Lacan, and the symptoms of educational ideology.

Lacan, and the symptoms of educational ideology. ES2407 The Art of Learning

The introductory text to the illustrations of lacanian fantasy discussed the idea of thinking about society as though it were a person, generating images and figures as social fantasies - symptoms of ‘its’ mass ideological formations. The task now is to search for symptoms that might reasonably be associated with education. We will do this by thinking about ideology in general, and then employ a number of classical myths to tease out those ideologies that seem central to education.

The last chapter in Zizek’s The Plague of Fantasies is entitled, ‘Cyberspace, or, the unbearable closure of being’. In the first section he discusses the notion of symptom in relation to social ideologies. His starting point is the absolute nature of ideology itself. Once it is implemented, its particular principle of formation runs through every instance of content – think of ideology as being like a frame. So, within it, the issue of whether or not a particular content is present or not is contingent – and of no significance to the maintenance of the ideological domain itself, or a threat to its universal truth.

But to quote Zizek, • ‘A symptom, however, is an element which – although the non-realisation of the universal principle in it appears to hinge on contingent circumstances – has to remain an exception, that is, the point of suspension of the universal principle: if the universal principle were to apply to this point, the universal system itself would disintegrate.’

Think of feminism’s advance. In every instance the assumptions of an exclusive masculinity – in respect of deity, kingship, wisdom, intellectual prowess, and even the warrior virtues – have had to eventually accommodate the presence of women as symptom. Such symptoms appear as either ‘tokens’ satisfying some higher, extra-ideological principle, or else appear in disguise – as compromised forms of femininity which avoid overt conflict with the universal principle. As Zizek indicates, the alternative – full acceptance of their status as women – leads to the collapse of the prior ideological system, i.e., the combination of universal principle and contingent content – now seen to be not so contingent as all that. In effect, then, the symptom is a necessity generated by the ideological structure itself.

To further illustrate this example we need some sexualised ‘symptoms’ to think with, and since this is such a central aspect of contemporary society, it’s reasonable to ask if our education system responds in a particular way. In fact does it even recognise the difficulties faced by those who are expected to act as ‘tokens’, or those who are condemned to fulfil patriarchal assumptions of femininity? And if it doesn’t, what does this tell you about its ideology?

I. Athena - goddess of wisdom, justice, civilisation, strategic warfare, the female arts, and the virgin patron of Athens. She is the daughter of Metis, a Titan, whom Zeus swallowed after coupling with her so as to avoid a prophesy that their progeny would be greater than himself. But Metis was already pregnant and gave birth to Athena inside Zeus. Later, suffering from a terrible headache, Zeus asked Hephaestus to split open his forehead, from which Athena burst forth fully armed with weapons given to her by her mother.

II. Pandora - first woman and the origin of evil. Her name means ‘all-gifted’, since each god gave her a unique gift to add to her seductive charms. Zeus had ordered Hephaestus to mould her out of earth as a ‘beautiful evil’ – to balance the benefits of fire given to men by Prometheus. Epimetheus, his brother, accepted her as a wife – despite Prometheus’ warning. For her dowry she brought a jar holding all the evils of the world, and once on Earth she opened it, releasing them, until only hope remained inside.

Clearly, Athena is no token! But, nevertheless, her femininity is disguised so as to match a still dominant patriarchy. She has an almost masculine face, and any obviously feminine or maternal physical qualities are hidden by her clothing and military equipment. Not only does she carry a spear and shield, she also wears a helmet and chest armour that presents the head of a gorgon. She has no lovers, is a virgin, and even as an adoptive mother her ‘son’ is always represented as a serpent. Finally, and perhaps of most significance, her birth ‘mother’ is Zeus, the father of the gods. The principal fantasy at play here seems to be what Zizek calls the ‘impossible gaze’ – the narrative creation of a self-witnessed moment of ‘birth’ to account for the reconfiguration of the symbolic order that she herself bring about – to some degree. She is emblematic of a state of transition.

Given the history of the Twentieth Century, it is remarkable that even towards the end of that century our education system offered no information about an experience that half the school population were likely to face at some time during their working lives. Today, the problem has not gone away; and arguably, it is even more of a requirement than before. The remaining ‘bastions’ of masculine exclusiveness are deeply entrenched, while many areas of apparent sexual equality still resist the breaking of their own ‘glass ceilings’. Men also are beginning to experience equivalent transitions as they enter work places previously assumed to be exclusively ‘feminine’, such as nursing and infant education.

If education’s silence about transitional experience is surprising, its silence with respect to the implications of the Pandora figure is deafening: she figures in the education of every pupil, be they male or female, beautiful or plain, accepting or rejecting their implied social role. As the seductive bringer of evil she is neither token nor transitional form. Her first ‘veil’ of fantasy is the transcendental schematism of desire – teaching men how to desire and women how to be desirous. Her second veil is the inter-subjective. Here, she introduces the mysteries, risks, and specific co-ordinations within the symbolic order intrinsic to gendered inter-subjectivity. Her own entry into this order is as the carrier of the Real – the troubles and confusions which irrupt through the ordered surfaces of the world. And, finally, hope itself is her agalma, that within her which is greater than herself.

Athena and Pandora offer simplified ideological figures/models which can be used to tease out the ideologies and symptoms associated with education under patriarchy. As we have just seen, we drew two blanks which were highly significant because of their relevance to society and experience in general, and yet the official education system ignores them – what is this telling us about the nature of this education?

The next set of figures provides us with insight into the ideologies of teaching itself. Note that here we recapitulate many of the risks associated with the psychoanalytic ‘transference’. The most obvious aspect of this is the assumption that the ‘good’ teacher will make enlightened interventions – and so, to the Master’s workshop!

III. Pygmalion was a sculptor who lived on an island where the women had rejected the deity of Aphrodite. In response, she made all the women permanently promiscuous – and Pygmalion began to live alone. He dreamt of a perfect woman, and to relieve his loneliness he made a statue of his fantasy. He loved it - and dressed it in precious clothes and jewels. Taking pity on him, Aphrodite gave life to his statue.

The ideology for which Pygmalion may figure as model is not simply one keen to police any impropriety between teacher and pupil – refer to Socrates in his Symposium. It features instead the risk of any pupil-teacher relationship - one in which the teacher is given licence to transgress the respect for separate identities normally accorded to private individuals. (The phrase, ‘in loco parentis’, is often used as an epithet for much that is unusual about public schooling.) Pygmalion’s ideal statue implies that although this process will result in a new ‘life’ for the pupil, it will be one determined by the teacher according to his/her desire. Cf. Michaelangelo: I find and release forms hidden in the stone.

In lacanian terms, rather than the teacher acting as a specialised token for symbolic authority, s/he has allowed herself to regress to the realm of the Imaginary - subverting her pupil’s entry into the symbolic – offering herself as the authority – the Other – one ruthlessly searching for its own image reflected in the responses of its ideal students. This is in opposition to working ‘through’ the pupil’s transference so as to eventually release their individuality. (See, for example, The Prime of Miss Jean Brody, but also The Dead Poets Society.) Recall also that narratives impose temporal distance between contradictions existing within the same context, imposing a before and after, allocating victory to one side and defeat to the other. The myth of Pygmalion tells of how godliness might be rewarded, but Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein offers an ironic riposte.

IV. Ariadne, daughter of King Minos of Crete, has a half-brother – the Minotaur: half man, half beast – trapped in Daedalus’ labyrinth. Her other brother is killed in Athens - Minos attacks, defeats the city, and demands that it sends seven youths and seven maidens every nine years to Crete as sacrifice to his other son. Theseus, future ‘father’ of the new Athens, joins the victims. Ariadne falls in love on first sight and plots his escape. Before the sacrifice, she leads him to the labyrinth, giving him a sword and spindle of thread. Using these, Theseus kills the monster and escapes from Crete with Ariadne, but later abandons her on Naxos.

Clearly, we witness another moment of birth – and a different model of the ‘good’ teacher. In this, Ariadne appears at first sight to act as both self-sacrificing guardian and guide to her pupil-hero, Theseus, who will follow her lead through love, but then discard her. But we know that narratives typically transcribe co-present contraries into a before-and-after structure, so the direct reading of this myth is that the triumph of Theseus over the Minotaur conceals two opposing ideas. Both the monster (Ariadne’s half-brother) and the future-hero are products of the co-mingling of gods and mortals - even sharing the same godly ‘father’: Poseidon.

So it is more accurate to think of the Minotaur as a shadow image or negation of Theseus – its singular bestiality matching his heroism. Consider, then, Ariadne’s spindle of red thread; the gender associations are clear (and didn’t Socrates describe himself as a ‘midwife’?), Equally, knots and thread have always been associated with problems and their solution. The labyrinth is both complex knot and problem: Theseus must solve them both; but this will involve self-mutilation – his ‘shadow’ must die so that a new self-image can shine more brightly. On this reading, progress will involve no more than the denial of ‘base’ impulses, etc.

The lacanian conclusion is more daunting than this suggests. The price of progress is not simply the denial of some part of the self. With each step upward and forward, the pupil-hero’s shadow shifts – and as it does so both the labyrinth and the Minotaur also change their nature. Ariadne (the teacher) is less a guide than a guardian, and less a guardian than a messenger of constant difference: ‘Here heroism will find no final resting place – other than your final fall.’

The next two models help to make explicit further complexities in the pupil-teacher relationship. Both Phaedra and Medea have served as the central protagonists in many plays, novels, musical works, and in the case of Phaedra, a film. There are, therefore, for the first time, versions that can be chosen to match one’s analytic focus. Each figure presents a married woman with children who is provoked to question the stability of her marriage. In each case, the response is extreme.

V. Phaedra is another daughter of Minos and Pasiphae. She marries Theseus and has two sons by him, and also becomes mother to Hippolytus, Theseus’ son by a previous marriage. The simplest version of the myth has Phaedra falling in love with her step-son, who spurns her. In revenge, she tells Theseus that Hippolytus raped her. Theseus responds by calling on his father, Poseidon, to kill the youth. The god sends a huge bull from out of the sea which stampedes Hippolytus’ horses as he passes in his chariot. He is pulled into the reins and dragged to his death. On hearing of this, Phaedra kills herself in guilt and remorse.

VI. Medea uses magic to help Jason win the Golden Fleece, and helps him to escape with her by killing one of her own brothers. She becomes Jason’s wife, and bears him two sons. Later, he discards her so that he can marry a younger and more respected princess. Medea responds by killing the princess, the girl’s father, and then her two sons before fleeing to Athens.

As with Pygmalion, there are explicit sexual relationships in both myths that can limit the scope of application, but if these are put to one side, one has a powerful analytic model to think with. In the case of Phaedra, the obvious response is to take the educational interpretation as a warning against excessive emotional attachment on the part of a teacher for any of the children in their charge. More developed versions of the myth move matters further on. Hippolytus is said to spurn Aphrodite, goddess of erotic love and sexual beauty, preferring to remain a virgin devoted to Apollo’s twin sister, Artemis, goddess of the hunt and of nature, a virgin herself but also goddess of birth and nurture. It is therefore Aphrodite who fills Phaedra with lust for Hippolytus, in revenge for her rejection; and Phaedra spends the rest of what remains of her life trying to fight against this enforced desire.What is striking in this revised figuration is that both the ‘teacher’ and the ‘pupil’ suffer because they reject the entry of love – however understood - into their relationship.

Our interest in a wider sense of education may therefor suggest an analysis in which both ‘teacher’ and ‘pupil’ are seen to be at fault in refusing the changes to themselves that will be brought about through mutual affection. The idea of a more experienced woman entering into a positive sexual relationship with a less experienced younger man is still in the process of becoming acceptable in literature and film, e.g. The Graduate . But there are many examples where relative equality, often despite the patriarchal norm of rejection, becomes the eventual basis for mutual growth, e.g. Pride and Prejudice, North and South, and even Women in Love. But the myth of Phaedra is, in fact, set in motion by the pupil’s initial offence: Hippolytus rejects the power of love, and the myth continues to circle around this fact. Transcribing this, the pupil rejects desire – his/her lack – as a source of radical change to self. Both Freud and Lacan think all desire is, ultimately, a desire to be loved, so analysis starts here – leading, perhaps, to Narcissus.

There are a number of variations to the myth of Medea. The story of filicide seems to have been Euripedes’ own invention, but it has become a constant feature since then. The general assessment of the relationship between Jason and Medea is as follows: this is a story that starts with treachery and murder, and ends with suspicion, jealousy, and merciless revenge. You should know by now, however, to start your own analysis by placing the more striking aspects of a myth in brackets – releasing them selectively as your transcription proceeds. N.B. some versions have focussed on how Medea has little choice but to kill her sons since their fate – if Jason denies their inheritance – will be exile, death, or slavery. Various transcriptions suggest themselves based on this, but start by making Jason the teacher, Medea the pupil, and her children Jason’s ‘teachings’. Now reverse this to get the feminist reading, and try ‘teachings’ = poison!

The last illustrative models feature the idea of educational trajectories. Plato’s The Death of Socrates illustrates the rise and apparent ending of a quest for wisdom, while Oedipus is used by both Freud and Lacan to model the transition of the child from family to society. We consider here a question raised in the notes on Freud for Education, Social, and Political Thought: does the myth of Oedipus adequately express feminine experience of this transition?

VII. Oedipus. King Laius and Queen Jocasta of Thebes are warned that if their child is allowed to become an adult it will murder his father and marry his mother. The king orders the child’s feet to be pinned together and the infant abandoned. It is rescued by a shepherd, and later adopted as the son of another King and Queen. As a youth, Oedipus is warned he will kill his father and marry his mother, so he flees his home. On his travels he meets an elderly stranger, they quarrel, and Oedipus kills him. Oedipus reaches Thebes – besieged by a monster, the Sphinx.

The monster eats anyone who cannot answer its riddle: which animal has 4 feet in the morning, 2 at midday, and 3 in the evening? Oedipus replies that it is Man, the Sphinx screams in fury, and vanishes back into an abyss. Oedipus becomes the hero of Thebes, and he marries the recently widowed Queen, (his own mother) Jocasta. They reign in peace for some ten years and have a number of children together – then plagues break out in the city. The famous prophet, Tiresius, is called. He declares that the plague will only end when the murderer of King Laius, Jocasta’s previous husband and Oedipus’ father is found. Oedipus turns ruthless detective and soon the old shepherd who had originally rescued him is discovered.

The shepherd’s testimony, and other evidence, point conclusively towards Oedipus himself as the murderer. Jocasta, both his queen and mother, runs into the palace and hangs herself in their bedroom. Oedipus blinds himself with her clasp as he accepts his own guilt. He begs that he be banished from Thebes, but one daughter from his incestuous marriage volunteers to accompany him as a guide; she is called Antigone.

Analysis of the Oedipus myth as a model of an educational trajectory will take place in the lecture. As you now know, as far as feminine experience of individual agency is concerned, the shift from family to society is theorised as being dominated by the recognition of lack. For Freud it is the literal lack of a penis that drive’s the young girl to eventually become reconciled to her physical castrated state: for Lacan, castration is shifted to the Symbolic Register, but he also thinks that a woman’s ability to exercise agency within this realm is always dependent on being able to co-opt forms of masculine agency. One of Freud’s followers, C. G. Jung, suggested that the myth of Electra could provide a more suitable model for feminine experience. We therefore end this PowerPoint with a summary of the Electra myth that will be used in discussion.

VIII. Electraplots with Orestes, her brother, to kill her mother, Clytemnestra and Aegithus, her step-father, for murdering her actual father, Agamemnon. This murder is itself prompted by the fact that Agamemnon sacrificed his oldest daughter, Iphigenia, in order to get Artemis to allow him and his fleet to leave Athens and sail to Troy, thus beginning the Trojan war. Electra and Orestes succeed in their plan, but then have to atone for their shameful act by purifying their souls. (By far the strongest version is developed by Sophocles.)

A Reminder The following sequence of developmental experiences seems to be well established: primary bonding with the mother or principal care-giver, corresponding to sensation being organised around the mouth. Subsequently this moves to control of the faeces and the anus, and at about the age of 4 – 5 attention shifts to exploring the genitals and the pre-sexual pleasure they can generate; the child also becomes intensely curious about any observed differences in genital anatomy between individuals during this ‘phallic’ stage. Rather than at adolescence, then, psychoanalysts locate the Oedipus Complex at this early time within the individual’s life. Essentially, the ‘complex’ amounts to that experiential process by which the individual comes to associate themselves with the same-sex individual within the family setting, and at the same time relinquishing any thoughts of competing against this same half of the partnership for the love of the opposite partner, accepting, therefore ex-familial heterosexual social relationships, and initiating the formation of a super-ego modelled on the ‘law-giving’ capacity of the same-sex partner. Both sexes start by loving the mother. In the case of boys, what then drives this process is the fear of castration by the father. Girls come to recognise they lack a penis (‘penis envy’) and therefore cannot compete against the father for their mother’s attention. Initially, they blame their mothers for this assumed imperfection, but later become reconciled with their mothers through the formation of a superego, i.e., they come to accept their ‘castrated’ state and re-direct their affection towards the father or father-substitute. D.M.B. 2011.

Lacan, and the symptoms of educational ideology.