A Theory of What Constitutes the Heart of the iekian

Posted on May 21, 2013 by Daniel Tutt 1 Comment Here is the introduction of my essay for a new book on iek and Education edited by Antonio Garcia, with contributions from many of my favorite iek scholars. In this piece, entitled The Threshold of the iekian I argue that the heart of the iekian, can be located in the way that iek modifies the discourse of the Master by putting the disciple (reader) into a new relation towards what I call emancipatory knowledge. The threshold of the iekian consists first of a demand put onto the reader (subject) bringing them into a new relation to the Real a process that makes any identity or reality inherently paradoxical, and thus the orientation towards the iekian is disorienting by its very nature. After outlining the threshold, I develop a theory of iekian pedagogy that can be arranged like a musical score, reaching its crescendo at the point of the act, where the subject (disciple) becomes an agent in possession of emancipatory knowledge, possessing the ability to re-inscribe revolutionary potential into any socio-symbolic field: the pedagogical, the political and or the social. The threshold of the iekian is also enabled by the way in which iek modifies Lacans four discourses, and introduces a new, fifth discourse (an argument made by Levi Bryant). The fifth discourse has an important effect on what constitutes the core of the iekian. Overall, I argue that if we can apply the precise way in which the iekian places the disciple towards emancipatory knowledge, we can also facilitate a shift from iek studies the current reference point for scholars of iek - to the iekian. This movement consists of understanding and applying the subjective transformation of knowledge that underpins ieks philosophical approach. The Threshold of the iekian Rarely do scholars of iek speak of themselves or their work as iekian. Most critical interventions into ieks philosophy tend to examine a particular facet of the iekian, and the iekian as a mark of ones own approach to philosophy is rarely cited in scholarly work on philosophy or critical theory more generally. Despite this deficit of the application of the iekian, there are notable works by iek scholars that seek to transcend this limitation by highlighting a particular aspect of the iekian that in turn illuminates his larger project. In this category, several texts stand out, including Adrian Johnstons work on ieks ontology[1], Fabio Vighis work on Zizeks use of the dialectic[2], Adam Kotskos invaluable work on Zizeks Christian materialist theology[3], and the numerous interventions into aspects of the iekian critique of ideology, ethics, Hegel, and Lacan published by various thinkers in

the journal dedicated to iek studies, the International Journal of iek Studies. The diversity and range of these studies certainly constitute and encompass major shades of the iekian, but there still exists an unwillingness to embrace the iekian in the same way many embrace philosophers whom we might place as contemporaries of iek, such as Badiou, and other major thinkers that iek sees as interlocutors to his own work such as Derrida, Deleuze or Heidegger. At the level of ieks philosophical project, we can understand the essence of his project from multiple angles. For example, iek himself has defined his work as revolving around the question of postmodernity and modernity, where his interventions ask, is it still possible to pursue the Enlightenment goal of knowledge under conditions of late capitalism?[4] But this approach to ieks work falls short precisely in that his engagement with the modern out of a particular Freudian Marxist lineage, with unique refinements of Hegel, Lacan and thus all of continental philosophy, is only a shade of the iekian. This is what we might call the form of the iekian, but not the method of the iekian. Beginning with ieks dissertation on Hegel and the end of analysis, we find the origins of his project, in terms of form, up to his more recent tomb, Less Than Nothing: Hegel and the Shadow of Dialectical Materialism: to re-actualize the German idealist tradition through the application of Lacans meta-psychology and antiphilosophy. Perhaps then one of the reasons why the iekian has been difficult to locate is tied in part to ieks own (sometimes dogmatic) affinities to this constellation of thought and history of philosophy. Added to the complexity of locating a central iekian position is the fact that ieks work often lacks an intentionally rigorous explication of a distinct philosophical position. The iekian is also difficult to locate for psychoanalytic reasons. Buried deep within the act of ieks interventions, (writings and performative lectures) there is transference and a resistance that takes place with his readers. This transference between iek and his readers is tied to the way that ieks writing functions similar to an analytic session in the Lacanian sense, where the reader-as-analyst participates in the working through of ieks own symptom. In Leigh Claire La Berges account, the reader-as-analyst is constructed around the fundamental fantasy of iek, which she sees as his confrontation with the postmodern in dialectical relation to the modern. This dialectic presents a knot that prevents the transition that iek truly desires, which is a more informed critique of political economy, to move us out of late capitalism through theory[5]. But his interventions into postmodernism prevent such a movement, but this symptom, of a constant barrage of critiques on the postmodern serve as the hidden desire supplement that keeps the iekian forever stalled. What the reader-as-analyst is caught up in is ieks transference with postmodern multiculturalism which for however much application of Lacan-Hegel and Marx, iek himself remains unable to break the knot. While Zizek himself very well could be caught in this transference relation to late capitalism, there is a qualitative issue that arises in regards to La Berges essay. It neglects the wa y in which the reader-as-analyst of iek is placed into a field of knowledge in a way that positions the reader towards what I would call emancipatory knowledge. As iek notes, the analysts discourse for which the reader is placed into in the exchange with ieks work, portends major consequences for developing a new relation to truth and to the role of emancipation:

The analysts discourse stands for the emergence of revolutionary emancipatory subjectivity that resolves the split of university and hysteria. In it, the revolutionary agent a addresses the subject from the position of knowledge that occupies the place of truth (i.e., which intervenes in at the symptomal torsion of the subjects constellation), and the goal is to isolate, get rid of, the master signifier that structured the subjects (ideologico-political unconscious) (iek, 2006). The threshold of the iekian The threshold of the iekian is a positioning of the reader-as-analyst towards the real, facilitated by dialectical materialism and the parallax arguably ieks signature and most original methodology. Dialectical materialism is an approach that seeks through interpretation of phenomena of late capitalism (democracy, tolerance, imperialism, etc.) an identification with the repressed Real, which always returns in the form of a traumatic intervention into the social (symbolic). This return of the real is what reveals the inherent inconsistency of the MasterSignifier, or the figure that stands in for the real. As Lacan articulated, and as iek points out in his work, the empty Master-Signifier is the point whereby the signifier collapses into its signified. ieks ontological position, because he sees all symbolic identity and all reality as inconsistent/incomplete (non-All), is premised on the notion that the subject has the potential to be radically autonomous, or free. The iekian parallax also engages phenomena: an idea, a pop cultural reference, or even another philosopher, into a dialectical analysis of that thing with a social field or other problem and brings the two phenomena to a point of aporia whereby the reader is brought into a parallax with the Real which disrupts the entire basis of presuppositions that formerly sustained the field. ieks unique brand of dialectical materialism is a careful revitalization of Marx, Hegel, and Lacan and it involves, like the parallax approach, a similar radical commitment to exposing the Real within any symbolic order. Once the real is exposed as an inconsistent network of signifiers defined by relations of difference with one another, the subject is able to face a certain he Zizekian thus consists of this radical displacement of the field of the symbolic and a positioning of the subject (disciple/reader) towards emancipatory knowledge. The threshold of the iekian consists first of a demand put onto the reader (subject) bringing them into a new relation to the Real a process that makes any identity or reality inherently paradoxical, and thus the orientation towards the iekian is disorienting by its very nature. There is something unheimlich about the iekian a priori, because one faces their own radical lack of support in any symbolic[1]. The way that iek confronts the Masters discourse is seminal to the entire basis of the iekian as it consists of placing the subject in a new relation to knowledge, what I will refer to as emancipatory knowledge. The way in which ieks thought confronts the disciple (reader) is a philosophical method or orientation to doing philosophy that also puts a demand on the subject. The onus iek places onto the disciple is tied to a more general axiomatic position of philosophy in the precise moment of late capitalism today. As iek is fond of repeating, we must reverse Marxs 11th thesis in his, Theses on Feuerbach, that philosophers have only interpreted the world and have not yet changed it indeed interpretation as such holds the power in the iekian to change the world in so far as interpretation facilitates a shift in the perspectival field and a re-positioning of

knowledge towards emancipation. This shift takes place at the threshold of the iekian, where the reader is faced with his or her own split subjectivity, and ultimately faced with his or her own un-freedom. As iek claims, We feel free because we lack the very language to articulate our unfreedom.[2] Confronting ones own relation to the Real and to reality is an a priori to the iekian, and it has pedagogical consequences, serving as a threshold or entry point to the heart of the iekian. Before considering whether there is a pedagogical consequence of the iekian, we will examine ieks debate with Alain Badiou over the role of the Master and the Masters discourse in relation to emancipatory political change today.

[1] Adrian Johnstons text, ieks Ontology: A Transcendental Materialist Theory of Subjectivity is notable in this regard as it draws out the unique constellation of Zizeks appropriation of German idealism (Schelling and Hegel) with Lacans metapsychology revealing a consistent thinking of materiality (nature, body, world) as internally inconsistent, shot through with antagonisms, despite the wide array of Zizeks interrogations into popular culture, politics, etc. [2] Fabio Vighis On Zizeks Dialectics: Surplus, Subtraction, Sublimation develops a theory of iek application of the dialectic that places it into context with Marx, Foucault and psychoanalysis. [3] Adam Kotskos Zizeks Theology is an important companion to understanding how one can truly apply the Zizekian to the theological, but it does not provide us with a more all encompassing sense of the Zizekian. [4] Quote from Truth of Zizek [5] La Berge The Truth of Zizek [1] iek interprets the symbolic as always alienated from itself, a position that was held by Lacan in his late work. For iek, the symbolic order does not have an order that controls it, and the problem lies around the existence of the big Other as such. By this stage of his work, the symbolic is itself alienated and thus its Laws function anonymously. iek notes that it is this anonymous order that is the big Other, particularly in the context of our postmodern and post totalitarian societies. [2] Introduction: The Missing Ink, in Welcome to the Desert of the Real!: Five Essays on September 11 and Related Dates (2002), p. 2

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One thought on A Theory of What Constitutes the Heart of the iekian

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noir-realism says: May 21, 2013 at 11:07 am Reblogged this on noir realism and commented: Daniel Tutt of spirit is a bone introduces a new book on iek, iek and Education. Nuanced and calibrated he lays out the parade of scholars succinctly and with his usual aplomb! Looking forward to the reading the new work.