In that sense an atheist, Zizek claims, is unconsciously dominated by prohibitions that .There is also the thesis that if God exists then everything is permitted (religious fundamentalism) that apparently gives a sort of freedom to the subject but actually creates new prohibitions. The example of the old-authoritarian father and the post modern non authoritarian father who tries to convince the child to visit his grandmother even if he doesn’t want to,  makes obvious that both of them act (directly or indirectly) trying to deprive the child from his inner freedom. But in a certain way it s more dangerous the implicit way of the postmodern father.

 

The opinion that the atheist unconsciously believe in God but without knowing is linked with the paradigm on psychoanalysis and Marxian theory about commodity. The subject need to convince its own unconscious about the truth.

Marx uses fetishism to explain how commodity function in the modern society. Fetishism regards the belief of people that in the objects inhere magic powers. Even the people who claim that they don’t believe in that actually in their social reality they act and behave on the contrary. According Marx, commodity is not located to people’s mind but in the social reality itself. Commodity is a a social phenomenon and appears only within the social exchange of relations.

(source :http://www.cla.purdue.edu/english/theory/marxism/modules/marxfetishism.html)

In literature Kafka refers to the “magic” of the commodities and Dostoevsky provides an example of thee statement that   “If there is no God, everything is permitted”  in the weird story of Bobok:

The story of Ivan Ivanovitch who one day  attends the funeral of a casual acquaintance and falls to contemplation in the graveyard. He hears the voices of the recently deceased and buried, and he listens to their conversation. They (un)deads discuss because  the “inertia” of consciousness allows them to converse even while in the grave “for two or three months… sometimes even for half a year” . As the deceased prepare to entertain themselves by revealing all of the shameful details of their earthly lives, Ivan Ivanovitch sneezes. The dead are silent afterward. Ivan Ivanovitch leaves the graveyard distressed that depravity exists even in the grave, “the last moments of consciousness,” but hopeful that he may visit other cemeteries and finally have something to write about.

Source>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobok

This story expresses the motif that everything is permitted if there is no God and no immortality of the soul. The deceased are aware that they are dead that allow to them not be shamed. The talking corps experience is a proof that God exists: “God is here, keeping them alive after death, which is why can say everything”.

Zizek uses in his analysis the term Gnosticism > “externality of truth” and says that both Paganism and Gnosticism perceive the path toward the truth as the “inner journey” of spiritual self-purification.

Gnosticism is  religious movement characterized by a belief in gnosis, through which the spiritual element in man could be released from its bondage in matter: regarded as a heresy by the Christian Church (http://www.thefreedictionary.com/gnosticism). It is grounded  in the  human act of reflecting upon existence. The Gnostics are concerned with the basic questions of existence or “being-in-the-world” (Dasein)—that is:

who we are (as human beings),

where we have come from,

and where we are heading, historically and spiritually.

Gnostics of all kinds deny the idea that God directly created the material world, which they see as corrupt or fallen. Where Christianity and Gnosticism differ from Judaism is who or what created the Universe. Both reject the idea that God (the Jewish one) created the universe and claim other beings did it. In fact Gnostics believe the Law was given by lesser beings seeing the Hebrew God as a fallen angel or worse, the devil himself. Christianity claimed Jesus created the Universe before He became flesh. Gnostics differed claiming Jesus was a spirit.

From philosophical perspective according  the Gnostics and Carl Jung  the temporally constructed self is not the true self. The true self is the supreme consciousness existing and persisting beyond all space and time. Jung calls this the pure consciousness or Self, in contradistinction to the “ego consciousness” which is the temporally constructed and maintained form of a discrete existent (cf. C.G. Jung, “Gnostic Symbols of the Self,” in The Gnostic Jung 1992, pp. 55-92).

(source: http://www.sullivan-county.com/id2/gnosticism.htm)

http://www.iep.utm.edu/gnostic/#H1

Here Zizek  uses the Gnosticism as the “externalization of the truth”  and in relation to the  Cyberspace ideology and he is wondering if if we are becoming more and more monadic (Leibnitz’ s “monadology”)with no direct windows onto reality, interacting alone with the PC screen, encountering only virtual simulacra, and yet immersed more than ever in a global network, synchronously communicating with the entire world. This reminds me the animation film WALL-E and the human passengers of the  space-ship that “escaped” from the polluted Earth, who enclosed to the space of the spaceship interact with each other virtually completely unaware of the others presence.

The cyberspace is this kind of space where the people are not interacting with each other but with  machines or virtual people. This kind of space “saves” from any kind of “harassment”. The fear of harassment in the modern society has as consequence not only the condemnation of brutal actions against the other but also the distance between the individuals. To be tolerant means avoid to  go close to the other for the fear to intrude his/her space. The obsession about the sexual harassment leads to a “narcissistic subjectivity” for which everything that the others do is seen as a threat. In this way new prohibitions are emerged to block the “risky” excessive desires for enjoyment. This prohibitions become obstacles that deprive the subject from access to sexual satisfaction and the enjoyment becomes an ethical duty. The psychoanalyst in that case assume the role to free the person from the duty to “Enjoy!”.

 

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~ CYBERART>

Also spelled cyberarts and cyber art, is art produced with the help of computers. It is part of new media art, an umbrella term for forms of art that use non-traditional media. The function of the computer in creating this kind of art can be either in software or hardware. Though the term can be applied to traditionally-produced art that is merely scanned in, it is usually reserved for art that uses a computer for an integral part of the design.

 

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Question:

-Can be that: The big Other does exist, therefore is not all permitted or prohibited? 

 

 

Notes to ZIZEK: How ro read Lacan

Chapter: Ego Ideal and Superego: Lacan as viewer of Casablanca

KEY WORDS: juissance, enjoyment, pleasure, ethichally, superego, ideal ego, ego-ideal, Imaginary-Symbolic-Real, guilty, vengeful, agency, law of desire, Casablanca, ambiguous, 3 1/2 second shot, yes and no, fantasies, Hollywood, fundamental prohibition, Enjoy!, Hays Production Code, censorship, Realpolitik, Ulisses, inherent transgression, power, Guatanamo prisoners, homo sacer, living dead.

 

In this chapter Zizek deals with the triad structure model of personality: ego, id and superego. Freud was the one to introduced how the psyche is divided into these three agencies which later Lacan will revisit: ideal ego, ego-ideal and superego

or Id, Ego, Superego.

In order to simplify these terms we could say that Id is related to our desires; it contains the basic primitive impulses that demand satisfaction. It is the seat of our impulses.  Something like the Mr. Hyde emerging from the restrained Dr. Jekyll.

The Ego negotiates with the id. Thus, its main function is to mediate between the id’s demands and the external world around us ;what we call reality. So, the ego tries to get what it wants without the risk to dissapoint the big Other.The ego functions in both the conscious, preconscious and unconscious mind. So, according Freud, the Psyche develops an Ego to assume the role of mediator , negotiating betwwen the Id and the Supere ego.

 

 

 

The Superego, internalizes  moral standards and ideals based on right and wrong and provides guidelines for making judgments. It has a “vengeful, sadistic and punishing aspect”. It enjoys to observe out failure to meet our inner demands. It is insatiable, tries to make the subject to suppress its striving and desires. It is at one and the same time the law and its destruction. The law as such a symbolic structure regulates subjectivity but the Superego is more like the manifestation of a tyrannic law. The includes the rules and standards for good behaviors. These behaviors include those which are approved of by parental and other authority figures. Obeying these rules leads to feelings of pride, value and accomplishment.

From Lacan’s perspective, the ideal ego is located to the  Imaginary. It stands for the idealized mirror image of the ego that Lacan calls also “small other”. The ideal ego is a modification of  infantile narcissism and the omnipotence that accompanies it. The Ego -Ideal is located to the Symbolic  and it stands for the a symbolic identification that seeks to impress the big Other who watch over the subject. And for last the Superego lies in the realm of the Real and it is the cruel anti -ethical agency that judge my desires ad actions.

Zizek in the documentary film, The Perverts Guide To Cinema, will try to elucidate the function of the trio Id, Ego, Superego and Superego through the paradigms that the cinema offers. For example he uses the example of the MARX BROTHERS where Hyper Groucho is the super-ego; rational Chico, the ego; and mute Harpo, the id.

Another example is the “Psycho” of Hitchcock where the Ego is at the ground floor of the Bates house where Norman always seems to behave perfectly normal;in the basement is located the Id where  Norman psychically take over the role as his mother; and the top floor is the super-ego where Norman talks to his mothers corpse, she yells at him and behave in a very rude fashion.

Of course there are other examples of movies dealing with the same topic. One of this is the “Fight Club” in which Norton comes to realize that Tyler is actually him. He is figment of his imagination that he made up that represents everything he had always wanted to be himself; tough, good looking, carefree.  Although both being the same person, are both representatives of these different theories of the mind and the constant conflict between the different forces.

The trio of Star Treck functions as a picture of a tripartite man.  James Tiberius Kirk is the lion-like leader, stately and usually calm (Ego). Spock is his supremely rational, but somehow melancholy right-hand man (Super-ego). Then there was the volatile, emotional Doctor Leonard McCoy (Id).

Going back to Lacan, he will add also a forth ethical agency under the name of “law of desire”.  The crucial point is that the Ego Ideal forces us to betray our desires  and adapt what the big Other wants. Under this mechanism we don’t speak anymore about desires that will bring an enjoyment to the subject but desires that lead to the juissance, the traumatic and excessive pleasure that is more painful than joyful because it will never be fulfilled. For Lacan, superego is the vehicle of juissance.  In fact there is a strong link between (unfulfilled) desires, sense of guilty and big Other in which the superego plays an important role.

Zizek refers to the 3 1/2 second shot in Casablanca in order to highlight the  the ambiguity in which Hollywood relies on. He claims that the critical 3 1/2  seconds shot plays with the moral codes established by the big Other and opens the gate of  spectator’s dirty phantasmatic imagination. So for the big Other the two protagonists “did not do it” but because of the ambiguous elements of the next scene the spectator is guided to fantasize that “they did it”. The fantasmatic supplement has the structure of the inherent transgression that  Hollywood needs in order to function.

Fundamental Prohibition is another topic related to superego that Zizek brings into discussion. Prohibition can take the form of censorship which has an ambiguous role, like  Hays Production Code of 1930s.  For example, in accordance with the general principles  of this Code :

1)      No plot or theme should definitely side with evil and against good.

2)      Comedies and farces should not make fun of good, innocence, morality or justice.

3)      No plot should be constructed as to leave the question of right or wrong in doubt or fogged.

4)      No plot should by its treatment throw the sympathy of the audience with sin, crime, wrong-doing or evil.

5)      No plot should present evil alluringly.

(source: http://www.und.edu/instruct/cjacobs/ProductionCode.htm)

The fundamental prohibition, Zizek explains, is responsible for the excessive sexualization of the most common everyday events. Through the prohibition certain rules are created within the society. The individual tendency is to find ways to violate these oppressive rules.

Is it all this a  game of power.

Zizek will speak at the end of this chapter about the power that the social system operates in ambiguous ways like in the case of the Gautanamo prison where the prisoners are in the position of  “living dead”; they are alive but, in the eyes of the law, are already dead. Giorgio Agamben’s term is homo sacer. 

 

LINKS: http://www.answers.com/topic/ego-ideal-ideal-ego#ixzz2bHGlZ4XI

http://www.academia.edu/531503/Lacans_Formation_of_the_Subject_and_Freuds_Development_of_the_Ego

Never fear, the Super ego is here! An interesting post about the Jesus’s Superego, in the following blog :

http://www.google.de/imgres?imgurl=http://shiningstranger.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/superego.jpg&imgrefurl=http://shiningstranger.wordpress.com/2013/05/30/never-fear-the-superego-is-here/&h=400&w=313&sz=38&tbnid=R_T5hgn_nt8oUM:&tbnh=100&tbnw=78&zoom=1&usg=__ekMd9oCz-WSmkbrndGL8byQ46Xk=&docid=6a_Xl7Z-iLcB8M&hl=it&sa=X&ei=2nUCUsaoJci-PfWJgMAE&ved=0CE0Q9QEwBA&dur=692

 

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ARTIST

FRANZ WEST.

colorful sculpture called THE EGO AND THE ID

 

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Notes to  Zizek: How to read Lacan

Chapter: Troubles with the Real. Lacan as viewer of Alien.

 

Key words: lamella, “manlet”, object a, partial object, libido, living dead, death drive, compulsion to repeat, immortal, alien, theory of trauma, theory of relativity, Imaginary, Real, horror, objectit petit a, melancholy, anamorphosis, shame, tics, monster, Einstein, social antagonism, hard sciences, borrowing and annihilation, Theory of everything, sinthome.

 

 

In this chapter Zizek comments and analyzes the mysterious notion of  LAMELLA  that Lacan introduces in his theory in relation to  the Real and the Imaginary.  But what Lacan reveals through this weird term? “Lamella” etymologically signifies a “thin  layer.” It is used in biology and geology, to describe a plate-like structure. In zoology it can describe a gill; it can also refer to a layered material such as mica or graphite. Lastly, it can denote a portion of cortical bone, which is the hard, stacked osseous tissue that makes up thesurface of the skeleton.  In the field of psychoanalysis,  lamella is associated with the Freudian concept of “partial object”, this weird and autonomous organ that can survive without the Body. In the  The Three Essays on Sexuality, Freud links the partial object with the breast, the faeces and the phallus.

According Lacan, lamella  is this monstrous and unfathomable thing that is described as

• amoebalike.
•  an imaginary bodily organ; l’hommelette
• As the human being as pre-sexual, pre-subject substance, of a “life that has need of no organ”. Beyond the monstrosity of the Allien -lamella is hidden the postive obverse of  “castration”. Zizek explains that lamella can be seen as the the partial object cut off from the rest of the Body caught in sexual difference- which is associated with the anatomical differences between the sexes. The Real of lamella is linked with the Real inscribed in the core of the human (a) sexuality.

•  libido.
• organ without body.
• an entity of pure surface, of pure semblance, that changes its form
• something indivisible, immortal, indestructible, unreal.
• something that does not exists but it insists
• its status is phantasmatic
• the monstrous alien in the film of Ridley Scott. Lacan myths of lamella has something terrifying that recalls in mind the horror  film with Aliens, these nightmare, indestructible, invincible creatures that can be multiplied and change morph into a multiple of shapes. The description of ” an extra-flat thing that all of sudden flies up and envelops your face is” is depicted in Riddley Scott’s Alien:

Also alien “is libido as pure life” (p.63).  (Libido was introduced by Freud and uses the term to speak especially about sexual energy while Lacan uses the term to discuss sexuality in terms of desire and juissance and he locates it in the imaginary order.)

• in the domain of Imaginary is a kind of image that endeavors to stretch the imagination the boundary of unrepresentative.
• something between Imaginary and Real.

Zizek will describe the lamella as the image of the discordance between reality and the Real. The  realm of Real is divided  between the  Real of the lamella-the Real in its  imaginary dimension- and the scientific Real.

Zizek adds a third Real, the real of the object petit a which  is this small feature that betrays the true nature of the things; Like in the movie “Invasion of the body Snatchers”, in order for someone to distinguish an alien from the a human being has to grasp the small detail that makes the difference. No matter how much some things try to look differently, the fact is that the object petit a reveal their true nature.

The object petit a is also related to the concept of desire.  It can be seen as:

a) as object of desire

b) as  object, the cause of desire> the feature of whose we account we desire the object. And as Zizek explains the statut of this case is the anamorphosis:

A distorted or monstrous projection or representation of an image on a plane or curved surface, which, when viewed from a certain point, or as reflected from a curved mirror or through a polyhedron, appears regular and in proportion; a deformation of an image.

.

source> http://www.anamorphosis.com/what-is.htm

Next to the object petit a we find the Object a: “the shadow of what it is not”, “ shadow of nothing”. Lacan’s object a refers to the object-cause of desire: that which is in the object more than the object and which makes us desire it in the first place.Who starts to be aware to have lost his desire for the desired object, according to Freud, is the melancholic type. Melancholy occurs when finally we get the desired object but then we are disappointed; when we are thrown into a new environment with the feat to lose the attachment with the old environment.

Theory of trauma. Trauma is something that intrudes into the physical life and disturbs its balance.From this perspective, a brutal experience is inscribed in memory as an unclear event and elevated into a traumatic Real, in order to help the individual to cope with the enigma behind the traumatic experience.

Examples:

• Case of “Wolf-man”

 

Zizek claims that there is a parallel between the theory of relativity and the Lacanian theory. Theory of relativity, gives account of how nature works at the macroscopic level. For example the light for the observer moves at the same speed. For Lacan the object of desire remains always at the same distance from the subject without matter how close it is.

 

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Links: http://www.zizekstudies.org/index.php/ijzs/article/viewfile/368/424

http://nosubject.com/index.php?title=Lamella

http://www.rhul.ac.uk/dramaandtheatre/documents/pdf/platform/22/feelingtraumafinal.pdf

 

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While I was reading this chapter it came into my mind Kristeva and the theory regarding the abject.

Kristeva’s understanding of the “abject” provides a helpful term to contrast to Lacan’s “object of desire” or the “object petit a.”. Whereas the objet petit a allows a subject to coordinate his or her desires, thus allowing the symbolic order of meaning and intersubjective community to persist, the abject “is radically excluded and,” as Kristeva explains, “draws me toward the place where meaning collapses” . It is neither object nor subject; the abject is situated, rather, at a place before we entered into the symbolic order.

(Source: http://www.cla.purdue.edu/english/theory/psychoanalysis/kristevaabject.html)

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FEELING PERFORMANCE REMEMBERING TRAUMA>

http://www.rhul.ac.uk/dramaandtheatre/documents/pdf/platform/22/feelingtraumafinal.pdf

Kira O’ Reilly

http://blip.tv/pacitti-company/kira-o-reilly-syncope-645999

 

 

 

Notes  on: Zizek, How to read Lacan.

Chapter: FROM che vuoi? TO FANTASY: LACAN WITH EYES WIDE SHUT

Key words: “che vuoi?”, Judaism, performatives, desire, real, reality, dream, anti-humanism, rape, known, unknown, October revolution, paradox, feminism, neighbor, 10 Commandments, frog, beer, “fuck”, awaking.

What do you Want?

“REALITY IS FOR THOSE WHO CANNOT  ENDURE THEIR DREAMS” (p.57)

 

In this chapter,  Zizek treats basically the concept of desire and its interpretation through the lenses of fantasy. This analysis starts with  question: “Che vuoi?” (What do you want?); a question that according Lacan “leads the subject to the path of his own desire”. So Zizek here tries to elucidate the lacanian formula of Fantasy. The basic thesis that comes out is that in opposition to the opposite elements of dream and reality, fantasy is closer to the reality. Fantasy is considered as a screen that protects us from the encounter with the Real. That mean that there is a distinction between reality and Real.  Actually what Lacan says is that “reality” is a fantasy but this doesn´t mean that life is just an illusion or just a dream. Dream is actually is the way, the state that help us to approach the hard kernel of the Real. This means that what we approach in the dream is the fantasy-framework which determines our activity in reality.

Fantasy appears as  the answer to the question “che vuoi?” and to the enigma of the desire of the Other. Zizek explains that the desire cannot be completely “subjective”, doesn´t belongs to the subject but actually is linked to Other´s desire, the desire of who is around me and, the desire of whom I interact with. The desire is constructed by the big Other, this unfathomable mechanism of the symbolic order. “What do I want” is the mask of “What the others want from me?”.  So we could claim that the  aim behind the question “What do I want” is to discover my desire and the fantasy is “the imagined scenario representing the realization of the desire”.

The concept of Man´s desire of the Other´s desire brings me in confrontation not only with the enigmatic desire of the Other but also with the fact that I don´t know what I really want. Enigma of the Other-Enigma of myself. In this Judaism´s contribution was the “love”for your neighbor who becomes a mirror- image and an inert , impenetrable, enigmatic presence that hystericizes me. Questions like “who counts as my neighbor?” “what exactly is meant by love?” and “how can I love my neighbor as myself?” has been emerged.

Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor [plesion] has fulfilled [plerow] the law. The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not kill, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up [anakephalaioutai] in this sentence, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling [pleroma] of the law. (Romans 13:8-10) (source:http://www.soundandsignifier.com/research/Texts/Freud%20My%20Neighbor.html)

But Lacan speaks about the neighbor as the Thing (das Ding) that “beyond” of the pleasure principle whose unbearable, terrible Good is also an Evil. Thus, neighbor can be a negative and traumatic source. For this “Love” and be loved, as Zizek claims, is “so violent a discovery, even traumatic” . According this theory, the love expressed by the other can be perceived as something intrusive and obscene. Here it takes place the theory of performatives,  “speech acts that accomplish in the very act of their enunciation the state of affairs that they declare”.

The terrifying role of the other as Thing arise the question of how we can avoid the the traumatic impact of being too much exposed to the tremendous abyss of the Other and how can we cope with Other´s desire. The answer again is FANTASY. Fantasy not only is conceived as a construction that allows to  the subject to come to terms with its traumatic kernel (caused by the Other) but  shows us how to desire and tells me how do we know what we desire.

Sexuality is the field where we come more close and we establish an intimate relationship with other individuals so that  sexual relations, according Lacan, has to been screened through fantasy. Zizek brings different examples regarding the aspect of sexuality and fantasy. One of those examples regards to the rape and the fantasy to be raped. His point is  rape fantasy is a fantasy but is rooted in the symbolic; what the “actual” rape contains  is the sense of impossibility .No matter how wildly  or not the perverse one’s fantasy may be, the point is that as an event, the violation of rape is a confrontation with impossibility and meaninglessness.

All this is linked with the binary relationship “know-unknown”. Donald Rumsfeld will speak about three possibilities within this relationship.

1. There are known knows.
2. There are known unknowns.
3. There are unknown unknowns.

And Zizek will add a 4th one: There are unknown knows. This means that there are things that we don´t know that we know. This lack of awareness of what we know determines our actions and feelings and also decentralize the subject. Lacan refers that the subject is always “decentred ” so that teh individual is deprived by his most intimate subjective experience that guarantees the core of  who is. Even if ones  claims that although unknown mechanism  nobody can deprive him/her  from the experience to feel and see, Lacan argue that the role of the psychoanalyst is to take away from the subject its fundamental fantasy that regulates the universe of his/her self experience.

Zizek will end this chapter with the reference to the film Eyes wide shut, a film that is a kind of doorway that bridging the gap between reality and fantasy.  A story  about the couple that “wakes up” and sees the social power structure as it  is. Bu according Zizek we find in this film the manifestation of fantasies ambiguity, a paradigm of fantasy as a frame that protects us from the encounter with the Real. The awaking in the reality of the protagonists is  an escape from the real encounter within their dreams.

In this chapter Zizek dealt with the terms of desire, fantasy, dreams, reality, Real in relation to the big Other and the symbolic order, with the aim to elucidate the  “true awaking” from what control us.

 

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MORPHEUS: “What is real? How do you define real? If you are talking about your senses, what you feel, taste, smell, or see, then all you’re talking about are electrical signals interpreted by your brain.”

Wachowski Brothers- MATRIX

 

I believe the film DOGTOOTH  directed by Yorgos Lanthimos is a great example that could be analysed únder the lenses of Lacan´s theory. It is about a husband and wife who keep their children ignorant of the world outside their property well into adulthood. Construction of reality, Subjectivity, the big Other, Symbolic order and more can be traced within the film.

 

“A TALE ABOUT HOW TOYS CAN BECOME REAL. Always the fairy tales hide more deep meanings and maybe the children can capt the depth of them better that the adults

http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/williams/rabbit/rabbit.html

 QUESTIONs

• Is it my ethical duty to confront you with the frog embracing the bottle of beer while in the daydream you are embracing your beloved;
• As choreographer, whose desires I stage?mine?yours?Other´s?
• Should I make art in order to wake up the others?

 

 I came to dream with you.

I came to live the lie with you.

I came  to lose myself with you rather to find  my real “Self”.

Reality doesn´t exist. I don´t exist. But what do you see is real.