When engaging contact conjures up the gaze object…

Résumé 0

The psychoanalytic clinic with the Deaf highlights certain dimensions of lalangue and the voice, dimensions which are generally ignored but provide a source of instruction that goes far beyond these subjects. The clinic bears witness to the emergence of a soundless speaking being and confirms the existence of those “ways other than vocal to receive the language” that J. Lacan alluded to. The gesture, the visual and the tactile are here of utmost importance if such a “reception” is to succeed. Of course within the dominant cultural context, these language forms are very largely ignored. What do they elicit in interlocution? What do they provoke? Is it so simple to recognise what the Deaf unknowingly reveal? Doesn’t one become in turn “deaf and dumb” after such an encounter? Starting from my own discomfort and embarrassment in the beginnings of such an “exchange” ( prendre langue), I will explore the way in which -for us who vocalise- the gaze object emerges. The way in which, like a blot on the landscape, one finds oneself suddenly in the throes of a very uncomfortable drive movement, displaced and deported far from one’s customary language markers.