The Dislocations of the Real
4.1 The tissues of social life
crucial for understanding ‘the functioning of sociopolitical life[,] as the phantasy structure shapes the narratives of communities’ (Andreescu, 2013, p. 211). In turn, these narratives reinforce the associated fantasy as they make up ‘the context of the socialization of the members of the community’ (ibid.). Fantasy is said to create a shared sense of identity, community and common consciousness. As such, it plays an important part in our self-definition. Rather than being confined to the intimacy of one’s psychology, then, fantasies are claimed to be present on a high- er-order, communal level as well. On both levels (the individual and the societal), however, their role remains the same: they make bearable the lack in the Other while sustaining and orienting desire. Andreescu (2013) argues that a political system only functions to the degree that it channels and captures human desire, usually by making reference to a utopian and lost state of harmony and unity.
is nearly 100 years old, it is not far removed from the dominant contem- porary understanding of trauma, given its physiological undertones.
Psychological trauma theories analogously pose the existence of defen- sive, meaning-generating barriers and define trauma as the sudden destruction of these structures (Brewin & Holmes, 2003).
In recent years, notions such as social trauma, collective trauma, community trauma and cultural trauma have become increasingly well known and popular (for example, Alexander, Eyerman, Giesen, Smelser
& Sztompka, 2004; Erikson, 1995; Eyerman, 2003). Ostensibly, the idea of social trauma is the effect of a further extension of meaning, brought about by a new metaphor: that the ‘tissues of social life’ can be damaged in much the same way as the tissues of the mind and body. This implies that the tissues of social life ordinarily perform a defensive barrier func- tion, just like our skin or Freud’s proposed neurological blocking mecha- nisms: they shield the members of its community from a confrontation with something that threatens the community’s integrity. Stef Craps and Gert Buelens (2008) note that there are basically two fundamen- tally different perspectives on this type of trauma. Whereas some see it as a straightforward extension of psychological trauma to the collective level (as, for example, in the work of Dominick LaCapra, Kai Erikson and Linda Hutcheon), others view it as a social construction pure and simple – far removed from any sort of relation to the individual psyche (see, for example, the work of Ron Eyerman, Jeffrey Alexander and Neil Smelser).
From a Lacanian perspective, what needs to be kept at bay is the lack in the Other. As discussed above, this notion emphasizes that there is no external guarantee to ground a specific symbolic order. Consequently, every social structure necessarily comes into being through a ground- less, subjective act that must be ‘forgotten’ in order for the structure to function. For Lacan, being itself is split, and the coherence and continuity of both identity and reality require a misrecognition of this ontological lack through the development of a fantasmatic framework.
Furthermore, a fantasy is only convincing if, once it has been put into place, we can forget that it is a fantasy. Social trauma is defined, then, as a rupture in the protective fantasies that ordinarily ‘glue’ a commu- nity together, so to speak, and that conceal the contingent nature of this community’s particular sociopolitical organization (Andreescu, 2013, p. 215). From a Lacanian perspective, the tissues of social life are composed of such constitutive collective fantasies and their associ- ated, shared narratives. One small example: the Western organization of family life is concomitant with shared fantasies and narratives regarding what a(n ideal) father, mother, daughter, brother and so on should be.
More broadly, the tissues of social life can be equated with the notion of culture. Indeed, sociologists have been at the forefront of describing the dynamics of large-scale societal ruptures through the concept of cultural trauma (for example, Alexander et al., 2004).
Social or cultural trauma is considered to derive from forms of radical social change marked by a characteristic temporal quality, substance and scope, origin and mental frame (Sztompka, 2000). Examples are revolution, collapse of the market, radical economic reforms such as nationalization or privatization, forced migration, genocide, terrorism, assassination of a political or spiritual leader, the opening of secret archives that reveal a horrid truth about the past, revisionist interpre- tations of national traditions, and the collapse of an empire or a lost war (Sztompka, 2000, p. 452). Note that such events, which have the potential to cause cultural trauma, do not automatically or necessarily actualize this potential. The societal effects of these events depend on the manners in which they are perceived and experienced . Nevertheless, all of these major upheavals share the defining potential to perform a rupture within the pre-existent social order. Whether or not a break with the previous order is traumatic depends ‘on the relative degree of such a break or displacement, as compared with the preceding measure of order, or as compared with the expectations concerning the continua- tion of order’ (ibid., p. 457). In addition, it is worth pointing out that more local events such as incest, parental neglect and (sexual) abuse equally take place against the background of a collectively shared frame- work dislocated by such events.
At first glance, the idea of social trauma has the potential to circum- vent many of the problems associated with the hegemonic biomedical approach to trauma, discussed in Part I: individualization and psycholo- gization of suffering, decontextualization and depoliticization in treat- ment approaches, culminating in an emphasis on immaterial rather than material recovery. First, social trauma focuses primarily on the collective instead of the individual level. Second, it does not assume that the impact of an event can be deduced on the basis of a series of a priori parameters, but takes the social, cultural and political context into account to develop a case-by-case understanding of the problems to be addressed. Lastly, it investigates the ways the damaged ‘tissues of social life’ can be restored, rather than taking the individual psyche as the locus of intervention. It accomplishes this by acknowledging the survivors as political agents and thinking interventions on the level of the Other (the field of the symbolic), for example in the focus on forms of remembrance and commemoration.
Despite the appeal of this approach, it opens up a whole new array of difficulties. Specifically, how is this social tissue and its traumatic wounding to be imagined? If we follow Lacan’s basic tenets, we should try to understand them in a strictly materialist fashion, that is, insisting that there is nothing alien to matter. The idea of a ‘social tissue’ risks drawing us back to conceptions of some sort of extra-physical, imma- terial dimension of transcendent being (for example, the notorious idea of some sort of Jungian collective unconscious, or some sort of Durkheimian reification of the Institution), which should be avoided if we hope to approach these matters scientifically. Another related ques- tion that we must ask ourselves is whether or not the breach on the communal level is related to the individual (traumatic) experiences of those who make up the community, and if so, how? In other words, is the emphasis on the social tissues of life anything more than the shift from a psychiatric perspective to a sociological one, which is arguably the direction taken by scholars such as Eyerman? Or can we find a way to articulate both levels with each other?