Social Theory and Psychoanalysis in Transition: Self and Society from Freud to Kristeva
TL;DR: The second edition surveys the recent changes that have taken place in psychoanalytic social theory, including critical theory, Lacanian and post-Lacanian theory, post-structuralism and feminism as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: This text is a benchmark critique of Freudian theory in which a dialogue between the Frankfurt School, the Lacanian tradition and post-Lacanian developments in critical and feminist theory is developed. Considering afresh the relations between self and society, Elliot argues for the importance of imagination and the unconscious in understanding issues about the self and self-identity, ideology and power, sexual difference and gender. The second edition surveys the recent changes that have taken place in psychoanalytic social theory. Traditions of thought covered include critical theory, Lacanian and post-Lacanian theory, post-structuralism and feminism.
Citations
More filters
••
TL;DR: In this paper, a praxeological perspective is proposed for analysing emotions and affects that simultaneously pays attention to artefacts and to space, and integrates all of these as basic components of sociality and avoids the pitfall of their complete culturalisation and that of their total naturalisation.
Abstract: Classical social and cultural theory disregards the spatial and affective dimensions of social phenomena because of its anti-technological and anti-aesthetic bias. The first part of my paper digs into the reasons for this ignorance. Against this background, the second part outlines an alternative conceptual proposal, which I label a praxeological perspective. This approach offers a framework for analysing emotions and affects that simultaneously pays attention to artefacts and to space. It integrates all of these as basic components of sociality and, by doing so, avoids both the pitfall of their complete culturalisation and that of their total naturalisation. The aim is to achieve a basic ‘aesthetisation’ and ‘materialisation’ of cultural theory, instead. The third part, finally, illuminates the interconnection between emotions and space and argues that in order to explain the cultural change of affective structures in history, the analysis of the emergence of new artefact-space complexes is indispensable.
220 citations
Cites background from "Social Theory and Psychoanalysis in..."
...…authors, such as the up to recently largely neglected Gabriele Tarde in his sociology of imitation (cf. Borch and Stäheli 2009), or – of course – Freud’s psychoanalysis (cf. Elliott 1992) presented approaches which were right away centred around the affective core of social life....
[...]
••
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue that qualitative research in general, and a focus on reflexivity in particular, requires theoretical grounding, and that such theoretical grounding can usefully draw on developments in discourse analytic, deconstructionist, and psychoanalytic social research.
Abstract: This paper is concerned with reflexivity in research, and the way research is grounded in the operations of the psy-complex in social psychology. A central argument is that qualitative research in general, and a focus on reflexivity in particular, requires theoretical grounding. Distinctions are drawn between ‘uncomplicated subjectivity’, ‘blank subjectivity’ and ‘complex subjectivity’; and the analytic device of the ‘discursive complex’ is described. It is argued that such theoretical grounding can usefully draw on developments in discourse analytic, deconstructionist, and psychoanalytic social research. The opposition between objectivity and subjectivity is deconstructed, and psychoanalytic conceptual reference points for an understanding of the discursive construction of complex subjectivity in the context of institutions are explored with particular reference to the location of the researcher in the psy-complex. The paper discusses the reflexive engagement of the researcher with data, and the construction of the identity of the researcher with reference to professional bodies. An analysis of a document produced by the British Psychological Society is presented to illustrate conceptual issues addressed in the first sections. This illustrative analysis is designed to show how the material is structured by a series of six discursive complexes, and that the institutional structure facilitates, and inhibits, certain forms of action and reflection.
130 citations
••
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present a theory of representations sociales and affirme que le post-modernism ne parvient pas a prendre en compte ce type de processus and constitue, en ce domaine, un nouvelle approche de type behavioriste.
Abstract: L'A. montre l'importance de la notion de representation sociale. Il estime que celle-ci permet de comprendre le lien entre individu et societe. Il presente la theorie des representations sociales. Il examine de facon critique les analyses post-modernes qui rejettent ce type de perspective. Il souligne que la mise en evidence du lien entre forces sociales et individus permet de saisir de quelle maniere fonctionnent les representations sociales et de mettre en lumiere le role joue par les representations sur le plan de la mediation. Il affirme que le post-modernisme ne parvient pas a prendre en compte ce type de processus et qu'il constitue, en ce domaine, un nouvelle approche de type behavioriste
127 citations
••
110 citations
••
TL;DR: In this paper, a desiring subject and socio-symbolic order drawn from Lacanian psychoanalytic theory are used to suggest that public policies are also a product of social fantasy, and draw attention to the implications of this unrecognized function of policy-making.
Abstract: Although it is widely accepted that public policies are difficult to implement, most analyses of policy failures are conceived of as predominantly rational processes. This article questions that assumption by introducing ideas of a desiring subject and socio-symbolic order drawn from Lacanian psychoanalytic theory to suggest that public policies are also a product of social fantasy, and to draw attention to the implications of this unrecognized function of policy-making. It also employs the idea of defensive splitting borrowed from Kleinian object relations theory to explain the difficulty of translating policy into public organizations, which have to perform often conflicting societal tasks. The example of patient choice in the UK National Health Service (the NHS) is used to illustrate theoretical arguments and to propose an alternative understanding of public policy-making by way of bridging fantasy with reality.
106 citations
Cites background from "Social Theory and Psychoanalysis in..."
...…it lies in probing and ‘listening’ to the unconscious ‘structured like a language’ (Lacan, 1998: 48), as the subject holds onto the lost part of the self (the objet petit à) ‘which the ‘‘subject of the unconscious’’ forever tries to recapture through fantasies of wholeness’ (Elliott, 1999: 130)....
[...]
References
More filters
••
TL;DR: In this paper, a praxeological perspective is proposed for analysing emotions and affects that simultaneously pays attention to artefacts and to space, and integrates all of these as basic components of sociality and avoids the pitfall of their complete culturalisation and that of their total naturalisation.
Abstract: Classical social and cultural theory disregards the spatial and affective dimensions of social phenomena because of its anti-technological and anti-aesthetic bias. The first part of my paper digs into the reasons for this ignorance. Against this background, the second part outlines an alternative conceptual proposal, which I label a praxeological perspective. This approach offers a framework for analysing emotions and affects that simultaneously pays attention to artefacts and to space. It integrates all of these as basic components of sociality and, by doing so, avoids both the pitfall of their complete culturalisation and that of their total naturalisation. The aim is to achieve a basic ‘aesthetisation’ and ‘materialisation’ of cultural theory, instead. The third part, finally, illuminates the interconnection between emotions and space and argues that in order to explain the cultural change of affective structures in history, the analysis of the emergence of new artefact-space complexes is indispensable.
220 citations
••
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue that qualitative research in general, and a focus on reflexivity in particular, requires theoretical grounding, and that such theoretical grounding can usefully draw on developments in discourse analytic, deconstructionist, and psychoanalytic social research.
Abstract: This paper is concerned with reflexivity in research, and the way research is grounded in the operations of the psy-complex in social psychology. A central argument is that qualitative research in general, and a focus on reflexivity in particular, requires theoretical grounding. Distinctions are drawn between ‘uncomplicated subjectivity’, ‘blank subjectivity’ and ‘complex subjectivity’; and the analytic device of the ‘discursive complex’ is described. It is argued that such theoretical grounding can usefully draw on developments in discourse analytic, deconstructionist, and psychoanalytic social research. The opposition between objectivity and subjectivity is deconstructed, and psychoanalytic conceptual reference points for an understanding of the discursive construction of complex subjectivity in the context of institutions are explored with particular reference to the location of the researcher in the psy-complex. The paper discusses the reflexive engagement of the researcher with data, and the construction of the identity of the researcher with reference to professional bodies. An analysis of a document produced by the British Psychological Society is presented to illustrate conceptual issues addressed in the first sections. This illustrative analysis is designed to show how the material is structured by a series of six discursive complexes, and that the institutional structure facilitates, and inhibits, certain forms of action and reflection.
130 citations
••
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present a theory of representations sociales and affirme que le post-modernism ne parvient pas a prendre en compte ce type de processus and constitue, en ce domaine, un nouvelle approche de type behavioriste.
Abstract: L'A. montre l'importance de la notion de representation sociale. Il estime que celle-ci permet de comprendre le lien entre individu et societe. Il presente la theorie des representations sociales. Il examine de facon critique les analyses post-modernes qui rejettent ce type de perspective. Il souligne que la mise en evidence du lien entre forces sociales et individus permet de saisir de quelle maniere fonctionnent les representations sociales et de mettre en lumiere le role joue par les representations sur le plan de la mediation. Il affirme que le post-modernisme ne parvient pas a prendre en compte ce type de processus et qu'il constitue, en ce domaine, un nouvelle approche de type behavioriste
127 citations
••
110 citations
••
TL;DR: In this paper, a desiring subject and socio-symbolic order drawn from Lacanian psychoanalytic theory are used to suggest that public policies are also a product of social fantasy, and draw attention to the implications of this unrecognized function of policy-making.
Abstract: Although it is widely accepted that public policies are difficult to implement, most analyses of policy failures are conceived of as predominantly rational processes. This article questions that assumption by introducing ideas of a desiring subject and socio-symbolic order drawn from Lacanian psychoanalytic theory to suggest that public policies are also a product of social fantasy, and to draw attention to the implications of this unrecognized function of policy-making. It also employs the idea of defensive splitting borrowed from Kleinian object relations theory to explain the difficulty of translating policy into public organizations, which have to perform often conflicting societal tasks. The example of patient choice in the UK National Health Service (the NHS) is used to illustrate theoretical arguments and to propose an alternative understanding of public policy-making by way of bridging fantasy with reality.
106 citations