Jouissance

The French word "jouissance" means "enjoyment" particularly in an over-the-top or sexual (i.e. orgasm) sense.

"Jouissance", contrasts with "plaisir", which is a controlled state that happens within cultural norms. "Jouissance" is pleasure (and any stimulation) that can be too much to bear. It may be very largely felt as suffering. It is pleasure and pain together, a feeling of being at the edge. It can indicate a breaking of boundaries, a connection beyond the self. This can range from a mother feeling intense connection with a breast-feeding baby to meditative feelings of oneness with the universe. One of the goals of life is to manage "jouissance". Unchecked emotion will control and overwhelm you. Society helps this through controlling mechanisms such as education and cultural norms. It has been said that "jouissance" is 'drained' from the body throughout life, leading to the calm of old age.

This sexual connotation (i.e. orgasm) lacking in the English word "enjoyment", and is therefore left untranslated in English editions of the works of Jacques Lacan. [Dylan Evans, "An Introductory Dictionary of Lacanian Psychoanalysis"] . In his Seminar "The Ethics of Psychoanalysis" (1959-1960) Lacan develops his concept of the opposition of "jouissance" and pleasure. The pleasure principle, according to Lacan, functions as a limit to enjoyment: it is the law that commands the subject to 'enjoy as little as possible'. At the same time the subject constantly attempts to transgress the prohibitions imposed on his enjoyment, to go beyond the pleasure principle. Yet the result of transgressing the pleasure principle, according to Lacan, is not more pleasure but pain, since there is only a certain amount of pleasure that the subject can bear. Beyond this limit, pleasure becomes pain, and this 'painful principle' is what Lacan calls "jouissance". (Dylan Evans). Thus "jouissance" is suffering ("Ethics").

In his Seminar "Encore" (1972-1973) Lacan states that "jouissance" is essentially phallic. That is, insofar as "jouissance" is sexual it is phallic, meaning that it does not relate to the Other as such. Lacan admits, however, that there is a specifically feminine "jouissance", a supplementary "jouissance", which is beyond the phallus, a "jouissance" of the Other. This feminine "jouissance" is ineffable, for women experience it but know nothing about it.

In his seminar "The Other Side of Psychoanalysis" (1969-1970) Lacan introduced the concept of surplus-jouissance (French 'plus-de-jouir') inspired by Marx's concept of surplus-value: objet petit a is the excess of "jouissance" which has no use value, and which persists for the mere sake of "jouissance".

The Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Žižek, a known Lacanian theorist, has adopted the term in his philosophy; it may also be seen in the works, both joint and individual, of Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, and it plays an important role in the writing of Roland Barthes.

ources

* [http://www.lacan.com/seminars1a.htm The Seminars of Jacques Lacan]
*Dylan Evans, "An Introductory Dictionary of Lacanian Psychoanalysis"

References

External links

* [http://www.lacan.com/rolleyes.htm Chronology of Jacques Lacan]
* [http://www.lacan.com/lacan1.htm Lacan Dot Com]
* [http://www.lacan.com/zizwoman Slavoj Zizek: Lacan's Formulas of Sexuation]
* [http://www.lacan.com/frameXIV7.htm Josefina Ayerza: Comme des garçons]