The Logic of Sexuation: From Aristotle to Lacan

by Ellie Ragland

Overview

Challenges essentialist notions of gender through a detailed account of Lacan's theories of gender, sexuality, and sexual difference.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780791485149
Publisher:	State University of New York Press
Publication date:	09/18/2009
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	947 KB

About the Author

Ellie Ragland is Professor of English and Literary Theory at the University of Missouri. She is the author or editor of several books, including, Critical Essays on Jacques Lacan.

Table of Contents

Preface and Acknowledgments

1. "On the Signification of the Phallus" (1958) According to Lacan

2. Freud's "Female Sexuality" (1931) and "Femininity" (1932): Oedipus Revisited via the Lacanian Pre-Oedipus

3. Feminine Sexuality, or Why the Sexual Difference Makes All the Difference: Lacan's "For a Congress on Feminine Sexuality" (1958)

4. A Rereading of Freud's 1925 Essay: "Some Psychical Consequences of the Anatomical Distinction between the Sexes" through Lacan's Theory of Sexuation

5. The Place of the Mother in Lacanian Analysis: Lacan's Theory of the Object, or Castration Rethought

Conclusion

Notes

Index

Editorial Reviews

The level of [Ragland’s] erudition is impressive and indisputable, and this will contribute towards making this book a point of reference to which many a scholar will turn and return. Sexuality is not where we think it is, and Ragland’s text will revivify the force of this Lacanian belief time and again.” — French Studies

“…easily the best book to date on Lacan’s theories of sexuality, femininity, and sexual difference … will take its place alongside other indispensable and now-classic explications of Lacanian thought … a rewarding and pathbreaking book.” — CHOICE

“Ragland definitively buries the notion of a biological basis to gender for Lacan. More importantly, she places Lacan’s thinking on this subject of sexuality within a logical structure. Whether or not feminist and other critics agree with Ragland’s analysis of Lacan’s theory of sexuation and its importance for the psychic structuration, this book will be the groundbreaking work in the field. It stands as the first complete elucidation of Lacan’s thinking on how gender choices are inscribed in the human psyche.” — Evelyn Moore, Kenyon College

“This is the most insightful and illuminating account in English—and quite possibly in any language—of Lacan’s thinking on gender and sexuality.” — Mark Bracher, coeditor of Lacanian Theory of Discourse: Subject, Structure, and Society

From the Publisher