"As William Davies has pointed out in a different context, the mass of quantitative research by governmental agencies and sociologists, often produces data that is an “official statistical endorsement” of an otherwise disavowed underside or ugly side-effect of hegemonic ideology: “the contradictions and injuries…start to show up within the very positivist bodies of knowledge that are intended to regulate and sustain” this ideology. Yet these findings are alternately managed, smuggled away and overlooked by fantasy(1), often turning up in inverted form in fantasy(2). Psychoanalytic approaches help here in stressing the way fantasy helps to bring the gap between positivist knowledge (i.e. disavowed, troubled re-unification) and ideological enunciation (i.e. desired, complete re-unification) to “consistency” through the imaginary and symbolic relations of fantasy."

I need to submit a chunk of my thesis to my dole job provider to “prove” that I am working enough to get partial payment. I figure this bit will do them nicely. Might footnote this recent news article.