Lacan v. Gender Pt. 2

When Lacan writes of the non-existence of (the) woman, a few things must be taken into account. First and foremost, Lacan's writings consist predominantly of lectures. Therefore, the word as written (from the position of a speaker) corresponds to a series of demonstrations, inscriptions upon a chalkboard. Secondly, Lacan writes in the French language. The first point is evident based upon the reproductions of his chalkboard diagrams in several of his works. The second, well, Lacan gave his seminars to analysts in France.
As regards the place of the signifier, the "non-existence" of (the) woman--this is poorly rendered in English due to the structure of the language and usage of the concept of woman within academic discourse. When referencing the non-existence of woman, it is the "la" which is crossed out on the chalkboard and not the "femme." It is not "les femmes" or "une femme" which does not exist, but "la femme," the most correct translation of which, in Lacan's thought, would be "The Woman." This is a shot at hierarchy, at the attempts of reifying a dialectic wherein the feminine is the negation of masculine. This negation, strictly speaking, does not exist, as there is always something of (the) woman, which plots an exorbitant trajectory away from the domination of the masculine (entre jouissance). However, women, the plural still exists, as does a woman. It is only the overdetermined, the disciplined Woman which does not exist for a woman may still be some other than a woman without exclusion (plurality and the indeterminate exist, The One does not). Woman may only be The Woman, the negation of The Man. According to logic, then, if Man exists and Woman is the negation of Man, then Woman does not exist. This same gesture may be applied to any signifying discourse for which an absolute is posited; the indeterminate and plurality are the interminability of the signifying chain, whose beginning Lacan, with a strong degree of humor, notes with the symbol for the phallus (a regular mind-fuck, if you will, to those analysts operating within a concept of an absolute masculine/feminine opposition).