Bøker i Theory and History in the Human and Social Sciences-serien

Liminality has become a key concept within the social sciences, with a growing number of publications devoted to it in recent years. The concept is needed to address those aspects of human experience and social life that fall outside of ordered structures. In contrast to the clearly defined roles and routines that define so much of industrial work and economic life, it highlights spaces of transition, indefiniteness, ambiguity, play and creativity. Thus, it is an indispensable concept and a necessary counterweight to the overemphasis on structural influences on human behavior.This book aims to use the concept of liminality to develop a culturally and experientially sensitive psychology. This is accomplished by first setting out an original theoretical framework focused on understanding the 'liminal sources of cultural experience,' and second an application of concept to a number of different domains, such as tourism, pilgrimage, aesthetics, children's play, art therapy, and medical diagnosis. Finally, all these domains are then brought together in a concluding commentary chapter that puts them in relation to an overarching theoretical framework. This book will be useful for graduate students and researchers in cultural psychology, critical psychology, psychosocial psychology, developmental psychology, health psychology, anthropology and the social sciences, cultural studies among others.

This book presents a theory of motives that has evolved over decades in dialogue with academics and with practitioners. The key proposal is that of collectively cultivating meta-motives ¿ rather than the ubiquitous recipes for manipulating self-regulation. Cultivating meta-motives can proceed through rearticulating motives. Such rearticulation engages with theories and practices of motivation and motives. First, this is a discussion of the psychologies of motivation, and a reflection of post-psychology as a way forward. Second, this discussion takes us back to fundamental problems with subjectivity, and with psychology, even critical psychology, as a way of addressing it. Third, out of this theoretical work come concepts that are put to work in understanding practices of modelling and cultivating motives ¿ clinical, social work, and educational practices. In the first instance, as a critique of contemporary pragmatic practices, and then by rearticulating aesthetic practices as ways to expand and overcome those. Fourth, this has implications for the cultivation of the competence in care for motives, and for the place of theory in this competence. The book provides both a theoretical argument and a resource for those professionals in education, social work, and health who seek a qualitative understanding of what they do.

This book is aimed at appreciating and further developing the work of Pina Boggi Cavallo. She was a scholar that fully embodied the spirit of the first cognitive revolution in psychology, whose ideal was to consider human being in its totality. The focus of scientific investigation in her work, were the processes of thought, as connected to the affective and ethical dimensions, the social construction of the developing Self within the real context of its making.The book is organized in three sections:Sowing: the selected works of Pina Boggi Cavallo translated in English;Fertilizing: invited commentaries which develop the ideas of Pina Boggi Cavallo in the current and future scientific landscape;Cultivating: invited chapters by international scholars, including some who collaborated with her.

The ¿Re-Inventing Organic Metaphors for the Social Sciences¿ is a volume with the specific goal: to challenge psychological understandings by connecting psychological approaches with multidimensional perspectives of various other scientific streams, meanwhile imbedding the generated knowledge in metaphors that allows researchers to follow phenomena into a deeper and more (w)holistic understanding of its appearance. This is particularly important when the humankind faces challenges due to systemic biological changes, as the phenomenological dynamics bonded to those challenges can be conserved in appropriated context. For this purpose, the organic metaphors are introduced. A tool that has central advantage over mechanical metaphors as it can capture the complex and open-systemic nature of biological, psychological, and social phenomena. For example¿the widely used notion ¿mind as a computer¿ may be more productively replaced by ¿mind as a membrane¿¿with implications (e.g. focus on borders in-between, or in systems in themselves- exosystemic realities in our world). There are many other fertile opportunities not yet explored in the realms of psychology and other sciences. Furthermore, the contributors operated also as cross-reviewers for each other¿s. In this occasion a new dimension, in chapter construction, will be introduced. Beside the traditional reviewing of another paper the reviewer has been asked to add a small list of extending questions toward the reviewed paper. These added questions have been introduced as potential questions that the authors were demanded to add into a final sub-chapter of their contribution. The subchapter has been titled as ¿Dialogue¿ (the author was free to select between the questions and ideas on those they believe could inhabit an especially worth for the future readers).

The book is a true knowledge-enhancing project, dealing with the forms of rationality at work in social life, which are so many, varied and complex. Published already in Spanish and Italian, it analyses the role played by rationality through the lens of social theories in order to propose a problematic interpretation of human action. Since there is nothing more practical than a good theory when seeking to understand our society, the book reflects on the theoretical approaches that provide useful categories by means of which to understand and interpret individual, organizational, and institutional action. It proposes an analysis of a wide variety of classics by eminent European and Anglo-American thinkers, such as Dahrendorf, Mannheim, Marx, Popper, Weber, Habermas, Luhmann, Machiavelli, Pareto, Ardigò, Cesareo, Parsons, Schütz, Alexander, Bauman, Beck, Sennett, Antiseri, Boudon, Sen, Simon, to shed light on the relationship between rationality, difficulties in thinking and extra-rationality. Finally, the reasons for unexpected action are investigated as well as the strategic role played by ethics, rationality and skills in postmodern societies on the basis of the contributions of Nussbaum and Piketty.

This work brings together different perspectives on psychological methods and particularly methods involving experimentation. To encourage a reflective use of research methods, the authors illuminate the historical, philosophical, and scientific dimensions of methodology, providing both defenses and criticisms of experimental psychology. The primary audience of the work are students and researchers in psychological and behavioral sciences, who have an interest in methodology

Innovative research requires courageous methods. With this in mind, Courageous Methods in Cultural Psychology invites students and post-graduate researchers to develop methods that will let them grasp phenomena of interest more fully. Readers will learn how to use established methods, and may be asked to develop them further by combining single steps of extant procedures, or by taking a completely new approach to data collection and analysis. In this book, diverse researchers present projects in which they have tried to do just that. A comprehensive process - from narrowing down research questions to collecting and analyzing data - is given in detail, followed by critical reflections on how well the authors have understood and shared complex realities. Project presentations are framed by theoretical chapters that deal with the challenges and opportunities of cultural psychology and interdisciplinary research. Courageous Methods in Cultural Psychology is sure to inspire and encourage those who wish to venture on new roads "e;into the wild."e;

This book will be useful for graduate students and researchers in cultural psychology, critical psychology, psychosocial psychology, developmental psychology, health psychology, anthropology and the social sciences, cultural studies among others.

The book will also be of special interest for scholars working in social psychology, history of psychology, general psychology, theoretical psychology, environmental psychology and political psychology.

This book explores and provides an overview of the Norwegian psychologist Jan Smedslund's life work on Psycho-logic. His contributions to science have been radical not only in challenging the empirical foundation of psychology, but also in seeking to develop a viable alternative. This book brings together various reflections on his key contributions from the 1960s to the present day.The volume features three chapters by Jan Smedslund, offering his updated views on psychological science and psychotherapy. It also features contributions from several scholars that critically evaluates his legacy. His seminal ideas are discussed, revised and expanded upon and the questions raised are put in relevant historical and interdisciplinary context.Respect for Thought is a valuable resource for psychological researchers, historians of psychology, cultural psychologists, critical psychologists, theoretical psychologists, clinical psychologists and psychotherapists,social scientists, philosophers of psychology, and philosophers of science.

The book includes a new theoretical synthesis of William Stern's classic personology published in the 1930s with contemporary cultural psychology of semiotic mediation developed by the author over the last two decades.

This is an international and interdisciplinary volume that provides a new look at the general background of the social sciences from a philosophical perspective and provides directions for methodology. It seeks to overcome the limitations of the traditional treatises of a philosophy of science rooted in the physical sciences, as well as extend the coverage of basic science to intentional and socially normative features of the social sciences.The discussions included in this book are divided into four thematic sections: Social and cognitive roots for reflexivity upon the research process Philosophies of explanation in the social sciences Social normativity in social sciences Social processes in particular sciencesSocial Philosophy of Science for the Social Sciences will find an interested audience in students of the philosophy of science and social sciences. It is also relevant for researchers and students in the fields of psychology, sociology, economics, anthropology, education, and political science.

Rom Harré¿s career spans more than 40 years of original contributions to the development of both psychology and other human and social sciences. Recognized as a founder of modern social psychology, he developed the microsociological approach ¿ethogenics¿ and facilitated the discursive turn within psychology, as well as developed the concept of positioning theory. Used within both philosophy and social scientific approaches aimed at conflict analysis, analyses of power relations, and narrative structures, the development and impact of positioning theory can be understood as part of a second cognitive revolution. Whereas the first cognitive revolution involved incorporating cognition as both thoughts and feelings as an ineliminable part of psychology and social sciences, this second revolution released this cognition from a focus on individuals, and towards a focus of understanding individuals as participating in public practices using public discourses as part of their cognition. This edited volume adds to the scholarly conversation around positioning theory, evaluates Rom Harré¿s significance for the history and development of psychology, and highlights his numerous theoretical contributions and their lasting effects on the psychological and social sciences.Included among the chapters:What is it to be a human being? Rom Harré on self and identityThe social philosophy of Harré as a philosophy of cultureThe discursive ontology of the social worldEthics in socio-cultural psychologiesDiscursive cognition and neural networksThe Second Cognitive Revolution: A Tribute to Rom Harré is an indispensable reader for anyone interested in his cognitive-historical turn, and finds an audience with academics and researchers in the social and human science fields of cognitive psychology, social psychology, discursive psychology, philosophy, sociology, and ethnomethodology.

The book aims to bring art back into psychology, to provide an understanding for the art of psychology.An Old Melody in a New Song will be of interest to advanced students and researchers in the fields of educational and developmental psychology, cultural psychology, history of ideas, aesthetics, and art-based research.

This book explores and provides an overview of the Norwegian psychologist Jan Smedslund's life work on Psycho-logic. His contributions to science have been radical not only in challenging the empirical foundation of psychology, but also in seeking to develop a viable alternative. This book brings together various reflections on his key contributions from the 1960s to the present day.The volume features three chapters by Jan Smedslund, offering his updated views on psychological science and psychotherapy. It also features contributions from several scholars that critically evaluates his legacy. His seminal ideas are discussed, revised and expanded upon and the questions raised are put in relevant historical and interdisciplinary context.Respect for Thought is a valuable resource for psychological researchers, historians of psychology, cultural psychologists, critical psychologists, theoretical psychologists, clinical psychologists and psychotherapists, social scientists, philosophers of psychology, and philosophers of science.