ABSTRACT
The itinerary of various moments in Lacan begins with a discussion of the concept of 'the big Other' within the context of inter-subjective communication. One of the disciplinary areas that influenced Lacan's early work was communications theory. The Lacanian insistence on the necessary disjuncture between statement and enunciation may appear unfounded, certainly so from the ego's perspective on its own linguistic productions. There is a specific analytical device that Lacanian theory offers in respect of the conceptualization of communication. Drawing on the inspiration of earlier diagrammatic portrayals of the communicative process, Lacan devised a rudimentary schema with which he hoped to differentiate the noise of everyday imaginary speech from the disruptive potential of a form of symbolic speech. The chapter explores how many of the commonplace conceptualizations of communication might be challenged by a theorization that allows for no purely 'intra-psychic' life beyond the horizon of the symbolic.
