The enigmatic signifier and the decentred subject

Abstract

War, genocide, economic upheaval and terrorism have crushed belief in endlessly 'enlightened' progress. We more and more doubt the teleological nature of psychological events, including the activity of a Self or centre that guides the development of the subject. There is a growing view of a 'decentred' subject that develops in the face of an enigmatic Otherness. Jean Laplanche has created an extensive metapsychology describing this situation, emphasizing the original helplessness of an infant who is bathed in enigmatic messages from its very beginnings. These messages from the adult other are often sexualized, and are partly or largely unconscious to the sender. Laplanche calls this situation 'primal seduction'. The immature human cannot fully metabolize such adult messages, and through 'primal repression' they remain as the unconscious core of subjectivity. They disrupt psychological life, conveying a sense of signifying something to the subject. What they signify is an enigma, like finding a hieroglyph in the desert. The story of relationships and culture is the story of our repeated attempts to translate them, to respond to them. An analytic case illustrates these concepts as they appear in the transference, first as gaps and monsters, and then in the crucial and surprising appearance of transformative laughter. The vicissitudes of the clinical situation illustrate the vital importance of the enigmatic signifier in the development of the subject.

The ethical dimensions of life and analytic work through a Levinasian lens

“…19 Laplanche extended Lacan's position by including the enigmatic messages that partly originate beyond language, and are passed from mother to infant or young child before he/she has the capacity to comprehend them. These messages, often sexual, cannot be totally translated by the infant both because of the difference in maturity between infant and adult and because the meanings of the message are often enigmatic to the adult 'senders' themselves (Hinton, 2009). These inadequately metabolized messages eventually form a core 'internal foreign body' Á a sort of 'alien inside me, put inside me by an alien' (Laplanche, 1999, p. 65).…”

Working with chronic and relentless self‐hatred, self‐harm and existential shame: a clinical study and reflections

“…Thus, part of my aim in encouraging Leah to ‘slow down’ was to offer her space in which, instead of habitually ‘domesticating’ her inner othernesses, she might encounter what Hinton described earlier as ‘a kind of opening, a gap, a crack, a cleavage plane in the ordinary “filled in” process of things’ through which this more enlivening form of translation might become possible (Hinton , p. 643, referring to Laplanche , p. 160; 1999, pp. 228–9).…”

Working with chronic and relentless self‐hatred, self‐harm, and existential shame: a clinical study and reflections (Paper 2 of 2)

“…As Hinton describes: ‘The impact of the enigma may create a kind of opening, a gap, a crack, a cleavage plane in the ordinary “filled in” process of things. If not for the enigma, there would be no analytic work and no dismantling of old patterns’ (Hinton , p. 643, referring to Laplanche , p. 160; , pp. 228‐30).…”