displacement (Verschiebung) One of four key mechanisms of Freud, Sigmund’s concept of dreamwork. It is also to be found at work in the symptom-formation of both neurosis and hysteria. The concept of displacement depends on the prior thesis, developed by Freud, that a representation (Vorstellung) of an instinct one makes to oneself and its affect (Affekt) or liminality charge are effectively semi-autonomous. The shifter is a classic instance of this: to someone with a foot fetish, for example, the image of a naked foot has the same affect as does the image of a naked body as a whole (indeed, if they were a true fetishist in the clinical sense, the foot alone would give pleasure). Similarly, advertising constantly uses this strategy, aiming to shift the libidinal charge of sexual imagery onto products in the hope that the idea of that product will have a libidinal affect too. In dreams, the displacements tend to be found in the apparently irrelevant details of the dream which seem to occupy a place of undue prominence---they become apparent in therapy when in discussing them patients have a disproportionate reaction to them (i.e. the affect of their response is greater than the apparent affect of the idea). In Die Traumdeutung (1900), translated as The Interpretation of Dreams (1953) Freud gives the example of a dream in which someone sees themselves climbing up a staircase, an activity that at first glance seems relatively insignificant; but on closer examination, he argues that its true significance is that the person concerned was worried about the dangers of sexual relations with someone of lower social class. The Russian linguist Jakobson, Roman has argued that displacement is in fact a form of metonym and as such one of the fundamental poles of language. Lacan, Jacques adopts this thesis in his work, arguing that desire is in its nature metonymic. dispositif (apparatus) An organization of statement and things. The term is used by Foucault, Michel in his work on governmentality to describe the non-systemic connection of heterogeneous statements that exists in a contemporary formation such as the law which combines the discourse of law along with the architecture of courthouses, the costuming of judges and lawyers, as well as the administrative measures required to maintain it all. It is for this reason often translated as ‘apparatus’, although this does not really work as it is a virtual process rather than an actual entity. As Agamben writes in his succinct account of the concept, What is an Apparatus? (2009), the dispositif has three key attributes: (1) it is a heterogeneous network of objects of practically any type (linguistic, nonlinguistic, physical, virtual, etc.); (2) it always has a concrete strategic function and is always located in a power relation (as is obvious in the example given of the law); and (3) it sits at the intersection of relations of power and relations of knowledge. See also assemblage. Further Reading: G. Agamben What is an Apparatus? (2009).