Select Page

The Bodily Subject and the Subjective Body. From Theory to Clinic

by | Vol 22 (1) 2004

The subject of this article is the body within the clinic of neurosis. A chronological summary of Jacques Lacan’s theory of the body is presented and some crucial clinical implications are highlighted. Throughout Lacan’s teaching, the Imaginary, Symbolic and the Real respectively are of primary importance in the construction of the body’s reality. The body is a bodily image that is construed in the field of the Other in response to the fragmentation of the Real drive. Thus the author will argue that the body is the main feature in Lacanian ontology: psychological reality is constructed simultaneously with bodily reality. Therefore, subject and body cannot and should not be separated in the clinic. This point will be illustrated by two case studies. The case of Pirandello’s novel One, No One and One Hundred Thousand (2001) shows that the subject is first and foremost a bodily subject; whereas the case of Alessandro provides a clear illustration of the fact that the body is a subjective body that has to be treated and listened to as such. As an introduction to the second case, the author will briefly deal with the works of Jean Bergès and Julian de Ajuriaguerra.

Related articles

  • The Body and its Envelopes

    This article explains how packing as a cure affects the subject and her body in a special therapeutic way. The encounter with a young psychotic woman and her suffering, written all over her body, led us to initiate this treatment which takes the body as a privileged route of access for therapy. Packing as a cure is an attempt to create a corporeal development with the aim of reconstructing a psychic envelope and as such providing access to a history…

  • What is at Stake in Lacanian Theory

    It is argued that what is at stake in psychoanalytic theory, is first of all psychoanalytic practice, i.e. the endeavour to guide the psychoanalyst in bringing his conception of his experience above the level of common sense knowledge. Secondly, psychoanalytic theory must be constructed in such a way that it holds out from a scientific point of view. More specifically, Lacanian theory is a theory on the subject, on desire and on jouissance and must be situated in the intersection…

  • Reconstruction of the Symbiotic Origin of the Subject

    The article deals with the idea that the origin of the becoming of the subject is symbiotic. After a historical introduction, this concept is explored as well from a developmental as from a deferred perspective. The insurmountable problems arising during these considerations lead to the conclusion that there is no adequate proof to accept the hypothesis of the symbiosis.