Jacques Lacan‘s writing has had a marked influence on thinking about gender and sexual difference. He has written so many books that it is impossible to cover all his ideas extensively in this thesis. The researcher will only focus on certain parts of his theory which are relevant to the current research project, using mainly the work of critical psychologists (e.g. Frosh, 1994; Hollway, 1989; Hook, 2006; Parker, 2005) and gender theorists (Butler, 1990, 1993; Rose & Mitchell, 1982; Segal, 1990) who have appropriated Lacanian theory to think about aspects of gender identity and subjectivity. In his writings, Lacan went back to Freud‘s earlier work to
refine and develop certain aspects of his theory. Frosh (1994) regards Lacan‘s work as ―a return to Freud‘ and as recreating the spirit of the early gender debates in psychoanalysis‖ (p.66). Whilst located primarily in the realm of the symbolic (in keeping with the work of Juliet Mitchell, for example), Lacan‘s writing on gender represents a radical departure from object relations theory in its understanding of the relationship between gender, consciousness, language and the symbolic. He locates his work firmly within original Freudian theory, but rejected biological interpretations of Freud‗s ideas and insisted on understanding Freudian theory in terms of its symbolic associations (Frosh, 1994).
At the core of Lacan‘s theory is that identities, such as being a woman or a man, are primarily social in nature rather than natural and inborn. Based on this argument, his theory has been adopted by many feminist writers in problematizing gender and sexuality studies. For example, in the text, Feminine Sexuality: Jacques Lacan and The Ecolle Freudienne, Rose and Mitchell (1982) use Lacan‘s theory to critically understand feminine sexuality. Their main argument, like other theorists already discussed, is also that there is a value in using psychoanalysis to understand femininities and masculinities and their link with the unconscious. To quote Mitchell (1982) on this point, she asserts that:
―For all psychoanalysts the development of the human subject, it‘s unconscious and its sexuality go hand-in-hand, they are causatively intertwined. A psychoanalyst could not subscribe to a currently popular sociological distinction in which a person is born with their biological gender to which society - general environment, parents, education, the media - adds a socially defined sex, masculine or feminine. Psychoanalysis cannot make such a distinction: a person is formed through their sexuality; it could not be added to him or her. The ways in which psychosexuality and the unconscious are closely bound together are complex, but most obviously, the unconscious contains wishes that cannot be satisfied and hence have been repressed‖ (p.2)
In this fairly extended passage, Mitchell seems to agree with Chodorow and others that many aspects of gender development and negotiation appear to predominantly occur at an unconscious level. Mitchell also rejects the simple sociological explanation of gender as purely the product of the social and culture. She maintains that it is the unconscious that is central to human subject‘s behaviour, and it is only through psychoanalysis that one may able to understand psychical processes involved in how people become gendered subjects:
Psychoanalysis should not subscribe to ideas about how men and women do or should live as sexually differentiated beings, but instead it should analyze how they come to be such being in the first place (Mitchell, 1982, p.3)
In its entirety, Lacanian psychoanalysis rejects the deterministic nature of much of the sociological and gender studies theory on what makes a woman a woman or a man a man. His interest is in how the human subject comes to occupy a certain position in terms of gender and how this subjective position is psychically negotiated and negated. Like Freud, Lacan also deconstructs the myth of a unitary subject (Henriques et al., 1984). He shares the same sentiment with many other psychoanalytic writers that the human subject is characterized by internal instability and contradiction. As elaborated by Rose (1982), ―the unconscious undermines the subject from any position of certainty, from any relation of knowledge to his or her psychic processes and history, and simultaneously reveals the fictional nature of the sexual category to which every human subject is none the less assigned‖ (p.29).
Lacan argues that language is the central feature of human development. He explains how the resolution of the Oedipus complex and other childhood conflicts depend on the use of language. For example, it is through language that the infant enters the symbolic order, which leads to the ―formation of a properly human subject, as opposed to the narcissistic subject of the mirror phase‖ (Jefferson, 1994, p.20), the latter which is characterized by the failure to distinguish the difference between the self and the external world. During the mirror phase, the infant lives in the ‗imaginary world‘, but it is at this phase of development that the infant begins to acquire language which requires engagement with the social order (Henriques et al., 1984). Gaining mastery over language allows the infant to separate and individuate as part of entering the world of subjectivity - in which ―individuals understand themselves in relation to others and experience their lives‖ (Lupton, 1996, in Nordtug, 2004, p.87). So in terms of Lacan‘s theory, language plays a critical role in the production of subjectivity. It is through and in language that subjectivity is constructed (Lacan, 1981).
Ian Parker is one the leading critical theorists who, along with others, has used Lacanian psychoanalysis to theorise subjectivity (Parker, 2005). Much of the work of critical
psychologists (see, Hollway, 1989; Parker, 2005; Potter & Wetherell, 1989) represents ‗the turn to language‘, investigating how language is implicated in identity practices and how certain discourses are promoted as the ultimate truth. Language is not a neutral medium, but frequently serves some ideological purpose (Nordtug, 2004). For Lacan, language is not just language, but a tool that can be used to access unconscious functioning. Lacanian psychoanalysis is also interested to explore how human subjects position themselves within the existing dominant discourses. Lacan asserts that the human subject is always split and fragmented. It is through employment of language and discourse that male subjects come to identify as masculine. The process of identification remains central to Lacan‘s theory (Henriques et al., 1984; Jefferson, 1994) constellated around the importance of the phallus as the prime signifier of gender difference.
4.4.1. The notion of the Phallus: masculinity as a burden
Hegemonic or socially sanctioned masculinity represents an ideal image that boys and men aspire to achieve, but the process of achieving such identity arouses hidden feelings of fear and anxiety. Lacan (1958) sees this struggle to maintain the masculine image as the burden of ‗the phallus‘. For Lacan, the phallus is a symbolic representation of potency rather than a purely physical object. In his theory, the phallus is both something that symbolizes power and something that is empty. Drawing upon this idea, but giving it his own shape, Frosh (1994) argues that ― ‗having‘ the phallus attached to oneself is no guarantee of stability of identity; quite the contrary, it forces the man into an obsession with ‗getting things straight‘ and the terror of loss which must seem comic to the penis-free woman. Phallus is such a burden to a man; living up to it becomes the necessary condition of masculinity, which is always in danger of being betrayed and undermined‖ (pp. 165-184). The difficulty of sustaining a masculine identity produces an internal struggle for most boys and men. Having the phallus becomes a burden in that it signifies some kind of performance pressure. In her seminal text, Gender Trouble, Judith Butler (1990) builds on psychoanalytic ideas of both Freud and Lacan, to provide an account of the way in which individuals become gendered and are continually compelled to enact and re-enact gender roles. Butler argues that men and women are constantly required to ‗perform‟ gender (hence the notion of ‗performativity‘) and to participate in
behaviours required by cultural norms of masculinity and femininity. Elliot (2001) explains the notion of „performativity‟ in greater depth:
―Performance involves individuals in continually monitoring the impressions they give off to and make upon, others. Public identity is thus performed for an audience and the private self knows that such performances are essential to identity and to the maintenance of respect and trust in routine social interaction‖ (p. 31-32).
The above quote suggests something significant, i.e., that the self may be split into two kinds of selves, namely the public and the private self. The former is displayed to others and the social world, while the latter is hidden. Displaying competence to others in the public self is the key signifier of successful masculinity, whereas failure to live up to the public masculine image is anxiety provoking and shameful. Adolescent boys often find themselves feeling pressurized to indulge in risky behaviours in the public performance of the gender role (Pollack & Levant, 1998; Renold, 2001). Butler argues that subverting hegemonic norms of masculinity is important to counter hegemonic gender behaviour because the notion of performativity entails a lack of freedom. To put it more aptly, Butler (1990, p.138), argues that performativity entails the ‗forced reiterations of norms‘ within a matrix of constraints. The current research project will also draw upon Judith Butler‘s notion of subversion to explore discursive and behavioural strategies that adolescent boys may employ to challenge and reject the dominant norms of hegemonic masculinity. According to Frosh (1994) masculine success is derived from phallic mastery, but this is a complex and multifaceted process, provoking feelings of anxiety and fear about possible failure.
Furthermore, possessing the ‗phallus‘ is such a burden that living up to it becomes implicated in problematic behavioural practices such as sexual risk-taking behaviours in adolescence and young adulthood. The success of today‘s behaviour is not sufficient proof for tomorrow. The boy must always do more to prove his masculinity, each act a little riskier. Any failure to sustain a masculine identity produces feelings of inadequacy and a sense that the individual is ‗not man enough or a real male‘. In this theorization, boys may continuously find themselves struggling to establish an unchallenged phallus by being willing to demonstrate bravado and avoiding identification with anything feminine. This suggests that masculinity is a fragile
identity that needs to be constantly protected and also defended against threats such as those posed by femininity and homosexuality. Based on this short discussion, it is clear that Lacan‘s theory and its elaboration in the work of critical theorists is a useful framework within which to explore some of the contradictions, fears and anxieties that township boys may experience in negotiating multiple voices of masculinity.
4.4.2. Women as the „Other‟ in Lacan‟s theory
In terms of Lacanian theory, the ‗phallus‘ is taken to be the emblem of power and then identified with the male penis (Frosh, 1994, p. 11). Lacan was insistent that Freud‗s usage of the term ‗penis‘ did not refer to the biological organ, but to its symbolic representation (Segal, 1990, p.84). In Freud‘s theory, the woman is constituted by lack (penis envy), but in Lacan‘s work, the woman is fantasized as the ‗Other‘ through whom completion might be achieved. In quoting Rose (1982, p.50) ―the absolute ‗Otherness‘ of the woman, therefore, serves to secure the man‘s own self-knowledge and truth‖. So in terms of Lacan‘s theory, the notion of the ‗Other‘ suggests a particular set of power dynamics between masculinity and femininity. Women, in part through discourse are expected to masquerade as ‗lack‘ in order to affirm the phallus in men. Building on Joan Riviere‘s work, Butler (1990) contends that masquerading is what women need to do in order to participate in men‘s public desires, while suppressing their own desires. It becomes apparent that men‘s sense of manhood depends on women‘s suppression and denial of the phallus:
―In order to ‗be‘ the phallus, the reflector and guarantor of an apparent masculine subject position, women must become, must ―be‖ (in the sense of posture as if they were) precisely what men are not and their very lack establishes the essential function of men. Hence, ‗being‘ the phallus is always a ‗being for‘ a masculine subject who seeks to confirm and augment his identity through the recognition of that ‗being for‘ (Butler, 1990, p. 61).
In her work, Judith Butler relies on Joan Riviere and Jacques Lacan s‘ analysis of masquerade to expand her theory on gender performativity. She argues that women pose a potential threat to men‘s sense of manhood and thus they take on masquerade knowingly as a mask to conceal and suppress their own masculinity. As part of masquerading, Friedlander (2003) argues that
women often find themselves worrying about how they look in order to be seen as a ‗real woman‘. Here, Friedlander asserts that ―it is not the image of a woman that is crucial, but how her image is seen by men‖ (p. 99). In his classical book, Enjoy your Symptom, Zizek (2008) extends this idea that female beauty serves primarily as a focus for the enjoyment (jouissance) of men. Using Lacan‘s work, Zizek sees this enjoyment of women‘s bodies as part of the male gaze, as reinforcing the ideology of patriarchy and as perpetrating sexism against women. Quoting Pollock‘s (1998) work, Friedlander (2003) contends that women do not have much choice, but to ‗dance‘ to the ideology of patriarchy and sexism. Ideology, as Zizek (2008) argues, is something that is entrenched in the social and not easy to challenge and transform. It is passed from one generation to the next as the norm that cannot be questioned. Arp (1995, in Chadwick, 2006) asserted that ―from the onset of puberty, the female body assumes the status of the ‗object‘ and the woman comes to look upon her body as a sexual object for others. In turn, she becomes alienated from her own body and repeatedly casts herself as an object of desire for men‖ (p. 246).
However, in Bodies that Matter, Butler (1993) argues that women may also use the strategy of masquerade to resist and subvert men‘s sense of manhood. She uses the example of a lesbian woman, arguing that while men often find themselves being attracted to such women they simultaneously feel threatened and intimidated by their subversion. Here, Butler demonstrates that the strategy of the masquerade can also disrupt the ideology of patriarchy, which conceals the contradictions and incompleteness of masculinity. From a Lacanian point of view, it is clear that the existence of masculinity is to a large extent dependent on the ‗otherness of a woman‘ who is seen as the signifier of ‗lack‘. Masculinity can never exist independently, but requires femininity (as a counterpart) for its survival and affirmation. Zizek (1992) describes femininity as something mysterious and elusive for all men, cautioning that we should not see women as passive or subjugated in suppressing their sexual desires. For Zizek (1992, in Friedlander, 2006, p. 103), this constitutes ―a ‗false‘ sacrifice in the sense it serves to dupe the ‗Other‘ ‖, in this case a male person, into believing he has power, while he is powerless. Zizek argues that women often use their subservient position to strategically assert their power over men. However, this form of power is hidden and invisible and emerges most often in the sexual encounter. There is a widely held fantasy of the woman‘s greater power and the potential
inability of the man to satisfy her sexual desires, which is mirrored in the limited theoretical articulation of what masculine sexuality might consist of phallic (penetration and a search for assurance that castration has not occurred).
Overall, male sexuality reveals the problematic status of the ‗phallus‘. Segal (1990) argues that contemporarily boys and men are terrified of possible failure in satisfying women sexually. Masculinity is associated with sexual adequacy, which creates considerable performance anxiety in this domain. The most common sexual complaints of men seeking therapy are erectile dysfunction, inhibited sexual desire and premature ejaculation. The failure to satisfy women sexually is one of the most forceful indictments of masculine power. ―Whatever the meanings attached to ‗the act‘ of sexual intercourse, for many men it confirms a sense of ineptness and failure: the failure to satisfy women‖ (Segal, 1990, in Frosh, 1994, p.100). This literal sense of failure is also seen as a failure of the phallus. Describing the penis as a ‗symbol of terror‘, ―the knife, and the fist‖, Segal (1990, pp.221-209), argues that the binary active/passive, masculine/feminine construction of heterosexual intercourse as the spectacular moment of male domination and female submission: ―‗the man‘ ‗mounts‘ and penetrates; the woman spreads her legs and ‗submits‘, illustrates men‘s sexual dominance over women‖. This is seen as the natural order of things and places considerable pressure on men to live up to expectations of being active, dominant and virile in heterosexual encounters. Again, based on this short discussion, it is clear that Lacan‘s theory is also a useful theoretical framework to identify how women may both unsettle men, yet also simultaneously affirm their power by artificially putting themselves in the position of ‗lack‘ (masquerading). Some of these dynamics are influenced by the ‗paternal law‘ to be discussed in the section that follows. It is evident that within this theoretical framing the phallus is the primary signifier, producing difference and forcing men and women apart (Frosh, 1994).
4.4.3. Absent fathers: the name-of-the father as the law
In Lacanian theory the paternal law (‗the name-of-the father‘) is viewed as highly significant. The father plays a critical role in disrupting the mother-infant fusion so that the infant may enter into the symbolic world. For Lacan, breaking the imaginary bond represents a symbolic
castration. The law-of-the-father operates to institute the threat of castration (Frosh, 1994; Hook, 2006). Here, Lacan makes a major contribution in that the father in his theory is not necessarily the biological father but rather any representative of the social order, ‗the law‘. When speaking of the ‗father‘ in relation to the Oedipus complex and the development of the child more generally, Lacan is not referring to the person who has impregnated the mother, but to the symbolic father who is present in society as a whole. According to Lacan (1984) the ‗symbolic father‘ is the person (in the mind of the child) that the mother loves and desires and who has the capacity to free the child from his imaginary fusion with her. In his capacity as representative of law, the symbolic father helps the boy child to develop a relation to the phallus, which signifies masculinity (Lacan, 1984). Here, Lacan‘s theory may be viewed as progressive in that he shows that the ‗real‘ father is not necessarily central to gender identity development. In the absence of the ‗real‘ father, the mother is still able to help her infant break out of the ‗imaginary‘ world and enter the ‗symbolic‘ world. Based on this argument, many feminist writers found the work of Lacan useful in dismissing the portrayal of single mothers as necessarily responsible for raising unhealthy and pathological boy children. His theory offered an alternative view on how single mothers are consciously and unconsciously able to mediate the image of the ‗absent‘ father in the psyche of the infant. Lacan argues that the internalization of the experience of having a father is not only the result of the child‘s direct