Signification and Subjectivity

[@jeanlamontfilms5586]

It seems as if S1 is an Existential stand-in, while S2 is an Epistemological stand-in, while S(A) is an Etymological stand-in, while S(/A) is an Ontological stand-in, while Objet A is a Phenomenological stand-in for the constitutively lacking signifier.

[@toddmcgowan8233]

Yes!!!!!!!!!!

[@colinpartch887]

This is really helpful!

[@nah8845]

Can you break down further S(A) and S(/A)? I feel like on the cusp of understanding, but not fully there.... Also I know this was two years ago, but I hope you see this!

[@jeanlamontfilms5586]

@@nah8845 The way I like to think about it this- S(A): negation’s presence in our speech. S(/A): as negation’s presence in our being.

[@wormwood3118]

This video does some amazing work clarifying some seemingly obtuse concepts. Loved the scenes you chose to demonstrate too

[@TheDangerousMaybe]

This one is so helpful! It really succeeds at elucidating the Lacanian theory of signification. So many Lacanians conflate S1 and quilting point, which muddies the water, but the distinction between them you emphasize here actually quilts Lacan’s concept of signification.

[@toddmcgowan8233]

I agree that the conflation of S1 and quilting point is a real theoretical problem. Part of the problem, I think, is that Lacan basically abandons any discussion of quilting point after Seminar III, so there are not many theoretical resources for it.

[@TheDangerousMaybe]

@@toddmcgowan8233 It’s so strange that he went silent on such an important concept. Quilting point and its retroactivity have forever changed the way I think about things, so I don’t get why he “repressed” it. This gets even stranger in light of how he repeated this type of “repression” of a concept. First, it was quilting point, but, then, he did it again with das Ding. It makes me wonder if there’s some secret connection between these two hapaxes.

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@TheDangerousMaybe I think one could see it one of two ways: either the quilting point obscures das Ding, or the quilting point makes das Ding apparent. But there is definitely a relation.

[@americansyndicalist7602]

@@toddmcgowan8233 Just out of curiosity, are you a Marxist or at least a Marxist sympathizer? You don't necessarily appear to be a Fascist (despite seeming to be an Old Hegelian and not a Young Hegelian, which to my knowledge were the students of Hegel who propagated the Marxian tradition). At least, this is my understanding of yourself that I’ve gained by watching your vids. Apologies if I’m incorrect.

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@americansyndicalist7602 I'm certainly sympathetic to Marxism and think that Marx's critique of capital is more or less right.

[@nightoftheworld]

11:02 “Truth is that which makes a hole on knowledge.” -Theresa Giron, Umbr(a)

[@drillingo7491]

I've been trying to get a concise explanation of this for a while. Thanks, Todd. It's clearer now, though will be revisiting several times, and especially the end part. Oh, and the concrete examples help a lot, thanks.

[@Anabsurdsuggestion]

This is a masterpiece of presentation!

[@tetasao]

I wish to express my unbridled esteem for your work, and, particularly, your work on Lacan. After coming across a comic book (Introducing Lacan: A graphic Guide) at a local laundromat (irony?), I became fascinated with him. Your work with Theory Underground was particularly helpful in introducing the finer points of Lacan's thought. This lecture is also profound. In my own work, I had discovered something resembling 'the master signifier' which I call the uniphore (a linguistic/semantic concept). Effectively, this is a supercontainer for all possible concepts, which is determinative in the sense that anything included is inherited, and anything excluded is missing (from all other concepts). Beneath (or above) the uniphore (i.e. God / The Universe), there exists a tree-like formation of holophores (World/Food/Friend/Mother/Water/Sky, etc) which are root elements that have this similar property where they distribute their identities/inclusions/exclusions over all other common concepts. There's a cognitive technology here, because even slight repairs to these features radically transform what it is possible to conceive of... and, similarly, damage to them (artifacting / data loss) has a devastating effect on human cognition. I argue that, over time, the uniphore and holophores underwent phases of lossy compression, so that, today, we are left with 'the skeletal remains' of their originary scope, connotations, and implications. This lecture was particularly useful to me and I am so grateful for your careful and brilliant work on Lacan and related topics.

[@tigerli8336]

I searched the word holophore and found a website titled "organelle". is that your writing?

[@tetasao]

yes but most of my recent writing is on Medium. @@tigerli8336

[@nhajas1]

fantastic, please keep rocking the bandana and don't stop posting on this channel

[@ztruboff]

The whole video is great but your connection between the Big Other as the guarantor of meaning and Freud’s oceanic feeling is particularly clever. I have never thought about the oceanic feeling in those terms if only because Freud himself seems to see it as related to a form of ego development rather than socially structured but it makes a lot of sense.

[@ztruboff]

Just curious but is this your own novel interpretation? Have you published it anywhere?

[@toddmcgowan8233]

I think you're right that Freud--though he wouldn't use this term-sees the oceanic feeling as imaginary, as an extension of the ego, but I think that's not quite right.

[@ztruboff]

@@toddmcgowan8233 One more question: Is the missing signifer fundamentally different from Derrida's concept of differance? Obviously, Derrida doesn't have a notion of the Real, but it appears to me that the missing signifier comes closest to the notion of the Real in the chain of signification as you have laid it out.

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@ztruboff I do think that it's fundamentally different for this reason: Derrida very clearly rejects the necessity of the quilting point, which means that, for him theoretically at least, the signifier of the barred Other cannot appear. Differance is the attempt to delay or defer this encounter with this signifier because Derrida views the closure enacted by the quilting point as inherently an act of mastery. (I would say that he confuses the quilting point with the master signifier, but obviously that is much too cursory a critique.)

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@ztruboff It is my own interpretation, and I think it underlies a lot of what I've written (say in Capitalism and Desire or Only a Joke Can Save Us), but I haven't laid it out like this anywhere else

[@vinzent998]

I really enjoyed the video. Thank you for putting the work in and sharing. I really like the simplistic style of it.

[@lokes.123]

18:05 a pearl from Strangelove (Kubrick) right?

[@toddmcgowan8233]

Yes absolutely

[@kiwicfruit]

Hi Todd, I've been trying really hard to understand the difference between the human and the subject. Here's a quotation from Žižek: "I am ready to sacrifice (what we perceived till now as) the basic features of our being-human but not subject. ‘Humanity’ is a notion at the same level as personality, the ‘inner wealth’ of our soul, etc. - it is ultimately a phenomenal form, a mask, which fills in the void that ‘is’ subject. What subject stands for is the inhuman core of being-human, what Hegel called self-relating negativity, what Freud called death drive. So in the same way that Kant distinguished the subject of transcendental apperception from a person’s soul and its wealth, in the same way Freud and Lacan distinguish the subject of the unconscious from the Jungian personality full of deep passions, we should in our unique predicament stick to the inhuman core of subjectivity against the temptations of being-human. Subject is what is in a human being more than human, the immortality of the death-drive which makes it a living dead, something that insists beyond the cycle of life and death.". This is taken from "The Vagaries of the Superego" lacaneman.hypotheses.org/2098. I'm pretty sure that I lack the prior understanding of the history of philosophy on the subject. Besides your school of thought (the Ljubjlana School of Psychoanalysis), everyone else just conflates the subject with the human individual. I'm assuming here that you fully agree with Žižek's position in the quotation above.

[@mandys1505]

yes, along those lines, what does it mean when it is said that the index of the self, or of subjectivity, is located in the lacunae? why is it in an empty between place?? what information does that bring us about the self?

[@mandys1505]

the difference between the human and the subject....right on. .you bascially elucidated it already in the question 🏜

[@kirstinstrand6292]

I'm reasonably sure that Lavonians will be forgotten in future years. You ought to drop any association to Freud. If anyone wants to find their agency, authenticity, and cure for their suffering, this will not lead them to resolution.

[@noahwaiwaiole7888]

So helpful! Thank you sir

[@MrLukiszonek]

There is one thing which I cannot really grasp, at 11:40 it's said that it's this lack of the binary signifier that allows for us to generate signification, and I just cannot understand the link between these two things.

[@MrLukiszonek]

Is this connected somehow to the problem of Freedom in Plato's Parmenides? (I mean that the ontological lack allows for change, and through that for freedom)

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@MrLukiszonek Yes, good connection. The point is that if there was a signifier of completion, nothing at all could be done because the structure would simply be a closed one. That's the idea.

[@MrLukiszonek]

@@toddmcgowan8233 Could you suggest some articles, or books, which elaborate more on the Quilting point?

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@MrLukiszonek I would love to, but there really aren't any. The concept comes from Lacan's Seminar III, in the chapter called "Quilting Point." Zizek has some discussion in Sublime Object of Ideology.

[@MrLukiszonek]

@@toddmcgowan8233 Got it, thanks!

[@IgnatiusEPJ]

Great work as always, Todd. I would love a part 2 to this regarding “woman”, particularly the hysteric, as the signifier of the barred Other. I think it is in Seminar XIX that he explicitly connects S1 to the One or yad’lun, so it is only woman, the stroked out La, the woman that does not exist, which is the not-all of the One. That leads into the discourse theory that demonstrates the necessity of hystericization as the means of intervening in S1 as the only path of an emancipatory politic, which is in essence everything you described here. I think that Heathers clip shows something of the jouissance of the Other as S1, in other words the S1 in that clip is in the place of jouissance in the hysteric’s discourse vis-a-vis the audience who is hystericized.

[@toddmcgowan8233]

I almost got into the "Woman does not exist" here but wanted to present this without the sexuation dimension. I'll try to work that up.

[@MegaReza94]

​@@toddmcgowan8233 I wonder what your take is on Lacan's contempt for the "hystericized" mai 68 protesters. Do you think the criticism was directed towards the futility in trying to establish a non-lacking Other (i.e. "asking for a Master") through revolution, or towards large-scale political movements in general?

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@MegaReza94 I don't think that Lacan believes the kind of political act I describe here is possible. Which I see, obviously, as an error on his part.

[@joelnau6671]

Thank you for this video! If I may ask a question: where you would say Love in the Hegelian sense fits in Lacanian theory, if at all?

[@toddmcgowan8233]

Love emerges precisely out of this missing space of the lack in the Other. Or at least that's how I would theorize the connection, although obviously Hegel himself wouldn't put it that way.

[@joelnau6671]

@@toddmcgowan8233Thanks!

[@nightoftheworld]

34:30 And doesn’t Zizek’s reading of Christianity (of God’s radical decenteredness) give us this grounded groundlessness? Holy Spirit/community of believers alone together with their freedom.. also, love the Malcolm _X_ bomb at the end-freedom in uprootedness.

[@toddmcgowan8233]

Yes, I think that's absolutely right.

[@salmaa649]

Hi Todd! this has been really clear and helpful! I was wondering where I can perhaps read more about this specifically? Preferably in secondary sources? I know for instance that this is core in Lacan's four discourses, but I wanted to know if there are sources that explain about the master signifier specifically, regardless in which discourse we are. or in general the things you talk about here? You mentioned in a reply to someone's comment that there isn't written material about this specific presentation here, but could you maybe direct me to some sources that may help me further in understanding the components of what you are talking about in this video? I would appreciate that a lot!

[@toddmcgowan8233]

It's a genuine lacuna, and I don't think that there is really a written text that goes into this in detail. Someone should write it.

[@MonadS1412]

Hey Todd! This is really great! Thank you very much. I was wondering if there were any books or essay where the things you talked about, in the way you presented them, are explained more in detail or in depth? I am writing a seminar paper whose idea was inspired by this very video, so any help in understanding these ideas more clearly and deeply would be very appreciated!!

[@toddmcgowan8233]

Not really. That's why I made the video. I will try someday to write this up, but I just haven't had the time so far. Sorry about that.

[@tehninjadude]

So is "set" a master signifier in the discourse of mathematics? It founds the other signifiers, and is itself undefined.

[@toddmcgowan8233]

I would definitely say so, especially insofar as it makes possible every operation.

[@mcurtisallen]

What would be the relation between the _point de capiton_ and suture on your view?

[@toddmcgowan8233]

Suture is how the subject has a place within the structure of signification, whereas the point de capiton is what punctuates sense, so I would say that there's quite a difference.

[@mcurtisallen]

​@@toddmcgowan8233Apologies for the length of comment; I also realize that youtube may not be the place for this discussion, so please ignore this at will. As may be evident from the rudimentary---and, guessing from the reply, wrongheaded--nature of my question, I am not well-versed in the Lacanian (respectively, Millerian) arcana, it just seemed like there was an interesting figurative as well as potential conceptual resonance between them, but I know too little about either concept at present to articulate the claim in a substantive way. Nevertheless, too little knowledge never stopped anyone from prolixity of opinion, so...I think I'm failing to understand certain abstractions, but if the point de capiton is that which arrests the signifying chain in order to vouchsafe 'local' meaning, so to speak--in contrast to its 'global' lack of meaning in that the signifying chain is in itself always incomplete, unfixed, in such a way that the signifier always slides over the signified--that would seem to me to fulfill an analogous role to assigning the subject a place in the structure of signification--again, being mostly ignorant of the specificities of Miller's elaboration. Unless 'subject' is not to be understood as local, which may well be the case here. I suspect there's a good chance that there are technical valences to the phrase 'place within the structure of signification' that I do not apprehend, as I know each of these terms ('location', 'subject', etc.) plays certain stipulated roles in Lacan's overall conceptual edifice. Just curious if you had any ideas in that direction, because the metaphors seemed too related to be coincidental (though, I'm also somewhat unstudied in the chronology of these ideas). Thanks for the reply, enjoy your approach and your jokes.

[@MorbidSymptoms]

Very clarifying! Question how does your hypothesis that identifying with the signifier of the lack in the other work with the belief of others that still believe in the Master Sig - I am thinking of the joke Z uses all the time about the patient who no longer believes he is a seed but is worried that the chickens still believe he is? Also couldn't a cynic identify with the missing signifier but act like he/she doesn't in their daily life?

[@toddmcgowan8233]

The cynic doesn't know what the cynic actually believes. I would say that cynicism involves an identification with the master signifier that believes itself to be identifying with the missing signifier. As for others continuing to believe in the master signifier when one identifies with the lack in the Other, of course their unfreedom ultimately has an effect on one's own freedom, but it doesn't rule it out altogether. One can't control what others are doing, but one's act changes how one relates to what they do. That's the key.

[@Lastrevio]

Around 12:00 , I don't understand why you say that if there was an S2, we wouldn't be able to speak. The way I understood it was this: words have definitions. Those definitions are made up of other words, which themselves have definitions, which are made up of other words... and so on. If there was an S2, you'd just reach a word or a set of words which have no definition but everyone intuitively understands, and then every other word is defined either in relation to S2 or to other words which in themselves are defined by S2, etc. Of course such an S2 doesn't exist in the real world, because in reality we have a circular structure (words are defined by other words which are defined by other words... until you get to a definition which has the original word). However, even if it existed, people would still be able to make up new words by defining them in relation to the existing one. Am I getting this wrong?

[@toddmcgowan8233]

Good question. The point is that the opening that allows us to generate other words emerges out of the missing last word. If the structure was closed, nothing additional would be possible. The closure of the structure would make invention impossible, and the creation of a sentence is invention.

[@Lastrevio]

But why does S2 close a structure? I don t get this. I d say it simply opens it instead. You then just define new words in terms of the existing ones. There will always be missing words.

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@Lastrevio S2 in the sense of a binary signifier would be the final word. That's the point: there is no final word. Yes, there will always be missing words, but one has to be able to recognize them. If the structure is closed with a final word, no such recognition would be possible. It wouldn't appear as if nothing was missing.

[@mehmeta.3764]

Amazing,,,

[@loona7126]

is the symbolic phallus similar to the master signifier? I found that Lacan states in the seminar XX that symbolic phallus is "the signifier which does not have a signified". And also a description: "a signifier that anchors the chain of signification. Indeed, it is a particularly privileged signifier because it inaugurates the process of signification itself." Which sound like the master signifier as you have described. Thank you for your help and a great video!

[@toddmcgowan8233]

Yes, same thing, different term.

[@kirstinstrand6292]

Why not go directly to sleep dreams to discover directly from your PERSONAL unconscious what you really desire. Sex and phallus desires appear frequently. Write your dreams down a few months so you get closer to that reality? 😢

[@darksaga2006]

I am confused as to what exactly is signification? Any definition or description I can think of is incompatible with S1 (becase it does not have a tractable signified).

[@toddmcgowan8233]

It's an interesting point, that there must be a point within signification that doesn't have a meaning. But I think in some sense that's true about any structure. There must be a point within the structure that goes against the logic of the structure.

[@pongskills1]

Hi Todd, I loved loved loved this! I came from following Peter Rollins work but this short lecture was extremely elucidating and made something really click for me. I’d love to dive deeper into this stuff. I know you and Zizek often refer to Lacan. Can you recommend any helpful books or a particular place to start from Lacan’s lectures to engage more with this? Thanks

[@toddmcgowan8233]

Bruce Fink's Clinical Introduction to Lacanian Psychoanalysis is very good, as is his Lacanian Subject. Richard Boothby's Freud as Philosopher is, despite the title, the best book on Lacan, in my view. It's also extremely accessible.

[@kiwicfruit]

From a Hegelian view, is it correct to say that S1 is ontologically the same as S2? They are just different perspectives on the same thing (Žižek makes this comparison in the preface to For They Know Not What They Do) Im confused about the terminologies because S1 is also called the Name-of-the-Father while S2 is called the phallic signifier by Bruce Fink. And yet, someone in this comment section said that the symbolic phallus is the same as S1. Is this correct? S1: master signifier, empty signifier, unary trait, primordial signifier, Name-of-the-Father S2: knowledge, phallus as signifier

[@toddmcgowan8233]

Yes, Slavoj is certainly correct on that, but I think that Bruce is not. I would add phallus as signifier to the chain of equivalences for S1

[@kiwicfruit]

@@toddmcgowan8233 Ah I see now, thanks for the clarification. I have two more questions: 1. where does the death drive and the It/das Es fit in this framework? 2. How does this relate to Lacan's concept of symbolic castration? (In How to Read Lacan, Žižek says that symbolic castration is the gap between our immediate psychological identity and symbolic identity. The phallus is the external "signia" which gives me power.)

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@kiwicfruit This explanation is looking at things from the perspective of signification. The perspective of subjectivity is, in a sense, the other face of things. The subject emerges through this gap in the structure of signification. But it cannot fit perfectly within the structure because it is a product of the structure's failure. Its failure--its death drive--corresponds to that of the structure itself. Its castration is the result of the gap that the signifier places onto its ontological gap. Castration gives the subject a way to relate to its own lack rather than just suffering it, which is what happens to every other entity.

[@kiwicfruit]

@@toddmcgowan8233 thanks for the explanation. Am I then right to call castration a moment of the "negation of negation" or "aufhebung"? Namely, that the gap never was as an 'obstacle' to be overcome but is inherent to the subject itself? The lack is what makes the subject possible? I am still confused on how to fully distinguish between the objet a and the phallus as signifier. Can we call the phallus, S1 or unary trait the signifier of Jouissance and the objet a would be the excess-Jouissance which causes that existential dread in the subject?

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@kiwicfruit Yes, that's right about the distinction between phallus and objet a. It's the difference between a signifier and an absent object or a gap or failure within signification. Castration would be the reduplication of negation, not the negation of negation, I would say.

[@paulgaffaney7865]

what texts would i go to for more on this?

[@toddmcgowan8233]

That's a good question. Unfortunately, they simply don't exist. You could find some tangentially related discussion in Fink's Lacanian Subject and Chiesa's Subjectivity and Otherness.

[@kirstinstrand6292]

Ok, I listened to a different talk of Todds. I have a better 😌 sense of what he's about. His focus is more political and cultural, with smidgens of religion, philosophy, and linguistics tossed in to create a fancy 😉 mix of fun. Look, I get it😂 I haven't voted in 20 years. My issue is that you are adding to the massive misunderstanding of psychoanalytic thinking and making it impossible for all those lost souls in the US to find agency in themselves. I got there myself by finishing my psychoanalysis. Folks authenically attempting to find better lives for themselves are not responsible enough to get involved with your agenda. Please use wisom to remove Freudian Psychoanalysis from Laconians thinking. It can not be giving anyone researching psychoanalysis any good. I ask this of all Laconians. Best wishes ❤️

[@scottmcwaters8365]

Thank you.

[@ianszabo2079]

Two major takeaways this stimulated: Do you consider the structure of signification described as necessary for there to be a basis for metalanguage? Having read Seminar III for the first time recently, it certainly seems as if the Psychotic's discourse, paraphrase, inhabits a space where signifying the other isn't really possible. Without quilting, does this mean the psychotic's discourse is without s(A)? Second, I really thought the emancipatory possibly of S(dash-A) or the openness/lack in S2 produced by the failure to describe S seems to allude to Ernst Bloch's reading of Christianity in Atheism in Christianity, where he argues that the whole tradition is focused on the search for a sort of freedom from Yahweh; Christ as son of man and the resignation to freedom that brings seems to set the stage for an eschatological utopian project of unbounded openness

[@toddmcgowan8233]

Yes, I would say that the psychotic's structure lacks s(A), which is Lacan's notation for the quilting point. That's the theory in Seminar III, in any event. I don't see freedom in unbounded openness but in the constitution of one's own limit. For Hegel, Christ is the insertion of the infinite into the finite, and this is the site of freedom. The infinite being asserts its own limit through making itself finite.

[@christiantodorov6239]

`you say the S(/A) is primally repressed, is this the Mother's desire which is sort of erased (in the paternal metaphor)? If that is the case, does objet petit a then signify the primally repressed S(/A)? Also, great video, very nicely explained!

[@toddmcgowan8233]

I don't think it's the Mother's desire but precisely what cannot even be identified. The relationship between objet a and the primordially repressed signifier is fascinating. I would that the objet a exists in the gap where this signifier is missing.

[@christiantodorov6239]

​@@toddmcgowan8233 Thank you for your answer! however, i now want to ask you: 1. are you equating the S(/A) with objet petit a? As in the latter stands in for the former?Objet a being at least one of the ways to sense S(/A)? 2. Ive heard the phallus as primally repressed, sometimes the mothers desire, once even the name-of-the-father was stated as primally repressed... is this topic still contested and re-re-re-interpreted?

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@christiantodorov6239 No, I don't think that objet a and the signifier of the barred Other are the same. One is an object, the other a signifier. But the objet a appears where there is a signifier missing, so there is some connection between them. I do think that all of these terms and questions are contested. Even what I just wrote. There is room for interpretation, which is why it's important to do just that. But I wouldn't say that the phallus is the primordially repressed. That would be, in my view, the signifier of the barred Other.

[@christiantodorov6239]

@@toddmcgowan8233 Can you recommend some books on these topics? I have read some of Fink's books but he doesnt really go in depth when in comes to these concepts (master-signifiers, signifier of lack in other etc).Do you yourself have books which deal with these basics of lacanian thought?( since i see most of them are dealing with applying these concepts)

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@christiantodorov6239 Great question. I made this video, actually, in response to this lacuna. I would love to write a book on it because, as far as I know, no one has. Maybe Chieso's Subjectivity and Otherness could be of some help, but there really isn't a source that deals directly with the structure of signification understood psychoanalytically, even from Lacan himself because the ideas are too spread out in different texts. I have some discussion of S1 and S2 and objet a in Enjoying What We Don't Have. I can send you a pdf of that text if you email me.

[@kirstinstrand6292]

I thought Laconians were about psychoanalysis. What does God have to do with psychoanalytic methodology? The previous lecture I listened to was speaking of a client's father's family name bearing significant importance. Is that not a signifier, too? Where is this going? 😳

[@isawilraen9816]

I have a hard time with this, so here's my stupid question: The SIGN consists of the Signifier and the Signified, the former being the sound or string of letters (of a word) and the latter being its concept. Is the latter, i.e. the Signified, or the "concept" of the word, just another Signifier, then? If so, then structuralism suddenly makes more sense than ever. From my understanding, the basic idea of structuralism is that words get their MEANING from other words (they wouldn't really mean anything on their own, without a nexus of significance to 'give them life' or whatever); the meaning of a word is what we call its Signified; and hence the Signified of a word would be just another (or several other) Signifier(s). Excuse my ultra basic question. The extent of my familiarity with the subject comes from KZbin, so maybe I just haven't done my homework... but given that this is the level I'm at, I don't think that reading actual books on the topic, at this time, would be very productive.

[@toddmcgowan8233]

Yes, that's exactly right. The signified is always the relation of signifiers, not the idea that someone has in mind when speaking (although that would be the prestructuralism conception of the signified, which would have been known as the meaning)

[@kiwicfruit]

I had a similar confusion too. I think it's important to know that Lacan uses the term signifier in a very precise way in contrast to Saussure. Saussure thinks of a sign (signifier is always accompanied by the signified), then each sign must relate to other signs to define itself. A sign is what it is not. For Lacan, the signifier is primary. This means that there are pure signifiers. Signifiers with no signification. A tautology and self-referential. That is the master signifier. So for Lacan, it is not signs that must differentiate itself from other signs in a system, but signifiers.

[@charleslambdin3190]

I know you and Ryan have discussed that the quilting point and the master signifier cannot be the same thing, but would you disagree with the characterization that one quilts THROUGH the master signifier? With your German Aryan and Jew example, because the master signifier isn’t itself definable, it requires quilting points to give it shape. If a quilting point is an upholstery button, is the master signifier the surrounding chair? Rex Butler gives the example of “democracy”-you can’t decide whether liberal or socialist definitions of democracy are “correct,” but can only look at all the orientations that legitimate themselves through it, or, maybe, are “quilted through it.” So maybe here “democracy” is a master signifier and “socialism” vs. “liberalism” would be different quilting points? Some of this reminds me of framing and reframing and changing the quilting point is a way of “reframing” the concept.

[@toddmcgowan8233]

Totally agree. Great point. And I definitely accept the idea on democracy relative to socialism vs. liberalism vs. even communism

[@MetaverseMonk]

If we start with the God of the Old Testament as the master signifier, is it fair to say that the appearance of Jesus acts as the quilting point that tells people that God can in fact have a referent? And then rather than stopping at the quilting point, Jesus also points to the lack in the Other with his cry of “Father, why have you forsaken me?”

[@toddmcgowan8233]

I think that's the exact right interpretation of that line from Christ. Perfect. And I would also agree with the idea that Christ quilts God, in a way that is horrifying since God appears in the most humiliated form on the cross.

[@MetaverseMonk]

@@toddmcgowan8233 Thanks Todd!

[@kirstinstrand6292]

These ideas seem similar to bizarre cults, to me! omg 😲

[@sagewabi7298]

In the example of S1 "America" why is "Communism" a quilting point instead of it being the binary signifier? Maybe I'm missing something...but I don't see the difference between S1 and any other signifier, if we say that S1 is defined by a quilting point which is itself just another signifier.

[@toddmcgowan8233]

"Communism" isn't the binary signifier because it doesn't provide a complete and final identity, which is what a binary signifier would have to do. This is why it cannot exist. It's not just any other signifier because it is necessary for the identity of the master signifier to be established, whereas "cat" or "dog" is not. If those signifiers didn't exist, it wouldn't render the American unable to know what being an American was. However, if "communism" didn't exist, "American" would not be identifiable (at least in the mid-20th century). Now maybe it's terrorist or something else.

[@sagewabi7298]

Awesome! Thank you very much for the detailed reply. I think where I was (maybe still am) getting a bit confused is that it seems like to me that all signifiers are defined in contrast to another, so what makes the M1 different? So, "cat" is what it is because it is not "dog" or not "snake" ect. In the same way "America" is what it is because it is not "Canada" or not "Mexico". And what specifically defines "America" as not being "Communism" is more ideological or relating more with the signified ...I'm thinking. But again, maybe I'm missing something quite obvious :)

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@sagewabi7298 Exactly, "communism" provides not just a difference as another nation would but a signifier that would destroy "America." There is peaceful coexistence among "dog" and "cat" (at least as signifiers--ha), but not among "America" and "communism."

[@sagewabi7298]

Bingo! Now it's clear for me. Thanks a lot! So I wonder now whether that is a kind of formula to find out whether a signifier is M1 or just another signifier ...that is, if one is unsure whether a particular signifier is a M1 or not? The formula or test being, "Is the signifier defined in contrast of another fundamentally antagonist signifier or, not?" If yes, it is a M1, if not it is not. If so I wonder how this would apply to a M1 like "Science"? Just thinking out loud. Thanks again :)

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@sagewabi7298 Yes, I think that's right. "Science" is an interesting one, because it's possible that something like "faith" has to function as the quilting point. But maybe science doesn't function as a master signifier because it has no quilting point.

[@DialectMaterial]

Why do you never talk about the Name-Of-The-Father?

[@toddmcgowan8233]

No reason. Master signifier = Name of the Father, as I see it.

[@battragon]

Huh?

[@eanji36]

.

[@SplitSubject]

I'm sort of having a rough time making a clear cut difference between how both the signifying process/signification and the role of the big Other relate to the subject. I understand the big Other as that which symbolically signifies the subject by providing an Identity, but isn't this basically signification itself?. so it seems confusing to me that one causes the split, and the other offers the subject the illusion (not sure if it's an appropriate word) of overcoming that split. maybe this sounds naive and not hitting the nail at all, but I can't seem to put my finger on what makes the role of the big other NOT a signifying process. the key probably lies is in missing signifier S(Ⱥ) but i can't rotate it properly to fit the lock i'd appreciate a clarification to my messy (mis)understanding

[@toddmcgowan8233]

It's actually a really fascinating point, I think. You're right that there is a sense in which the big Other is just an effect of the signifying structure itself. But as you suggest, the big Other is the signifying structure without what is lacking. That's the key difference. The big Other provides recognition by hiding the missing signifier from the subject. I hope that helps.

[@SplitSubject]

@@toddmcgowan8233 thanks for the answer So i get how the signifying structure is in fact inherently lacking, which inevitably splits the subject. and that the big Other merely creates an impression of wholeness by hiding absence turning subjectivity into Identity. but here I lose grasp of the position/function of *Objet a* (under the effect of the Big Other), since it emerges, as you mentioned, from the cracks of the symbolic structure, or namely its lacking nature S(Ⱥ), that the big Other ultimately tries to hide. what is the role of Objet a and how desire comes into play in the subject who's totally invested in the big Other not recognising that absence (if such thing is possible) ?

[@toddmcgowan8233]

@@SplitSubject From the perspective of the big Other (and thanks to its intervention), one experiences the objet a in the form of a demand rather than a desire--thus as symbolic/imaginary rather than real. The big Other gives one a grid for transforming the point of nonsense into sense, so that there appears to be no absence of sense at all.

[@SplitSubject]

@@toddmcgowan8233 alright got it, so the big Other also changes the format of objet a to the subject if I understand well, that demand part is the key point I was missing. thank you again Todd.