Showing papers on "Agency (philosophy) published in 2003"

Modern Social Imaginaries

Abstract: Acknowledgments xi Introduction 1 1 The Modern Moral Order 3 2 What Is a "Social Imaginary"? 23 3 the Specter of idealism 31 4 The Great Disembedding 49 5 The Economy as Objectified Reality 69 6 The Public Sphere 83 7 Public and Private 101 8 The Sovereign People 109 9 An All-Pervasive Order 143 10 The Direct-Access Society 155 11 Agency and Objectification 163 12 Modes of Narration 175 13 The Meaning of Secularity 185 14 Provincializing Europe 195 Notes 197

Concepts and definitions of CSR and corporate sustainability: Between agency and communion

Abstract: This paper provides an overview of the contemporary debate on the concepts and definitions of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Corporate Sustainability (CS). The conclusions, based on historical perspectives, philosophical analyses, impact of changing contexts and situations and practical considerations, show that "one solution fits all"-definition for CS(R) should be abandoned, accepting various and more specific definitions matching the development, awareness and ambition levels of organizations.

Structure, Agency and the Internal Conversation

Abstract: The central problem of social theory is 'structure and agency'. How do the objective features of society influence human agents? Determinism is not the answer, nor is conditioning as currently conceptualised. It accentuates the way structure and culture shape the social context in which individuals operate, but it neglects our personal capacity to define what we care about most and to establish a modus vivendi expressive of our concerns. Through inner dialogue, 'the internal conversation', individuals reflect upon their social situation in the light of current concerns and projects. On the basis of a series of unique, in-depth interviews, Archer identifies three distinctive forms of internal conversation. These govern agents' responses to social conditioning, their individual patterns of social mobility and whether or not they contribute to social stability or change. Thus the internal conversation is seen as being the missing link between society and the individual, structure and agency.

“Said and Done” Versus “Saying and Doing” Gendering Practices, Practicing Gender at Work

Abstract: Recently, the study of gender has focused on processes by which gender is brought into social relations through interaction. This article explores implications of a two-sided dynamic—gendering practices and practicing of gender—for understanding gendering processes in formal organizations. Using stories from interviews and participant observation in multinational corporations, the author explores the practicing of gender at work. She defines practicing gender as a moving phenomenon that is done quickly, directionally (in time), and (often) nonreflexively; is informed (often) by liminal awareness; and is in concert with others. She notes how other conceptions of gender dynamics and practice inform the analysis and argues that adequate conceptualization (and potential elimination) of harmful aspects of gendering practices/practicing will require attention to (1) agency, intentionality, awareness, and reflexivity; (2) positions, power, and experience; and (3) choice, accountability, and audience. She calls f...

The Economics of Transnational Living1

Abstract: Migrants' long-distance economic relations with their homelands have been the subject of an extensive, albeit fragmented, multidisciplinary inquiry. Most existing studies have been primarily concerned with the north-south flow of monetary remittances that migrants send to their homelands. Using a transnational perspective informed by economic sociology tenets, this article argues that this north-south, monetary-centered approach is too limited, for it fails to heed the multiple macroeconomic effects of migrants' transnational economic and noneconomic connections and, thus, underestimates migrants' agency and their influence at the global level. Using the concept of transnational living, the study presents new vistas of transnational migration that question accepted notions about the relationship between labor mobility and capital mobility.

The determinants of health: structure, context and agency.

Abstract: The concept of social structure is one of the main building blocks of the social sciences, but it lacks any precise technical definition within general sociological theory. This paper reviews the way in which the concept has been deployed within medical sociology, arguing that in recent times it has been used primarily as a frame for the sociological interpretation of health inequalities and their social determinants. It goes on to examine the contribution that medical sociologists have made to the debate over health inequalities, giving particular attention to contributions to Sociology of Health and Illness. These have often provided a focus for discussions outside or critical of the mainstream debates that have been driven primarily by epidemiologists. The paper reviews some of the main points of criticism of epidemiological approaches, focusing in particular on the methodological constraints that limit the capacity of epidemiologists to develop more theoretically satisfactory accounts of the inter-relationships of social structure, context and agency in their impact on health and well being. Some recent examples from the Journal of more theoretically innovative and analytically fine-grained approaches to understanding the impact of social structure on health are then explored. The paper concludes with an argument for a more historically-informed analysis of the relationships between social structure and health, using the knowledgeable narratives of people in places as a window onto those relationships.

Motivation and Agency

Abstract: What place does motivation have in the lives of intelligent agents? Mele's answer is sensitive to the concerns of philosophers of mind and moral philosophers and informed by empirical work He offers a distinctive, comprehensive, attractive view of human agency This book stands boldly at the intersection of philosophy of mind, moral philosophy, and metaphysics

Discourses about ethnic group (de‐)essentialism: Oppressive and progressive aspects

Abstract: Social psychologists studying intergroup perceptions have shown an increasing interest in essentialist thinking. Essentialist beliefs about social groups are examined as cognitive processes and these beliefs would serve to rationalize and justify the existing social system. Discourse analyses on racism have emphasized that problems of racism are to a large extent problems of essentialism. Anti-essentialism has emerged as an emancipatory discourse in the challenge of hegemonic representations and oppressive relations. The present study examines how, in group discussions, ethnic Dutch and ethnic minority people define and use essentialist notions about social groups. Both Dutch and ethnic minority participants engaged in an essentialist discourse in which an intrinsic link between culture and ethnicity was made. However, there were also examples where this discourse was criticized and rejected. This variable use of (de-)essentialism is examined in terms of the conversation's context and issues at hand, such as questions of assimilation, group provisions, cultural rights, and agency. The main conclusion of this paper is that essentialism is not by definition oppressive and that de-essentialism is not by definition progressive. The discursive power of (de-)essentialist group beliefs depends on the way they are used and the context in which they appear.

Setting Theoretical Egos Aside: Issues and Theory in North American Archaeology

Abstract: Theory in North American archaeology is characterized in terms of foci and approaches manifested in research issues, rather than in explicit or oppositional theoretical positions. While there are some clear-cut theoretical perspectives—evolutionary ecology, behavioral archaeology, and Darwinian archaeology—a large majority of North American archaeology fits a broad category here called “processual-plus.” Among the major themes that crosscut many or all of the approaches are interests in gender, agency/practice, symbols and meaning, material culture, and native perspectives. Gender archaeology is paradigmatic of processual-plus archaeology, in that it draws on a diversity of theoretical approaches to address a common issue. Emphasis on agency and practice is an important development, though conceptions of agency are too often linked to Western ideas of individuals and motivation. The vast majority of North American archaeology, including postprocessual approaches, is modern, not postmodern, in orientation. The relative dearth of theoretical argument positively contributes to diversity and dialogue, but it also may cause North American theory to receive inadequate attention and unfortunate misunderstandings of postmodernism.

The Place of Trees and Trees in Their Place

Abstract: Owain Jones and Paul Cloke, Oxford and New York: Berg, 2002, xii + 252 pages (paper).Reviewer: Wayne Fife Memorial University of NewfoundlandI originally encountered this book as part of a reading group at Memorial University. I took extensive notes on it before we met and what follows is to be taken as my own opinion, but that opinion has inevitably been influenced by the lively discussion that this work engendered among our group. Reaction to the book ranged from not liking it very much at all to deciding that it usefully considered a number of issues related to human and non-human agency, questions about re-conceptualizing "nature," and why human beings have such an attachment to "place." One thing that we discovered in our discussion was that the differences in our perceptions of the book were partially related to why each of us was reading it. Those who read it more as "just another book" and compared it to other theoretical works concerning poststructuralism, network theory, and/or political ecology tended to be least satisfied with it; while those who read it as a work that pertained more directly to research problems that they were currently engaging with tended to feel that they gained far more from it. As I am currently involved in research associated with national parks and other issues relating to nature tourism, I was the member of the group who most found Tree Cultures to be useful, as it helped me think through a number of important issues related to political ecology in general and national parks in particular (although national parks are not part of the book's overt agenda). I would, therefore, recommend this book primarily to researchers struggling first hand with issues involving relationships between humans and the non-human world, especially those that revolve around organic entities such as trees or other non-conscious beings.Tree Cultures can be divided into two main parts. Part 1 is entitled "Placing Trees in Cultural Theory" and Part 2 "Trees in their Place." In the second part, four case studies from England (involving an orchard, a cemetery, a heritage trail, and a town square) are used to illustrate how some of the concepts discussed in Part 1 can be put into practice in actual research situations.So many concepts are discussed in Part 1 that only a few of them can be considered here. Primarily, the authors are interested in the issue of non-human agency and whether other organic and non-organic entities can be considered to have agency in the world. Their clear answer to this question is yes. "Nature 'pushes back' and injects its own materiality and dynamism into what [David] Harvey terms 'socio-ecological processes'" (p. 30). In explaining why and how they have arrived at this answer, Jones and Cloke are careful to steer away from anthropomorphic romanticism or suggestions that trees, or other similar elements of nature, are "just like humans" in their agency. Instead they make the case that the key feature of "intentionality" in human agency needs to be replaced with the notion of "purposefulness" in the case of non-human agency. Purposefulness in relation to trees, for example, has to do with "fulfillment of their embodied tendencies to grow in certain ways and to reproduce" (p. 7). As an illustration of this principle, in a case study chapter on Arnos Vale Cemetery (a Victorian cemetery in Bristol), they show that a variety of tree species that were originally planted as an adjunct to the human enjoyment of the cemetery (which was used extensively for walking) became "wild" over time and self-seeded new trees to such an extent that by the contemporary period thousands of gravesites had been destroyed or altered by trees and the overall character of the cemetery irrevocably changed. This leads the authors to state: "The agency of trees in Arnos Vale has clearly been an active co-constituent in the changing nature and contested cultures of the place" (p. 152).One of the points Jones and Cloke make is that such non-human entities as trees have been largely overlooked when we consider agency because of the limited notions we normally apply to both scale and time when considering the effects of agents. …

The secular revolution : power, interests, and conflict in the secularization of American public life

Abstract: Sociologists, historians, and other social observers have long considered the secularization of American public life over the past hundred and thirty years to be an inevitable and natural outcome of modernization. This groundbreaking work rejects this view and fundamentally rethinks the historical and theoretical causes of the secularization of American public life between 1870 and 1930. Christian Smith and his team of contributors boldly argue that the declining authority of religion was not the by-product of modernization, but rather the intentional achievement of cultural and intellectual elites, including scientists, academics, and literary intellectuals, seeking to gain control of social institutions and increase their own cultural authority. Writing with vigor and a broad intellectual grasp, the contributors examine power struggles and ideological shifts in various social sectors where the public authority of religion has diminished, in particular education, science, law, and journalism. Together the essays depict a cultural and institutional revolution that is best understood in terms of individual agency, conflicts of interest, resource mobilization, and struggles for authority. Engaging both sociological and historical literature, The Secular Revolution offers a new theoretical framework and original empirical research that will inform our understanding of American society from the nineteenth to the twenty-first centuries. The ramifications of its provocative and cogent thesis will be felt throughout sociology, religious studies, and our general thinking about society for years to come.

Victims of circumstances? a defense of virtue ethics in business

Abstract: Should the responsibilities of business managers be under- stood independently of the social circumstances and 'smarket forces" that surround them, or (in accord with empiricism and the social sci- ences) are agents and their choices shaped by their circumstances, free only insofar as they act in accordance with antecedently estab- lished dispositions, their "character"? Virtue ethics, of which I consider myself a proponent, shares with empiricism this emphasis on char- acter as well as an affinity with the social sciences But recent criticisms of both empiricist and virtue ethical accounts of character deny even this apparent compromise between agency and environ- ment Here is an account of character that emphasizes dynamic interaction both in the formation and in the interplay between per- sonal agency and responsibility on the one hand and social pressures and the environment on the other

Spectacles of Race and Pedagogies of Denial: Anti-Black Racist Pedagogy Under the Reign of Neoliberalism

Abstract: Quality education in the United States has been compromised via public discourses that reinstitute racism on a daily basis. In its current manifestation, racism survives through the guise of neoliberalism, a kind of repartee that imagines human agency as simply a matter of individualized choices, the only obstacle to effective citizenship and agency being the lack of principled self-help and moral responsibility. In this article, I examine briefly the changing nature of the new racism by analyzing how some of its central assumptions evade notions of race, racial justice, equity, and democracy altogether. My analysis focuses especially on the discourse of color blindness and neoliberal racism. I then address how the racism of denial and neoliberal racism were recently on prominent display in the controversies surrounding former Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott's praise for segregationist Strom Thurmond. The essay concludes by offering some suggestions about how the new racism, particularly its neoliberal ...

Resisting with Authority: Historical Specificity, Agency and the Performative Self:

Abstract: How is it possible for human subjects who are socially constructed to engage in effective and authoritative acts of resistance to the social norms and institutions within which they were formed? Ju...

Getting out of the habitus: an alternative model of dynamically embodied social action

Abstract: Although Bourdieu's theory of practice has drawn widespread attention to the role of the body and space in social life, the concept of habitus is problematic as an explanatory account of dynamic embodiment because it lacks an adequate conception of the nature and location of human agency. An alternative model is presented which locates agency in the causal powers and capacities of embodied persons to engage in dialogic, signifying acts. Grounded in a non-Cartesian concept of person and 'new realist', post-positivist philosophy of science, vocal signs and action signs, not the dispositions of a habitus, become the means by which humans exercise agency in dynamically embodied practices. Ethnographic data from the commulnicative practices of the Nakota (Assiniboine) people of northern Montana (USA) support and illustrate the theoretical argument.

Early Childhood Education as an Evolving 'Community of Practice' or as Lived 'Social Reproduction': researching the 'taken-for-granted'

Abstract: Early childhood education within many English-speaking countries has evolved routines, practices, rituals, artefacts, symbols, conventions, stories and histories. In effect, practices have become traditions that have been named and reified, evolving a specialist discourse. What has become valued within the profession of early childhood education is essentially a Western view of childhood. Documents abound with statements on what is constituted as 'good' practice or 'quality' practice or even 'best' practice. But for whom is this practice best? This article examines early childhood education from a 'communities of practice' perspective, drawing upon the work of Goncu, Rogoff and Wenger to shed light on the levels of agency inherent in the profession.

Account episodes in family discourse: the making of morality in everyday interaction:

Abstract: This article investigates account episodes in Italian family dinner conversations and illustrates how sequential patterns and participation are organized in terms of preferences indexical of moral ...

Art and Agency: A Reassessment

Abstract: In his book, Art and agency, Alfred Gell presents a theory of art based neither on aesthetics nor on visual communication. Art is defined by the distinctive function it performs in advancing social relationships through 'the abduction of agency'. Art objects are indexes of the artist's or model's agency. This article examines Gell's use of agency, particularly in relation to the ritual art that is central to his argument. Focusing on Gell's employment of Peirce's term 'index' (out of his triad of index, icon, and symbol), I note that Peirce's approach deflects attention from signification towards the link between art works and the things to which they refer. I consider what Peirce meant by abduction, and conclude that while Gell makes a good case for the agency of art objects he does not explain the distinctive ways in which art objects extend their maker's or user's agency. Gell lacked the time to make detailed revisions before publication and I acknowledge that, given more time, he might have revised some parts of the book. It is now five years since the publication of Alfred Gell's highly original, posthumous book, Art and agency (1998). Gell set out to construct a theory of art based neither on aesthetics nor on visual communication. Gell acknowledges the importance of form, balance, and rhythm at various points in his analysis, but argues that they are not to be appreciated in the detached manner implied by the term 'aesthetics'. His rejection of semiotics is more radical. Drawing on Peirce's concepts of index, icon, and symbol, Gell argues that art objects may be icons or indexes, but never symbols. Indeed, he frequently treats icon and index as synonymous. The argument is dense and ingenious, and highlights many aspects of the social role of art objects that have previously been neglected. In the end, however, I consider Gell's argument to be unsustainable. His efforts to exclude Saussurian symbolism have also been criticized by some of the contributors to a recent volume evaluating Gell's achievement (Pinney & Thomas 2001). In this article I propose to recall what Peirce, Saussure, and Mounin wrote on index, icon, sign, and symbol. Peirce and Saussure employed the terms sign and symbol in very different ways, while Mounin (1970) elaborated a theory of visual communication that acknowledged the special qualities of icons and indexes. Armed with some basic definitions, I then critically re-examine Gell's argument in Art and agency. I argue that Gell was correct to reject a specifically linguistic model for visual communication, but that he was wrong to minimize the importance of cultural convention in shaping the reception or 'reading' of art objects.

Gender and the foundations of social choice: the role of situated agency

Abstract: Amartya Sen defends a rich conception of social choice theory against tendencies to limit social choice theory to the formal investigation of rules of collective decision-making. His understanding of social choice theory makes the field a natural candidate for exploring gender issues in the evaluation of democratic policy. Not surprisingly, Sen has applied the insights he developed from his study of social choice to the evaluation of gender inequality, in particular to women's well-being in the context of the family. I focus on Sen's distinction between well-being and agency, and argue that from the perspective of women's movements and related social movements, the role of agency has so far been unduly neglected in social choice theory.

On space as a capacity

Abstract: This article is about space and social relationships. More precisely, it is about the space of and in social relationships. It is also about the efficacy of social relationships in segregating their own contexts of meaning and value. The article also addresses the question of how agency comes about. This 'coming about' of agency, its swelling and appearance in a structure of meaning, is what I call 'capacity'. Social relationships have 'capacity'. That is, they have both spaciousness and potency. They accomplish things, and accomplish things 'somewhere'. In this respect, space (or the capacity of social relationships) is something very different from idioms that we have come to think of as forms of space, like landscape or place. This article is also, therefore, a critique of the way in which some anthropologists have recently theorized landscape and place. My argument is based on an ethnographic account of the dimensions through which people construct urban space in the Chilean city of Antofagasta. What happens when people's identity is not land-related? When a land holds no values, no memories, no history for the people that inhabit it? In the city of Antofagasta, Chile, people say that they live in a 'moment of fugue'. They refer to the city as a campamento minero, a mining encampment: a place where 'people come to make money, and then they leave'. The city is also known for being dirty, and its inhabitants are often heard complaining that 'people behave as if they did not live here'. In Antofagasta, social relationships are not anchored in the land, for the land is no 'place' for them. The place of social relationships is not the territory where they unfold, but a different space. In this article I explore some of the ways in which the people of Antofagasta fabricate spaces in order to seek refuge from a territory that they deride. The city is located in the desert of Atacama, which is celebrated for being the driest desert on earth. The desert is also celebrated for its hidden mineral wealth. The people of Antofagasta are grateful to the desert for this, but they also express contempt for the territory because of its harshness, isolation, and lack of history. It is not unusual to hear people describing or referring to the desert by insulting it: pampa del carajo (damned desert). The relationship that the people of Antofagasta have with the city and, historically, with the desert, is one of surmounting or seeking to overcome the limiting structures that their environment has imposed and continues to impose on them. My present purpose is to illustrate some of the forms that these strategies of surmounting have taken, and thus to describe some of the efforts that the people of Antofagasta have made to invest their city with value and meaning. In the context of everyday life in Antofagasta, value stands today, broadly, for a concern with issues of healthcare and cleanliness, family life, and the well-being of children. What is

Agency, Anticipation and Indeterminacy in Feminist Theory

Abstract: Much contemporary work on agency offers only a partial account because it remains within an essentially negative understanding of subject formation. This essay examines the work of Judith Butler an...

Corporate Versus Individual Moral Responsibility

Abstract: There is a clear tendency in contemporary political/legal thought to limit agency to individual agents, thereby denying the existence and relevance of collective moral agency in general, and corporate agency in particular. This tendency is ultimately rooted in two particular forms of individualism – methodological and fictive (abstract) – which have their source in the Enlightenment. Furthermore, the dominant notion of moral agency owes a lot to Kant whose moral/legal philosophy is grounded exclusively on abstract reason and personal autonomy, to the detriment of a due recognition of the socio-historical grounds of moral social conduct.

Welfare, social exclusion and reflexivity: The case of child and woman protection

Abstract: Questions concerning what it means to be a human agent and the capacities of those who receive welfare services to reflect upon and shape their lives, and the kinds of social conditions which create opportunities for such ‘reflexivity’, have begun to move to the centre of social policy and social work analysis. Using empirical evidence drawn from a study of child and woman protection, this paper argues that, contrary to claims that the concept of self-reflexivity as developed in the work of Beck and Giddens is of little relevance to marginalised citizens, in late-modernity the socially excluded are using social work and welfare services in creative ways to critically engage in life-planning, to find safety and healing. However, the data suggest that much greater specificity is needed in relation to the areas in which it is possible to act to change and develop the self and the social world in late-modernity. The paper argues for a complex theory of agency and reflexivity in welfare discourse which takes account of the intersection of structural disadvantage, intervention practices and personal biography and how people adjust to adversity and cope with toxic experiences and relationships in their lives. This helps to account for the limits to the capacities of agents to reflect and know why they act as they do and their capacities to act destructively, as well as providing for an appreciation of the creative, reflexive welfare subject.

Can Institutions Have Responsibilities?: Collective Moral Agency and International Relations

Abstract: Introduction: Making Sense of 'Responsibility' in International Relations: Key Questions and Concepts T.Erskine PART I: IDENTIFYING MORAL AGENTS: STATES, GOVERNMENTS AND 'INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY' Assigning Responsibilities to Institutional Moral Agents: The Case of States and Quasi-states T. Erskine Moral Responsibility and the Problem of Representing the State D.Runciman Moral Agency and International Society: Reflections on Norms, the UN, the Gulf War, and the Kosovo Campaign C.Brown PART II: OBSTACLES AND ALTERNATIVE QUESTIONS Collective Moral Agency and the Political Process F.V.Harbour Constitutive Theory and Moral Accountability: Individuals, Institutions, and Dispersed Practices M.Frost When Agents Cannot Act: International Institutions as 'Moral Patients' C.Navari PART III: HARD CASES: ASSIGNING DUTIES NATO and the Individual Soldier as Moral Agents with Reciprocal Duties: Imbalance in the Kosovo Campaign P.Cornish & F.V.Harbour The Anti-Sweatshop Movement: Constructing Corporate Moral Agency in the Global Apparel Industry R.DeWinter PART IV: HARD CASES: APPORTIONING BLAME The Responsibility of Collective External Bystanders in Cases of Genocide: The French in Rwanda D.Kroslak The United Nations and the Fall of Srebrenica: Meaningful Responsibility and International Society A.F.Lang, Jr. PART V: CONCLUSIONS On 'Good Global Governance', Institutional Design and the Practices of Moral Agency N.Rengger Global Justice: Aims, Arrangements and Responsibilities C.Barry Selected Bibliography Index

Sustainability: ecological, social, economic, technological, and systems perspectives

Abstract: Sustainability is generally associated with a definition by the World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987: "... development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs ..." However, there is no mathematical theory embodying these concepts, although one would be immensely valuable in humanity's efforts to manage the environment. The concept of sustainability applies to integrated systems comprising humans and the rest of nature; the structures and operation of the human component (society, economy, law, etc.) must be such that they reinforce the persistence of the structures and operation of the natural component (ecosystem trophic linkages, biodiversity, biogeochemical cycles, etc.). One of the challenges of sustainability research lies in linking measures of ecosystem functioning to the structure and operation of the associated social system. We review the nature of this complex system including its ecological, social, economic, and technological aspects, and propose an approach to assessing sustainability based on Information Theory that bridges the natural and human systems. These principles are then illustrated using a model system with an ecological food web linked to a rudimentary social system. This work is part of the efforts of a larger multidisciplinary group at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's National Risk Management Research Laboratory.

Group Identity, Individual Creativity, and Symbolic Generation in a BaKongo Diaspora

Abstract: This article applies theories of group dynamics and individual agency to past material expressions of core symbols within particular African American religious beliefs. The past creation and use of such artifacts is analyzed using theories concerning modes of symbolic expression, the interplay of dominant and nondominant religions, formation and maintenance of social group identities, and the role of individual creativity and innovation within those processes. This analysis demonstrates the ways in which facets of the core symbolic expressions of the BaKongo people of West Central Africa evolved over time and across the trans-Atlantic region.

Narrative incoherence in schizophrenia: the absent agent-protagonist and the collapse of internal dialogue.

Abstract: It is widely known that people with schizophrenia have difficulty telling a coherent story of their lives and that this is linked to impoverished function. But what specifically has gone wrong in the narratives in schizophrenia? Is it the case that some elements of narrative remain intact in schizophrenia while others are uniquely affected? To address these questions, we qualitatively analyze the personal narratives of three persons with schizophrenia, which have emerged in psychotherapy. Based on this analysis we suggest that narratives in schizophrenia uniquely fail to situate agency within the narrator resulting in a story that is missing an agent-protagonist. While the narratives we present contain coherent accounts of how others are connected to one another, they fail to evolve into a story about the self as an agent that others could associate with the narrator. We speculate that this may reflect neuro-cognitively based difficulties maintaining the internal dialogue that propels agency as well as fears that any emergent subjectivity may be appropriated or objectified by others. Implications for psychotherapy are discussed.

The Construction of Self: The Public Reach into the Private Sphere

Abstract: The public/private debate has not been a major feature in recent sociological theory. However, Bailey (2000) has argued for a renewed sociological research programme to focus on the sociological private. He outlines three dimensions of this: intimate relationships, the self and the unconscious. This article seeks to address two of these dimensions, the production of self-theories and unconscious dis-avowal. We extend this theorizing to account for the experience of sexual engagement, and present a discourse analysis of the diaries of the comedian and actor Kenneth Williams (1928-1988). Drawing principally on the thought of Merleau-Ponty (1962) we argue that our analysis demonstrates the importance of a pre-reflective engagement with the social world that is then reflected on in internal dialogue. We show how discourse analysis may be used to demonstrate the dis-cursive production of a self-theory and the role of such a self-theory in the dis-avowal of the principal's pre-reflective engagement with others.