How Lacanian Psychoanalytical Theory Differs From That Of Freud
 |
| License: Image author owned |
An article on the evolution of Freudian theory by Jacques Lacan, the controversial reception of his mirror stage theory, in place of Freud's Oedipal Drive."
It was Sigmund Freud who originally established the field of psychoanalysis, and so the debt owed to him by the entire area of study is hard to overstate. However, it should always be remembered that many other figures have since built on Freud's work, expanding psychoanalysis into areas which he could not have imagined. The best-known individuals in psychoanalysis include the likes of Carl Jung and Wilhelm Reich, each with their own theories, their own disciples and their own students. This article will compare and contrast the theories of Freud with those of one of the most admired men to have followed up on his work: Jacques Lacan.
Lacan was heavily influenced by Freud, in fact, although he went on to found an entirely new school of psychoanalysis, he described himself as a Freudian Psychoanalyst. In the fifties Jacques Lacan ran seminars calling for psychoanalysts to return to Freud's body of work. He believed that many of Freud's followers had distorted his original writings, and so argued that it was time to reclaim the early work by the father of psychoanalysis.
Lacan also added to Freudian theory, however, and one of the key concepts which he introduced to the field was that of structural linguistics. He looked at Freud's case of a patient nicknamed the Rat Man. This individual was obsessed with the idea of people being tortured by rat-bites. Freud concluded that his obsession with rats masked concerns over money, and pointed to the similarities between the two words in German: "Ratten" (rats) echoes "Raten" (instalments, as in debt). Lacan used this case to articulate his theories regarding signifiers: chains of words which lead from one meaning to another, and which can provide insight into a patient's mental state.
However, Lacan also made a large and very controversial departure from Freudian theory with his concept of the Mirror Phase, the idea that observing ones self in a mirror triggered apperception, and hense the notion of an inner and outer self, an event that Lacan considered to be a significant milestone in the mental development of a child. Although Lacan himself saw his theory as compatible with Freud's theories regarding primal urges from early childhood, many disagree. The Fellow Frenchman psychoanalyst Raymond Tallis argued that the mirror stage had no factual foundation, and that congenially blind people would be incapable of learning to speak were Lacan's theories factually unflawed.
Freud placed great emphasis on the Oedipal drive: the subconscious desire in male children to kill the father and marry the mother (the female equivalent of the Oedipus complex is the Electra complex). Lacan, instead, held that the most important stage in the early development of a child was when it first sees itself in a mirror - or comes across a reasonable substitute, such as the image of a different child.
Lacan saw this as filling a gap in Freud's theories by explaining how the ego is constituted. More traditional Freudians, meanwhile, remain unconvinced.
This guest post was written by Nick Davison, Nick writes for a number of websites including Lacanian Psychoanalysis London.
Category: Cosmetic Surgery, Mental Health
0 comments