ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the work of French psychoanalysts Jacques Lacan, Luce Irigaray and Julie Kristeva in order to evaluate their contributions to the understanding of lesbianism. Feminists are attracted to Lacan's work because he acknowledges cultural issues, linking subjectivity, sexuality and language in a way that, for example, Kleinian analysts do not. The chapter examines the paradoxes of his theory and, in particular, the contradictions between his claims for the precariousness of subjectivity and identity and his maintenance of a binary gender identification. The exposition of Lacan's account of language, the unconscious, and the practice of analysis is particularly important in the light of the unfamiliarity of his theories to many British analysts and therapists. Lacanian analysis might appear to be an appealing prospect for lesbians, gay men, heterosexual men and women who want to find happier lives through working with an analyst but do not want endless interpretations of their sexuality as 'the root of the problem'.
