It is sometimes assumed that fantasizing stands in contrast to activism. This book, however, argues that fantasy plays a central role in social movements. Drawing on psychoanalysis and psychosocial theories, Fantasy and Social Movements examines the relationships between fantasy, reality, action, the unconscious and the collective.

Behind our computer screens we are all cyborgs: through fantasy we can understand our involvement in virtual worlds. Cyberspace is first and foremost a mental space. Therefore we need to take a psychological approach to understand our experiences in it. In Interface Fantasy, André Nusselder uses the core psychoanalytic notion of fantasy to examine our relationship to computers and digital technology. Lacanian psychoanalysis considers fantasy to be an indispensable “screen” for our interaction with the outside world; Nusselder argues that, at the mental level, computer screens and other human-computer interfaces incorporate this function of fantasy: they mediate the real and the virtual. Interface Fantasy illuminates our attachment to new media: why we love our devices; why we are fascinated by the images on their screens; and how it is possible that virtual images can provide physical pleasure. Nusselder puts such phenomena as avatars, role playing, cybersex, computer psychotherapy, and Internet addiction in the context of established psychoanalytic theory. The virtual identities we assume in virtual worlds, exemplified best by avatars consisting of both realistic and symbolic self-representations, illustrate the three orders that Lacan uses to analyze human reality: the imaginary, the symbolic, and the real. Nusselder analyzes our most intimate involvement with information technology—the almost invisible, affective aspects of technology that have the greatest impact on our lives. Interface Fantasy lays the foundation for a new way of thinking that acknowledges the pivotal role of the screen in the current world of information. And it gives an intelligible overview of basic Lacanian principles (including fantasy, language, the virtual, the real, embodiment, and enjoyment) that shows their enormous relevance for understanding the current state of media technology.

A Lacanian reading of fantasy fiction 1887-1914 showing the return of atavistic horrors in the wake of the dissolution of traditional authorities. The book shows the critical power of fantasy read in conjunction with psychoanalysis in exploring profound socio-political questions.

This edited volume draws upon Lacanian psychoanalytic theory to examine the conscious and unconscious forces underlying race as a social formation, conceptualizing race, racial identity, and racism in ways that go beyond traditional modes of psychoanalytic thought. Featuring contributions by Lacanian scholars from diverse geographical and disciplinary contexts, chapters span a wide breadth of topics, including white nationalism and contemporary debates over confederate monuments; emergent theories of race rooted in Afropessimism and postcolonialism; analyses of racism in apartheid and American slavery; clinical reflections on Latinx and other racialized patients; and applications of Lacan’s concepts of the lamella, drive and sexuation to processes of racialization. The collection both reorients readers’ understandings of race through its deployment of Lacanian theory and redefines the Lacanian subject through its theorizing of subjectivity in relation to race, racism and racial identification. Lacan and Race will be a definitive text for psychoanalytic theorists and contemporary scholars of race, appealing to readers across the fields of psychology, cultural studies, humanities, politics, and sociology.

Lacanian Fantasy addresses the question of how fantasy developed as a psychological concept, particularly as influenced by Sigmund Freud and Jacques Lacan. Kirk Turner moves thematically, from childhood to adulthood, and chronologically, from Freud’s earliest theories to Lacan’s most complex statements on fantasy towards the end of his career. He explores not only the variations that the concept has undergone throughout its history – from Ancient Greek discourse around phantasia to the present day – but also the changing consequences of its applications. Lacanian Fantasy includes further insights on our current predicament: the age of the social media image and fantasy in the uncertain ‘locked down’ world of a pandemic. Spanning numerous examples, both historical and recent, this book explores relatable forms of fantasy life. In bridging psychology and philosophy, as well as gender and sexuality studies, it ultimately opens new perspectives on fantasy. This book will be of interest to psychoanalytic practitioners and humanities scholars, as well as students interested in critical theory.

China has undergone a unique path of development in the post-Maoist era. Especially, the last decade witnessed China's rapid rise to economic wealth and superpower status vis-à-vis the severe developmental predicaments of the West (financial crises, socio-political turbulences, etc.). This book analyzes how the leading Chinese thinkers understand China's prosperity and rapid development today, and whether there is any hidden mechanism that has been playing a crucial role of forming contemporary Chinese thinkers' shared passionate endeavor of resuscitating classical Chinese ideas, and thus shows how the fervor for discovering “essential characteristics” of Chinese thought reveals a hidden psychological mechanism.

Arguably the most profound psychoanalytic thinker since Freud, and deeply influential in many fields, Jacques Lacan often seems opaque to those he most wanted to reach. These are the readers Bruce Fink addresses in this clear and practical account of Lacan's highly original approach to therapy. Written by a clinician for clinicians, Fink's introduction is an invaluable guide to Lacanian psychoanalysis, how it's done, and how it differs from other forms of therapy. While elucidating many of Lacan's theoretical notions, the book does so from the perspective of the practitioner faced with the pressing questions of diagnosis, which therapeutic stance to adopt, how to involve the patient, and how to bring about change.