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Braindance of the Hikikomori : Towards a Return to Speculative Psychoanalysis

Braindance of the Hikikomori : Towards a Return to Speculative Psychoanalysis <jats:p> This article takes its point of departure from late Lacan's meditations on the incompatibility of psychoanalysis with Japanese culture due to its non-European linguistic basis. The article argues that this emphasis on language narrowly conceived fails to keep pace with the interconnected, multi-media, all-encompassing nature of the unconscious today. Illustrating this point, the article focuses on the figure of the hikikomori: middle-class Japanese youths who have withdrawn from all conventional social contact to indulge exclusively computer-based interactions. Thanks to the overlap with the related figure of the ‘Bedroom DJ’, the analysis then moves on to the ambient music of Richard D. James, aka Aphex Twin. It argues for the validity of the concept of an ‘audio unconscious’ distinct from Lacan's unconscious ‘structured like a language’. The final part of the article, however, examines one of James's music videos and discerns in it modes of jouissance that psychoanalysis can still describe. </jats:p> http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Paragraph Edinburgh University Press

Braindance of the Hikikomori : Towards a Return to Speculative Psychoanalysis

Paragraph , Volume 33 (3): 392 – Nov 1, 2010

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References (2)

Publisher
Edinburgh University Press
Copyright
© Edinburgh University Press 2010
Subject
Literary Studies
ISSN
0264-8334
eISSN
1750-0176
DOI
10.3366/para.2010.0206
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

<jats:p> This article takes its point of departure from late Lacan's meditations on the incompatibility of psychoanalysis with Japanese culture due to its non-European linguistic basis. The article argues that this emphasis on language narrowly conceived fails to keep pace with the interconnected, multi-media, all-encompassing nature of the unconscious today. Illustrating this point, the article focuses on the figure of the hikikomori: middle-class Japanese youths who have withdrawn from all conventional social contact to indulge exclusively computer-based interactions. Thanks to the overlap with the related figure of the ‘Bedroom DJ’, the analysis then moves on to the ambient music of Richard D. James, aka Aphex Twin. It argues for the validity of the concept of an ‘audio unconscious’ distinct from Lacan's unconscious ‘structured like a language’. The final part of the article, however, examines one of James's music videos and discerns in it modes of jouissance that psychoanalysis can still describe. </jats:p>

Journal

ParagraphEdinburgh University Press

Published: Nov 1, 2010

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