Volume II,Issue IV, March 2026
Volume-II, Issue-IV, March, 2026 |
Received: 09.03.2026 | Accepted: 13.03.2026 | ||
Published Online: 31.03.2026 | Page No: | ||
DOI: 10.69655/atmadeep.vol.2.issue.04W. | |||
কজিটোর মৃত্যু: লাঁকানীয় মনোবিশ্লেষণ ও বিষয়-গঠনে চিহ্নকের একাধিপত্য ড. মোঃ নাজমুল হাসান, স্বাধীন গবেষক, শান্তিনিকেতন, পশ্চিমবঙ্গ, ভারত |
The Death of the Cogito: Lacanian Psychoanalysis and the Dominance of the Signifier in Subject Formation Dr. Md. Nazmul Hasan, Independent Research Scholar, Shantiniketan, West Bengal, India | ||
ABSTRACT | ||
The concept of Cogito, ergo sum formulated by René Descartes established one of the most influential foundations of modern Western philosophy. By grounding certainty in the thinking subject, the Cartesian Cogito introduced a model of subjectivity characterized by self-transparency, rational autonomy, and epistemic certainty. This conception of the subject subsequently shaped the intellectual framework of modern science, political liberalism, and humanism. However, twentieth-century theoretical developments, particularly within psychoanalysis and structural linguistics, began to challenge this unified and self-transparent notion of the subject. This paper examines the theoretical displacement of the Cartesian Cogito through the psychoanalytic framework of Jacques Lacan. Building upon the discovery of the unconscious by Sigmund Freud, Lacan reformulates subjectivity through language and symbolic structures. His well-known proposition that “the unconscious is structured like a language” fundamentally destabilizes the Cartesian subject by demonstrating that thought and meaning are mediated through a pre-existing linguistic order. Within this framework, the subject is not the origin of meaning but an effect of the differential relations between signifiers. Through an analysis of Lacan’s theories of the mirror stage, the symbolic order, and the primacy of the signifier, this article argues that the apparent unity of the Cartesian subject is a structural illusion. The subject emerges as divided, decentred, and constituted within the symbolic network of language and desire. Consequently, the “death of the Cogito” does not signify the disappearance of the subject but rather the transformation of subjectivity into a linguistically mediated and structurally fragmented phenomenon. | ||
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