Abstract

The thesis of this study is that it is possible to formulate a theory of the subject that does not reduce it to a material basis, linguistic structure or the internalization of an ideology when the subject is conceived of as the subject of discourse, that is, a process of gathering up and transforming the discursive materials of its world. ;The inquiry begins with a reading of Descartes and some later interpretations of Descartes' cogito and philosophical revolution using Barthes' theory of the text and the idea of writerly reading as a preliminary method. The level of psychical reality understood in Freudian terms, will be the terrain of the investigation of the concept of the subject as a discursive process of producing sense. And this reading of Descartes will be an introduction to the psychoanalysis of Lacan through his reading of Descartes. ;The development of the argument is an exploration of the opposition between formalization and interpretation in the history of psychoanalysis and social science. Formalization is related to phenomenology and structuralism as two forms of transcendentalism through a reading of Derrida and interpretation is related to a theory of discursive context and practice. This opposition is used to organize two readings of Freud that attempt to rethink psychoanalysis. ;The role of metaphors such as the process of production is explored as a way of interpreting the subject and discursive processes. Derrida's deconstructive philosophy is employed to understand the place of metaphor in theory and its concept of the trace is compared to that of Freud and Lacan to explore the question of the relation of drives to discourse and to understand the logic of subjective discourse. Freud's theory of sense is interpreted in relation to the analysis of discourse. ;The question of the components of discursive sense are analysed in relation to Freud's topology of the subject and to the social context and effects of discourse. Lacan's analysis of the four fundamental discourse is then used to relate a social science interpretation of this analysis to the theory of the discursive formation and its context of social and power relations