#lacan — Public Fediverse posts on home.social

The paradox of desire:
If it is true that "the goal of desire is nothing other than the return in a circuit" (Lacan, Seminar XI), then repeated failure prevents the circuit from closing, perpetuating the desire.

Photo: George Digalakis

#Lacan #Psychoanalysis #BlackandWhite

#lacan #psychoanalysis #blackandwhite

Ale Kairos @[email protected] · 2026-07-21 · 18:16 UTC

The paradox of desire:
If it is true that "the goal of desire is nothing other than the return in a circuit" (Lacan, Seminar XI), then repeated failure prevents the circuit from closing, perpetuating the desire.

Photo: George Digalakis

#Lacan #Psychoanalysis #BlackandWhite

#lacan #psychoanalysis #blackandwhite

Mark Carrigan @[email protected] · 2026-07-18 · 14:02 UTC

The power of the signifier: why the power up sign is actually doing something real

After weeks of niggling injuries I returned to distance running this morning for the first time in a couple of months. I’d been widely assured that despite my catastrophising it really wasn’t possible to have lost much fitness and strength in eight weeks. Yet in practice it was newly exhausting to run a distance I could have done pretty casually back in May. It left me pining for something I saw a lot at the last competitive race I did:

Source: https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/2111131062705470/

I really like these signs. Once I got over feeling silly about doing it, I found that tapping the power up does indeed make me feel powered up. What’s going on here? If you accept my experience that this is, at least mildly, energising then the obvious explanation is that it’s energising because it’s fun. But what does it mean for it to be fun? It’s fun because the signifier itself carries traces of past fun. For anyone who spent years playing Mario Kart the idea of a mushroom that you tap to go faster resonates with diffuse memories of hours playing a fun game, individually and in groups. The sense of acceleration in the game, particularly when you’re falling behind and a judiciously timed mushroom leaves you rushing back ahead, translates into the context of the race.

A sceptical voice in me points out that I actually start accelerating before I tap the mushroom. Part of the fun is rushing to tap the power up, before rushing forward newly powered up. But this in itself is a response to the signifier. It carries the capacity to induce a response which is in a real sense causal. It makes me think of Mari Ruti’s description in The Creative Self of “tiny morsels of jouissance latching themselves onto the underbellies of select signifiers so as to give them the kind of boost that enables them to resuscitate the domain of signification” (loc 1225). Each of those countless games of Mario Kart is a little barnacle attached to the underbelly of the mushroom on the sign, perfectly attuned to the libidinal economy of the race itself. It’s good to get a power up in a half marathon for pretty similar reasons to it being good to get a power up in a game of Mario Kart. The fact it’s offer in a spirit of support, such that solidarity is expressed through making and sharing the sign, amplifies this but I don’t think it creates it. I can’t think of another sign at a race that has had this effect. Occasionally good jokes make you laugh, which can in turn cheer you up if you’re feeling exhausted and miserable. But that’s more a situational response to occasional feelings of “why am I doing this to myself?” rather than something which directly acts on you in a libidinal sense.

I find the idea that the signifier itself as a causal power, albeit dependent on the individual’s past history of engagement with that signifier, vastly more plausible than a sceptical reading which suggests that at best this just people responding emotionally to a supportive crowd. Without engaging with the signifiers through which that support intervenes in the race, these are just general platitudes rather than specific claims about identifiable effects which forms of support have on particular runners. I find it interesting to think this through in relation to the mushroom sign because transposing a signifier from a racing game to a running race makes it easier to see the causal forces at work. It leaves the prior influences more easily legible than they would otherwise be. But one of the things I’ve learned from Lacan is that signifiers are working on us constantly, in often profound and idiosyncratic ways, in a manner which much sociology (particularly the school I was trained in for all its other virtues) is pretty incurious about and unresponsive to.

#crowds #distanceRunning #energy #halfMarathons #Jouissance #Lacan #racing #signifiers #support

#crowds #distancerunning #energy #halfmarathons #jouissance #lacan

Mark Carrigan @[email protected] · 2026-07-18 · 14:02 UTC

The power of the signifier: why the power up sign is actually doing something real

After weeks of niggling injuries I returned to distance running this morning for the first time in a couple of months. I’d been widely assured that despite my catastrophising it really wasn’t possible to have lost much fitness and strength in eight weeks. Yet in practice it was newly exhausting to run a distance I could have done pretty casually back in May. It left me pining for something I saw a lot at the last competitive race I did:

Source: https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/2111131062705470/

I really like these signs. Once I got over feeling silly about doing it, I found that tapping the power up does indeed make me feel powered up. What’s going on here? If you accept my experience that this is, at least mildly, energising then the obvious explanation is that it’s energising because it’s fun. But what does it mean for it to be fun? It’s fun in part because the signifier itself carries traces of past fun. For anyone who spent years playing Mario Kart the idea of a mushroom that you tap to go faster resonates with diffuse memories of hours playing a fun game, individually and in groups. The sense of acceleration in the game, particularly when you’re falling behind and a judiciously timed mushroom leaves you rushing back ahead, translates into the context of the race. A sceptical voice in me points out that I actually start accelerating before I tap the mushroom. Part of the fun is rushing to tap the power up, before rushing forward newly powered up. But this in itself is a response to the signifier. It carries the capacity to induce a response which is in a real sense causal even if that capacity can only accumulate through iterated engagements with the signifier over time. It’s not a nostalgic phenomenon because it’s very much present tense. The past fun is in a sense present now even if it’s force relies entirely on the past engagements.

It makes me think of Mari Ruti’s description in The Creative Self of “tiny morsels of jouissance latching themselves onto the underbellies of select signifiers so as to give them the kind of boost that enables them to resuscitate the domain of signification” (loc 1225). Each of those countless games of Mario Kart is a little barnacle attached to the underbelly of the mushroom on the sign, perfectly attuned to the libidinal economy of the race itself. It’s good to get a power up in a half marathon for pretty similar reasons to it being good to get a power up in a game of Mario Kart. The fact it’s offered in a spirit of support, such that solidarity is expressed through making and sharing the sign, amplifies this but I don’t think it creates it. I can’t think of another sign at a race that has had this effect. Occasionally good jokes make me laugh, which can in turn cheer me up if I’m feeling exhausted and miserable. But that’s more a situational response to occasional wonderings of “why am I doing this to myself?” rather than something which directly acts on me in a libidinal sense.

I find the idea that the signifier itself as a causal power, albeit dependent on the individual’s past history of engagement with that signifier, vastly more plausible than a sceptical reading which suggests that at best this is just people responding emotionally to a supportive crowd. Without engaging with the signifiers through which that support intervenes in the race, these are just general platitudes rather than specific claims about identifiable effects which forms of support have on particular runners. I find it interesting to think this through in relation to the mushroom sign because transposing a signifier from a racing game to a running race makes it easier to see the causal forces at work. It leaves the prior influences more easily legible than they would otherwise be. But one of the things I’ve learned from Lacan is that signifiers are working on us constantly, in often profound and idiosyncratic ways, in a manner which much sociology (particularly the school I was trained in for all its other virtues) is pretty incurious about and unresponsive to.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plAr3adKbyc

#crowds #distanceRunning #energy #halfMarathons #Jouissance #Lacan #racing #signifiers #support

#crowds #distancerunning #energy #halfmarathons #jouissance #lacan

Mark Carrigan @[email protected] · 2026-07-18 · 14:02 UTC

The power of the signifier: why the power up sign is actually doing something real

After weeks of niggling injuries I returned to distance running this morning for the first time in a couple of months. I’d been widely assured that despite my catastrophising it really wasn’t possible to have lost much fitness and strength in eight weeks. Yet in practice it was newly exhausting to run a distance I could have done pretty casually back in May. It left me pining for something I saw a lot at the last competitive race I did:

Source: https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/2111131062705470/

I really like these signs. Once I got over feeling silly about doing it, I found that tapping the power up does indeed make me feel powered up. What’s going on here? If you accept my experience that this is, at least mildly, energising then the obvious explanation is that it’s energising because it’s fun. But what does it mean for it to be fun? It’s fun in part because the signifier itself carries traces of past fun. For anyone who spent years playing Mario Kart the idea of a mushroom that you tap to go faster resonates with diffuse memories of hours playing a fun game, individually and in groups. The sense of acceleration in the game, particularly when you’re falling behind and a judiciously timed mushroom leaves you rushing back ahead, translates into the context of the race. A sceptical voice in me points out that I actually start accelerating before I tap the mushroom. Part of the fun is rushing to tap the power up, before rushing forward newly powered up. But this in itself is a response to the signifier. It carries the capacity to induce a response which is in a real sense causal even if that capacity can only accumulate through iterated engagements with the signifier over time. It’s not a nostalgic phenomenon because it’s very much present tense. The past fun is in a sense present now even if it’s force relies entirely on the past engagements.

It makes me think of Mari Ruti’s description in The Creative Self of “tiny morsels of jouissance latching themselves onto the underbellies of select signifiers so as to give them the kind of boost that enables them to resuscitate the domain of signification” (loc 1225). Each of those countless games of Mario Kart is a little barnacle attached to the underbelly of the mushroom on the sign, perfectly attuned to the libidinal economy of the race itself. It’s good to get a power up in a half marathon for pretty similar reasons to it being good to get a power up in a game of Mario Kart. The fact it’s offered in a spirit of support, such that solidarity is expressed through making and sharing the sign, amplifies this but I don’t think it creates it. I can’t think of another sign at a race that has had this effect. Occasionally good jokes make me laugh, which can in turn cheer me up if I’m feeling exhausted and miserable. But that’s more a situational response to occasional wonderings of “why am I doing this to myself?” rather than something which directly acts on me in a libidinal sense.

I find the idea that the signifier itself as a causal power, albeit dependent on the individual’s past history of engagement with that signifier, vastly more plausible than a sceptical reading which suggests that at best this is just people responding emotionally to a supportive crowd. Without engaging with the signifiers through which that support intervenes in the race, these are just general platitudes rather than specific claims about identifiable effects which forms of support have on particular runners. I find it interesting to think this through in relation to the mushroom sign because transposing a signifier from a racing game to a running race makes it easier to see the causal forces at work. It leaves the prior influences more easily legible than they would otherwise be. But one of the things I’ve learned from Lacan is that signifiers are working on us constantly, in often profound and idiosyncratic ways, in a manner which much sociology (particularly the school I was trained in for all its other virtues) is pretty incurious about and unresponsive to.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plAr3adKbyc

#crowds #distanceRunning #energy #halfMarathons #Jouissance #Lacan #racing #signifiers #support

#support #signifiers #racing #lacan #jouissance #halfmarathons

Mark Carrigan @[email protected] · 2026-07-18 · 14:02 UTC

The power of the signifier: why the power up sign is actually doing something real

After weeks of niggling injuries I returned to distance running this morning for the first time in a couple of months. I’d been widely assured that despite my catastrophising it really wasn’t possible to have lost much fitness and strength in eight weeks. Yet in practice it was newly exhausting to run a distance I could have done pretty casually back in May. It left me pining for something I saw a lot at the last competitive race I did:

Source: https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/2111131062705470/

I really like these signs. Once I got over feeling silly about doing it, I found that tapping the power up does indeed make me feel powered up. What’s going on here? If you accept my experience that this is, at least mildly, energising then the obvious explanation is that it’s energising because it’s fun. But what does it mean for it to be fun? It’s fun in part because the signifier itself carries traces of past fun. For anyone who spent years playing Mario Kart the idea of a mushroom that you tap to go faster resonates with diffuse memories of hours playing a fun game, individually and in groups. The sense of acceleration in the game, particularly when you’re falling behind and a judiciously timed mushroom leaves you rushing back ahead, translates into the context of the race. A sceptical voice in me points out that I actually start accelerating before I tap the mushroom. Part of the fun is rushing to tap the power up, before rushing forward newly powered up. But this in itself is a response to the signifier. It carries the capacity to induce a response which is in a real sense causal even if that capacity can only accumulate through iterated engagements with the signifier over time. It’s not a nostalgic phenomenon because it’s very much present tense. The past fun is in a sense present now even if it’s force relies entirely on the past engagements.

It makes me think of Mari Ruti’s description in The Creative Self of “tiny morsels of jouissance latching themselves onto the underbellies of select signifiers so as to give them the kind of boost that enables them to resuscitate the domain of signification” (loc 1225). Each of those countless games of Mario Kart is a little barnacle attached to the underbelly of the mushroom on the sign, perfectly attuned to the libidinal economy of the race itself. It’s good to get a power up in a half marathon for pretty similar reasons to it being good to get a power up in a game of Mario Kart. The fact it’s offered in a spirit of support, such that solidarity is expressed through making and sharing the sign, amplifies this but I don’t think it creates it. I can’t think of another sign at a race that has had this effect. Occasionally good jokes make me laugh, which can in turn cheer me up if I’m feeling exhausted and miserable. But that’s more a situational response to occasional wonderings of “why am I doing this to myself?” rather than something which directly acts on me in a libidinal sense.

I find the idea that the signifier itself as a causal power, albeit dependent on the individual’s past history of engagement with that signifier, vastly more plausible than a sceptical reading which suggests that at best this is just people responding emotionally to a supportive crowd. Without engaging with the signifiers through which that support intervenes in the race, these are just general platitudes rather than specific claims about identifiable effects which forms of support have on particular runners. I find it interesting to think this through in relation to the mushroom sign because transposing a signifier from a racing game to a running race makes it easier to see the causal forces at work. It leaves the prior influences more easily legible than they would otherwise be. But one of the things I’ve learned from Lacan is that signifiers are working on us constantly, in often profound and idiosyncratic ways, in a manner which much sociology (particularly the school I was trained in for all its other virtues) is pretty incurious about and unresponsive to.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plAr3adKbyc

#crowds #distanceRunning #energy #halfMarathons #Jouissance #Lacan #racing #signifiers #support

#crowds #distancerunning #energy #halfmarathons #jouissance #lacan

Mark Carrigan @[email protected] · 2026-07-18 · 14:02 UTC

The power of the signifier: why the power up sign is actually doing something real

After weeks of niggling injuries I returned to distance running this morning for the first time in a couple of months. I’d been widely assured that despite my catastrophising it really wasn’t possible to have lost much fitness and strength in eight weeks. Yet in practice it was newly exhausting to run a distance I could have done pretty casually back in May. It left me pining for something I saw a lot at the last competitive race I did:

Source: https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/2111131062705470/

I really like these signs. Once I got over feeling silly about doing it, I found that tapping the power up does indeed make me feel powered up. What’s going on here? If you accept my experience that this is, at least mildly, energising then the obvious explanation is that it’s energising because it’s fun. But what does it mean for it to be fun? It’s fun in part because the signifier itself carries traces of past fun. For anyone who spent years playing Mario Kart the idea of a mushroom that you tap to go faster resonates with diffuse memories of hours playing a fun game, individually and in groups. The sense of acceleration in the game, particularly when you’re falling behind and a judiciously timed mushroom leaves you rushing back ahead, translates into the context of the race. A sceptical voice in me points out that I actually start accelerating before I tap the mushroom. Part of the fun is rushing to tap the power up, before rushing forward newly powered up. But this in itself is a response to the signifier. It carries the capacity to induce a response which is in a real sense causal even if that capacity can only accumulate through iterated engagements with the signifier over time. It’s not a nostalgic phenomenon because it’s very much present tense. The past fun is in a sense present now even if it’s force relies entirely on the past engagements.

It makes me think of Mari Ruti’s description in The Creative Self of “tiny morsels of jouissance latching themselves onto the underbellies of select signifiers so as to give them the kind of boost that enables them to resuscitate the domain of signification” (loc 1225). Each of those countless games of Mario Kart is a little barnacle attached to the underbelly of the mushroom on the sign, perfectly attuned to the libidinal economy of the race itself. It’s good to get a power up in a half marathon for pretty similar reasons to it being good to get a power up in a game of Mario Kart. The fact it’s offered in a spirit of support, such that solidarity is expressed through making and sharing the sign, amplifies this but I don’t think it creates it. I can’t think of another sign at a race that has had this effect. Occasionally good jokes make me laugh, which can in turn cheer me up if I’m feeling exhausted and miserable. But that’s more a situational response to occasional wonderings of “why am I doing this to myself?” rather than something which directly acts on me in a libidinal sense.

I find the idea that the signifier itself as a causal power, albeit dependent on the individual’s past history of engagement with that signifier, vastly more plausible than a sceptical reading which suggests that at best this is just people responding emotionally to a supportive crowd. Without engaging with the signifiers through which that support intervenes in the race, these are just general platitudes rather than specific claims about identifiable effects which forms of support have on particular runners. I find it interesting to think this through in relation to the mushroom sign because transposing a signifier from a racing game to a running race makes it easier to see the causal forces at work. It leaves the prior influences more easily legible than they would otherwise be. But one of the things I’ve learned from Lacan is that signifiers are working on us constantly, in often profound and idiosyncratic ways, in a manner which much sociology (particularly the school I was trained in for all its other virtues) is pretty incurious about and unresponsive to.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plAr3adKbyc

#crowds #distanceRunning #energy #halfMarathons #Jouissance #Lacan #racing #signifiers #support

#crowds #distancerunning #energy #halfmarathons #jouissance #lacan

Mark Carrigan @[email protected] · 2026-07-17 · 08:42 UTC

Olivia Laing on recovery

These beautiful passages from The Trip to Echo Spring: On Writers and Drinking immediately made me think of Lacan:

Particularly these passages from Bruce Fink:

#BruceFink #Lacan #OliviaLaing #recovery

#brucefink #lacan #olivialaing #recovery

Mark Carrigan @[email protected] · 2026-07-17 · 08:42 UTC

Olivia Laing on recovery

These beautiful passages from The Trip to Echo Spring: On Writers and Drinking immediately made me think of Lacan:

Particularly these passages from Bruce Fink:

#BruceFink #Lacan #OliviaLaing #recovery

#brucefink #lacan #olivialaing #recovery

Mark Carrigan @[email protected] · 2026-07-17 · 08:42 UTC

Olivia Laing on recovery

These beautiful passages from The Trip to Echo Spring: On Writers and Drinking immediately made me think of Lacan:

Particularly these passages from Bruce Fink:

#BruceFink #Lacan #OliviaLaing #recovery

#recovery #olivialaing #lacan #brucefink

Ale Kairos @[email protected] · 2026-07-16 · 14:25 UTC

...life only returns there along paths
that are always the same,
and which it has once traced out.

Lacan, Seminar XVII

Foto Filipe Correia

#Lacan #psychoanalysis #photography #AK

#lacan #psychoanalysis #photography #ak

Ale Kairos @[email protected] · 2026-07-16 · 14:25 UTC

...life only returns there along paths
that are always the same,
and which it has once traced out.

Lacan, Seminar XVII

Foto Filipe Correia

#Lacan #psychoanalysis #photography #AK

#lacan #psychoanalysis #photography #ak

Judith Beyer @[email protected] · 2026-07-04 · 13:47 UTC

On Mentoring. A 🧵.

“He [Telemachus] sat down, and up stood Mentor” (2:225).

This is the first time in Homer’s epos The Odyssey that Mentor, Odysseus’s trusted companion, is mentioned. What was his task?

judithbeyer.com/2026/07/04/o...

#mentoring #academia #psychoanalysis #Lacan

On Mentoring

#mentoring #academia #psychoanalysis #lacan

Judith Beyer @[email protected] · 2026-07-04 · 13:47 UTC

On Mentoring. A 🧵.

“He [Telemachus] sat down, and up stood Mentor” (2:225).

This is the first time in Homer’s epos The Odyssey that Mentor, Odysseus’s trusted companion, is mentioned. What was his task?

judithbeyer.com/2026/07/04/o...

#mentoring #academia #psychoanalysis #Lacan

On Mentoring

#mentoring #academia #psychoanalysis #lacan

Judith Beyer @[email protected] · 2026-07-04 · 13:47 UTC

On Mentoring. A 🧵.

“He [Telemachus] sat down, and up stood Mentor” (2:225).

This is the first time in Homer’s epos The Odyssey that Mentor, Odysseus’s trusted companion, is mentioned. What was his task?

judithbeyer.com/2026/07/04/o...

#mentoring #academia #psychoanalysis #Lacan

On Mentoring

#mentoring #academia #psychoanalysis #lacan

Judith Beyer @[email protected] · 2026-06-28 · 06:07 UTC

Anthropologists can learn from psychoanalysts. For example the clinical view on “ritual” is different as “rituals attach themselves to bad thoughts to prevent them from happening”. We tend to look at rituals as social events only, but they are also tied to each subject’s symbolic order. #Lacan

#lacan

Judith Beyer @[email protected] · 2026-06-26 · 12:24 UTC

« Love is a contingent encounter between two exiles of the sexual relationship, which means between two symptoms. Everything that follows is the fiction that this was meant to be… It is not the couple that is ‘cured’ in an analysis. It remains a question, an x, for each One.” Wülfing on #Lacan 2026

#lacan

Judith Beyer @[email protected] · 2026-06-20 · 19:15 UTC

#Lacan |s school works via the Cartel in a 4+1 formation: No “working group“, no “collective consciousness“, no “leader“, no “follower“, but “scattered and mismatched“ ones-all-alone, ready to put their desire to work by talking & listening to each other. The aim: transmission, not transference.

#lacan

Judith Beyer @[email protected] · 2026-06-20 · 08:45 UTC

Wir arbeiten Theorien im Fach durch vom Kulturrelativismus als Reaktion gegen die Rassentheorien des 19. Jhdts, über Strukturalismus als Theorie über das Klassifizieren und die Zentralität der Sprache (inkl #Lacan), zu neueren Manifesten einer Anthropologie vom Menschwerden (Ingold gegen Latour)…

#lacan

Mark Carrigan @[email protected] · 2026-06-18 · 09:46 UTC

What was, simply was what it was, it had to be that way

I’m a huge fan of WordPress’s new rewind feature which shows what you were posting about on this day in previous years. It turns out that on 18th June 2025 I was posting about this extract from Bruce Fink’s book on Seminar XI:

I’d forgotten what a starkly beautiful expression that was: “What was, simply was what it was, it had to be that way“. If, as Ruti puts it, the melancholic subject is lost in “the labyrinth of its melancholy investments” Φ signifies the moment of suddenly realising that you’re alone in the labyrinth and walking, falteringly, out of the door and wondering what comes next as your eyes adjust to the sun and your lungs breath in the fresh air.

(I realise the proper Lacanian position would be something more like Φ making the labyrinth navigable, so it’s no longer a prison, but I like the image so much I’m not going to correct it 😊 I also think it captures something phenomenological of these kinds of transitions which structural approaches tend to miss)

#Lacan #loss #melancholia #Ruti

#lacan #loss #melancholia #ruti

Mark Carrigan @[email protected] · 2026-06-18 · 09:46 UTC

What was, simply was what it was, it had to be that way

I’m a huge fan of WordPress’s new rewind feature which shows what you were posting about on this day in previous years. It turns out that on 18th June 2025 I was posting about this extract from Bruce Fink’s book on Seminar XI:

I’d forgotten what a starkly beautiful expression that was: “What was, simply was what it was, it had to be that way“. If, as Ruti puts it, the melancholic subject is lost in “the labyrinth of its melancholy investments” Φ signifies the moment of suddenly realising that you’re alone in the labyrinth and walking, falteringly, out of the door and wondering what comes next as your eyes adjust to the sun and your lungs breath in the fresh air.

(I realise the proper Lacanian position would be something more like Φ making the labyrinth navigable, so it’s no longer a prison, but I like the image so much I’m not going to correct it 😊 I also think it captures something phenomenological of these kinds of transitions which structural approaches tend to miss)

#Lacan #loss #melancholia #Ruti

#lacan #loss #melancholia #ruti

Mark Carrigan @[email protected] · 2026-06-18 · 09:46 UTC

What was, simply was what it was, it had to be that way

I’m a huge fan of WordPress’s new rewind feature which shows what you were posting about on this day in previous years. It turns out that on 18th June 2025 I was posting about this extract from Bruce Fink’s book on Seminar XI:

I’d forgotten what a starkly beautiful expression that was: “What was, simply was what it was, it had to be that way“. If, as Ruti puts it, the melancholic subject is lost in “the labyrinth of its melancholy investments” Φ signifies the moment of suddenly realising that you’re alone in the labyrinth and walking, falteringly, out of the door and wondering what comes next as your eyes adjust to the sun and your lungs breath in the fresh air.

(I realise the proper Lacanian position would be something more like Φ making the labyrinth navigable, so it’s no longer a prison, but I like the image so much I’m not going to correct it 😊 I also think it captures something phenomenological of these kinds of transitions which structural approaches tend to miss)

#Lacan #loss #melancholia #Ruti

#lacan #loss #melancholia #ruti

Mark Carrigan @[email protected] · 2026-06-18 · 09:46 UTC

What was, simply was what it was, it had to be that way

I’m a huge fan of WordPress’s new rewind feature which shows what you were posting about on this day in previous years. It turns out that on 18th June 2025 I was posting about this extract from Bruce Fink’s book on Seminar XI:

I’d forgotten what a starkly beautiful expression that was: “What was, simply was what it was, it had to be that way“. If, as Ruti puts it, the melancholic subject is lost in “the labyrinth of its melancholy investments” Φ signifies the moment of suddenly realising that you’re alone in the labyrinth and walking, falteringly, out of the door and wondering what comes next as your eyes adjust to the sun and your lungs breath in the fresh air.

(I realise the proper Lacanian position would be something more like Φ making the labyrinth navigable, so it’s no longer a prison, but I like the image so much I’m not going to correct it 😊 I also think it captures something phenomenological of these kinds of transitions which structural approaches tend to miss)

#Lacan #loss #melancholia #Ruti

#ruti #melancholia #loss #lacan

Judith Beyer @[email protected] · 2026-06-10 · 11:17 UTC

There cannot be #AI literacy, because there are no letters within #AI. Only code. Read "The instance of the letter in the unconscious" by #Lacan and you will see what I mean! Do not read the wikipedia-article on this text, it is misleading and has itself copied parts from elsewhere.

#ai #lacan

Judith Beyer @[email protected] · 2026-06-10 · 11:17 UTC

There cannot be #AI literacy, because there are no letters within #AI. Only code. Read "The instance of the letter in the unconscious" by #Lacan and you will see what I mean! Do not read the wikipedia-article on this text, it is misleading and has itself copied parts from elsewhere.

#ai #lacan

Judith Beyer @[email protected] · 2026-06-07 · 13:22 UTC

Nerding out on a Sunday. I am preparing for my MA-course on #theory in #anthropology, covering #semiotics #structuralism and #Lacan #psychoanalysis 😍

#theory #anthropology #semiotics #structuralism #lacan #psychoanalysis

ジン @[email protected] · 2026-06-07 · 03:03 UTC

Is There a Universal Enjoyment? —Todd McGowan

https://quokk.au/c/zizek/p/964833/is-there-a-universal-enjoyment-todd-mcgowan

#politics #philosophy #psychoanalysis #lacan #freud

ジン @[email protected] · 2026-06-07 · 03:03 UTC

Is There a Universal Enjoyment? —Todd McGowan

https://quokk.au/c/zizek/p/964833/is-there-a-universal-enjoyment-todd-mcgowan

#politics #philosophy #psychoanalysis #lacan #freud

Judith Beyer @[email protected] · 2026-06-04 · 08:27 UTC

Morgen Abend in Berlin, wer Interesse hat, hingehen! #Lacan #Psychoanalyse Anmeldung: www.nls-initiative-berlin.com/anmeldung

#lacan #psychoanalyse

Mark Carrigan @[email protected] · 2026-05-28 · 07:04 UTC

Is there a psychoanalytical concept for how one frustration can be a synecdoche for frustration as such?

I came across a reference to the abjet petit a and immediately had a flash of what it might mean For Lacan the objet petit a is the object cause of our desire, it is the slither of the sublime which invests a concrete object with a sense of wondrous desirability. The sense of a deeper primordial loss from the trauma of socialisation lurks in the background of our psychic machinery, leading us to invest a flicker of what we feel was lost into the objects we now encounter in the present.

When I encountered the abjet petit a term, I hoped it described a parallel experience of frustration. There are times when a particular frustration takes on an outsized significance beyond what it is actually stopping us doing or impeding. A particular annoyance exists as a synecdoche for annoyance as such: this one thing we can’t control, this one thing which frustrates us, condenses the weight of all the things we can’t control, all the things which frustrate us. This one event becomes a spot where you feel the sheer traumatic weight of the world’s fundamental intransigence. What realists think of as the recalcitrance of reality (the causal criterion of existence) sometimes manifests itself as an affront to us which is deeply painful. If objet petit a is about desire, abjet petit a I hoped would be about castration: the trauma of recognising our limits.

Unfortunately this is not what Lacan meant. It seems to just be a late spin on the original concept which is slightly more inflected towards the Real. Is there an existing concept for what I’m describing here? I feel that there should be. Now back to being inexplicably pissed off with the cyclists riding on the pavement on my way to work.

#abjetPetitA #castration #desire #Lacan #objetPetitA

#abjetpetita #castration #desire #lacan #objetpetita

Chris J. ♿ @[email protected] · 2026-05-19 · 02:43 UTC

@courtcan How was it? I'm looking into getting a copy of *Looking Awry* by Žižek.

More generally, I'm looking for like-minded folks who read/know Jacques Lacan and Lacan-adjacent writers and thinkers. 25 years ago, my French professor/mentor applied Lacanian theory to books, films, and...well, everything. I was/still am fascinated by it, and I want to expand my knowledge/grasp of it.

#Lacan #Žižek #Philosopy #Books #CriticalTheory #Psychoanalysis

#lacan #zizek #philosopy #books #criticaltheory #psychoanalysis

Chris J. ♿ @[email protected] · 2026-05-19 · 02:43 UTC

@courtcan How was it? I'm looking into getting a copy of *Looking Awry* by Žižek.

More generally, I'm looking for like-minded folks who read/know Jacques Lacan and Lacan-adjacent writers and thinkers. 25 years ago, my French professor/mentor applied Lacanian theory to books, films, and...well, everything. I was/still am fascinated by it, and I want to expand my knowledge/grasp of it.

#Lacan #Žižek #Philosopy #Books #CriticalTheory #Psychoanalysis

#lacan #zizek #philosopy #books #criticaltheory #psychoanalysis

Chris J. ♿ @[email protected] · 2026-05-19 · 02:43 UTC

@courtcan How was it? I'm looking into getting a copy of *Looking Awry* by Žižek.

More generally, I'm looking for like-minded folks who read/know Jacques Lacan and Lacan-adjacent writers and thinkers. 25 years ago, my French professor/mentor applied Lacanian theory to books, films, and...well, everything. I was/still am fascinated by it, and I want to expand my knowledge/grasp of it.

#Lacan #Žižek #Philosopy #Books #CriticalTheory #Psychoanalysis

#lacan #zizek #philosopy #books #criticaltheory #psychoanalysis

Chris J. ♿ @[email protected] · 2026-05-19 · 02:43 UTC

@courtcan How was it? I'm looking into getting a copy of *Looking Awry* by Žižek.

More generally, I'm looking for like-minded folks who read/know Jacques Lacan and Lacan-adjacent writers and thinkers. 25 years ago, my French professor/mentor applied Lacanian theory to books, films, and...well, everything. I was/still am fascinated by it, and I want to expand my knowledge/grasp of it.

#Lacan #Žižek #Philosopy #Books #CriticalTheory #Psychoanalysis

#lacan #zizek #philosopy #books #criticaltheory #psychoanalysis

Chris J. ♿ @[email protected] · 2026-05-19 · 02:43 UTC

@courtcan How was it? I'm looking into getting a copy of *Looking Awry* by Žižek.

More generally, I'm looking for like-minded folks who read/know Jacques Lacan and Lacan-adjacent writers and thinkers. 25 years ago, my French professor/mentor applied Lacanian theory to books, films, and...well, everything. I was/still am fascinated by it, and I want to expand my knowledge/grasp of it.

#Lacan #Žižek #Philosopy #Books #CriticalTheory #Psychoanalysis

#psychoanalysis #criticaltheory #books #philosopy #zizek #lacan

Chris J. ♿ @[email protected] · 2026-05-19 · 01:48 UTC

Qui, sur Mastodon, a lu et étudié sérieusement la théorie psychanalytique de Jacques Lacan ?

Ma connaissance dans ce domaine reste assez rudimentaire, mais mon mentor français à l’université, il y a vingt-cinq ans, appliquait la pensée lacanienne aux textes, au cinéma et presque à tout. J’étais fasciné.

J’aimerais beaucoup approfondir ma propre compréhension de Lacan, s’il y a ici quelqu’un qui voudrait et pourrait m’y aider.

Merci d’avance.

#Lacan #Psychanalyse #ThéorieCritique

#lacan #psychanalyse #theoriecritique

Chris J. ♿ @[email protected] · 2026-05-19 · 01:48 UTC

Qui, sur Mastodon, a lu et étudié sérieusement la théorie psychanalytique de Jacques Lacan ?

Ma connaissance dans ce domaine reste assez rudimentaire, mais mon mentor français à l’université, il y a vingt-cinq ans, appliquait la pensée lacanienne aux textes, au cinéma et presque à tout. J’étais fasciné.

J’aimerais beaucoup approfondir ma propre compréhension de Lacan, s’il y a ici quelqu’un qui voudrait et pourrait m’y aider.

Merci d’avance.

#Lacan #Psychanalyse #ThéorieCritique

#lacan #psychanalyse #theoriecritique

Chris J. ♿ @[email protected] · 2026-05-19 · 01:48 UTC

Qui, sur Mastodon, a lu et étudié sérieusement la théorie psychanalytique de Jacques Lacan ?

Ma connaissance dans ce domaine reste assez rudimentaire, mais mon mentor français à l’université, il y a vingt-cinq ans, appliquait la pensée lacanienne aux textes, au cinéma et presque à tout. J’étais fasciné.

J’aimerais beaucoup approfondir ma propre compréhension de Lacan, s’il y a ici quelqu’un qui voudrait et pourrait m’y aider.

Merci d’avance.

#Lacan #Psychanalyse #ThéorieCritique

#lacan #psychanalyse #theoriecritique

Chris J. ♿ @[email protected] · 2026-05-19 · 01:48 UTC

Qui, sur Mastodon, a lu et étudié sérieusement la théorie psychanalytique de Jacques Lacan ?

Ma connaissance dans ce domaine reste assez rudimentaire, mais mon mentor français à l’université, il y a vingt-cinq ans, appliquait la pensée lacanienne aux textes, au cinéma et presque à tout. J’étais fasciné.

J’aimerais beaucoup approfondir ma propre compréhension de Lacan, s’il y a ici quelqu’un qui voudrait et pourrait m’y aider.

Merci d’avance.

#Lacan #Psychanalyse #ThéorieCritique

#theoriecritique #psychanalyse #lacan

Chris J. ♿ @[email protected] · 2026-05-18 · 23:40 UTC

#Introduction

I’m Chris, a writer and independent researcher from Minnesota. I’m a Prince obsessive, French cinema/literature lover, sci-fi person, and Lacanian wanderer.

I live with spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy and use a wheelchair. I write about music, memory, disability, embodiment, film, literature, and the strange ways art helps us survive ourselves.

Glad to be back on Mastodon.

#WritersOfMastodon #Prince4Ever #FrenchCinema #FrenchLiterature #Disability #CerebralPalsy #Lacan

#introduction #writersofmastodon #prince4ever #frenchcinema #frenchliterature #disability

Chris J. ♿ @[email protected] · 2026-05-18 · 23:40 UTC

#Introduction

I’m Chris, a writer and independent researcher from Minnesota. I’m a Prince obsessive, French cinema/literature lover, sci-fi person, and Lacanian wanderer.

I live with spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy and use a wheelchair. I write about music, memory, disability, embodiment, film, literature, and the strange ways art helps us survive ourselves.

Glad to be back on Mastodon.

#WritersOfMastodon #Prince4Ever #FrenchCinema #FrenchLiterature #Disability #CerebralPalsy #Lacan

#introduction #writersofmastodon #prince4ever #frenchcinema #frenchliterature #disability

infosophia.eu @[email protected] · 2026-05-16 · 11:18 UTC

Die folgende Arbeit entwickelt den borromäischen Knoten als Denkfigur für ein rotierendes Zusammenspiel von drei Registern in einer selbstreflexiven, dreiwertigen, paradoxen Logik mit drei involutiven Negationsoperatoren.

#psychology #lacan #polykontextualitat #polykontextural #logic #reflection #philosophy #ai #ki #paradox #Paradoxien #logik #semiotik #semiotic #semiotics #cybernetics #kybernetik #semioticsystem #cybernetic #kybernetiker #kybernethik

https://infosophia.eu/Borromaeische-Logik.pdf

#psychology #lacan #polykontextualitat #polykontextural #logic #reflection

infosophia.eu @[email protected] · 2026-05-16 · 11:18 UTC

Die folgende Arbeit entwickelt den borromäischen Knoten als Denkfigur für ein rotierendes Zusammenspiel von drei Registern in einer selbstreflexiven, dreiwertigen, paradoxen Logik mit drei involutiven Negationsoperatoren.

#psychology #lacan #polykontextualitat #polykontextural #logic #reflection #philosophy #ai #ki #paradox #Paradoxien #logik #semiotik #semiotic #semiotics #cybernetics #kybernetik #semioticsystem #cybernetic #kybernetiker #kybernethik

https://infosophia.eu/Borromaeische-Logik.pdf

#psychology #lacan #polykontextualitat #polykontextural #logic #reflection