word-jouissance

Jouissance, as I had imagined, is a french word. The Merriam-Webster online dictionary defines it with three known English terms, "pleasure : sexual pleasure : orgasm". I think Edelman is using this term with these words in mind but in a broader way of thinking. It is presented as a kind of force that can take on different types and functions within society. It is shown as a tool that affects from a unified body, not a singular person. Edelman uses "fantasy" a lot to signify the pleasurable desires within our ideas of how we function as subjects. But when factoring in homosexuality Edelman warns of an end to this, "Thus, homosexuality is thought of as a threat to the logic of thought itself insofar as it figures the availability of an unthinkable jouissance that would put an end to fantasy-" (Edelman 39). Jouissance is acting as a state of mind focused on desire that can have different characteristics and attitudes.