Subjectivity and Otherness A Philosophical Reading of Lacan

Contents

Series Foreword vii

INTRODUCTION 2

I The Subject of the Imaginary (other)

1THESUBJECT OF THEIMAGINARY(OTHER)

1.1 Introduction: The Subject and the Ego 13

1.2 “Je est un autre”: The (De)formative Function of the Image

and the Mirror Stage 14

1.3 Hainamoration,Ideal Ego and Ego-Ideal 19

1.4 Consciousness, the Unconscious, and the Complexes 26

II The Subject of the Symbolic (Other)

2THEUNCONSCIOUSSTRUCTUREDLIKE ALANGUAGE 34

2. 1 Introduction: From the Small to the Big Other 35

2. 2 The Function of Speech 37

2. 3 The Notion of Message 41

2. 4 Signifier, Signified, Letter 46

3OEDIPUS AS AMETAPHOR 60

3. 1 Introduction: Entering the Symbolic 61

3. 2 The Mythical State before Frustration, and

Primordial Frustration 65

3. 3 The Dialectic of Frustration, or, the First (“Pre-Oedipal”)

Stage of the Oedipus Complex 67

3. 4 The Second and Third Stages of the Oedipus Complex 75