I am not quite sure what drew me initially to reading Lacan. It could be that my first analyst was Lacanian, or perhaps merely an instance of “why not?” The obscurity of the theory seduced me with its tantalizing effect of something that can never be mastered and owned. Perhaps, because I was a foreigner here myself, I may have been drawn to marginal places and Lacanian theory promises just such a voyage into the marginal. Whatever the reason was, I became ambitious about becoming a Lacanian, at least until I realized the irony inherent in that ambition. Lacan in the “Seminaire de Caracas” clearly mocked the ones who shared my ambition: “You can be Lacanians, if you want. As far as I am concerned, I am Freudian.” And this is probably a good example of Lacan's version of clarity and direction for his followers.
Well, this is as far as this ambition went and this is as good as this Father was going to get; and still, it was precisely the “as good as it gets” that demarcated a place for me to begin enjoying Lacan. My intention here is to comment (drawing from my own experience in a Lacanian institute) on what it is about Lacanian theory that makes it simultaneously desired and repudiated, some ways that it differs from the mainstream ego psychology, and how this difference plays out in the Lacanian educational standards and selection of candidates.
The Lacanian theory defies quick consumption and easy understanding: “…his [Lacan's] writing very often falls (on purpose) into a Mallarmean mannerism, the high and obscure style practiced by French doctors around the 1930s,” says Alexandre Leupin in his recent book, Lacan Today. But, of course, given that this obscurity is also “on purpose,” Lacan is seen as a “bad” boy, perhaps sadistic, or at least arrogant, in the eyes of many readers. It is difficult enough to try to separate the theory from the person creating this theory; and since Lacan was also anti-American and dismissively critical of ego psychology, the ego psychologically oriented American reader may be especially challenged to entertain his ideas. For that matter, why should we entertain those ideas? If he did not like us, why should we even attempt to pretend that we might like him? But, in being blessed by the analytic spirit, we might be better disposed to refrain from talionic countertransferential enactments. Additionally, if Lacan remains obscure, he also remains seductive, especially with his claim of a return to Freud and of a further articulation of the Freudian doctrine.
The obscurity of the theory seduced me with its tantalizing effect of something that can never be mastered and owned.
How is Lacanian theory a return to and a further elaboration of Freud? Let's take, for example, Freud's attempt to define truth (what had really happened) as he first sought to locate the buried truth through the deciphering of symptoms, dreams, and other formations of the unconscious, later realizing that this truth had less to do with actuality than fantasy, that it was, rather, a subjective truth. Lacan elaborated on that distinction by situating truth as a fiction—a fiction invested with affect. He drew a clear distinction between actuality and subjective truth, and also between subjective truth and knowledge. He thought that it was impossible to think that every truth can be completely articulated and translated into knowledge. Driven by this assumption, he used mathematics and the obscuring of language as an attempt to help the reader to become cognizant of this impossibility. Lacan aimed to find active readers and warned his followers against becoming idolaters. However, he often achieved the opposite result, since some obsessively tried to decipher his oral teachings and writings explicitly, to map out the true Lacanian doctrine.
It is on this point that Lacanian institutes remain faithful to Lacan in their effort to avoid idolatry in the group identifications by shaping accordingly their educational standards and the selection of candidates. Selection of candidates follows a different logic than the one with which we are generally familiar. Having the desire to become an analyst and fulfilling the requirements of suitability (in terms of credentials, clinical experience, and personality characteristics) are not enough. In fact, this particular desire is none other than a symptom that needs to be analyzed, not the basis for candidacy. Similarly, having standards for selection of candidates being based on credentials, similar clinical background, and personal characteristics is viewed as another symptomatic way of seeking conformity and normativity, concepts antithetical to the Lacanian version of the analytic tradition.
Paola Mieli, a founder of Après Coup, a Lacanian psychoanalytic institute in New York City, says:
In opposition to any idea of conformity, psychoanalysis is fundamentally an experience with and towards otherness, a practice of de-identification that enhances the relation to
Vaia Tsolas, Ph.D., a clinical psychologist in private practice in New York City and supervising psychologist at Fordham University Counseling Center, is a candidate at the Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research. She is a past Fellow of APsaA.
Page 17difference. It is the subject's practice of “exile,” a leaving behind of mystifying individual and group identifications and of the guarantees provided by the already known. It is a journey towards what is unknown and foreign within the subject, as manifested, for example, in the formations of the unconscious. This practice of exile leads towards the progressive “deconstruction of a person's idolatry (ego narcissism and super-egoic requirements),” towards the “encounter, in the rigour of one's speech, with one's singularity, style, and difference.”
As such, the formation of an analyst goes in a manner that many Lacanians consider to be a reversal of more traditional training; instead of aiming towards identification with the group's ideals and assimilation to the communities, the aim is rather from identification to dis-identification.
Hypothetically, we hope that regardless of our theoretical orientations, we can usually arrive at a relatively similar final destination if we were to analyze the same patient. Can we hope the same with our differences in standards (whether implicit or explicit) to the end goal to form an analyst? Or put it differently, does it make for the same trip if you travel in reverse?
I left the Lacanian institute when I realized that I really needed to know Freud in order to be able to claim the return to him. Now, thinking back, I realize that it bothered me as a child when I had the urge to read a book from the back to the front and sacrifice the suspense of the travel. As the Greek poet Constantine P. Cavafy wrote in his poem, Ithaka, “Keep Ithaka always in your mind./Arriving there is what you destined for,/ But do not hurry the journey at all./ Better if it lasts for years,/ so you are old by the time you reach the island,/ wealthy with all you have gained on the way,/ not expecting Ithaka to make you rich.”
I had a very brief experience in the Lacanian landscape, far too brief to know the answers to the questions posed above. Lacanian analysts might not think the trip is the same, and perhaps it is worthwhile listening to their experiences and keeping an open mind about their ideals and idols.