The Imaginary
Lacan thought the relationship between the Ego and the reflected image means that the Ego and the Imaginary order itself are places of radical alienation: "alienation is constitutive of the Imaginary order".[14] This relationship is also narcissistic. So the Imaginary is the field of images and imagination, and deception: the main illusions of this order are synthesis, autonomy, duality, similarity.
The Imaginary is structured by the Symbolic order: in The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis Lacan argues how the visual field is structured by symbolic laws. Thus the Imaginary involves a linguistic dimension. If the signifier is the foundation of the Symbolic, the signified and signification are part of the Imaginary order. Language has Symbolic and Imaginary connotations; in its Imaginary aspect, language is the "wall of language" which inverts and distorts the discourse of the Other. On the other hand, the Imaginary is rooted in the subject's relationship with its own body (the image of the body). In Fetishism: the Symbolic, the Imaginary and the Real Lacan argues that in the sexual plane the Imaginary appears as sexual display and courtship love.
Lacan accused major psychoanalytic schools of reducing the practice of psychoanalysis to the Imaginary order by making identification with the analyst the objective of analysis (see Écrits, "The Directions of the Treatment"). He proposes the use of the Symbolic as the way to dislodge the disabling fixations of the Imaginary: the analyst transforms the images into words. "The use of the Symbolic is the only way for the analytic process to cross the plane of identification."[19]
The Symbolic
In his Seminar IV "La relation d'objet" Lacan asserts that the concepts of Law and Structure are unthinkable without language: thus the Symbolic is a linguistic dimension. Yet, he does not simply equate this order with language since language involves the Imaginary and the Real as well. The dimension proper of language in the Symbolic is that of the signifier, that is a dimension in which elements have no positive existence but which are constituted by virtue of their mutual differences.
The Symbolic is also the field of radical alterity, that is the Other: the unconscious is the discourse of this Other. Besides it is the realm of the Law which regulates desire in the Oedipus complex. We may add that the Symbolic is the domain of culture as opposed to the Imaginary order of nature. As important elements in the Symbolic, the concepts of death and lack (manque) connive to make of the pleasure principle the regulator of the distance from the Thing (das ding an sich) and the death drive which goes "beyond the pleasure principle by means of repetition"—"the death drive is only a mask of the Symbolic order."[11]
It is by working in the Symbolic order that the analyst can produce changes in the subjective position of the analysand; these changes will produce imaginary effects since the Imaginary is structured by the Symbolic.[4] Thus, it is the Symbolic which is determinant of subjectivity, and the Imaginary, made of images and appearances, is the effect of the Symbolic.
The Real
Not only opposed to the Imaginary, the Real is also located outside the Symbolic. Unlike the latter which is constituted in terms of oppositions, i.e. presence/absence, "there is no absence in the Real."[11] Whereas the Symbolic opposition presence/absence implies the possibility that something may be missing from the Symbolic, "the Real is always in its place."[19] If the Symbolic is a set of differentiated elements, signifiers, the Real in itself is undifferentiated, it bears no fissure. The Symbolic introduces "a cut in the real", in the process of signification: "it is the world of words that creates the world of things - things originally confused in the "here and now" of the all in the process of coming into being.[20]
Thus the Real is that which is outside language, resisting symbolization absolutely. In Seminar XI Lacan defines the Real as "the impossible" because it is impossible to imagine and impossible to integrate into the Symbolic, being impossibly attainable. It is this resistance to symbolization that lends the Real its traumatic quality. In his Seminar "La relation d'objet", Lacan reads Freud's case on "Little Hans." He distinguishes two real elements which intrude and disrupt the child's imaginary pre-oedipical harmony: the real penis which is felt in infantile masturbation and the newly born sister.
Finally, the Real is the object of anxiety in that it lacks any possible mediation, and is "the essential object which is not an object any longer, but this something faced with which all words cease and all categories fail, the object of anxiety par excellence."[11]
Objet petit a
In the psychoanalytic theory of Jacques Lacan, objet petit a (object little-a) stands for the unattainable object of desire. It is sometimes called the object cause of desire. Lacan always insisted for it to remain untranslated "thus acquiring the status of an algebraic sign." (Écrits).
In 1957, in his Seminar Les formations de l'inconscient, Lacan introduces the concept of objet petit a as the imaginary part-object (see Melanie Klein), an element which is imagined as separable from the rest of the body. In the Seminar Le transfert (1960-1961) he articulates objet a with the term agalma (Greek, an ornament). Just as the agalma is a precious object hidden in a worthless box, so objet petit a is the object of desire which we seek in the other.
In the Seminars L'angoisse (1962-1963) and The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis (1964), objet petit a is defined as the leftover, the remnant left behind by the introduction of the Symbolic in the Real. This is further elaborated in the Seminar The Other Side of Psychoanalysis (1969-1970), where Lacan elaborates his Four discourses. In the discourse of the Master, one signifier attempts to represent the subject for all other signifiers, but a surplus is always produced: this surplus is objet petit a, a surplus meaning, a surplus of jouissance.
Slavoj Žižek explains this objet petit a in relation to Alfred Hitchcock's MacGuffin: "[The] MacGuffin is objet petit a pure and simple: the lack, the remainder of the real that sets in motion the symbolic movement of interpretation, a hole at the center of the symbolic order, the mere appearance of some secret to be explained, interpreted, etc." (Love thy symptom as thyself).
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Lacan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objet_Petit_a
心理發展階段論：想像界／象徵界／實存
拉岡提出的心理結構，和弗洛依德的本我／自我／超我有所不同，特別是拉岡在其結構中加入了主體（Subject）的角色，主體是拉岡一個重要的構思，主體是語言學上所有言說的主動因素（例如英文句式中的 ﹣﹣ I），在哲學上也令人想起我思故我在的我，也是提供認知心理境界時的主動性視點。在現象學上主體被理解為意向性 Intentionality，Paul Ricoeur 在其論著 Rule of Metaphor 也提出和拉岡理論類似的說法。
- 想像界 （Imaginary Order）是主體離開母體後產生的必然性心理結構。對於主體，胎兒時期在母體內安然自足的，是不可知的完美處境，是先於存在而存在的零度生命境界。可是，從出生的一刻開始，離開母體令嬰兒產生，一種破裂後失去安全感和物質支援的痛苦，這種無可補救的痛苦，激發出對於自我的想像，從而發展出對於自我作為一個完整個體的幻想。這幻得幻失的境界被形容為回歸母體的原生慾望。可是，事實上主體並不如想像中，是一個完整而可以行動自如的個體，嬰兒在鏡像期產生的喜悅，正正是想像力推動的，是沒有物質基礎的幻想式快感。想像界突顯的是本我／自我之間的差異性，由於想像界是先於象徵界存在的，所以，這差異性也是不可言說的心理境況。在鏡像期的嬰兒，對於本我的能動力和自我的慾望之間就存在不可滿足的差異。不過，這差異性並不只是發生在嬰兒時期，在主體成長後，想像界（包括當中本我／自我的差異）仍然不會離開主體，而且永遠成為心理結構的一部份。
- 象徵界 （Symbolic Order）是突顯語言世界對主體心理的塑造，語言在拉岡看來不單止是溝通，其實包含社會上所有以語言符號維繫／創造／建構的現境，是現象學的現象世界，對應於實存，它是沒有物質性的外相。不過，對於拉岡來說，語言的真實性並不重要，因為它對於主體產生了無限的意義網路，當中包念了認知／自我認同／規則／家庭關係／朋友關係／感情表達／社會制約／歷史時空／意識形態，是主體存在最重要的一部份。如果沒有了語言建構，類似猿人泰山的事，將不會是子烏虛有的故事。
- 實存 （The Real）是拉岡最神秘而富爭論性的說法。實存是主體在言說中無法言說的境界，是主體無法幻想的完美境界的真實存在，是全然物質性的，但又不能用言語說清的完美存在。部份論者認為這是拉岡系統中留給超越者﹣﹣神 的位置，但筆者認為，與其說是一個外於主體存在的超越者（基督教會的上帝），倒不如說是拉岡理論中留給主體自身成佛﹣﹣無上正等正覺的覺悟者的位置，較為合乎拉岡的思想方式。（註：拉岡曾出訪日本，並對佛學有研究）實存界的物性推動拉岡思想進入後結構主義時代，由於實存沒法由語言（象徵界）解讀，（這不是指實存界沒有符號運作，正正相反的，由於實存界有如黑洞一樣的內在動力，令二元對立的簡單符號操作沒法有效進行，因此反而意義的真空境）形成所有伴隨象徵界滲入的部份（道德、倫理、知識論、意識型態、社會組合、法則）均沒法切入實存界。令物性問題成為拉岡進入拓樸世界的最好註腳。拓樸及拉岡晚相當注重的數元(matheme)概念，都是以實存界的邏輯，淩架結構主義時代拉岡理論中完全依重語言和象徵運作的做法。
Objet a
Objet a (法語讀音為 objet petit a)是無法翻譯的術語，拉岡指出在人類成長過程中，會將孩提時期某些特別的物品（例如某些玩具）認定為有特別意義的實體，此實體具有超乎單純心理價值的實質性存在。在拉岡系統之中，objet a 被視為心理發展過程的殘存物，是經歷過Imaginary order後，兒童面對以父權為代表的語言規則界之後，主體因為要被迫放棄原生性慾望，而取得的補償性的代替品，當中尤其是對作為經過戀母情結後的補償。故此，objet a有作為童年小玩偶的一切特質，也往往含有性徵（例如母親乳頭等）的某些特質。
隨著主體長大，objet a 會發展為一種戀物式的愛好，其物質性（觸摸物件時的手感）會引發主體一種獨特而不能言說的快感。Objet a 也是拉岡系統中唯一有絕對物質性的一項。因為這物體雖然作為一個隱喻著存在最大機密的意義，但矛盾的，這存在本身是不可言說的，既充滿重要意義信息，卻又不可言說的。就連帶語言符號 objet a 本身亦不能翻譯。
這個拉岡理論中並不多提到的 objet a 在後期的言說中尤其重要，成為心理分析學的拓樸中一項重點提法。
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%8B%89%E5%B4%97
