The Politics of Lacanian Structuralism feat. Samo Tomšič

We welcome Lacanian philosopher Samo Tomšič for a presentation and discussion on Lacan's relationship to structuralism and politics. We center this discussion around Seminar XVI, "From an Other to the Other" where we witness a shift in Lacan’s structuralism, indicated in the very seminar title: from an Other (symbolic order) to the other (enjoyment). It is not unimportant that Lacan's sole thorough engagement with Marx appears precisely in this context, an engagement that can, and probably should, be read together with the shift from the indefinite to the definite article in the Seminar’s title: “an” Other (language) is abstract, unspecified, and therefore detached from historicity; “the” other is specific and historically contextualised (surplus-value).
In this talk, Samo revisits this and other open issues regarding the transformation of Lacanian structuralism, initiated in this ground-breaking Seminar. Above all, he argues for a “partisan reading” of Lacan’s references to Marx. Although these may have been circumstantial (May ‘68) and perhaps even opportunistic (pleasing the radical students), they nevertheless open the horizon of a consistently left Lacanianism.
Please support our work to bring these presentations and new research to a public audience by joining and contributing to our Patreon / torsiongroups

[@raymond7427]

Intellectual guff.

[@discogodfather22]

Complete waste of time without a real class theory. Who are the proletarians Daniel? Can you give a concise concept of where and who they are without resorting to wage exploitation formulas that result in banal generalizations that make it seem like 90% of people are proletarians? Lacan is not going to help you do a basic economic analysis.

[@CRManor]

“An economic science inspired by Capital does not necessarily lead to its utilization as a revolutionary power, and history seems to require help from
something other than a predicative dialectic.”