About the unconscious, words and the social link

HASENBALG Virginia

Addressing someone in the familiar second person singular (vos, tu) is becoming usual practice in Spanish-speaking countries - both Spain and South America. As far as psycho-analysis is concerned, some clinical reports written in Spanish indicate that the second person singular may be used in the course of a therapy. Is that common usage, or is it exceptional? If the use of the second person singular is instituted and enforced by the social link, then a therapy may become the place where the patient finds someone he addresses in the third person singular (Ud).
It might be interesting to discuss this point with therapists who do not live in France, and examine whether this linguistic fact taking place in a given social link has any consequences on the handling of transference.
If transference is to be the means whereby the reality of the unconscious is actualized, then, in the patient's eyes, the therapist has to represent the place where his speech is built. How does the widespread use of the familiar second person singular affect the nature of the place of the Other, insofar as addressing a person in the familiar second person inmediately creates a very close relationship? How do Spanish-speaking therapists manage not to institute a friendly relation with patients who address them in the familiar second person?
In France, teenagers may sometimes address the therapist in the familiar second person at the first meeting. But the latter immediately addresses them in the second person plural (Vous) - to which no objection is raised, that being the rule in France.
If the therapist enjoined the use of the second person plural (equivalent of the third singular in Spanish) where custom allows a widespread use of the familiar second person, to what extent would that be a form of symbolical violence? What is the essence of the domination exercised by the therapist who would thus oppose what custom allows?
Besides, addressing a patient in the third person singular (or second person plural in France) is obviously not in itself sufficient to put in place transference, to connect the patient with what remains beyond the imaginary axis, so that he may find references in the place of the Other where he has to find his own message.
A passage from Lacan may throw some light upon the matter. In diagram L, Lacan distinguishes between the first experience of an absolute real Other, the mother, which is placed on the imaginary axis - and the place of the Other which refers to the Symbolic order and fatherhood (an authority vested with great pacifying powers) and commits man to the ways of the signifier. That is precisely the place from which Hans takes his stand after the glimpse he caught of the place of the Other in the course of his visit to Freud : the knowledge he immediately credits the "professeur" with stems from the fact that he speaks with God. And in the child's eyes, God represents the very point that ultimately resists any form of imaginary identification.
There are different ways of addressing a person in different languages. While in Japanese an elaborate code institutes many different ways of addressing another, in English on the contrary, one word only is in use nowadays, whoever you are addressing : the pronoun you. Which shows that it is possible to create a distance with another person without resorting to a variety grammatical pronouns or verb forms. Let us note also that the more formal way of addressing a person is expressed differently in different languages : in German, it is conveyed by a feminine form of the third person singular (Sie); in French, by the second person plural (Vous), and in Spanish, by a third person singular which is heard in the masculine form though it comes from a feminine form (Usted : vuestra merced).
Besides, in the Rio de la Plata region, the pronoun "vos"is used to address a person in the more familiar way. Though it used to express the formal way of addressing another - the equivalent of the french pronoun "vous" - it then followed a different path : in the course of the XIVth century, it ceased to express formal address, to denote familiarity lacking respect : it was felt to be awkward and was not used any longer. In the catalan language, the pronoun vos continued to be used when persons who were on equal terms and who had long known one another respectfully talkes together, or when peasants were addressed. The classic Spanish writer Tirso also used the pronoun vos in connection with peasants, when he made them talk, and that is the use of the word has always retained in the Rio de La Plata region, where it has now become the most common way of addressing another.
Thus appears a sort of bilingual system within one and the same language.
On the one hand, the second person singular, which is a familiar form of address, is reminiscent of a communal way of life in which the subject can forget himself within a group. The subject - if he may thus termed - will generally look for the signs of his childhood in order to find reassurance while involved in the process of self-forgetfulness. Even patients who address their therapist in the third person may sometimes, at the first meeting, wish to attract his attention by ressorting to mimics, thus instituting a sort of familiarity akin to the one induced by the use of the second person singular form : such a process clearly shows the patient's endeavour to shelter themselves from the instituting of the place of the Other.
On the other hand, the third person singular as a courtoisie form - which is a more conventionnal form of address - creates a distance, and thus contributes to instituting the place of the Other. Although that place is personified in the relationships established in our everyday lives, in our capacity as analysts we ultimately relate it to the otherness of the signifier - a prerequisite, if the place of the Other is to be left vacant.
In the West indies, the use of either French or Creole may be the equivalent of the dual mode of address, and West Indian therapists say how difficult it is to conduct a therapy in the creole language which allows a high degree of proximity.
In Paraguay too, the two languages spoken give rise to a bilingual mode of address, but because Spanish and Guarani - a language of Indian origin which is widely spread in the social link - have quite different and specific uses that transcend the master/slave dialectics, bilingual mode is of a different kind there.
A study of the various ways of addressing another would show the extent to which the psycho-analytical technique can adjust to the specific ways of a given social link, that can hardly be understood from without. After all, the question may be asked why a patient addresses his analyst in a formal way? Why should he? Are there any new theories on the subject?
Spanish-speaking therapists who are privileged to work in places where the second person singular has become usual practice may acquaint us with the new ways of speaking that are coming into usage, in order to avoid the lure of familiarity.