Our research starts with a type of "Pascal's bet": the existence of a subject inhabited by speech within dementia. Analysis of various works on speech defects shows a lack of knowledge regarding the communication possibilities of these individuals. Research leaves out Austin's pragmatic dimensions, Benveniste's overhangs and Bakthin's analysis, and therefore dismisses the demented person from the field of speech. We offer a new analysis of the demented patient which underlines his existence within the speech area. Helped by Freud and Lacan's unconscious development and by a clinical diary (which will "map-make" the various caring approaches of the demented person) we offer a clinical method. Developed around Ferenczi and Winnicott's clinical perspectives our work presents relationship techniques based upon mothering-type care and compassionate flow. An ethical path then appears, not opposed to an analytical referential.
dementia; psychoanalysis; psychopathology; subject; speech; unconscious
