Tell me if I've got this down. I haven't read Lacan, but from arguments on 4chan and readings of several of Zizek's books, I've gotten this out of him.
1. Psychoanalysis
Lacan refers to his theories as being psychoanalytical, and he ran a psychoanalytic practice. He saw his work as a rejection of Freud that was meant to patch up the holes in Freud's theories. Whether or not he succeeded, and whether or not the method he used was valid, is debatable, but beside the point of this post--when Lacanians refer to "psychoanalysis," they mean either the entire history of the discourse stretching back to Freud, or the specifically Lacanian way of performing this practice. The nature of the referent depends on the context.
2. Fantasy
Our fantasies are constituent to our perception of the world. Lacanian psychoanalysis encourages us to embrace our fantasies, to the extent that this can help us attain the jouissance necessary for human flourishing or, at the very least, psychological health. (Again, whether or not this works is beside the point, I'm just trying to understand Lacan's claims.) The Fantastic plays a significant role in the process whereby man is subjugated by power, interpolated into an ideology or religion, and relates to his fellow humans and himself psychologically. The human need to embrace the Fantastic is a key part of Lacanian psychoanalysis, which we might call post-rational for its rejection of Freud's antipathy toward religion and the primitive. The Fantastic lies beyond the order of symbolism; compare it to the superego, in terms of the way it works as a conditioner of the ego.
(contd)
3. The Real
The Real is the sum of the basic, visceral sensations that give rise to the sense of self, the things that cannot be symbolized or properly integrated into the Fantastic order, which exists in part to cope with what goes on on the level of the Real.
4. The Symbolic
All of this is mediated by the symbolic order, which is in fact, as language conceived in a very broad sense, the essence of consciousness. Essentially, we can get lost in the symbolic and lose touch with the relationship between the Real and the Fantastic. The point of Lacanian psychoanalysis, like Platonic contemplation, Christian prayer, Zen meditation or the Confucian rectification of names, is to bring ourselves, as agents operating primarily on the level of the symbolic within the confines of the social and physical structures that give rise to the Fantastic and the Real, in touch with these visceral kernels of Being which defy symbolization and which therefore defy us, as symbolic and symbolizing, signified and symbolizing beings.
So is this Lacan? Or is this just some post-Hegelian bullshit that I just concocted?
>>8062076
>>8062078
Point 1 is wrong, there is no rejection of Freud, he himself called his work freudian, it is a return to Freud not a rejection.
Point 2 it seems you are calling the Imaginary order Fantasy which is wrong, it lends itself to confusion when you read about the phantasm as well.
Point 4
>Essentially, we can get lost in the symbolic and lose touch with the relationship between the Real and the Fantastic.
The borromean knot tries to point the exact opposite of this, there is not one without the others.
So, yea, I would say you got the majority of it wrong and should probably read Lacan instead of 4chan "arguments" and Zizek if you intend to understand anything about his theory.
>>8062076
:^)
>>8062076
>-Rene Descartes
>picture of Voltaire
>>8062076
Jesus fucking Christ. Just stop posting and read Lacan's work. I don't want to be a rude dude but you're a fucking pseud.
