Lacan; from Psychiatry to Psychoanalysis

Abstract

This article takes a turn from the Lacan of his psychiatric beginnings in 1927 to the Lacan of function and the field of language, where he is considered to begin his teaching in 1953. This is one of Lacan's important but perhaps less known periods. First of all, we talk about his psychiatric wanderings, where his main teacher was Gaëtan de Clérembault during his psychiatric phase, recognising him as his only teacher, although he was also influenced by Jaspers and, to a lesser extent, by Freud. From 1936, with his writing «Beyond the reality principle» Lacan's imaginary period begins, in which he will incorporate phenomenology and Freudian psychoanalysis with more and more solidity and importance. Finally, Lacan begins to incorporate not only Freud, but also Heidegger's conception of language, although not yet as a signifier. It will be in 1953, with «Function and field of the word» where he begins his great entry into the symbolic, abandoning his imaginary phase, giving entry to his notion of signifier and finally breaking with phenomenology and Jaspers, and fully integrating Freud, with the so-called return to the founder of psychoanalysis.