Online (via Zoom), Sunday the 7th of May at 3pm (Eastern Standard Time)

In addition to the four discourses he described in seminar XVII, in 1972 Lacan also put forward a matheme that characterizes capitalism: the capitalist discourse. Lacan considers this discourse to be an amended version of the discourse of the master. In my talk I will explore the particularities of the capitalist discourse and discuss its fundamental differences with respect to the other discourses. The capitalist logic will be considered as a most extreme form of broader mechanical thinking in which man and society are seen as a machine, which is a mode of thinking that took shape since the Enlightenment. Contemporary belief in science makes up a component of this mechanical mode of thinking.  The truth of capitalist discourse is that it disavows the non-rapport and associated jouissance that lie at the basis of any subjectivity and any social bond. Capitalist discourse entails a specific position vis-à-vis discontent, in which it is assumed that this latter can be resolved by way of fetishized consumption. Many contemporary psychiatric disorders can be read in terms of such a position towards discontent.

Interestingly, the covid pandemic has shed a new light on the clinic of capitalism. Confinement measures challenge habitual ways of dealing with non-rapport. Solitary ways of administering jouissance have been magnified, and measures articulated in the name of science provoke the paranoid fear of being the object of a malignant enjoying other.

Stijn Vanheule, PhD, is a professor of psychoanalysis and clinical psychology at Ghent University, and chair of the Department of Psychoanalysis and Clinical Consulting. He is also a practicing analyst, member of the New Lacanian School and the World Association of Psychoanalysis. For an overview of his writings: https://biblio.ugent.be/publication?text=stijn+vanheule

Zoom Details

Topic: Stijn Vanheule: ‘The Clinic of Psychoanalysis in Times of Capitalism’

Time: May 7, 2023 03:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

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https://duq.zoom.us/j/98133485008

Meeting ID: 981 3348 5008

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