The mirror stage as formative of the I function as revealed in psychoanalytic experience

Neill, Calum

Abstract

The short essay ‘The mirror stage as formative of the I function as revealed in psychoanalytic experience’ is without doubt Lacan's best-known piece of writing. Over its dense seven pages, Lacan presents a repost to both Sartre's existentialism and developmental psychology and presents the basis of his own theory of the emergence of human subjectivity as an encounter with an image from the external world. This reading takes us, paragraph by paragraph, through Lacan's text, unpacking the allusions and obtuse references and shining a light on the details of his powerful and influential argument.

Citation

Neill, C. (2024). The mirror stage as formative of the I function as revealed in psychoanalytic experience. In C. Neill, D. Hook, & S. Vanheule (Eds.), Reading Lacan's Ecrits: From ‘Overture to this Collection’ to ‘Presentation on Psychical Causality’. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780415707954

• Acceptance Date: Aug 25, 2015
• Online Publication Date: Feb 23, 2024
• Publication Date: 2024
• Deposit Date: May 11, 2017
• Publicly Available Date: Aug 24, 2025
• Publisher: Routledge
• Book Title: Reading Lacan's Ecrits: From ‘Overture to this Collection’ to ‘Presentation on Psychical Causality’
• Chapter Number: 5
• ISBN: 9780415707954
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9780415707954
• Keywords: Psychoanalysis, mirror stage, Lacan
• Public URL: http://researchrepository.napier.ac.uk/Output/829301
• Contract Date: May 11, 2017