design context: Context of Practice: Lecture 1

Psychoanalysis
A: The development of the psyche from birth,
B: The development and role of the Unconscious in our everyday lives,
C: The development of gender identity (psycho-sexual identity),
D: Understanding the complexities of human subjectivity

Psychoanalysis is not only a form of therapy but a study of human subjectivity. Psychoanalysis provides us with a theory of the unconscious, sexuality and the development of the Ego. It can tell us a lot about why we are the way we are giving us insight into our daily goings-on. It can also be a great tool for gathering a greater understanding of Art & Design.

Key Psychoanalysts: Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan, Melanie Klein, Carl Jung, Juliet Mitchell, Luce Irigaray, Julia Kristeva

The Unconscious: Created through infancy to protect our conscious selves from events, ideas and thoughts that are not acceptable to consciousness...Continues to affect our conscious selves in SOME* ways...The unconscious is chaotic, without order and without language...Makes itself present through ticks, slips and symptoms (e.g. Freudian slip)...Hysteria patients developed debilitating symptoms as a result of experiences or feelings that had become repressed.

Stages of development: Our development into willful, conscious beings is full of confusing, contradictory and misapprehended thoughts and ideas...An attempt to make sense of both our biological/instinctual self and our logical/thinking self...We create associations and assumptions through sense data...often incorrectly...The developing child goes through stages: oral, anal and phallic...Also, the child develops preconceptions that must be dealt with in order to develop successfully – oedipus complex, castration complex, penis envy.

Psycho-sexual identity: Oedipus complex – sexual/love feelings towards mother and resentment of father...through childhood dependence...feelings of love, rivalry, jealousy all mixed...confusing feelings ‘to want’ vs. ‘to be wanted’...Development of both masculine and feminine identities in relation to the penis/phallus (having or not having)...Castration complex – the boy fears castration while the girl accepts that she has already been castrated. (the phallus as a symbol of power)...Penis-envy – the girl experiences this when she begins to realise she does not have a penis...not as a sexual organ but a way of identifying with the father-figure...Presence/absence – both create possible negative feelings: the boy fears his castration (his powerlessness) while the girl feels that she is missing something.

The Uncanny: ‘Unhomely’...Something that is simultaneously unnatural yet familiar...Something that was supposed to remain hidden which has come to the open....Where the boundary between fantasy
and reality break down...Unconscious vs. Uncanny

Models of the psyche: Unconscious, Preconscious, Conscious....Id, Ego, Super-Ego

The Mirror Stage (Lacanian): The child’s recognition of itself in reflection (in objects or other people) signifies a split or alienation – it is seen as both subject and other....Rivalry – while the child may recognise it’s own image it is still limited in movement and dexterity....Thus...resulting in the formation of Ego which aids (and continues to aid) a reconciliation of body and image/subject and other....Captation – the process by which the child is at once absorbed and repelled by the image of itself (the specular image)

The Lacanian Unconscious: ‘The unconscious is structured like a language’...That’s not to say that the unconscious has a language but its structure is LIKE a language....The unconscious is the discourse of the Other....Highlighting the ways in which meaning in encoded within linguistic signs – written or spoken words....Unconscious details are encoded in various ways as they slip into consciousness.

The Lacanian Phallus: Not the biological penis but a symbol of power/order attained through its associated LACK – the potential of lack (male) and the actual lack (female)...Masculinity/femininity are not biological definitions but symbolic positions...Our interactions with the symbolic phallus provides a ‘speaking position in culture’ / within the symbolic order - a: relating to the signifying nature of the phallus b: our sexual identity informed through the phallus.

Lacan’s Orders of reality: The Real - That which cannot be symbolised/signified...Where our most basic, animal selves exist. The Imaginary - The order which exists before symbols and signification...Where the Ego is born and continues to develop...No clear distinctions between self and others/subject and object. The Symbolic - ‘The order of the Other’...Exists outside ourselves – language exists before and outside of us...The order that allows us to exist within a culture of others.

Slide List:

Max Ernst – Collages (title unknown), c1930s Victor Burgin – The Bridge, 1984 (detail of a series) Rene Magritte – The Red Model, 1937
Louise Bourgeois – Spiral Woman, 1952
Further Reading:
Freud, S. (1962) Sigmund Freud: Five Lectures on psychoanalysis. London: Penguin Books
Freud, S. (1976) The Interpretation of dreams. London: Penguin Books
Grosz, E. (1990) Jacques Lacan: A feminist Introduction. London: Routledge
Lacan, J (2001) Ecrits: A selection. London: Routledge
Wright, E. (2000) Lacan and postfeminism. London: Postmodern encounters

Slide 1: Psychoanalysis

psyche from birth
role of unconscious in everyday life
gender identity
human subjectivity
development of a form of therapy
what it is to be human - the subject is us - identities/personalities/what desire etc
understanding desire, motivation, dreams
adopted by designers/artists
establishes we are not entirely in control of what we do

Slide 2: Sigmund Freud

1890's
hysteria patients suffer from anxiety/depression etc. - they developed physical symptoms to there suppression
infants - relationship with there patients
oedipus story

Slide 3: The Dynamic Unconscious

events, ideas, thoughts that are not acceptable to consciousness/society
contains everything were not meant to think/feel in social order
contains everything not for are unconscious
not directly accessible by us
suppressed thoughts
no language - chaos in the mind
certain connection to conscious
present through ticks, slips and symptoms
most obvious in hysteria patients

Freudian Slip:

A Freudian slip is a verbal or memory mistake that is believed to be linked to the unconscious mind. Common examples include an individual calling his or her spouse by an ex's name, saying the wrong word or even misinterpreting a written or spoken word.

"Two factors seem to play a part in bringing to consciousness the substitutive names: first, the effort of attention, and second, and inner determinant which adheres to the psychic material," Freud suggested in his book. "Besides the simple forgetting of proper names there is another forgetting which is motivated by repression," Freud explained (1901). According to Freud, unacceptable thoughts or beliefs are withheld from conscious awareness, and these slip help reveal what is hidden in the unconscious.

http://psychology.about.com/od/sigmundfreud/f/freudian-slip.htm

Slide 4: Stages of Development

development full of confusing contradictory and miss apprehended thoughts and ideas
attempt to make sense of our biological/instinctual self and logical/thinking self
infant has a lot of things to work out eg. emotions /body
Stages: oral, anal and phallic
develops preconceptions must be dealt with to develop successfully - oedipus complex, castration complex, penis envy

Oedipus complex, in psychoanalytic theory, a desire for sexual involvement with the parent of the opposite sex and a concomitant sense of rivalry with the parent of the same sex; a crucial stage in the normal developmental process. The term derives from the Theban hero Oedipus of Greek legend, who unknowingly slew his father and married his mother; its female analogue.

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/425451/Oedipus-complex

Castration complex : a child's fear or delusion of genital injury at the hands of the parent of the same sex as punishment for unconscious guilt over oedipal strivings; broadly : the often unconscious fear or feeling of bodily injury or loss of power at the hands of authority

http://www.merriam-webster.com/medical/castration%20complex

Penis envy,

literally, female envy of the male penis, but generally a female wish for male attributes, position, and advantages. It is believed by some psychologists to be a significant factor in female personality development.

http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/penis+envy

Slide 5: Pshyo-sexual identity

Oedipus complex - feelings of love, rivalry, jealously all mixed - confusing feelings 'to want' vs. 'to be wanted'
development of masculine and feminine identities
understand our bodies and others - sexualities
infant doesn't understand emotions its having - places over affections and resents father
own sexual identity all in relation to the penis - the boy noticing girls don't have a penis think they are constructed and fears it happen to them - identifies with father
girls assumes its been castrated by mother and relates to father - feels like its missing something
negative feelings towards mothers

Slide 6: Pshyco- sexual identity

overcome these to gain a sexual identity and position within order of language and society
misconceived ideas of gender/power/identity work unconsciously throughout our lives
child has to overcome this happy & unhealthily
Dreams - symbolically refer to childhood experiences

Slide 7: The Uncanny

Unnatural but familiar
something supposed to remain hidden which has come open
fantasy and reality break down
uncomfortable/uneasy
used in horror films - create bodies from unnatural yet familiar rather than out of this world
surrealists arts - elements of familiar but surrealised

Slide 8: Freudian models

ID, ego, superego
Unconscious, preconscious, conscious

Slide 9: Unconscious, preconscious, conscious

Unconscious - hidden repressed
Preconscious - stored knowledge memories
Conscious - personality identity

Slide 10: ID, ego, superego

ID - biological/ instinct, pleasure principle,unconscious primary process
Ego - conscious - secondary process
Superego - Part in ourselves in relation to others, social order and language
'spaces' - conflict each other

Slide 11: Jacques Lacan

Philosophy - complex language
stole phrases/used slang/swore
human psyche is chaos/contradictory
reconceptualises Freuds ides
subordinate to language or we are not language
theoretical model of structural linguistics - signification

Slide 12: The Mirror Stage

Child recognises own reflection
themselves in other people
creates a split - state of alienation
originally was centre of everything
ego and rivalry
creates personality - morals/identity to fill the gap
captation - visual state as child sees image of itself (who am i?)

Slide 13: Lacanian Unconscious

structured like a language
unconscious is the discourse of the Other
words/signs/sounds translate into concepts
Other - the superego in yourself
unconscious details encoded in various ways as they slip into conscious

Slide 14: Metaphor/Metonymy

Symptom like a metaphor unconscious idea translated to physical symptom
Metonymy - pushes meaning along a chain of similar associations
displaced desire we felt in our infancy which can't be fulfilled

Slide 15: Lancanian Phallus

symbol of power/order through associated LACK
Men experience potential lack
females experience actual lack
identity within culture - 'speaking position' within symbolic order

Slide 16: The 'orders' of reality

The Real - basic animalistic self, cannot be symbolised/signified
The Imaginary - order which exists before symbols and signification, ego is born and develops, no clear distinction between self and others
The Symbolic - language and rules, exist outside of ourselves, order that allows us to exist within a culture of others

Slide 17: Psychoanalysis and art criticism/theory

human subjectivity - what it is to be human, motivation, desires, unconscious
help to understand why things are as they are
help to understand artists/designers motivations for creating
Model-based theory/paradigm - deeper about things elements are conscious/unconscious whats outside influences

Slide 18: Edward Bernays

used the psycho to sell things through desire
a lifestyle
sketchy characters
he applied knowledge of psychoanalysis to advertising and PR campaigns
manipulation techniques - embedding desire in products
'Torches of Freedom'

"Torches of Freedom" was a phrase used to encourage women’s smoking during the women’s liberation movement in the United States. Cigarettes were described as symbols of emancipation and equality with men. The term was first used by psychoanalyst A. A. Brill when describing the natural desire for women to smoke and was used by Edward Bernays to encourage women to smoke in public despite social taboos. Bernays hired women to march while smoking their “torches of freedom” in the Easter Sunday Parade of 1929 which was a significant moment for fighting social barriers for women smokers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torches_of_Freedom