Lacanian Psychoanalysis: Theory and Practice
Summer 2017 (14-16 & 19-20 June)
Dr Derek Hook
Course overview
This course introduces and explores Lacanian psychoanalysis by focussing
on series of distinct topic areas in Lacan’s work, all of which are related to
Lacan’s over-arching objective of ‘a return to Freud’. The objective of the
course is to render Lacan’s ideas accessible, and to link Lacanian theory to
forms of practical application (such as the clinical and the realm of
psychosocial analysis). The opening session focuses on the topic of the
imaginary, which includes an understanding of the mirror-stage and ego
identifications. The second centres on Lacan’s complementary notion of the
symbolic order, and the aligned notions of full and empty speech. The third
session extends this basic foundation by asking the question: ‘What is the
Lacanian unconscious?’, via a reading of Freud’s understandings of dream
interpretation, and the famous Lacanian maxim that ‘the unconscious is
structured like a language’. Additional focus areas include Lacan’s clinical
structures – obsessional neurosis and hysteria, psychosis and perversion –
each of which are approached via discussions of desire, the Other and the
relation to objet a, the object-cause of desire. Further topics include the
notions of the ‘Name-of-the-Father’, the concept of jouissance (libidinal
enjoyment) and the issue of ‘sexuation’ (that is, the taking of
masculine/feminine identifications). The course closes with a discussion of
Lacan’s thoughts on ‘direction of treatment’, that is, with a review of the
various ways in which Lacan’s theoretical axioms are brought to life both in
the clinical realm and within the domain of psychosocial analysis.
Email: [email protected]
Prescribed texts:
Fink, B. (1997). A Clinical Introduction to Lacanian Psychoanalysis: Theory and
Technique. Harvard University Press.
Lacan, J. (2006). Écrits. B. Fink (Trans.). New York & London: W.W Norton.
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Provisional Timetable:
9.00-11-30
Introduction
+
L: Mirror
stage and the
imaginary
L: What is the
Lacanian
UCS? Part 1:
(Freud’s
theory of
dreams)
12.00-1.30
RS: ‘The
Mirror Stage’,
Vanheule,
Rose
1.30-2.00
Lunch
2.00-3.45
L: Full &
Empty speech
RS: Freud’s
‘On dreams’
Lunch
Day 3:
Friday
16 June
L: Jouissance
RS:
Braunstein,
De Kessel,
Evans
Lunch
L: What is the
Lacanian
UCS? Part 2:
The UCS
structured
like a
language.
L: Foreclosure
and the
Name-of-theFather
Day 4:
Monday
19 June
L: Obsessional
neurosis &
hysteria
Lunch
L: Perversion
Day 6:
Tuesday
20 June
L: Phallus as
signifier
RS: Fink,
Gessert,
Evans,
Quinodoz
RS: Chiesa,
McGowan,
Swales
Lunch
L: Lacanian
clinical
technique
Day 1:
Wednesday
14 June
Day 2:
Thursday
15 June
4.00-5.00
RS: extract
from
‘Function and
Field’, Muller,
Hook
RS: Fink
(1995), Fink
(2004),
Muller &
Richardson
RS: extract
from Seminar
III, Leader,
Redmond,
Vanheule
RS: Dor,
Nobus et al,
Swales
RS: Fink
(2007), Fink
(2014),
Leader, Miller,
Nobus
L: lecture
RS: Reading + discussion session
Lecture/reading sessions: Each day is broken down into a morning and an afternoon session.
Each session will begin with a lecture, which will be followed by a reading + discussion session. The
reading sessions extend the content of the lecture, and students will be given the choice of readings
to focus on during this time this is to accommodate those with differing interests (and levels of
experience) in Lacanian psychoanalysis. Note: students should start reading through the materials
before the class begins. The reading sessions will not be lengthy enough for students to cover all
material within class. These sessions are for close readings and discussions of select sections of these
texts.
Students will be expected to bring to class copies of the readings they will focus on in each day’s
reading sessions! Most - if not all – readings will be available online via Moodle. In the case of
difficulties, please contact Derek ([email protected]).
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READINGS
SESSION 1 (Day 1, morning):
Lacan, J. (2006). The mirror-stage as formative of the I function as revealed in
psychoanalytic experience. In B. Fink (Trans.), Écrits. (pp 75-81). New York &
London: W.W Norton.
Rose, J. (1986). Sexuality in the field of vision. London: Verso. (Chapter 7: The Imaginary).
Vanheule, S. (2011). Lacan’s construction and deconstruction of the double-mirror device.
Frontiers in Psychology, 2, 1-9. Available free online:
http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2011.00209/full
SESSION 2 (Day 1, afternoon):
Hook, D. (2013). Nixon’s ‘full speech’: Imaginary and Symbolic registers of communication.
Journal of Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology, 33, 1, 32-50. Available via email
from: [email protected]
Lacan, J. (2006). The function and field of speech and language in psychoanalysis (extract),
Écrits. (pp. 206-215). New York & London: W.W Norton.
Muller, J.P. & Richardson, W.J. (1982). Lacan and language a reader’s guide to Écrits. New
York, NY: International Universities Press. (Selection from Chapter 3, ‘The function
and field of speech and language in psychoanalysis’ - pages 67 – 95).
SESSION 3 (Day 2, morning):
Freud, S. (1905), ‘On dreams’, SE: 5.
SESSION 4 (Day 2, afternoon):
Fink, B. (1995). The Lacanian Subject. Princeton University Press. (Chapter 4: The Lacanian
Subject).
Fink, B. (2004). Lacan to the letter. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. (Chapter 3:
Reading “The instance of the letter in the unconscious”).
Muller, J.P. & Richardon, W.J. (1988). Lacan’s seminar on “The purloined letter”. In J.P.
Muller & W.J. Richardson (Eds). The purloined Poe. Baltimore: John Hopkins
University.
SESSION 5 (Day 3, morning):
Braunstein, N. (2003). Desire and jouissance on the teachings of Lacan. In J, Rabate (Ed.).
The Cambridge Companion to Lacan.
De Kesel, M. (2009). Eros and ethics: Reading Jacques Lacan’s Seminar VII. New York: SUNY
Press. (Chapter 6: The weight of enjoyment).
Evans, D. (1998). From Kantian ethics to mystical experience: An exploration of jouissance.
In D. Nobus (Ed.) Key concepts of Lacanian psychoanalysis. New York: Other Press.
Kirschner, L. (2004). Rethinking desire: The objet petit a in Lacanian theory. Frontiers in
Psychology.
SESSION 6 (Day 3, afternoon):
Leader, D. (2011). What is madness? London: Penguin. (Chapter 3, ‘Psychosis’).
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Lacan, J. (1993). The seminar of Jacques Lacan, Book III: The Psychoses, 1955-1956. (R. Grigg,
Trans.). New York & London: W.W. Norton. (Chapter XI ‘On the rejection of a
primordial signifier’).
Redmond J.D. (2013) Contemporary perspectives on Lacanian theories of psychosis.
Frontiers in Psychology, 4. . Psychol. 4:350.
http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00350/full
Vanheule, S. (2011). The subject of psychosis: A Lacanian perspective. London & New York:
Palgrave. (Chapter 3: ‘Foreclosure and its vicissitudes’).
SESSION 7 (Day 4, morning):
Baldwin, Y. (2016). Let’s Keep Talking. London: Karnac. (Chapter 2: ‘Needling the virgin’).
Evans, D. (1996). An Introductory Dictionary of Lacanian Psychoanalysis. London & New York:
Routledge (sections on ‘obsessional neurosis’ (p. 126) and ‘hysteria’, pp. 78-79).
Fink, B. (1997). A Clinical Introduction to Lacanian Psychoanalysis: Theory and Technique.
Harvard University Press. (Chapter 8: Neurosis).
Gessert, A. (2014). Hysteria and obsession. In A. Gessert (Ed). Introductory lectures on
Lacan (Chapter 4).
Quinodoz, J. (2005). Reading Freud: A chronological exploration of Freud’s Writings.
Routledge. (“Notes upon a case of obsessional neurosis (the ‘rat man’)”, pp. 88-93).
SESSION 8: (Day 4, afternoon)
Dor, J. (2001). Structure & Perversions. New York: Other Press. (Chapter 1).
Nobus, D. & Downing. L. (2006). Perversion: Psychoanalytic perspectives. London: Karnac.
(Chapter 6: ‘The structure of perversion’).
Swales, S. (2012). Perversion: A Lacanian Psychoanalytic approach to the subject. London &
New York: Routledge. (Chapter 3: ‘The etiology of perversion’).
SESSION 9: (Day 5, morning)
Chiesa, L. (2007). Subjectivity and otherness: A philosophical reading of Lacan. Cambridge,
MA: MIT Press. (Chapter 3 ‘Oedipus as metaphor’).
Dor, J. (2000). Introduction to the reading of Lacan: The unconscious is structured like a
language. New York: Other Press. (Chapter 11: The predominance of the phallus).
Lacan, J. (2006). The signification of the phallus. In B. Fink (Trans.), Écrits. (pp. 575-84).
New York & London: W.W Norton.
McGowan, T. (in press). Commentary on ‘The signification of the phallus’.
Swales, S. (2012). Perversion: A Lacanian Psychoanalytic approach to the subject. London &
New York: Routledge. (Chapter 2: ‘Button ties of Lacanian theory’).
SESSION 10: (Day 5, afternoon)
Fink, B. (2007). Fundamentals of psychoanalytic technique: A Lacanian approach for
practitioners. London & New York: W.W. Norton. (Chapter 7: Handling
transference).
Fink, B. (2014). Against Understanding: Commentary and Critique in a Lacanian Key, Volume
1. London & New York. Routledge. (Chapter 1).
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Leader, D. (2014). Interpretation. In A. Gessert (Ed). Introductory lectures on Lacan.
London: Karnac.
Miller, M.J. (2011). Lacanian psychotherapy: Theory and practical applications. London &
New York: Routledge. (Chapter 5).
Nobus, D. (2000). Jacques Lacan and the Freudian practice of psychoanalysis. (Chapter 3,
‘Strategies of transference’).
BREAKDOWN OF TOPICS AND SUGGESTED/REQUIRED READINGS + QUESTIONS
Note: texts highlighted in bold font will be prioritized in the course, and students
should start reading these before the beginning of the course. Texts underlined are of
an introductory nature, and have been included for students who have no or very little
previous exposure to Lacan.
SESSION 1: THE MIRROR STAGE
Lacan’s first major contribution to psychoanalytic theory was his notion of the mirror
stage. This introductory session will cover the key aspects of this theory, and discuss also a
series of related notions – the imaginary order, the ideal-ego, narcissism, identification –
that would prove fundamental to all of his subsequent theorizing.
Freud, S. On narcissism. In J. Strachey (Ed.), The standard edition of the complete
psychological works of Sigmund Freud. (14, pp. 237-58). London: Hogarth, 19271931.
Lacan, J. (2006). The mirror-stage as formative of the I function as revealed in
psychoanalytic experience. In B. Fink (Trans.), Écrits. (pp 75-81). New York &
London: W.W Norton.
Sullivan, G. (2014). The place of the mirror phase in Lacan’s work. In A. Gessert (Ed).
Introductory lectures on Lacan (Chapter 2).
Muller, J. (2000). The origins and self-serving functions of the ego. In K.R. Malone and S.
Friedlander (Eds.). The Subject of Lacan – a Lacanian Reader for Psychologists.
Albany: State University of New York Press. (Chapter 2).
Rose, J. (1986). Sexuality in the field of vision. London: Verso. (Chapter 7: The
Imaginary).
Vanheule, S. (2011). Lacan’s construction and deconstruction of the double-mirror
device. Frontiers in Psychology, 2, 1-9.
Questions for Session 1:
1. How are we to understand the body, and embodiment, via the notion of the mirror stage?
2. How does the idea of the mirror stage inform distinctions between psychosis and neurosis?
3. What is included within the remit of the imaginary?
4. Is there a mode of temporality specific to the mirror stage?
5. What is entailed by the notion of meconnaissance, and how does conceptualization this
inform clinical practice?
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SESSION 2: FULL & EMPTY SPEECH
Benvenuto, B. & Kennedy, R. (1986). The works of Jacques Lacan: An introduction. London:
Free Association Press. (Chapter 4: The Rome discourse).
Dunand, A. (1996). Lacan and Lévi-Strauss. In R. Feldstein, B. Fink & M. Jaanus (Eds.),
Reading Seminars I & II: Lacan’s return to Freud, pp. 98-109. SUNY Press: New York.
Hook, D. (2013). Nixon’s ‘full speech’: Imaginary and Symbolic registers of
communication. Journal of Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology, 33, 1, 3250.
Lacan, J. (2006). The function and field of speech and language in psychoanalysis. In
B. Fink (Trans.), Écrits. (pp. 197-268). New York & London: W.W Norton.
Zafiropoulos, M. (2010). Lacan and Lévi-Strauss or the return to Freud. London: Karnac.
(Section in Chapter 2: ‘The Rome report: “The function and field of speech and
language in psychoanalysis’, pp. 129-156).
Muller, J.P. & Richardson, W.J. (1982). Lacan and language a reader’s guide to Écrits.
New York, NY: International Universities Press. (Selection from Chapter 3,
‘The function and field of speech and language in psychoanalysis’ - pages 67 –
95).
Questions for Session 2:
1. How can we differentiate between the imaginary and the symbolic registers?
2. What are the crucial facets of the idea of the ‘symbolic order’ that Lacan derives from LeviStrauss?
3. What is ‘full speech’, and how is it attained?
4. What is ‘the Other’, and how does this concept inform clinical work and forms of ideology
critique?
5. What are the uses of the L-schema?
SESSIONS 3-4: WHAT IS THE LACANIAN UNCONSCIOUS?
The Lacanian notion of the unconscious often proves paradoxical for newcomers to Lacan
and those familiar with the literature of post-Freudian analyses. These sessions will
explore a series of such paradoxes (the unconscious as ‘structured like a language’, as
symbolic rather than imaginary, as the ‘discourse of the Other’), and do so via a careful and
detailed consideration of the matrix of ideas contained in Freud’s theorization of the
dreamwork (including notions of condensation, displacement, symbolism, and
dramatization/representability).
Bowie, M. (1991). Lacan. London: Fontana. (Chapter 3: Language and the unconscious).
Fink, B. (1995). The Lacanian Subject. Princeton University Press. (Chapter 4: The
Lacanian Subject).
Fink, B. (2004). Lacan to the letter. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
(Chapter 3: Reading “The instance of the letter in the unconscious”).
Freud, S. (1905). On dreams. SE: 5.
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Hook, D. (2013). Tracking the Lacanian unconscious in Language. Psychodynamic
Practice.19, 1, 38-54.
Krips, H. (1999). Fetish: An erotics of culture. London: Free Association Books. (Chapter 2:
Body and text – the roots of the unconscious).
Lacan, J. (2006). Seminar on “The Purloined Letter”. In B. Fink (Trans.), Écrits. (pp. 6-48).
New York & London: W.W Norton.
Muller, J.P. & Richardon, W.J. (1988). Lacan’s seminar on “The purloined letter”. In
J.P. Muller & W.J. Richardson (Eds). The purloined Poe. Baltimore: John
Hopkins University.
Soler, C. (2014). Lacan: The unconscious reinvented. London: Karnac. (Chapter 2: Toward
the real).
Questions for Sessions 3 & 4:
1. What crucial concepts from Freud’s analysis of dreams are foundational to the
Lacanian credo that the unconscious is structured like a language?
2. The notion of the dream as a rebus has often been neglected by post-Freudians. Why
is this idea so essential to Lacanian understandings of the unconscious.
3. How, via Freud’s ideas in respect of dreaming, should one understand the
temporality of the unconscious?
4. How are the Freudian notions of condensation and displacement taken up and
developed by Lacan?
5. Why does the notion of the signifier feature so prominently in Lacan’s
understanding of the unconscious?
6. How might the idea of ‘the unconscious structured like a language’ inform clinical
practice?
7. How should one understand Lacan’s idea that the unconscious can be understood as
‘the discourse of the Other’?
8. What are the most crucial elements from Lacan’s seminar on ‘The purloined letter’
for an understanding of the unconscious?
SESSION 5: JOUISSANCE
The later Lacanian is said to have prioritized the notion of jouissance, that is, instances of
disturbing libidinal enjoyment. This session will explore various dimensions of this notion
both with references to the clinical and the cultural and political terrain where the
perceived ownership - and theft – of a type of superabundant vitality (that is, enjoyment)
are often crucial in anchoring both symptomatic and ideological struggles.
Braunstein, N. (2003). Desire and jouissance on the teachings of Lacan. In J, Rabate
(Ed.). The Cambridge Companion to Lacan.
De Kesel, M. (2009). Eros and ethics: Reading Jacques Lacan’s Seminar VII. New York:
SUNY Press. (Chapter 6: The weight of enjoyment).
Dean, J. (2006). Žižek’s politics. London & New York: Routledge. (Chapter 1: Enjoyment as a
category of political theory).
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Declerq, F. (2004). Lacan’s concept of the real of jouissance: Clinical illustrations and
implications. Psychoanalysis, Culture & Society, 9, 237-251.
Evans, D. (1998). From Kantian ethics to mystical experience: An exploration of
jouissance. In D. Nobus (Ed.) Key concepts of Lacanian psychoanalysis. New
York: Other Press.
Kirschner, L. (2004). Rethinking desire: The objet petit a in Lacanian theory.
Frontiers in Psychology.
Stavrakakis, Y. (2007). The Lacanian left. Edinburgh University Press. (Chapter 4, ‘What
sticks? From Symbolic Power to Jouissance).
Verhaeghe, P. (2009). New studies of old villains: A radical reconsideration of the Oedipus
complex. New York: Other Press. (Chapter 3: Jouissance).
Questions for Session 5:
1. How, following Lacan, are jouissance and desire to be differentiated?
2. Why is the notion of enjoyment so crucial to the analysis of ideology?
3. Why is it the case that an analysis of jouissance entails a necessarily ethical
dimension?
4. Is jouissance, strictly speaking, ‘unconscious’? If so, in what capacity?
5. What is the relationship between jouissance and objet a?
SESSION 6: FORECLOSURE AND PSYCHOSIS
The subjective structure of psychosis is understood differently in Lacanian theory to how it
is in virtually all other schools of psychotherapy and psychoanalysis. This session explores
both the crucial underlying mechanism that determines psychosis (the foreclosure of the
Name-of-the-Father) and elaborates on a series of related concepts (the relation to the
Other, the localization of jouissance, the anchoring of meaning) that are vital in
understanding psychic structure more generally.
Leader, D. (2011). What is madness? London: Penguin. (Chapter 3, ‘Psychosis’).
Lacan, J. (1993). The seminar of Jacques Lacan, Book III: The Psychoses, 1955-1956. (R.
Grigg, Trans.). New York & London: W.W. Norton. (Chapter XI ‘On the rejection
of a primordial signifier’).
Lacan, J. (2006d). On a question prior to any possible treatment of psychosis. In B. Fink
(Trans.), Écrits. (pp. 445-488). New York & London: W.W Norton.
Redmond J.D. (2013) Contemporary perspectives on Lacanian theories of psychosis.
Frontiers in Psychology, 4. . Psychol. 4:350.
http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00350/full
Vanheule, S. (2011). The subject of psychosis: A Lacanian perspective. London & New
York: Palgrave. (Chapter 3: ‘Foreclosure and its vicissitudes’).
Vanheule, S. (2010). A Lacanian perspective of psychotic hallucinations. Theory &
Psychology, 21 (1), 86-106.
Questions for Session 6:
1. What is the Name-of-the-Father, and why is it such a crucial factor in a diagnosis
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2.
3.
4.
5.
of psychosis?
What is the location of the unconscious in psychosis?
Jouissance and the Other are both unstable and potentially threatening to the
psychotic subject. Explain.
List five categorical differences between the structures of neurosis and
psychosis.
How are we to differentiate ‘ordinary’ from ‘extraordinary’ forms of psychosis?
SESSION 7: OBSESSION AND HYSTERIA
Lacan offers a series of helpful postulates regards obsession and hysteria, including the well-known
dilemmas of suffering from (respectfully) an impossible desire and a desire for an unfulfilled desire
and the questions ‘Am I alive or am I dead?’ and ‘Am I a man or a woman?’. We will flesh out these
ideas by dwelling on the Freudian roots of Lacan’s conceptualizations, and also by exploring briefly
Lacan’s notion of the ‘individual neurotic myth’.
Baldwin, Y. (2016). Let’s Keep Talking. London: Karnac. (Chapter 2: ‘Needling the virgin’).
Evans, D. (1996). An Introductory Dictionary of Lacanian Psychoanalysis. London & New York:
Routledge (sections on ‘obsessional neurosis’ (p. 126) and ‘hysteria’, pp. 78-79).
Fink, B. (1997). A Clinical Introduction to Lacanian Psychoanalysis: Theory and
Technique. Harvard University Press. (Chapter 8: Neurosis).
Fink, B. (2014). Against Understanding: Commentary and Critique in a Lacanian Key,
Volume 2. London & New York. Routledge. (Chapter 11: In the wake of Medea: A
case of obsession from a Lacanian perspective).
Gessert, A. (2014). Hysteria and obsession. In A. Gessert (Ed). Introductory lectures
on Lacan (Chapter 4).
Quinodoz, J. (2005). Reading Freud: A chronological exploration of Freud’s Writings.
Routledge. (“Notes upon a case of obsessional neurosis (the ‘rat man’)”, pp. 8893).
Verhaeghe, P. (2004). On Being Norman and Other Disorders: A Manual for Clinical
Psychodiagnostics. New York: Other Press. (Pages on hysteria and obsessional
neurosis, i.e. pp. 364-39).
Questions for Session 7:
1. Lacan provides an encapsulating question for the logic of both obsessional neurosis
and hysteria. State these two questions with reference to practical examples in the
literature.
2. What does Lacan have in mind with his description of the individual myth of the
neurotic?
3. List five characteristic of the structure of obsessionality.
4. What is the hysteric’s relation to desire?
5. Why the predominance of the motif of ‘the Other woman’ in hysteria?
SESSION 8: PERVERSION
Perversion is often considered to be the most elusive of Lacan’s psychic structures when it
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comes to the clinic, and yet the various ideas brought to the fore by this structure
(disavowal, subject as embodying the Other’s jouissance, the enactment of an ostensibly
transgressed Law) are indispensable in the broader architecture of his psychoanatic
thinking.
Dor, J. (2001). Structure & Perversions. New York: Other Press. (Chapter 1).
Lacan, J. (2006). Kant with Sade. In B. Fink (Trans.), Écrits. (pp. 645-670). New York &
London: W.W Norton.
Nobus, D. & Downing. L. (2006). Perversion: Psychoanalytic perspectives. London:
Karnac. (Chapter 6: ‘The structure of perversion’).
Swales, S. (2012). Perversion: A Lacanian Psychoanalytic approach to the subject.
London & New York: Routledge. (Chapter 3: ‘The etiology of perversion’).
Questions for Session 8:
1. The perverse subject has a very particular relation to the law that they so frequently
appear to transgress. Explain.
2. Name and describe – with examples - the characteristic form of negation that
features in cases of perversion.
3. What is the perverse subject’s relation to desire?
4. Perversion invariable implies a very particular relation to the Other. What is this
relation?
5. What differential diagnostic considerations would be useful in differentiating
neurosis from perversion, and perversion from psychosis?
SESSION 9: THE PHALLUS AS SIGNIFIER
One of Lacan’s most controversial – and arguably misunderstood – Freudian concepts is
that of the phallus as signifier. This session will focus on exploring the various dimensions
of the phallus (imaginary, symbolic) and developing an appreciation of how the concept is
utilized in relation to understandings of castration, sexuation, lack, negativity, jouissance
and desire.
Chiesa, L. (2007). Subjectivity and otherness: A philosophical reading of Lacan.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. (Chapter 3 ‘Oedipus as metaphor’).
Dor, J. (2000). Introduction to the reading of Lacan: The unconscious is structured like
a language. New York: Other Press. (Chapter 11: The predominance of the
phallus).
Gherovici, P. (2012). State your gender. London & New York: Gender. (Chapter 1: ‘The
Imperative of Choice).
Lacan, J. (2006). The signification of the phallus. In B. Fink (Trans.), Écrits. (pp. 575-84).
New York & London: W.W Norton.
McGowan, T. (in press). Commentary on ‘The signification of the phallus’.
Minsky, R. (1996). Psychoanalysis and gender. London & New York: Routledge. (Chapter 4:
Lacan: The meaning of the phallus).
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Morel, G. (2000). Psychoanalytical anatomy. In R. Salecl (Ed.), Sexuation. Duke University
Press. (Chapter 2, pp. 28-38).
Morel, G. (2011). Sexual ambiguities. London: Karnac. (Chapter 5: Psychoanalytic anatomy:
Three moments of sexuation).
Rodriquez, L. S. (1999). Lacan’s subversion of the subject. In Psychoanalysis with children.
London: Free Association.
Rose, J. (1985). Introduction II. In J. Lacan, Feminine Sexuality, (Ed.) J. Mitchell and J. Rose,
London: W.W. Norton. pp. 27-58.
Swales, S. (2012). Perversion: A Lacanian Psychoanalytic approach to the subject.
London & New York: Routledge. (Chapter 2: ‘Button ties of Lacanian theory’).
Questions for Session 9:
1. The phallus appears to mean different things at different times to Lacan. Why is this
the case?
2. Why for Lacan the predominance of motifs of negativity or subtraction when he
discusses the phallus?
3. Why is there a different relation to the phallus as signifier for those designated as
‘men’ opposed to those designated as ‘women’?
4. What is the relation of the phallus to language?
5. Why should questions of sexuation be so intricately tied to questions of psychosis?
6. Name three crucial functions of the phallus as signifier.
SESSION 10: LACANIAN CLINICAL TECHNIQUE
Having arrived at the end of the course, this session will function both to wrap up foregoing
questions and to apply various conceptual motifs to the domain of clinical practice.
Particularly importance here will be: issues of temporality (and suspension); the critique of
meaning; the role of the signifier; the analyst’s position in the transference; interpretation;
the objectives of scansion and punctuation.
Dor, J. (1999). The clinical Lacan. New York: Other Press. (Chapter 3: The paternal
function).
Fink, B. (2007). Fundamentals of psychoanalytic technique: A Lacanian approach for
practitioners. London & New York: W.W. Norton. (Chapter 7: Handling
transference).
Fink, B. (2014). Against Understanding: Commentary and Critique in a Lacanian Key,
Volume 1. London & New York. Routledge. (Chapter 1).
Leader, D. (2014). Interpretation. In A. Gessert (Ed). Introductory lectures on Lacan.
London: Karnac.
Lacan, J. (2006). Direction of the treatment. In B. Fink (Trans.), Écrits. New York & London:
W.W Norton.
Miller, M.J. (2011). Lacanian psychotherapy: Theory and practical applications.
London & New York: Routledge. (Chapter 5).
11
Nobus, D. (2000). Jacques Lacan and the Freudian practice of psychoanalysis. (Chapter
3, ‘Strategies of transference’).
Samuels, R. (1996). From Freud to Lacan: A question of technique. In R. Feldstein, B. Fink &
M. Jaanus (Eds.), Reading Seminars I & II: Lacan’s return to Freud, pp. 301-305. SUNY
Press: New York.
Rodriquez, L, S. (2005). Diagnosis in psychoanalysis. Journal for the Centre of Freudian
Analysis and Research. Available online.
Questions for Session 10:
1. Why the pronounced Lacanian distrust of meaning in the clinic?
2. How do Lacanians understand the role of the transference, and how might we
differentiate between imaginary and symbolic transference?
3. How do Lacanian notions of temporality directly impact clinical practice?
4. What is meant by the materiality of the signifier, and how does this inform
psychoanalytic practice?
5. How do notions of jouissance and castration feature in approaches to Lacanian
clinical technique?
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