uncanny

is a challenge to the ego in that it is a reminder to the self that all the material it had neglected lies dormant in the unconscious.

Though processes of rational calculation the ego manages its experiences often by discarding and evacuating (through repression) all it considers inappropriate to its needs. But this neglected material is not completely eradicated... it does not disappear. It lies dormant in the unconscious, and when the conditions are right (and much of Freud's work explores and elaborates what these conditions are), it seeks conscious recognition once again, and thereby destabilses or realigns the orientation of the ego in the process of achieving it.

is a feeling of strangeness not tied to a remembered but repressed past event, but which takes one closer to the object, which is what his life and death instincts look for and what gives meaning to his life, yet that at the same time, must remain unreachable for the subject if he wants to keep his sanity and even his own life.

In other words, for Lacan, the uncanny is a feeling of strangeness that does not necessarily remind the subject of a repressed past event, but that takes him closer to the object, which is what his life and death instincts look for and what gives meaning to his life, yet that at the same time, must remain unreachable for the subject if he wants to keep his sanity and even his own life.

is a feeling rooted in the compulsion to repeat.

The factor of the repetition of the same thing will perhaps not appeal to everyone as a source of uncanny feeling. (Freud 'The Uncanny' pdf)

is a threat in that it acts like an intruder in the ego's 'house', even threatening to evict it from its house, making it altogether homeless.

The return of the repressed can be likened to an intruder in the ego's 'house', or, in more worrying and pathological cases, it threatens to evict the ego from its house, making it altogether homeless.

is, along with the sublime, two phases in a single process based on repression.

The point of stressing the similarity rather than the differences between the uncanny and the sublime lies in the way they are conceptualized. That is, instead of forming static realms or domains, they articulate two phases in a single process. Those phases are based on the same principle, namely repression.

is an experience of that which ought to have remained secret and hidden but has come to light.

For Freud, the uncanny is not simply an experience of something we cannot comprehend or be certain of, or of something that disorientates and confuses. It is rather, Freud says and he quotes from the philosopher Schelling in his summation an experience of that which 'ought to have remained . . .secret and hidden but has come to light' (1919: 224... emphasis and ellipses in original).

is at work in the idea of being buried alive, because it points to a repetition of intra-uterine existence.

To some people the idea of being buried alive by mistake is the most uncanny thing of all. And yet psycho-analysis has taught us that this terrifying phantasy is only a transformation of another phantasy which had originally nothing terrifying about it at all, but was qualified by a certain lasciviousness the phantasy, I mean, of intra-uterine existence. (Freud 'The Uncanny' pdf)

is at work in the obsessive neurotic who is in the habit of saying that they have 'presentiments' which 'usually' come true.

They are never surprised at their invariably running up against someone they have just been thinking of, perhaps for the first time for a long while. If they say one day 'I haven't had any news of so-and-so for a long time,' they will be sure to get a letter from him the next morning, and an accident or a death will rarely take place without having passed through their mind a little while before. They are in the habit of referring to this state of affairs in the most modest manner, saying that they have 'presentiments' which 'usually' come true. (Freud 'The Uncanny' pdf)

uncanny, n.Definitions

uncanny