ABSTRACT
Symbolization, as it has evolved over a century of psychoanalytic writing, has a unique meaning that transcends its cognitive linguistic counterpart. Linguistically, all symbolization involves three components: the symbol or abstract signifier, the thing being signified, and the integration of such in the mind of the interpreting subject. Symbolization is the integration of unformulated affective arousal with formulated spoken language. The notion of arousal as a substrate of symbolization dates back to the beginnings of psychoanalysis. Symbolization is a process of integration through the subject's shift in position towards the object. Symbolic representations are generative as the symbol attained becomes available for new symbolic representations. The internal and the external, the past and the present are all brought together through symbolization, resulting in greater access to unconscious fantasy. Desymbolization implies not simply the absence of the symbolic, but the destruction of the meaning-making process. In symbolization there is differentiation, in desymbolization equivalence.
