ABSTRACT
A rereading of Civilization and its Discontents will help us understand the nature and reason of society's malaise. Sigmund Freud equates discontent with what he calls a sense of guilt. According to Freud, guilt feelings stem from civilisation's demands upon the subject's simultaneous surrender of the drive and the drive's demand for satisfaction. As civilisation's leftovers, gaze and voice, devoid of any demand signifier representations, are objects that both represent desire. James Cameron's blockbuster film Titanic illustrates jouissance's tidal overflow and the signifier's inability to completely contain it. The established order and organisation—social/class boundaries—are clearly marked in first class and steerage. The field of jouissance is, primarily, a linguistically structured conceptual and operational field. Moreover, jouissance spins its web with the thread of discourses, which are among its many toys and tools. Freud brilliantly describes the surveillance and legislative functions of the superego in "On Narcissism: An Introduction".
