Depressive realism is a theory which states that people who are depressed are able to more accurately gauge their reputation, locus of control, abilities, and the way the world actually is. It’s argued that depressed people are able to see without the rose-colored glasses that non-depressed people wear. On initial reflection I was inclined to agree, but the nature of the concept of the objet petit a, put forward by Jacques Lacan, speaks against Depressive Realism, or at least suggests that ‘realism’ may be an inappropriate term for the way that depressed people see the world.
The objet petit a in Lacanian psychoanalysis is the object that is created by desire. Zizek puts it nicely in “Looking Awry”: “The objet petit a is an object that can be perceived only by a gaze distorted by desire, an object that does not exist for an “objective gaze.”" The objet petit a does not exist in-itself because it is nothing but the enfleshment of the distorted gaze; a mapping of desire onto the contours of objective reality.
For depressive realism to be an accurate theory it would have to posit that depressed individuals lack an interested gaze; a gaze permeated by desire. It would also have to posit that depressed people occupy a gaze that is objective. This would only make sense since an objective gaze would be able to “see” reality more accurately. The below illustration is my attempt to represent the way depressed and non-depressed people see objects differently according to depressive realism. On the left side we have the non-depressed subject with a distorted gaze seeing an object that doesn’t actually exist. The black on the inside represents a void, and the black line around it represents desire mapped on to the void. It is the mapped on desire that ultimately gives positive existence to a void. On the right, we have the depressed subject who sees the real object untainted by a distorted gaze. The real object actually exists because it is seen by an objective gaze.
Certainly a good argument could be put forward that the depressed subject does lack the desire needed to distort the world, however I would argue that the depressed gaze is rife with desire. The depressed gaze, in my view, is an eschatological gaze, because it sees into the future and in the future it sees nothing. The eschatological gaze of the depressed subject indelibly marks everything he/she sees with the empty vision of the future. The eschatology of the depressed subject is a realized eschatology where the events and conditions which belong to the eschatological consummation (which he/she sees as nothingness) are described as if they already belonged to present experience.
2 Comments
March 7, 2008 at 10:36 pm
The depressed gaze in my view, is an eschatological gaze, it sees into the future, and in the future it sees nothing. The eschatological gaze of the depressed subject indelibly marks everything he/she sees with the empty vision of the future. The eschatology of the depressed subject is a realized eschatology where the events and conditions which belong to the eschatological consummation (which he/she sees as nothingness) are described as if they already belonged to present experience.
Excellent! That is the cold world precisely: the world of the end, of realized eschatology.
March 20, 2008 at 3:12 am
Zizek, oh zizek. I just made him the quote of my first post. Also, according to the white people’s blog–I’m whiter than ever now that I can reference him.