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The Death Drive Revisited: A Reexamination of Psychoanalytic Drive Theory and its Implications for Critical Theory Benjamin Yen-Yi Fong Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 2013 © 2013 Benjamin Yen-Yi Fong All rights reserved ABSTRACT The Death Drive Revisited: A Reexamination of Psychoanalytic Drive Theory and its Implications for Critical Theory Benjamin Yen-Yi Fong This dissertation is a reexamination of Sigmund Freud’s mature drive theory, also known as his theory of the death drive, and its relevance for critical social theory, and in particular that of the so-called “Frankfurt school.” By tracing the emergence of Freud’s theory in his enigmatic Beyond the Pleasure Principle and then its development in the hands of Hans Loewald and Jacques Lacan, I aim, in the first three chapters, to articulate a drive theory centered around the opposition between what Freud calls the death drive and the drive to mastery, as well as the developmental hazards therein. In the last two chapters, I then attempt to integrate this drive theory into the Frankfurt school’s analysis of the intrusion of mass media and state institutions on the developmental process with the aim of both providing historical weight to the dialectic of death and mastery articulated in the first part of the dissertation and also strengthening the psychological component of critical theory. CONTENTS Acknowledgments ............................................................................................................... iv Dedication ......................................................................................................................... vii Introduction ........................................................................................................................ 1 1. A Defense of Drive Theory in Three Parts a. Psychical Reality .................................................................................... 3 b. What are drives? .................................................................................... 7 c. Why We Do What We Do ................................................................. 13 2. The Use and Abuse of Death .......................................................................... 17 3. Conversation Partners ..................................................................................... 24 4. Chapter Summary ........................................................................................... 43 Chapter 1 Death, Mastery, and the Origins of Life: ................................................ 48 Sigmund Freud’s Metapsychological Narrative 1. A Brief History of Mastery and Death in Psychoanalytic Theory ................... 50 2. Life After Death: Freud’s Account of the Origins of Life .............................. 61 in Sections IV and V of Beyond the Pleasure Principle 3. Primal Repression, or ...................................................................................... 74 Tying off a Loose End in “The Economic Problem of Masochism” 4. Death and Mastery .......................................................................................... 78 Conclusion ...................................................................................................... 81 Chapter 2 From Whence We Came: ........................................................................ 83 Hans Loewald and the Primordial Density i 1. The Primordial Density ................................................................................... 86 2. The Birth of the Superego ............................................................................... 95 3. Mourning and Language Acquisition ........................................................... 100 4. Religious Experience ..................................................................................... 105 Conclusion .................................................................................................... 112 Chapter 3 Aggressivity in Psychoanalysis (Reprised): ............................................ 115 Jacques Lacan and the Problem of Mastery 1. The Mirror Stage Revisited ........................................................................... 117 2. Recognition ................................................................................................... 122 3. Towards a New Theory of Aggressivity ......................................................... 127 4. Mastery and Aggressivity: Lacan on the Project ............................................. 131 5. From Imaginary to Symbolic Identification .................................................. 135 Conclusion .................................................................................................... 143 Chapter 4 The Domestication of the Death Drive: ............................................... 147 Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, and the Crisis of Internalization 1. The End of Internalization Revisited ............................................................ 149 2. Dialectic of Enlightenment ................................................................................ 162 3. Resisting the Culture Industry: Adorno contra Horkheimer ........................ 170 Conclusion .................................................................................................... 180 Chapter 5 Aggressivity Sublimated: ........................................................................ 183 Herbert Marcuse and the Lure of Technological Innovation 1. Aggressivity Sublimated ................................................................................. 188 2. Death and Aggressivity .................................................................................. 194 ii 3. Who and What ............................................................................................. 197 4. Technics, Capitalism, Subjectivation ............................................................ 201 5. Technics, Language, Liberation .................................................................... 211 Conclusion .................................................................................................... 215 Conclusion ....................................................................................................................... 219 Afterword ............................................................................................................. 226 Bibliography .................................................................................................................... 234 iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS It is not simply for the sake of convention that most acknowledgements begin by sheepishly recognizing that there are simply too many people to thank. I have been overwhelmed by the tremendous amount of support I’ve received during my graduate studies and while writing this dissertation. I am grateful first of all to my advisor, Mark C. Taylor, who has offered me the perfect balance of guidance and freedom from the beginning of my time at Columbia. His feedback on all of my work, not just the dissertation but the many essays and shorter articles with which I’ve burdened him, has been invaluable. In addition, I have profited greatly from his ample advice about navigating the academy and his compelling narrative of the history of western philosophy and theology. Wayne Proudfoot, who has been as generous with his time as Professor Taylor, must be mentioned in the same breath: his feedback has been just as insightful and plentiful, and his guidance as helpful. I consider myself incredibly lucky to have had such two, devoted mentors whose interests and approaches complement each other so well. Much of this project was formulated in my time as an Affiliate Scholar at the Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research. Fred Neuhouser, whose courses on modern and social philosophy I had the immense pleasure of taking and who provided valuable feedback on a longer paper that eventually became Chapters 1 and 2, first alerted me to the Center’s course offerings. Eric Marcus very kindly admitted me to the theory courses and waived the normal fees. All of the instructors were phenomenal, iv ! though special thanks must be accorded to Kevin Kelly, whose positive feedback on Chapters 1 and 2 gave me the confidence to move ahead with the dissertation. I doubt it would be possible to make Freudian metapsychology more interesting than Dr. Kelly is able to make it. I must also thank the associate instructors, who made a graduate student in religion feel at home amidst doctors: Wendy Katz, Rebecca Chaplan, Alison Brown, and Sandra Park. In the course of writing the dissertation, I have been lucky enough to receive a great deal of feedback and help from a wide range of colleagues, mentors, friends, and family members. Gil Anidjar and Courtney Bender both offered valuable comments on an early paper that eventually became Chapters 1 and 2, and both also kindly served on my M.Phil. examination committee. Joshua Dubler has never tired of serving as my sounding board, from the humble beginnings of this dissertation to its more formed articulations, and his feedback always demonstrates an almost intimidating investment in what he is presented with. Lisa Cerami generously helped me work through some of the more impenetrable passages in Adorno. Andrea Sun-Mee Jones also provided a great deal of feedback on the project, and she is in