the Split Subject

"What isn't resolved by love, remains forever in suspense."

ANNA PERLIN 

The subject of the signifier refers to subjectivity that arises as an effect of concatenating signifiers. This subject ‘exists’, to the extent that its position and identity in the world are articulated via the Other.

The subject of jouissance, by contrast, refers to the libidinous corporeality of being. It designates a state of being that is not (yet) determined by the signifier. The subject of jouissance ‘is’, but does not exist. It designates the human being qua Thing, before it is differentiated by means of the signifier. Its identity and its position in the world are not articulated.

Importantly Lacan conceptualizes the relationship between the Other and the subject of jouissance in dialectical terms. This means that in the tension between jouissance and Other an Aufhebung or upheaval is realized, which gives rise to a new component of subjectivity: the object a.

The object a is a component of libidinous corporeality that is created by using signifiers, but that is not represented by means of the signifier. It is an element of being that persists in the subject of the signifier, but is not transformed into Symbolic existence.

Masahisa Fukase