Origins of Desire & Ethics of the Drive in Lacanian Psychoanalysis

Samuel McCormick, PhD is Professor of Communication Studies at San Francisco State University and the host of Lectures on Lacan, a learning community dedicated to clear, coherent, and accessible readings of key texts in Lacanian psychoanalysis.

“Reading McCormick's book on Lacan's Seminar XI cost me a sleepless night, for two simple reasons. The subtitle of his book could be: "Everything You Wanted to Know about Lacan, But Were Afraid to Ask McCormick." The effect of his reading is magic: you again and again ask yourself, "But things are so clear now, why didn't I get it myself before?" And the second reason is a variation of this subtitle: "Everything You Wanted to Know about Lacan but Were Afraid to Ask Lacan Himself." McCormick achieves clarity not by reading Lacan through another (structuralist, Hegelian, feminist...) frame, but just by being attentive to Lacan's precise formulations, to the literal texture of his seminar. In an ideal community, Lacan's Seminar XI should be printed in a single volume together with McCormick's text!”Slavoj Žižek, International Director at the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, Global Distinguished Professor of German at New York University, and Senior Researcher at the University of Ljubljana“Samuel McCormick’s commentary on Jacques Lacan’s Seminar XI provides the perfect introduction not only to that crucial seminar but to all of Lacan’s notoriously difficult thought. McCormick guides the reader through all of Lacan’s important ideas by stripping away the jargon and giving us a much more readable version of Lacan. He does this, amazingly, without a moment of dumbing down Lacan’s ideas, a feat that makes this book not to be missed.”Todd McGowan, Professor English and Director of Film and Television Studies at the University of Vermont“We are often told that Lacan' Seminar XI is a pivotal seminar, a crucial turning-point in Lacan's teaching; yet it has seldom been illuminated with the expository originality and flair that it deserves. McCormick achieves just this. He transports us to the lecture theatre at the Ecole Normale Superiere, where we take a seat, amongst luminaries of the day, so as to witness Lacan's 'post-excommunication' performance. The pulse and cadence of Lacan's thinking, his redefinition of the drive, the re-conceptualization of transference, the new urgency afforded the concept of repetition, the dimension of ethics, all of these are made vital again in McCormick's distinctive manner. Simultaneously grounded and exploratory, accessible and instructive to newcomers and longstanding scholars and practitioners of Lacanian psychoanalysis, McCormick has produced an indispensable guide to a watershed Seminar, to a historical moment in Lacanian psychoanalysis.”Derek Hook, Professor of Psychology at Duquesne University and Extraordinary Professor at the University of Pretoria

• Acknowledgements PrefaceIntroduction: The Subject's CauseChapter 1: A Science of Openings: Lack, Causality, and the Subject in Seminar XIKey Concepts Introduction Part I: The Contested Scientificity of Psychoanalysis1.1 The Epistemological Break: Seeking versus Finding 1.2 The Ontological Distinction: Objectivity and Objectality 1.3 A Science of Structural Causality Part II: The Differential Logic of Lack and Desire2.1 Desire as the Metonymy of Lack 2.2 The Constituted Lack: Absence versus Experience 2.3 The Differential Structure of Being: Lacan's Saussure 2.4 From Two to Three: The Emergence of Objet a Part III: The Genetic Logic of the Subject and the Object3.1 The Primordial Prohibition: Castration and the Name-of-the-Father 3.2 Alienation and the Split Subject ($) 3.3 The Algebraic Formulation of Lack: (-φ) and (a) 3.4 The Oedipal Drama as Structural Logic Part IV: Beyond Interpretation: Hermeneutics, History, and the Real4.1 Psychoanalysis: A Hermeneutics of Faith or a Science of the Letter? 4.2 "Wo es war, soll Ich werden": From Past to History 4.3 The Limits of Interpretation: The Sinthome and the Real Conclusion Key Takeaways Discussion Questions Chapter 2: The Repetition of the Cut: Trauma, Representation, and the Split SubjectKey Concepts Introduction Part I: The Architecture of the Split Subject1.1 The Retroactive Constitution of a Lost Origin 1.2 The "No" of the Father and the Production of "No-Things" 1.3 The Set of Castration: { -φ, a } Part II: The Logic of Repetition: Tuché and Automaton2.1 Repression and the Return of the Repressed: The Logic of Retroaction 2.2 An Encounter with the Real (Tuché) 2.3 The Insistence of the Signifier (Automaton) Part III: The Three-Tiered Structure of Repetition and Representation3.1 Case Study I: The Fort-Da Game 3.2 Case Study II: "Father, Can't You See I'm Burning?" 3.3 The Retroactive Logic of the Real Part IV: The Scopic Field: The Gaze as Objet a4.1 The Split Between the Eye and the Gaze 4.2 The Stain and the Annihilation of the Subject 4.3 Love and the Deception of the Eye ConclusionKey Takeaways Discussion Questions Chapter 3: The Signifier of the Says-No: Meontology, Transference, and the Primordial CutKey Concepts Introduction Part I: The Primordial Signifier and Its Effects1.1 The Quadrilateral of the Subject 1.2 Identifying The Signifier: The Unary Trait 1.3 The "One" of the Split Part II: A Science of Non-Being: The Meontology of Psychoanalysis2.1 The "Says-No" as Primordial Utterance 2.2 From Ontology to Meontology 2.3 Human Existence as a Subtracted State 2.4 The Death Drive and the Fantasy of Oneness Part III: The Clinic of the Orifice: A New Theory of Transference3.1 The Hoop Net and the Temporal Pulsations of the Unconscious 3.2 Transference as Closure 3.3 The Objet a as Obturator 3.4 The Analyst's Strategy Conclusion Key Takeaways Discussion Questions Chapter 4: The Lamella and the Lost Cause of Life: A New Theory of the DriveKey Concepts Introduction Part I: The Sexed Organism and the Real Lack1.1 The Interface of Organism and Subject 1.2 The Symbolic Imposition of Sexual Bipolarity 1.3 The Lost Cause of Life: Redefining Libido 1.4 The Lamella: An Organ without a Body Part II: The Overlapping of the Two Lacks2.1 A Network of Loss 2.2 The Symbolic Veiling the Real 2.3 Sex, Death, and the Species Part III: The Grammar and Topology of the Drive3.1 Deconstructing the Drive: The Four-Part Montage 3.2 The Topology of the Circuit 3.3 The Three Voices of the Drive Part IV: The Ethics of the Drive: Traversing the Fantasy4.1 Beyond the Pleasure Principle 4.2 Traversing the Fundamental Fantasy 4.3 Living Out the Drive Conclusion Key Takeaways Discussion Questions Chapter 5: The Libidinal Economy: Sublimation, Desublimation, and the Object of the DriveKey Concepts Introduction Part I: The Libidinal Economy: Sublimation vs. Desublimation1.1 The Direction of Desire: The Sublimatory Path 1.2 The Reversal of the Drive: The Desublimatory Path 1.3 A Hierarchy of Loss Part II: An Ontology of the Drive: Having versus Being2.1 The Imaginary Logic of Having 2.2 The Real Logic of Being 2.3 The Drive as a Portal between Meaning and Being Part III: The Object as Opening3.1 From Object to Objectality 3.2 The Indifference and Constraints of the Object 3.3 The Object as Portal: Revisiting the Hoop Net Part IV: The In-Out Logic of the Drive4.1 The Primacy of the Circuit 4.2 The Respiratory Drive as a Paradigm 4.3 The Incorporeal Organ Conclusion Key Takeaways Discussion Questions Chapter 6: The Unreal Organ: A Myth of the Drive's OriginKey Concepts Introduction Part I: The Topology of the Unconscious: The Pulsating Cave1.1 The "Position" of the Unconscious 1.2 The Cave, the Rim, and the Flow 1.3 The Opening and Closing Part II: The Myth of the Egg: A New Origin Story2.1 From Aristophanes to the Egg 2.2 Humpty Dumpty and the Broken Subject Part III: Placenta, Breath, and Cry3.1 The First Loss: The Placenta as Anatomical Complement 3.2 The First Pulsation: The Respiratory Drive 3.3 The First Demand: The Prohibition of the Cry Part IV: The Incorporeal Organ and the Activity of the Drive4.1 The Ectopic Chain 4.2 Libido as Unreal Organ 4.3 The Activity of the Drive as Recovery Conclusion Key Takeaways Discussion Questions Conclusion: Love Beyond the FantasyIntroduction Part I: The Dead End of Desire1.1 Desire's Servitude to the Law 1.2 The Jouissance of the Symptom 1.3 Desire as a Defense Part II: The Path of Separation2.1 Alienation and the Subject Supposed to Know 2.2 Separation and the Desire of the Other 2.3 Traversing the Fundamental Fantasy Part III: The Interior Eight and the Liberation of the Drive3.1 The Regressive Loop of Identification 3.2 The Progressive Loop of Separation 3.3 The Fall of the Analyst Part IV: The Ethics of the Drive4.1 The Evil God of Anxiety 4.2 Alcibiades's Shortcut: The Path of Pure Desire 4.3 The Potential for Limitless Love Conclusion Works Cited