Issue 39 (Autumn 2008)

The author argues that a consideration o f the subjective economy crucially calls for reflection on an object described as “partial Plato’s Symposium (or more evocatively Le Banquet) which forms a backdrop to major sections of Lacan’s Seminar VIII on Transference, leads her to the notion o f agalma, which, she explains, suggests an object which lacks the full and steady presence expected o f an object, a partial that is not part o f any whole. The essential linkage between the birth o f desire and a state o f lack is also elaborated.

Jacques Lacan, in the early 1960’s, defines the subject as that which is represented by a signifier for another signifier. From now on the subject can no longer be regarded as substantial, but rather as an effect of language.1 This formulation crucially calls out for a re-examination also of the object……..