Why the Letter Functions as a MacGuffin

On this episode, Ryan and Todd continue their series of commentaries on Lacan's Seminars, this time bringing their attention to Seminar XVIII: On a Discourse that Might not Be a Semblance, which was recently published in an official English translation by Bruce Fink for Polity. The hosts work through the stakes and questions of this "morning after" seminar for Lacan's toward the quadratic formulation of the Four Discourses that will define his late work. Ultimately, the hosts see a stark break in the non-relation developed and insisted upon in XVIII from the signifying chain that had defined Lacan's work and thinking up to this point.