Towards a Copernican Revolution: “Žižek!” as Symptom, Žižek as Symptom, Žižek’s Symptom

Abstract

In the updated preface to the 2008 edition of his seminal work The Sublime Object of Ideology, Slavoj Žižek writes that “when a discipline is in crisis, attempts are made to change or supplement its theses within the terms of its basic framework – a procedure one might call ‘Ptolemization’”. The alternative, he claims, is a “true ‘Copernican’ revolution” which takes place “when, instead of just adding complications and changing minor premises, the basic framework itself undergoes a transformation” (Žižek 2008: vii). In light of these remarks, the central question posed in this paper is as follows: how might Žižek’s distinction between a Ptomelization and Copernican revolution be applied to the field of Žižek Studies today? How, in other words, might we seek to re-evaluate Žižek’s work in a way that includes the mechanisms of evaluation as part of the observed phenomena?  The working hypothesis is that, as Žižekians, we must reassert the fundamental rule of psychoanalysis as articulated by Žižek himself: one must remember to include as part of the content of the message communicated, the act of communication itself (Žižek 2008: 21). In short, when it comes to the reception of Žižek’s thought we should remember Žižek’s basic point that “the question to ask is always: is this truly a Copernician revolution, or merely a Ptolemization of the old paradigm?” (Žižek 2008: vii).