THE ENIGMATIC DIMENSION OF SEXUAL EXPERIENCE - THE OTHERNESS OF SEXUALITY AND PRIMAL SEDUCTION

Sexual experience has an ''otherness'' abo rct it that distinguishes i t from daily, habitual modes of experiencing and relating: This paper attempts to use Freud's and Laplanche's theories of primal seduction b y the mother, who sends an ''enigmatic signifier'' or message of her s exuality to the child whom she nurtures. A tension are is created betw een bodily sensations and the enigmatic other carrying over into adult life and constituting a bedrock for the sense of enigma and unfathoma bleness and the sense of the profound revelation that sometimes accomp anies sexual experience. The author articulates links with transferenc e and countertransference forms and offers new possibilities of unders tanding some clinical phenomena.