Our Understanding of Identity and Desire in Contemporary Society - Personal Statement Example

Our Understanding of Identity and Desire in Contemporary Society Introduction Contemporary societies are characterised by uncertainty (terror threat, climate change, political upheavals etc) and rapidity of change (tumultuous technological change). One can only assume that deconstructed subjects, fluid, fragmented and decentred are produced as a ripple effect of the destabilising context in which these ideas of selfhood are formed. The distinction between the Imaginary, the Symbolic and the Real (ISR) provides a diagnostic interpretation of the conventional post-modernist perception that the contemporary understanding of selfhood is fictitious, by drawing in discussions of the unconscious back into the social domain. The Lacanian register of the ISR can be a tool used to make sense of the notion that contemporary lifestyles characterised by uncertainty, multiplicity and rapidity of change, produces unstable subjects who embody identities that are based on fantasies because somehow down the line in the race to keep up with the rapid change they have lost sight of their real idea of self.  In this paper, Identity will be understood as a summary term referring to a subject’s investment in certain ways of experiencing themselves, and their affiliations with particular groups and social roles (Frosh 2010. p125). The imaginary, the symbolic, and the real all evoke unique meanings and implications. In addition, their depictions and references are arguably independent of each other. Jacques Lacan’s, emphasizes that the three orders of symbolic-real-imaginary (Roberts, p. 619) form a trio of psychic phenomena, which serves to situate subjectivity within a system of perception by forming a dialogue with the external world. Lacan’s writings and teachings explore the implications of Freud’s discovery in relation to the unconscious within theory and practices of psychoanalysis. Furthermore, his portrayal of the symbolic-real-imaginary orders derives their basis on the Freudian perceptions of the infantile sexuality, oedipal phase, and Lévi-Strauss linguistic schema’s of Language formations. How we reflect in our individual experience the “I” of all our lives requires a language and set of concepts which are finely attuned to the nuances of Lacan’s register theory. The distinction between the three registers reveal the unappreciated connections between what we experience as our Identity and what it is we think we are. This difference in experience and psychic awareness according to Frosh (1991, p2) resonates with the dialectic of the unconscious, which is of cause a central component of psychoanalysis. The subjectivity of the individual is therefore of great concern here because, it is a subjectivity given not just by what can be easily expressed as a consciously available “I”, but also by obscure and contradictory segments of a hidden self. The various branches of psychoanalysis provide a whole gamut of discourse on contemporary understanding of identity and desire. However these debates are construed, when closely read one can notice a pattern of reasoning that follows one of these two strands of reasoning: The psychotic pathology notion that there is something stable and central about the self. A selfhood which is constituted of a core element of each individual’s personality and a subjective existence. Theories based on this notion emphasis on the celebration of the “true self” as a refuge in the face of modernity’s sadism (Frosh 1991). The object relations theory of Melanie Klien and most modernist theories of Identity follow this view. The narcissistic pathology is based on the notion that the achievement of a true self is an ambiguity. This strand of reasoning argues that the self like the psychoanalytic ego is an alienating fiction produced as a defence against the painful realities of desire. The Narcissistic pathology theory is based on the Lacanian notion of the split subject (which will be discussed further); it is a line of reasoning that postmodernist theorist of Identity follow. My debate on contemporary understandings of identity will follow this line of reasoning. It is worth noting that no matter what their intellectual affiliation is, most theorists agree that when faced with the contradictions and multiplicities of contemporary western experience, all selves are thrown into a state of confusion - a condition in which the struggle to be a self is nearly impossible (Frosh 1991). This notion resonates with the Lacanian split subject. This subject, according to Bruce Fink, is abstract and exists as a breach in discourse whose precise manifestation in daily life is seen as a fleeting irruption of something foreign or extraneous. One will assume then that the subject is but a split between two forms of Otherness; The Ego as the other (a crystallisation of images which allows for a coherent sense of self) and the Unconscious as the Other's discourse (Fink 1997. p41). Identity and Subjectivity are not synonymous, however to enable me clearly explain contemporary notions of Identity and Desire; I will be using the lens of the imaginary, symbolic and real to describe how the Lacanian subject comes into being. This subject being akin to the contemporary subject will give us a clear idea of why our perception of a stable identity is fictitious and construed from our social interactions Register Theory The journey of the register began in the 1930’s with Lacan’s attempt to return to Freud. The journey began with the publication of his doctoral dissertation, paranoid psychosis and its relation to personality (even then you’ll notice that the unnamed imaginary realm was in his purview). The categories became distinguished in the thoughts by the 1950’s when he discovered Levi-Strauss, from then on his thinking progressed from a specula image to the structure/structuring of language and effect of the symbolic on the imaginary. The 1960’s-1970’s the real became the focus of attention; the relation between the three modalities also began to take shape, hence the conception of the topology of the Borromean Knot (P Julien 1994). The Borromean Knot analogy remain a key topic of discussion up tile 1980’s in his weekly or bi-monthly series. The Real, Symbolic and Imaginary (RSI) are systems of interacting registers (orders/realms) that traverse an individual’s psychic function. The analogy of the Knots allows us to comprehend strength in unity, that although together the three rings comprise a structure, that structure is far from static; they constantly act on each other, defining each other and themselves in contradistinction to one another like a force field within a universal matrix (L Bailey, 2010). Together, they form a complex topological space, in which the characteristic disorderly motions of the human mind can be plotted (M Bowie, 1991, P. 98-99).This is why the topology of the Borromean Knot is of great interest in the identity debate. The interaction of Lacan’s three modalities produces the analysable human subject. For Lacan this subject exist out there like a force-field within a universal matrix, the imaginary, the Symbolic and the Real are properties of this matrix (Baily 2010). The distinction between them in my view provides a workable framework for understanding the normal function of the human mind. The Topic of the Imaginary Register It makes sense to start with the Imaginary when using the analogy of the Borromean Knot in the topology of subjectivity. This register is the basic level of self-perception; as such it is the precursor of subjectivity. The imaginary register, as defined by Bowie, is the order of the mirror image, identifications and reciprocities. It is the dimension of experience, in which the individual not only seeks to placate the Other, but also tries to dissolve her otherness by becoming her counterpart; the Ego. The self-replication function of the imaginary realm makes it quite distinct from the other two registers. This function is active because the subject seeks to prevent herself from succumbing to subjectivist forces of the Other. As a result, the imaginary register becomes a scene of a desperate attempt to be and to remain “what one is” by gathering onto oneself ever more instances of sameness, resemblance and self-replication. It is the birthplace of the narcissistic ego (Ideal -I). In his seminar on the Mirror stage as the formative function of the ‘I’; you see an integration of his works in the 1930’s to that of the 1940’s, the imaginary register Lacan presents is seen to be the threshold of the visual world and psychical realities. This bridge however dupes the subject of all sense of reality. Firstly, because it presents an image that assumes an over inflated sense of mental mastery and completeness, at stage when the subject is in-fact immature. Secondly, the ideas which are used to create a perception of this image belong to an external entity. The extract below provides a succinct version of what I am trying to explain. The fact is that the total form of the body by which the subject anticipates in a mirage the maturation of his power is given to him only as a gestalt, that is to say, in an exteriority in which it appears to him more constituent than constituted… (Lacan 1949, P 2) What Lacan wants us to conceptualise here is that the infant’s identification with its reflection in the mirror begins the primary intellectual act of self-recognition from which springs the dialectic of identification. This dialectic comes into being via the infant’s identification of an object on which ideas of self can be projected. It then uses this object as a prototype from which it establishes the foundations of its Ideal-I. This action automatically creates an identity impossibility because the Ideal-I doesn’t exist it is a constituent of an exteriority awaiting symbolisation in the form of language. Before the infants encounter with the image it is to some extent familiar with different parts of its body, the sight of itself as a whole form in the mirror is a traumatic experience, during which the infants’ primary narcissism is fractured. The result is the ability to perceive the differences between self and other, instating the lifelong quest to return to the pre-imaginary stage of primary narcissism when there was no differentiation between self and other. Going back to our Identity debate, the drama of the mirror image is repeated by the power relations in an individualist capitalist society such as ours; it produces the same the destabilising effect as that of the mirror image. I agree with Ian Burkit’s argument in his 2008 paper on everyday life in contemporary capitalism that the individualization and “autonomization” of selves, and the demand that they should be constantly open to flexibility and change as required by the market can provoke anxiety and a sense of alienation. The pursuit to find the individual autonomy is powered by the socially construed ideology that that the ego has integrity and wholeness. Subject of individualised society develops fantasised identifications as a survival instinct which becomes armour against the alienating identity relations they are faced with. The fantasised identities are imaginatively used to substitute difference to identification, producing in the process an imago or ideal ego, which symbolises the mental permanent of the ‘I’ the vision which becomes the essence of identity. This essence of identity is l’objet petit (a), the object cause of desire. This desire is never symbolised as such what we understand as our identity in contemporary society is in actual fact fantasied versions of what we consider to be our sense of self before our encounter with the mirror image. What we consider to be our identities is based on this sensory image/ prototype of self; our desires are thus products of this prototype. We gain pleasure in the impossible pursuit of our desires due to the object we encounter during the mirror stage. The Topic of the Symbolic Register The moment the in which the mirror stage come on an end inaugurates by identification with the imago of the counterpart and the drama of primordial jealousy the dialectic that will henceforth link the I to a socially elaborated situations (Lacan 1949, p5) The symbolic, Lacan’s next stage in the process of subjectivity unlike its predecessor – the imaginary; celebrates the existence of variations. It is the order of movements rather than fixity and of heterogeneity rather than similarity. In the symbolic we encounter a subject that is distinct from the ego, it is however a being disjoined and intermitted (Bowie, 1991, P92). The disjoined and intermitted subject came into being in the imaginary order, as the human infant develops and progressively gains access to the symbolic its state of discordance is plunge further into turmoil when faced with the Other in the form of language and a whole set of hypotheses that exerts their influence on the it (Lacan 1949,p5). In the bridge between symbolisation and the imaginary the subject see the emptiness of the image and its narcissistic cathexis invested in it. With the knowledge that the omnipotent position assumed in its initial development is fake, it lets go of this identification and pursues what it thinks owns the omnipotent position, the Other. The unconscious comes into to being here. The idea of the ideal-I, is repressed but constitute a perpetual reversion, revived verbally by socially elaborated situations (Lacan 1953-954;Chpt xiii; p17). One can therefore assume as Frosh did ( 2010, p 117) that in relation to identity the theory of the symbolic emphasises that the position of the subject with respect to language requires an encounter with otherness in a way that fractures the omnipotence of the mirrored ‘I’ in the imaginary ...If the imaginary celebrates the fictitious identity of the subject and the ego, it is the tearing of this identity that moves the subject into the symbolic order but at the same time constructs the unconscious; what is left out becomes repressed. This concept can be weaved into the domain of some contemporary understanding of the identity. For example in Lasch’s (1984, p164) account that all cultural aspirations find their origin in the original experience of loss encountered by the human infant, an event which will become the basis of all subsequent experiences of alienation. Janine Chasseguet-Smirgel as resonates by Frosh (1991) also agrees with Lacan’s notion of the split that comes into being through the formations of object relations when the infant perceives its own weakness and the phantasy of it omnipotent position. What one notices in these notions is the prominence of Lack in the symbolic order. As Bowie (1991) noted in his description of the symbolic, in this order everything exists on an assumed foundation of absence. This lack propels the subject into the social domain of Language; in search of what has been lost, to demand from the other that which has been lost. The narcissistic aggressiveness of the Ego is dissolved in the symbolic. There is no need to for the subject to self-replicate in the symbolic, because it is in search of a lost object. Desire is found at exactly this point. In his seminar the see saw of desire Lacan (1953-54) comments on the impact on the symbolic register in helping the subject to commit desire to mediation helps the subject to become a social being. He continues to say that the ‘I’ is a socially construe phenomenon constituted at first in a linguistic experience through the reference to the you, for this to work the infant develops the ability to identify the “I” and not-me. Before this the subject had no reason to create a resonance of its individual identity so his hasn’t got a clue them (p167). This implies that the subject has no self-knowledge, no self-consciousness. Through the function of the symbolic, at 18 months the infant human self-consciousness arises through the internalisation of the way the others see them, assimilating the approving and disapproving looks and comments. The infant human learns to see itself as the other sees it; it also learns to know itself as the other knows it (Fink 2004, p108); this dialectic is a continuation from the event of the mirror stage when its image of self is seen as a constituent of an exteriority. This explains the identity struggle of individuals in our contemporary culture of narcissism, the repeated experience of uneasy self-scrutiny, of submission to expert judgement, of distrust of their own capacity to make intelligent decisions, either as producers or as consumers, colours people’s perceptions both of themselves and of the world around them... both as a worker and as a consumer, the individual learns not merely to measure himself against others but to see himself through others’ eyes (Lasch 1984 p.29) Lasch implies here that the prevailing social conditions of declining economic situations, threat of terror attack and so on, fosters a mass produced image of the self that encourages contradiction a survival instinct. In doing this we blur the boundaries between the self and its surroundings resulting in a self, uncertain of its own outlines. Our consumer culture an also be understand in this valence , consumerism according the sociologist Zygmunt Bauman (2000) is really a symbolisation of our need to escape insecurity triggered by our modern lifestyles. Individuals want to be, for once, free from the fears of mistake, neglect or sloppiness. They want to be, for once, sure, confident, self-assured and trusting; and the awesome virtue of the objects they find when shopping around is that they come (or so it seems for a time) complete with the promise of certainty (P.81). Going back to Lacan’s saw see of desire, he mentioned in this seminar that before desire learns to see itself as a symbol it is seen solely in the other. As mentioned in our discussion on the imaginary register the object cause of desire is found in the imaginary plane. Lacan argues that the tension caused by the mirror image that leads to the alienation of the subject are never resolved it produces instead an aggressive need to extinguish the other. The subject’s desire can only be confirmed in this relation through a competition, through an absolute rivalry with the other (p170). We see this tension each time the subject sees itself as a form alongside its ego the symbolic by taking the omniscient status of the subject away makes alienation and absence the centre of the subject. In both the Écrits and seminars the symbolic is proposed by Lacan to be a plane which allows the subject to make sense of the imaginary fantasies of selfhood, in essence what I expressed as the self is thus a combination of the features internalise from the mirror stage and the provisions offered by the dialectic of the symbolic. The subject’s real conceptualisation of their identity is beyond symbolisation and thus can never be fully expressed. The Topic of the Real The distinguishing characteristic of the real is that it cannot be rendered as an image or symbol. That is to say, the real resists ‘capture’ in both the imaginary and the symbolic orders. In essence, the Real is often resistant and radically opposed to both the imaginary and the symbolic forms of presentation (Imaginary) or representation (Symbolic). The real can be explained as everything the symbolic expels from reality when representations are formed. Desire in contemporary society is seen as the motivating force of consumption. In our symbolic discussion it has been established that consumerism is powered by an innate anxiety caused by the need to be understood and interpreted as a separate entity. The sociologist Zygmunt Bauman, in his book Liquid Modernity (2000) aligns with this line of reasoning he claims that present-day consumerism, is no longer about satisfying needs; consumer activity is no longer the measurable set of articulated needs, but desire - a much more volatile and ephemeral, evasive and capricious, and essentially a non-referential entity than 'needs', a self-begotten and self-propelled motive that needs no other justification or 'cause’. One may be inclined to think that Bauman is to some extent invoking Lacan’s desire. With a note that Bauman is describing the behaviour of subjects in a society that expects them to embrace growing change, I believe the object of desire in this instance is in the plane of the real, the Thing (das Ding) a formulation borrowed from Freud, one of Lacan’s attempt to reconcile some Freudian formulations with his . The Thing attracts desire in the same way as ‘l’objet petit a’ because it is a lost object. It is an unimaginable, unsymbolisable reality of loss. Lacan’s interpretation of the Thing was to link it with the absence of the mother, the subject is constituted by its separation from the emotional relationship with the maternal thing whose primary characteristic is to be unsymbolisable thus it cannot be repressed. The subject is brought into being when it develops an ability to make symbolic representations, the Thing being outside the symbolic register requires a subject to exit the symbolic plane of subjectivity, absolute jouissance of the thing will erase and annihilate the subject (Bailly 2010). Going back to Bauman, liquid modernity he claims that modernism produces awareness that the present is ostensibly a temporary state that continues to update itself. This expectation of constantly updating our forms of living and consequently our identity creates a condition of loss and yarning for a previous state of order, dear I say stability. The western culture of decadence is thus a daytime ritual to exorcise the gruesome apparitions of uncertainty and insecurity which keep haunting the nights. Read More