ABSTRACT
Chapter Five follows Nicos Nicolaïdis as he takes a look at perception as a substitute for symbolisation. If the early object imposes itself in a form in which its oppressive sensory presence makes separation difficult, the groundwork of future disorganisation is being laid. Is there, Nicolaïdis asks, an early perceptive-sensorial force field that provides a primitive voltage supply for the organisation of an as yet fragmentary self - the mosaïque prèmiere hypothesised by Marty - a force field which, if unduly strong and protracted, impedes hallucination and the onset of the imaginary? In contrast to Lacan, Nicolaïdis does not believe that we are faced with invariant structures as a universal given. Nicolaïdis makes the point that it does matter to what inner space the individual can regress, and what mental infrastructure is available to the individual to process his/her inner stirrings. Transmitted by the mother's culture the elements provided, which - if things work out well - can be freely combined like the letters of an alphabet to form larger units of meaning, are important in weaning the child off the earlier dyad.
