We will begin our theoretical discussion of desire with the basics. Lacan states right at the outset that desire is “riveted to a certain linguistic function—that is, to a certain relationship between the subject and the signifying system” (S6, p. 5). In other words, what he refers to as desire is not what we find in the animal kingdom, even though we loosely say that the cat wants to go out or that the dog wants its bone. Wanting in the animal kingdom is not the same as wanting in the human realm. Human wants are colored, structured, and indeed skewed (i.e., distorted) by language. (Here we might say that Lacan is incorporating the “articulated” nature of Freud’s Wunsch into his term désir.)