The Destinies of Trauma: Psychoanalytic Perspectives from Freud to Lacan

We live in what Bauman famously described as a "liquid society" a vulnerable and unstable modern world where trauma increasingly manifests not only through the repetition of seemingly random events but within a broader global context that affects individuals, communities, and even nations in a deeply disruptive way. This paper explores how such traumatic repetition can be transformed into an opportunity for new meaning and direction. Rather than being condemned to repetition, subjects may become protagonists in re-presenting traumatic events and reframing their narrative through processes of symbolisation and sublimation. Drawing on psychoanalytic thought from Freud to Lacan, as well as philosophical and artistic reflections, the paper investigates the possible destinies of trauma - tracing a path from symptom to sinthome. In doing so, it highlights how the encounter with the Real can be integrated into subjective experience, allowing trauma to move from raw repetition toward symbolic recovery and transformation.© The Author(s) 2024. Published by RITHA Publishing. This article is distributed under the terms of the license CC-BY 4.0., which permits any further distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited maintaining attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and DOI.