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Psychology without Foundations
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Psychology without Foundations
History, Philosophy and Psychosocial Theory


August 2009 | 248 pages | SAGE Publications Ltd

For many years, for many people social psychology has been deemed a discipline in crisis. Factions within the field have emerged as the field has struggled to find a new identity for what social psychology is. In spite of recent efforts to forge connections across these paradigmatical territories many academics remain locked in perpetual disagreement to this day.

This new book proposes a way out of the crisis by letting go of the idea that psychology needs new foundations or a new identity, whether biological, discursive, or cognitive. The psychological is not narrowly confined to any one aspect of human experience; it is quite literally everywhere. Drawing on a range of influential thinkers including Michel Serres, Michel Foucault, AN Whitehead and Gilles Deleuze, the book proposes a strong process-oriented approach to the psychological which studies events or occasions. Aspects of experience such as communication or embodiment are treated as thoroughly mediated – the product of multiple intersecting relationships between the biological, the psychic, and the social. The outcome is an image of a 'mobile' reflexively founded discipline which follows the psychological wherever it takes us, from the depths of embodiment to the complexities of modern global politics.

The critically important new text is written in a way that is accessible for undergraduate students as well as more advanced readers and could be an exciting gateway into a new understanding of the rich, historical discipline of psychology.


 
The First Word Or In the Beginning Is the Middle
 
Whitehead and Process
 
Serres and Mediation
 
Luhmann and Communication
 
Artaud and Embodiment
 
Spinoza and Affect
 
Bergson and Memory
 
Foucault and Subjectivity
 
Deleuze and Life
 
On Losing Your Foundations and Finding Them Again

`On the showing of this book, "Critical Psychology" (for want of a better label) has a long way to run, and a lot of work to do yet. It may well become required reading, so get in early - but expect some mind-stretching and moments of bewilderment. Oh - and recommend it to undergraduate students too; tell them how "accessible" it is - and run. They'll thank you when writing up their doctorates' - History and Philosophy of Psychology

Sample Materials & Chapters

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Chapter Two


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