the choice of sex - Ecole de Psychanalyse des Forums du Champ

Scientific Committee
Annie-Claude Sortant-Delanoë
(Responsible for the Study Days)
Nicolas Bendrihen
Nadine Cordova-Naïtali
Françoise Hurstel
Marie-Annick Le Port-Gobert
Anne Lopez
Hervé de Saint-Affrique
JOURNÉES
DE L’ÉCOLE
DE PSYCHANALYSE
DES FORUMS
DU CHAMP
LACANIEN
PARIS 29-30 NOVEMBER 2014
Organizing committee
Sophie Henry
(Responsible for the organization)
Frédérique Decoin-Vargas
Martine Delorme
Adrien Klajnman
Esther Morere–Diderot
Lina Velez
EPFCL-FRANCE
118 rue d’Assas
75006 Paris
France
THE CHOICE OF SEX
« THE SEXED BEING DERIVES
HIS AUTHORIZATION ONLY
FROM HIMSELF » J. LACAN
Information
01 56 24 22 56
www.champlacanien.net
e-mail : [email protected]
www.champlacanienfrance.net
Formation continue no 11 75 411 93 75
MAISON DE LA CHIMIE
28 BIS RUE SAINT DOMINIQUE
75007 PARIS-FRANCE
INFORMATION
01 56 24 22 56
EPFCL-France
118 rue d’Assas 75 006 Paris
www.champlacanienfrance.net
Formation continue no 11754119375
THE CHOICE OF SEX
1/
The choice of sex is a topical question. Everyone defends their firm belief that sex is
either one extreme or the other : just a matter of nature or just a social construction.
Is there not sometimes a risk of confusing choice of sex with choice of object,
that is to say, confusing sexuation with sexuality ?
During these study days we will endeavour to approach this question in a whole
different way : the choice of sex comes from the unconscious.
But also “The analyst derives his authorization only from himself”… and from a
few others, 3 / Lacan told us in 1967 ; adding in 1974: “The sexed being derives his
authorization only from himself”… and from a few others. 4 /
From Freud’s “anatomy is destiny” 2 / to Lacan’s “they have a choice”, what does
psychoanalysis say about it today ?
For psychoanalysis, the choice of the subject, regarding their sex, is their choice
of jouissance :
Whether it is wholly within phallic jouissance – organized by language, the partner
of which is object a about which we know something via the fantasy ; or whether it is
not wholly in this mode, but in a beyond, in a supplementary other jouissance beyond
language, outside signifiers, and with a remainder to say yet impossible to say… but
which sometimes seeps into the speech of the analysand.
This choice can appear as an unfathomable decision… And yet…
What are the repercussions of this choice in neurosis and in psychosis ?
What clinical experiences will we bring into the conversation ?
What theoretical references will we summon in order to throw light on the
modalities of unconscious choice, determined by identifications ?
What links is Lacan encouraging us to make between the analyst and the sexed
being, seven years later ?
Do they both have a particular responsibility towards their act ?
What is the relation between the choice of sex beyond the phallus and the
position of the analyst – as hollowed out object a, extricated from phallic jouissance ?
And how do all these different approaches allow us to understand the current
changing attitudes ?
So many questions that we will attempt to consider during these study days, and
which we should not cease to consider in a school of psychoanalysis, even and above
all if “Our not-all is discordance”. 5 /
Annie-Claude Sortant-Delanoë
Translated by Esther Faye
1/ In English, we have two words, “gender” and “sex”, which are economically conveyed in French by the one word,
“le sexe”. Both “gender” and “sex” are implied in the context of the present argument, but I have chosen to translate
“le sexe” as “sex” rather than as “gender”.
2/ FREUD S. (1992) La vie sexuelle. Paris, PUF, p. 121
3/ LACAN, J. (1995) Proposition of 9 October 1967 on the Psychoanalyst of the School.
Analysis 6, p. 1.
4/ LACAN, J. (1973–1974) Les non-dupes errent, Lesson 11.
5/ LACAN, J. (2011) Le séminaire, livre XIX… ou pire. Paris, Seuil, p. 22.