Glossary

 

Real - Imaginary - Symbolic

 

 

These three notions are

among the most elementary

of anthropic life.

Or of the life of the 'subject'.

 

One could even say that they are inaugural.

 

It is Jacques Lacan,

in his arche-scientific work

on the anthropic condition

who pointed them out.

They are the basis

of this anthropic condition. 

 

They are also essential

for the notion of architecture

that we defend in this site

and in our writings.

 

*

 

We recall this position

in order to understand the necessity

to understand these terms.

 

Architecture

establishes

just out of the Real

a first dis-position of matter

-dis-position named space-

for the first wel Being

(not well-being)

of the subject

that it, the Real,

has there.

 

or

-Badiou's dazzling synthesis-

 

Architecture

should be

the violent interval

between

the Real and the Symbolic.

 

 

*

 

In these two maxims of architecture,

we note the words 'Real' and 'Symbolic'.

The word 'Imaginary' does not appear.

 

We also note that the word 'subject' appears.

 

 

This is important.

because

the notions Real - Imaginary - Symbolic 

have no importance

for the 'non-subject’

who thinks, believes or claims to be

humanist or a priori central to himself.

 

 

So what is the ‘subject'?

 

The word has a double meaning.

 

It can mean 'subject'.

He is then subject to forces or powers that are external to him.

That is to say, it is without its own matter or without its own law of aggregation.

It cannot even be the true subject of a sentence.

We write it subject with a small 's'.

 

On the contrary, it can mean 'capable’

i.e. the anthrope's own matter constituted over time

whereas he is nothing a priori at the start of his life.

It can then be the subject of a sentence

or subject of a verb...

We write it as Subject with a capital 'S'.

 

Our position is that we are at the beginning of our life

subject to the Real that surrounds us,

culture ... family ... society...

And that we can become Subject

through openness and welcomed events

to which we are faithful

thereby establishing ourselves our own truth

 

We do not therefore exist a priori.

At the beginning, at birth,

we are nothing.

 

And we can become Subject

but without certainty

and not by our own means,

since a priori we are devoid of them.

 

This happens  necessarily by events,

that appear in excess of ourselves,

to which without knowing it

we have opened ourselves up and been faithful.

 

And it is this faithfulness to these inaugural events

which finally established us

in our own 'truth' or our own matter.

 

If we use this matter we can become a capable Subject.

 

Many do not become and do not take matter.

They do not go beyond the norm.

They are literally 'proletarians'.

 

But then... :

A priori

the subject does not exist.

He is the intersection of others (Subjects - Culture - Society...)

It can become a Subject

if he has welcomed an event

and has constituted itself in truth

in its matter.

It is then capable.

 

There is therefore no a priori 'human nature'.

 

 

*

 

So...

 

At the beginning,

we must say

to the beginnings

since the beginning is multiple,

 

To the beginnings

the subject

that just is there, while it does not yet exist,

is disposed to the Real

Real where nothing is distinguished a priori.

Real with which nothing seems a priori possible…

 

But

the subject is a question there.

The subject is intrigued there

 

The subject distinguishes

repetitions or insistence

which become laws of aggregation

of relatively finite elements

which he manages to distinguish and associate.

This is the Imaginary:

to detect and distinguish elements

because they are made of internal repetitions of small sub-elements

or insistence

that make them hold together in a law of aggregation.

 

There is no imagination in this.

Imaginary and imagination must not be confused.

 

The imaginary detects or distils in the Real.

And when it has finished, it leaves itself an image.

 

A contract is then made with the Real.

This image is named.

(Grass ... Tree... ...Father ...Mother...

But it can also be articulations

and in that case we get verbs...)

Maybe it starts with onomatopoeia.

 

This contract establishes a Symbol

(‘To symbolon’ in Greek means a contract

accompanied by a something  broken in two

for each of the contracting parties.

In this case, the Real and the Image.

 

The association in their complexity of these distinguished images...

or

this faculty of complex distinction is language (langage in French). 

Language is pronounced afterwards by languages (langues in french) .

 

We have then there,

very primitively for the subject,

these three terms :

Real - Imaginary - Symbolic.

 

They are there a priori...

But it is still necessary ,

for this subject which does not exist a priori,

that these three terms

distinguish themselves well...

Keep a distance.

Do not collapse on each other.

All this is labile.

All the more labile

that for everything that is distinguished and associated,

it is not certain that it is the same for all.

 

These three terms

must remain distinct.

Must remain at a distance

so that the experience can be.

 

And here we understand

experience as ex-perishing.

We ex-perit....

Or ex-perit-mente

 

These three terms

must remain distinct.

Must remain in dis-stance.

And also stand.

Dis-stance is a stance.

 

There has to be a way to the stance.

 

For there to be a stance…

So that everything does not collapse into catatonia.

This distance must be maintained.

There has to be a interval.

 

There has to be an interval

between the Real and the Symbolic

(and thus, of course, also 

between the Real and the Imaginary

as

between the Imaginary and the Symbolic

 

Badiou says, in a flash,

 

What holds in dis-stance

the Real and the Symbolic

is architecture.

 

This is its role

of a primitive arkhè.

 

Architecture should be

the violent interval

between the Real and the Symbolic.

 

This highlights the importance of

of understanding

that we are subject becoming perhaps Subject

and the importance of these three inaugural terms

Real, Imaginary, Symbolic.