<p>The starting point of this essay was the frustration I felt after having read the novel Nadja (1928) written by the French surrealist André Breton. The title promises the story of someone called Nadja but the promise stays unfulfilled. Recognition of this phenomenon, where a man writes a book about a woman, but the woman hardly is seen, made me want to examine it further.</p><p>Using the theories of the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan I analyze the relation between the male narrator and his female object. I also compare Nadja to a precursor: the novel Bruges-la-morte (1892) of the Belgian symbolist writer Georges Rodenbach. Their stories are, to a large degree, similar. The male main character meets a woman who becomes the center of his world for a short period of time, before he in Nadja rejects her, and in Bruges-la-morte kills her. What differentiates the two books mainly is, that whereas Breton uses Nadja as a tool to emancipate his unconscious in order to be able to create, Hugues tries to replace his dead wife with Jane in order to be able to desire a living object.</p><p>The setting for both stories is the City, which seems to be analogous to the Woman. I examine the possible interpretations of the notion of the City as it appears in the two novels.</p><p>The Lacanian notions of the Thing and objet petit a are essential for the understanding of the function of the Woman in these stories, I argue. Nadja is a femme-enfant, a muse, and the objet petit a for the male poet, i.e. the narrator of Nadja. Jane, the woman in Bruges-la-morte, is a femme fatale, and the Thing for the main character Hugues.</p>

The starting point of this essay was the frustration I felt after having read the novel Nadja (1928) written by the French surrealist André Breton. The title promises the story of someone called Nadja but the promise stays unfulfilled. Recognition of this phenomenon, where a man writes a book about a woman, but the woman hardly is seen, made me want to examine it further. Using the theories of the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan I analyze the relation between the male narrator and his female object. I also compare Nadja to a precursor: the novel Bruges-la-morte (1892) of the Belgian symbolist writer Georges Rodenbach. Their stories are, to a large degree, similar. The male main character meets a woman who becomes the center of his world for a short period of time, before he in Nadja rejects her, and in Bruges-la-morte kills her. What differentiates the two books mainly is, that whereas Breton uses Nadja as a tool to emancipate his unconscious in order to be able to create, Hugues tries to replace his dead wife with Jane in order to be able to desire a living object. The setting for both stories is the City, which seems to be analogous to the Woman. I examine the possible interpretations of the notion of the City as it appears in the two novels. The Lacanian notions of the Thing and objet petit a are essential for the understanding of the function of the Woman in these stories, I argue. Nadja is a femme-enfant, a muse, and the objet petit a for the male poet, i.e. the narrator of Nadja. Jane, the woman in Bruges-la-morte, is a femme fatale, and the Thing for the main character Hugues.

In this paper Mona Hatoums installation Corps étranger is discussed via a post structuralized method based on associative and semiotic comparisons with vanitas, a post-modern self-portrait, and as a representative for modern visual art. The analyze touches upon pornography, science fiction and the quest for scientific conquest in outer and inner space. Theoretical references are Foucault, Freud, Lacan, Barthes, Dolar, Said and Virilio. Hatoum makes the observer a voyageur with the aid of the latest medical technology, endoscope, which gives her the opportunity to make an introvert self-portrait when she films her own throat and rectum. But at the same time she makes the portrait of us all. I interpret this as a fictious science with postcolonial ideas, and the reference to science fiction is close at range. Hatoum takes the role as the other, the woman or the stranger and might flirt with Jülich interpretation of Corps étranger as a sign of the visual cultures colonisation of the human body’s inside, that is a conscious reference to sexuality, ethics and the search for knowledge and power.

Cette thèse étudie la réception plurielle de Hegel dans le discours philosophique du XXème siècle. En prenant comme fil rouge la dialectique hégélienne de la reconnaissance, cette thèse soumet à l'examen ses réappropriations successives chez Kojève, Lacan et Honneth. La première réception de Hegel fût une théorie de l'anthropogenèse qui mettait l'accent sur la lutte pour la reconnaissance et sur la fameuse dialectique du maître et de l'esclave. La reconnaissance de soi atteinte par l'esclave et sa victoire imaginaire ouvrant sur la terre promise de la reconnaissance correspondent à la fin du Temps Historique. Mais à la suite de Kojève, c'est cette version de l'anthropologie hégélienne qui a inspiré la psychanalyse lacanienne. Celle-ci constitue une critique de la conscience de soi considérée comme synonyme d'aliénation imaginaire. Bien qu'indispensable pour la constitution d'un soi et d'un monde stables, la reconnaissance spéculaire de soi est forcément méconnaissance. Contrairement à Kojève et à sa reprise par Lacan, la théorie de la reconnaissance d'Honneth constitue l'envers de la domination puisqu'elle autorise le passage de la tyrannie de l'inconscient et du déni résiduel à une lutte pour la reconnaissance. Son entreprise consiste à renouer avec Hegel, mais celui-ci n'est pas lu comme une pensée de l'historicité, mais celle de la constitution intersubjective de l'autonomie du sujet. Ainsi, l'horizon de la vie éthique ne procède plus d'une dialectique du développement historique, il est inscrit plutôt dans la formation psycho-sociologique de l'identité

This paper will consider the function of queer space and presence in the post modern horror film genre. Beginning with George Romero’s 1968 film Night of the Living Dead and continuing through to contemporary examples of the genre, the paper posits the function of the queer monster or monstrous as integral to and representative of the genre as a whole. The paper analyzes both the current theory and scholarship of the genre and through Lacanian psychoanalytic theory and queer theory offers a theory of how these theories can add to existing theory and scholarship.

Based on Harold Pinter&#039 / s three plays &ldquo / The Homecoming,&rdquo / &ldquo / The Caretaker&rdquo / and &ldquo / The Dumb Waiter,&rdquo / the aim of this study is to explore the idea that an individual cannot be a speaking member of the Symbolic Order, thus of the society unless s/he obeys the prohibitions/commands of language, a concept on which both Pinter and Lacan put great emphasis in their own vision. For Pinter human beings lead a life controlled by some unknown powers and build a disastrous subjective world devoid of linguistic competence. As for Lacan, language imprisons, castrates and pushes the subject into a claustrophobic world, which is portrayed strikingly by Pinter. The result is equally impressive / for Lacan: neurosis or psychosis, oscillating between the Orders/Registers of the Symbolic, Imaginary and Real, not possessing an assigned role in the community, and for Pinter: an absurd world where there is no meaning but a sense of loss. Lacan&rsquo / s explanation for the reasons of this absurd world focuses on two significant factors : the m(O)ther, who meets the basic needs in the Imaginary Order/stage of infancy and who introduces the Father to the child, and the Father, who will enable the child to obey the prohibitions of language, and thus to secure the child&rsquo / s adulthood. Throughout the study the points which will be highlighted are as follows: the characteristics of the absurd drama, the place of Harold Pinter in the contemporary theatre and the justification of a Lacanian reading, subjectivity&rsquo / s constitution.

Lacan is an influential figure of 20th Century thought. Being a psychoanalyst, a linguist and at the same time a philosopher, in his theory he combines all three of these disciplines. Even in his later works, he tried to combine his theory with mathematical formalization. His theory influenced three important political thinkers: Laclau, &amp / #381 / i&amp / #382 / ek and Badiou. The purpose of this dissertation is mainly to examine Lacan&rsquo / s thought and its impasses which could be found especially in the political applications of his theory. First I start with a critical reading of Lacan&rsquo / s own works. I try to figure out the idealizations, presuppositions and blind spots hidden in his work. I develop my critical reading by focusing on the works of Laclau, &amp / #381 / i&amp / #382 / ek and Badiou. The main argument of this dissertation is, such a critical reading of these philosophers will lead us to a general questioning of Lacan&rsquo / s theory and the legitimacy of its applications. Lacan&rsquo / s use of the impossibility as a founding principle and his passion for formalization cause several idealizations, like the idealization of the neutrality of the signifier, the idealization of the non-represented and so on. These problems are extended and transformed into other ones in his disciples&rsquo / works. For Laclau, the problem is transformed into a purely content-free understanding of elements of democracy which ends up with paradoxical results. For &amp / #381 / i&amp / #382 / ek and Badiou, because of their insistence on a political theory based on the impossible real, their subversive theories end up with a theory which take the form of messianic discourses. What I propose is a reconsideration of the role of the theory on the understanding of human reality: in principle every theory excludes some portions of the richness of human life-world, therefore every theory must have a retrospective and critical stance against its own founding principles. This cannot be done by formalized theories which keep the formal structure of itself untouchable.

ABSTRACT THE REAL AND THE IMAGINARY THRESHOLDS OF OTTOMAN SUBJECTIVITY TaStan, CoSkun Ph.D., Department of Sociology Supervisor: Assoc. Prof. Dr. Erdogan YILDIRIM March 2010, 262 pages. This work examines the nature of frames that restrict our perspectives and thus give birth to such sociological entities like societies, communities and nations. How is the dualism of &ldquo / inside-outside&rdquo / created on sociological and psychic levels? More importantly, what instruments play what kind of roles in the creation of that dualism? Examining the formation of Ottoman subjectivity as a case, this study gives original answers to these questions. The psychoanalytic theory, which opened a new methodological domain for the social sciences in the past century, productively accommodated a good amount of works on these questions. Sigmund Freud&rsquo / s pioneering works on the dynamics of human psyche and Jacques Lacan&rsquo / s theories of human subjectivity played important roles in the improvement of this domain. Beginning from the second half of the past century, discussions on identity and belonging, as well as such furious social questions as nationalism, racism and xenophobia, have been held in the light of the new approaches of psychoanalytic theories in the field of social sciences. In this sense, this study can be seen as a part of those approaches, because methodologically, it bases itself on the opportunities offered by a particular psychoanalytic theory, namely, that of a French psychoanalyst, Jacques Lacan. I pick up two of Lacan&rsquo / s productively scrutinized concepts, namely the &ldquo / real&rdquo / and the &ldquo / imaginary&rdquo / , to develop a particular perspective towards this question: How is the dualism of inside-outside created in different contexts throughout the Ottoman history, so that this dualism could give birth to Ottoman subjectivity? Taking the two Lacanian concepts as a base, I analyze the instruments that play the role of &ldquo / thresholds&rdquo / in the formation of the dualism of &ldquo / inside-outside&rdquo / , under two general headings: The &ldquo / real thresholds&rdquo / and the &ldquo / imaginary thresholds&rdquo / . To put in a very brief manner, a &ldquo / real threshold&rdquo / is born out of any material obstacle that puts restrictions of any kind to the abilities of human body (natural obstacles like mountains, rivers and oceans, as well as designed obstacles like any object of war architecture, for instance, fall into this heading). Imaginary thresholds, on the other hand, are the &ldquo / images of selves&rdquo / that reflect back to us on the social ground, just in the same manner as our mirror-images come back to us and provide us with a subjective feeling of self (like the diplomatic texts and the mythologies). Although I borrow the two Lacanian terms (i.e. real and imaginary) to build up a theory of thresholds, I do not hesitate to bend and reshape those concepts whenever necessary, to build the conceptual tools into a rather ergonomic manner.

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Dans le contexte d'une société américaine où la religion occupe une place primordiale, une approche lacanienne des romans de Tom Robbins s'avère particulièrement utile pour dégager les thèmes directeurs de ses œuvres : le messianisme, le mysticisme et le monothéisme. Non seulement ces manifestations religieuses jouent un rôle central dans son œuvre romanesque, mais elles servent aussi à mieux exploiter les outils psychanalytiques développés par Jacques Lacan, et en particulier le Symbolique, l'Imaginaire et le Réel. Comment le RSI peut-il éclaircir le débat religieux dans les œuvres de Tom Robbins ou dans d'autres œuvres postmodernes ? Cette étude multidisciplinaire répond à cette problématique en se portant sur trois axes principaux. Premièrement, l'envergure de la messianité dans la société américaine donne lieu au phénomène littéraire que nous appelons " le sujet messianique ", se caractérisant par son ancrage topologique dans le Symbolique lacanien. Ensuite, la prévalence d'une approche mystique de la spiritualité dans les œuvres robbinsiennes s'exprime par une relation mystique entre un être divin d'une part, et le croyant d'autre part - rapport symbiotique propre à l'instance Imaginaire. Enfin, le Réel lacanien met en exergue l'impossibilité de la réconciliation structurale entre ces deux instances en explorant le thème du monothéisme dans les œuvres de Tom Robbins. Cette thèse a l'ambition non seulement de faire connaître un écrivain américain peu connu du public francophone, mais aussi de mieux définir l'articulation entre la religion, la psychanalyse et les romans de Tom Robbins