well Matthew,
my understanding of Lacan is informed by a great deal more than just reading
him -- it's funny how we Lacanians (how in the world did Derrideans get into
this discussion?) tend to rely on the actual experience of analysis. the
fact that you read Lacan and didn't get him doesn't necessarily reflect badly
on Lacan. if you, along with the other haters of Freud & company -- see Mark
Weiss' last post on this subject -- want to insist that everything Freudian
or Lacanian is hokum, there's nothing more to be said about it. however, I
do notice that you tend to be long on contempt and very short on specific
discussions. it's too bad that no one can have a discussion about these
subjects without having to deal with a lot of knee-jerkiness from people who
really don't seem to have any real expertise, just an surfeit of uninformed
opinions.
jb...
In a message dated 07/13/2000 6:54:57 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:
<<
Amazing how you Lacanians (and Derrideans etc) think that just reading your
idols will bring about a miraculous conversion. It does prove you're
sincere -and that you read in a very different way from me, since it was the
agonizing experience of trying to read these people that put me off them in
the first place. At any rate, reading The Mirror Stage doesn't help against
the charge that Lacan is a pseudo-scientist, since it raises some very
awkward questions about who exactly has observed and recorded the universal
childhood reactions to mirrors that he so relies on, and which he is
arrogant enough to provide absolutely no evidence for. It seems to me like a
deliberate rhetorical ploy, an attempt to go even further out on a limb than
Freud did in the dodgiest part of his own theory, the Primal Scene. Which
does make it an interesting literary device, a sort of psychoanalytic
burlesque - but it doesn't do much for his claims to scientific status.
Best wishes,
Matthew Francis >>
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
|