Littoral Zones & Brick Walls

Tomorrow is the final Friday get together of our series on Seminar XVIII, wonderfully titled “On a Discourse That Might Not Be a Semblance.” I couldn’t be more excited for this concluding session, or more wowed by the clinical and conceptual insights that folks have generated so far — to say nothing of wondrous intellectual community that continues to flourish as a result.

Huge thanks to the international crew of scholars, clinicians, students, and independent learners that have made all of this possible. Andrew, Andrey, Barbara, Benjamin, Brandon, Carolina, Christie, Cody, Craig, Daniel, Derek, Dharmysha, Dieter, Douglas, Edward, Emanuel, Fernanda, Geo, Henrik, Ira, Ivan, Jordan, Julia, Kieran, Kolya, Messina, Micheli, Monique, Oliver, Patrick, Phoebus, Rachel, Rishab, Robert, Sandy, Sarah, Soraya, The Friend, Tiffi, & Wanessa: Way to take this series to the next level!

As for the prospect of “a discourse that might not be a semblance,” well, if you’ve seen any of the lectures in this series, you know where we landed on this topic. Right on the beach, in what Lacan aptly defines as a “littoral zone” between knowledge and jouissance! At high tide, we saw real discourse washing up as symptomatic expressions commanded by the unconscious. And at low tide, we saw it surface anew in the mathemes, formulas, and diagrams of radical psychoanalytic inquiry. All of which, in turn, brought Lacan’s theory of discourse into sharp focus:

But back to thanking everyone, not least of whom are all the folks at The Association for Psychoanalysis & Psychotherapy in Ireland (APPI) who joined us for this series! And just in time for their upcoming conference on “Returning to the Clinical Case Study,” which is set to occur in Dublin and online via Zoom on 18 Nov 2023. With keynote speakers like Rik Loose and Stijn Vanheule, you know it’s going to be lit!

And speaking of upcoming events, what do you have planned for the first part December? As a prelude to our next major series — Seminar XIX, here we come! — I’m planning to host a miniseries on Lacan’s winter 1971-1972 lectures on “The Psychoanalyst’s Knowledge,” the first three of which were recently published in Talking to Brick Walls. Access the full text HERE and stay tuned for more details next week!