Uncovering Lacan: Separation and Alienation

When French psychoanalyst, Jacques Lacan, decided to revisit the works of Freud, focusing on their philosophical dimension and opening them up to previously unrelated fields of study, he and his followers were soon expelled from the International Psychoanalytic Association. Come explore a realm of thought that, like Jung’s, led to a significant break from the Freudian paradigm. An original thinker and psychoanalytic pioneer, Lacan contributed profoundly to the way modern therapy thinks about “the Other”. What role does language play in determining the non-Self? What is the unconscious, and how does it relate to “the Other”? What is the difference between “the ego” and “the subject”? Explored previously by Hegel and Marx, the concepts of “alienation” and “separation” take on altogether new and unique meanings in Lacan’s thought. Come explore how the many ways we experience alienation – but especially the separation we feel between our subjective experiences and the Western values that no longer account for them – can actually open us up to deeper understandings of subjectivity, the body, suffering, and gender identity.