This book presents a theory of autistic subjectivity from a Lacanian psychoanalytic perspective. Dr. Brenner describes autism as a singular mode of being that is fundamentally linked to ones identity and basic practices of existence, offering a rigorous alternative to treating autism as a mental or physical disorder. Drawing on Freud and Lacans psychoanalytic understanding of the subject, Brenner outlines the unique features of the autistic subjective structure and provides a comprehensive synthesis of contemporary work on the psychoanalysis of autism.
The book examines research by theorists including Jean-Claude Maleval, Éric Laurent, Rosine and Robert Lefort that has been largely unavailable to Anglophone audiences until now. In this book autism is posited to be a singular subjective structure not reducible to neurosis or psychosis. In accordance with the Lacanian approach, autism is examined with detailed attention to the subjects use of language, culminating in Brenners autistic linguistic spectrum. A compelling read for students and scholars of psychoanalysis and autism researchers and clinicians.
Introduction by Jean-Claude Maleval.- Part I: Subjectivity
Negativity.- Chapter
1. Autism as a Mode of Being.- Chapter
2. Exclusion as a
Constitutive Feature of the Subject.- Part II: Neurotic Repression and
Psychotic Foreclosure.- Chapter 3: Repression and the Neurotic
Subject.- Chapter 4: Foreclosure and the Psychotic Subject.- Part III: The
Autistic Subject.- Chapter 5: Autistic Foreclosure in the Model of
Repression.- Chapter 6: The Object of Autistic Foreclosure.- Chapter 7: The
Autistic Linguistic Spectrum.- Chapter 8: Autism as a Singular Subjective
Structure.
Leon S. Brenner is a research fellow at the University of Potsdam, Institute for Philosophy, Germany. His fields of interest include Lacanian psychoanalysis, philosophy of mind, contemporary French philosophy and autism research.
