Lacan, the Phallus, and the Oedipus

Lacan reworks the Freudian account of the Oedipus complex on several occasions. In, Seminar IV: The Object Relations (19561957), Lacan associates it with his understanding of the phallus annexing it as a fourth term in the Oedipal triangle of the childmotherfather. Defining the phallus as a signifier of lack, he accounts for its role in the course of the Oedipus complex in three different forms the real, imaginary and symbolic phallus. But what exactly is the function of the phallus as a signifier i