The Subject v. Ego

More From On the Aim and End of Analysis in the Lacanian School by Raul Moncayo.

[T]he unconscious, and [the subject], is best described as no-self. Of the three categories of self, ego, and subject, the subject is the one that best captures the sense of the human subject being something temporary, impermanent, evanescent, and insubstantial. (Emphisis mine)

I like this passage for a few reasons.

• I think that the subject is one of the most important concepts in Lacanian psychoanalysis. I think the subject is another way to describe what Miller has called the "real unconscious," which is different than the Freudian (transferential) unconscious.
• The subject (i.e., real unconscious truth/desire) is what emerges in the lapses, gaps, places where plans breakdown. The analysand as a subject is what interestes a psychoanalyst.
• The subject (i.e. real unconscious) is what remains outside of the imaginary and symbolic attempts to create a consistant socially appropriate self, ego, or personality. We can'te be cured of our subjectivity, but we might learn how to live with it.