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dialectic” of the symbolic realm of the third, The Other, ‘in’ the transference is close to the interpersonal and relational emendations to classical psychoanalysis. Another important aspect of Lacan’s thoughts on transference concerns technique. For Lacan, there is no ‘meta’ position the analyst can assume in relation to the transference. When the analysand hears what the analyst says, he hears it ‘in’ the transference to the analyst, namely, through whatever particular subjective position he or she may be occupying in the unfolding of the analysis. This challenges many ideas concerning the interpretation of the transference, especially when done from an external vantage point. It also raises a question about the ‘dissolution’ of the transference via interpretation. For Lacan, transference takes place whenever “the subject supposed to know” arises, meaning the love, hate, and ignorance that develop in the face of those to whom we attribute knowledge. This is why it happens most readily with teachers, religious figures, doctors and psychoanalysts; namely with parental figures in positions of power. What distinguishes analysts, and differentiates interpretation from suggestion, is that the analyst does not abuse this transfer to him/her by the patient. The very frame of analysis allows this supposed knowledge to be seen not as a particular property of an individual, but rather a knowledge ‘in’ the unconscious, in the Other, that can be unpacked, becoming part of the evolution of an analysis. Lacan describes this movement in terms of the feeling the analysand has that the all- powerful analyst knows something about their symptoms, allowing a treatment to begin and gain traction. We might think of this as the imaginary and projective aspects of the ‘benign positive transference’ - the therapeutic alliance. The analyst’s neutrality helps contain the patient’s developing anxious preoccupation with the analyst’s desire, e.g., What does the analyst want from me? Does the analyst love me? And so on. Finally, the analysis transforms this focus on the analyst’s desire into questions that concern the analysand’s own desires and fantasies; work that will make up a series of important encounters with the conditions of desiring that are unique and singular to each patient. When the patient can let the analyst fall from the special place he/she occupied in the transference, the analysis can end. In essence, the analyst becomes the loved and lost object (cause of desire), allowing the patient to separate and individuate. Lacan’s position on the ending of the analysis thus comes close to classical notions of ‘identification’ with the ‘analytic function’ or the ‘analyzing instrument’, mourning, working-through, and the capacity for self- analysis after termination. V. B. Lacan in the USA Although there is no coherent group of USA Lacanians, his influence is especially present in academe where some have observed that a “psychoanalytic approach” is synonymous with the application of Lacanian thinking. But there is also a small and increasingly influential group of practicing and theorizing Lacanian psychoanalysts. Some among these represent a more “pure” Lacanian position (e.g., Lichtenstein, Fink) while others who have had both “classical” and Lacanian training (e.g., Webster) engage in dialogue with
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