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Buy Peter’s books and all the books mentioned on/related to this episode via my booklist for AEWCH 167 on bookshop.org! The site sources from independent bookstores in the US, not a big corporate shipping warehouse where the workers are treated like machines. Plus when you click through here to order, the show gets a small affiliate kickback!
Interested in Lacan? Sign up for my patreon at the $10 level or higher to join me + other patrons for a live discussion on Lacanian analysis on October 30th!
Friends,
The core of AEWCH is the spiritualization of the material. That is, I want to present a truly non-materialist way of viewing the world, where spirituality is seen as the wellspring of existence, and informs how we talk about ourselves, politics, economy, art, and more. But to that end, I’m not just inspired by spiritual thinkers. Instead, I draw on the work of humanistic philosophers, dialectical materialists, political theorists, atheists, and more.
One of the thinkers I’ve learned the most from is French psychoanalyst and philosopher Jacques Lacan (1901- 1981). I think Lacan’s work has tremendous potential to be leveraged as a spiritual project (despite most Lacanian’s protestations!), particularly in its formulation of its three clinical diagnoses: Neurosis, Perversion, and Psychosis. That’s it. Just three. And they can all be used in radical ways to affect culture/politics/economy. But Lacan is notoriously hard to understand. So I invited my friend, theologian and philosopher Peter Rollins, back on the show to break down Lacanian psychoanalysis in an understandable and clear way.
Peter is the most AEWCH of AEWCH guests, with this being his fifth appearance on the show – we also talked on AEWCH 14, AEWCH 55, and AEWCH 70 (with Todd McGowan), and AEWCH 135 (with Elliot Morgan).
That’s because Peter is one of my most important provocateurs; we agree on so much and so little all at once. For me, talking with Peter is electrifying, fun, and friendly.Of course, Peter and I are friends so we wander out into the jargon-y weeds from time to time, but we always pull it back! This is as good a place as any to get your Lacanian start.
SHOW NOTES
• Support Peter’s patreon here. He gives tons of content to patrons. And listen to his great religion & psychoanalysis podcast (with Elliot Morgan), The Fundamentalists; some recommended episodes are “Success,” “Socialism,” “Fascism,” and “New Normal.” But you can really just start anywhere.
• One of the best resources on Lacan is nosubject.com, which is basically a wiki for all things psychoanalysis, particularly Lacanian psychoanalysis.
• For a look at how standard psychotherapy diagnoses models differ from psychoanalytic ones, here an article using depression as the example: “The Failings of Depression: A Review of Lacanian Psychoanalytic Critiques“
• Some other psychoanalysis-oriented episodes of the show not featuring Peter include AEWCH 162 with Dr. Gwen Adshead, AEWCH 101 with Katherine Angel, and AEWCH 47 with Todd McGowan.
Until next time, friends,
XO
CH
