This Lacan in Scotland seminar ‘Which Covid Discourse? Lacan, Emergency Capitalism & Successful Paranoia’ took place on Zoom on Thursday 30 September 2021. Professor Fabio Vighi speaks about the Covid-19 pandemic, capitalism and Lacan’s discourse theory. It is chaired by Dr Calum Neill, Director of Lacan in Scotland, and the presentation is followed by a discussion with the audience.

Video timestamps:

0:00 – Intro
03:11 – Presentation
53:53 – Discussion
1:38:42 – Closing Remarks

Description of the event:

This talk will consider the global health emergency through the lens of Lacan’s discourse theory, focusing on the pandemic as a monetary event and, more broadly, on its fetishistic character within the crumbling capitalist structure. Professor Fabio Vighi will argue that the ‘curious copulation between science and capital’ (Lacan, Seminar XVII) has resulted in both the breakdown of capitalist ‘work societies’ and their continuation by authoritarian means. And yet, from a psychoanalytic angle, the key question is: can a new discourse emerge from the current stalemate?

FABIO VIGHI is Professor of Critical Theory and Italian at Cardiff University, UK. His recent work includes Critical Theory and the Crisis of Contemporary Capitalism (Bloomsbury 2015, with Heiko Feldner) and Crisi di valore: Lacan, Marx e il crepuscolo della società del lavoro (Mimesis 2018).