Select Page

TRAUMA, VICTIMHOOD AND SUBJECTIVITY

by | Vol 39 (4) 2021

Summary: This paper sets out to analyse victimhood as an identity marker after experiences of sexual victimization. Experiences of victimization do not necessarily entail a sense of victimhood. In reference to Lacan’s allegory of the robbery, it is argued that the constitution of subjectivity in relation to the Other is structurally preceded by an instant of victimization. The difference between structural and accidental victimization is then described. For victimization to develop into victimhood, two psychic processes play a role. First, victimhood is the outcome of a process of symbolico-imaginary identification that is fed by contemporary trauma discourses and cultural representations of victimhood. Second, victimhood is the result of a process of identification with (the object of jouissance of) the aggressor as described by Ferenczi. Finally, a distinction is made between victimhood in the hysteric subject and in the perverse subject. These two types of victimhood are illustrated with vignettes of sexual abuse.

Related articles

  • The Transmission of Trauma

    Arising from the work of Fonagy and others, the question of the transmission of the effects of trauma is examined, particularly in the context of holocaust trauma and the survivors. Possible mechanisms are explored and the place of Freud's notion of deferred action is discussed and the mode of its possible operation in this context. It is suggested that this notion offers a more specifically psychoanalytic and more adequate approach to exploring what is operative here. Transmission is considered as…

  • The mental landscape of trauma

    Referring to the evolution of the psychoanalytic conception of trauma the author considers, based on clinical fragments, three questions with which we are confronted in the clinic of trauma. The first fragment about a trauma of incest, which was initially dealt with within the family in a sensitive and appropriate manner, raises the question of the impact of speech on trauma where it concerns laypeople. It can be argued that the consequences of this kind of speech can be equally…

  • Cartesian Meditations: unconscious, truth and subjectivity

    In this contribution we will offer a reading of Freud’s ambiguous therapeutic “advice” to “say more than one knows”. Starting from some preliminary reflections on the issue of confession and Lacan’s theoretical distinction between enunciation/enunciated, we will propose three successive ideas with regard to the notions of unconscious, truth and subjectivity. Firstly, a connection will be established between unconscious enunciation and Austin’s couple of performative/constative utterances. Secondly, we will offer a psychoanalytic notion of “truth” through a brief comparison with…