This article presents some findings of an investigation into the unconscious formations (Unbewusste Bildung) in learning situations whose subjects are two groups of eleven-year old students. The formations of the unconscious that appeared in these learning situations are the jokes (Witz) and what we call day-dreaming in otherness (alterity). The work shows the contribution of the psychoanalytical theory to the understanding of the processes of the thoughts. The article discusses the separation between affection and cognition and suggests that the different conceptual fields concerning the cognitive subject and the unconscious subject do not oppose each other, but in their differences they enrich the understanding of the processes of thought.
Psychoanalysis; unconscious formations (Unbewusste Bildung); jokes (Witz); day-dreaming in otherness (alterity); unconscious subject; epistemic subject