This is a fairly ambitious post. Here I attempt to show how the theory of neurosis developed by the early psychoanalyst Edmund Bergler, particularly his theory of pseudo aggression or aggression that is fundamentally fictional and a defense of a deeper source of antagonism can provide an excellent addition to the standard theory of ideology … Continue reading Pseudo aggression, Contradiction, Ideology
Seminar on Paranoia in Hegel and Lacan
Hegel and Lacan on Paranoia: The Romantic Idealist Reformer Becomes an Aggressive Paranoid Study Groups in Psychoanalysis and Politics Presents: Wilfried Ver Eecke on "Hegel and Lacan on Paranoia" Dr. Ver Eecke is a Lacanian Psychoanalyst and Professor of Philosophy, Georgetown University In this seminar, Dr. Wilfried Ver Eecke will discuss Hegel’s idea of the … Continue reading Seminar on Paranoia in Hegel and Lacan
Seminar with Bracha Ettinger
Our Study Groups in Psychoanalysis and Politics is pleased to invite you to join our next seminar series with the psychoanalyst and artist Bracha Ettinger. We’re very grateful that Bracha has agreed to present to our group and following her lecture on Sunday March 14th, we will host a forum on Ettinger’s talk and her … Continue reading Seminar with Bracha Ettinger
Lacan and the Logic of Structure with Ellie Ragland
I'm pleased to offer a new seminar with Lacanian analyst and literary theorist Ellie Ragland starting in early 2021. You can sign up to join us here. Lacan and the Logic of Structure Two Seminars with Ellie Ragland January 7th 7:00 pm EST – "Topology, Lacan and the Borromean Clinic" January 14th 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm … Continue reading Lacan and the Logic of Structure with Ellie Ragland
The Politics of Resentment with Samo Tomsic
I'm happy to announce that we have an upcoming keynote lecture by Samo Tomsic on "The Politics of Resentment" on December 3rd at 7 pm. You can register for this talk here and check out our prior two sessions here (on ressentiment, sublimation and neoliberalism) and here (on Lacan, affects, and the four five discourses). … Continue reading The Politics of Resentment with Samo Tomsic
Announcing New Beyond the Pleasure Principle – Reading Series
This coming Thursday I will be starting a reading series on Freud's Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920). I will host this series via Zoom on Thursday nights starting September 24th. We will read the text closely and reference Lacan's work throughout the series. On our first night, we will consider the famous "fort-da" game that … Continue reading Announcing New Beyond the Pleasure Principle – Reading Series
The Subject Supposed to Rebel
I'm pleased to share an article I wrote based on a talk I offered to the Lacanian Forum of Washington, DC earlier this month. The editors at Everyday Analysis have provided some really useful edits to this piece. You can read "The Subject Supposed to Rebel" here.
Upcoming Talk: On the Virtue of Modesty in Lacan
Lacan has remarked that modesty is the most important virtue. Lacan thinks modesty as an affect that keeps one’s desire or symptom protected behind a veil. Yet when the veil is lifted through the gaze of the other, the subject undergoes shame. Where there is shame, the extimate part of one’s being, precisely their desire is exposed to the other. Shame thus awakens the subject to being riveted to oneself, to a foreign self inside oneself.
A Lacanian Reading of Joker
Todd Phillip's Joker is a film about class war in utero. The film sets the stage for a coming political world in which the class war in Gotham has been named and elevated to the undeniable antagonism that situates the injustice of society. The film is also a psychobiography of an antihero's journey into this … Continue reading A Lacanian Reading of Joker
Lacan And The Politics Of Psychoanalysis – An Interview With Thomas Svolos
The following is an interview I conducted with Lacanian psychoanalyst Thomas Svolos for The New Polis where I serve as Contributing Editor.
Whither the critique of political economy in post-Marxism?
In my dissertation, I made an argument that the decisionism of Badiou, Zizek, Laclau and other so-called 'post-Marxist' theorists is derived from an intra-theoretical debate amongst left-Heideggerians, specifically against the pervasive authenticity politics and existentialist politics of the time. I argue that Lacan's 'ontology of lack' was the alternative formula that enabled these thinkers to … Continue reading Whither the critique of political economy in post-Marxism?
Something Bigger: Lady Bird and the Divinity of the Name
“a something, a greater than which cannot be conceived.” St. Anselm Amidst the fanfare and excitement over Lady Bird, a lingering debate about the film is whether the family of Lady Bird really "lived in poverty." Some people want to suggest that her position was really just lower middle class striving, a more ordinary American family struggling … Continue reading Something Bigger: Lady Bird and the Divinity of the Name
Affects and Lacanian Theology
One of the more admirable aspects of Colette Soler's work is her allegiance to theological concepts, which we should remember, Lacan himself took very seriously. In Lacanian Affects: The Function of Affect in Lacan's Thought, theological and philosophical concepts such as sin, guilt, God, and the ethics of virtue--all of which were crucial to Lacan's understanding of … Continue reading Affects and Lacanian Theology
Identification in Lacanian Psychoanalysis – Audio Lecture
As part of the clinical Wednesday series with the DC Lacanian Forum, I gave my third presentation to the group, this time on the theme of identification. I begin with an analysis of identification in Freud's Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego and look at Borch-Jacobsen's critique of Freud in his controversial The … Continue reading Identification in Lacanian Psychoanalysis – Audio Lecture
Identification and emancipation: unary trait or unary trace?
Political philosophy has considered its project of thinking to be ‘emancipatory’ since the enlightenment. Emancipation is a term that refers to the idea of a total freedom from ignorance, from animality, or from a state of ‘self-imposed tutelage’ – as Kant would say in What is Enlightenment. Today, the question of emancipation has taken new … Continue reading Identification and emancipation: unary trait or unary trace?
The Queen Mob’s Teahouse
My first post as a blogger for the new webzine Queen Mob's Teahouse is here. I wrote about the affect of shame in Lacan. This is a fun and creative collective for poets and writers of all different stripes. The brainchild of Berfrois, another website I have written for over the years.
Mourning, Psychoanalysis, and the Death of Adulthood
The widely read essay by A.O. Scott, "The Death of Adulthood in American Culture" argues pretty convincingly that the changing heroes and anti-heroes of contemporary television provide a glimpse into a larger shift in contemporary life, a shift that now means adulthood as we have come to know it, is conceptually untenable. The essay received a critique for … Continue reading Mourning, Psychoanalysis, and the Death of Adulthood
The Imminent Revolution Will Favor What Capital Does Not: Interview with Frank Smecker
Interview with American philosopher and social theorist Frank Smecker on his new book, Night of the World: Traversing the Ideology of Objectivity published by Zero Books.
From Shame to Love: The Politics of Hamlet. Interview with Simon Critchley
I recently interviewed the philosopher Simon Critchely on his new book, (co-written with his wife and psychoanalyst Jamieson Webster) entitled, The Hamlet Doctrine: Knowing Too Much, Doing Nothing for the online magazine Berfrois. There's a lot this book opens up not only for Shakespeare studies, but also for psychoanalysis. The idea that mosts interests me in … Continue reading From Shame to Love: The Politics of Hamlet. Interview with Simon Critchley
The Hysteric-Obsessional Dialectic in True Detective
"This world is a veil. And the face you wear is not your own." Preacher Joe TheriotIn one of the most telling lines in True Detective, Cohle says to Hart, "you're obsessed, just not with your work." Not only is this deeply funny for its brutal honesty and for the quick-witted retort of Cohle, it … Continue reading The Hysteric-Obsessional Dialectic in True Detective