Prof. Todd McGowan & Prof. Ryan Engley: The Why Theory: Psychoanalysis, Ideology & Why We Think the Way We Do | EPS 019
What if the way we think, desire, and enjoy is not freely chosen, but structured by forces we can barely see? And what if the frameworks we most commonly use to understand human behaviour, psychology, economics, political science, self-help, are precisely the frameworks that prevent us from seeing those forces clearly?
In this rare and intellectually exhilarating double-guest episode, Dr. Steven Stolz is joined by Prof. Todd McGowan of the University of Vermont and Prof. Ryan Engley of Pomona College, the acclaimed hosts of the "Why Theory" podcast, which has spent over 200 episodes bringing Lacanian psychoanalysis and Hegelian philosophy to bear on everything from blockbuster superhero films and television Christmas specials to contemporary politics, ideology, desire, and the deepest questions of what it means to be a human subject in a capitalist world.
McGowan and Engley are not merely academic commentators. They are genuinely original thinkers who have built one of the most intellectually serious and consistently surprising podcasts in the English-speaking world, one that has demonstrated, episode after episode, that psychoanalysis and continental philosophy are not museum pieces but living tools for understanding the world we actually inhabit.
In this conversation, Dr. Steve, Prof. McGowan, and Prof. Engley explore:
The "Why Theory" project, what made McGowan and Engley believe that Lacanian concepts like the objet petit a, the Real, and the gaze, and Hegelian ideas about contradiction and dialectic, could illuminate everything from popular culture to political movements , and what resistance they have encountered along the way
Why the way we think, desire, and enjoy is not freely chosen but structured by ideological forces we can barely perceive, and what psychoanalysis offers as a method for making those forces visible
Enjoyment versus happiness, why Todd McGowan's work on "enjoying what we don't have" challenges the therapeutic culture's obsession with satisfaction and wellbeing, and why the pursuit of enjoyment may be more honest and more human than the pursuit of happiness
Film as public dreaming, what blockbuster films, superhero franchises, and television reveal about collective ideology, desire, and fantasy that explicit political discourse systematically conceals
Lacan's late turn, what is at stake in Lacan's move away from the signifying chain toward the concept of non-relation, and how understanding that "there is no sexual relationship" changes how we think about connection, intimacy, and politics The gaze and the voice as objet a, how these concepts illuminate our relationship to media, surveillance culture, and the contemporary demand to be constantly seen and heard on social media
Hegel's dialectic misunderstood, why the standard "thesis-antithesis-synthesis" formula completely misrepresents what Hegel was doing, what Hegelian contradiction actually means, and why this matters for understanding politics, subjectivity, and genuine change
Capitalism and desire, how the "society of enjoyment" functions differently from older forms of repressive ideology, and what the psychic costs are of living in a system that commands us to enjoy
Theory and activism, how Lacanian psychoanalysis responds to the charge that continental philosophy is too abstract or apolitical, and what psychoanalysis offers political movements that other frameworks miss
The symptom and contemporary culture, why psychoanalysis teaches us to embrace rather than eliminate our symptoms, what this means for therapeutic culture and self-help ideology, and what it would mean to build a politics around identifying with our symptoms rather than trying to cure ourselves
What all of this means for education, how psychoanalysis and Hegelian philosophy illuminate the formation of human subjects, the role of ideology in schooling, and what genuine education might demand if it took these frameworks seriously
Prof. Todd McGowan is Professor of Film and Television Studies at the University of Vermont and the author of numerous books including "Enjoying What We Don't Have," "Capitalism and Desire," "Emancipation After Hegel," and "The Racism of Intelligence." Prof. Ryan Engley is Associate Professor of English at Pomona College. Together they are the hosts of "Why Theory," one of the most intellectually ambitious and widely listened-to philosophy podcasts in the world.
🔗 Why Theory Podcast: podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/why-theory/id1299863834
🔗 Todd McGowan: uvm.edu/cas/english/profile/todd-mcgowan
🔗 Ryan Engley: pomona.edu/directory/people/ryan-engley
🌐 Show notes and resources: stevenstolz.com
This is episode five of the 2026 season of Deep Thinking, titled "Reconsidering Education." Previous episodes in this season:
EPS 015 with Fred W. Stolz OAM on educational leadership and legacy
EPS 016 with Prof. David Labaree of Stanford on why schools were never meant to change
EPS 017 with Prof. Jack Schneider of UMass on the politics of educational evidence
EPS 018 with Prof. Gert Biesta of Edinburgh on what education is actually for.
Deep Thinking with Dr. Steven Stolz is produced in Adelaide, Australia and releases every second Wednesday on all major platforms. Hosted by Dr. Steven Stolz, educator, philosopher, and academic at the University of Adelaide.
