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Abstract
McNamee (2003) and Raskin and Neimeyer (2003) largely bypass my analysis (Mackay, 2003) of the uses and misuses of `meaning' in psychotherapy, and of why the philosophy of the meaning-makers has no implications for therapy, tolerant or otherwise. They focus on my critique of constructionism and constructivism. Their responses repeat rather than address errors of which I criticized constructionism/ivism. Justifications of discourse pluralism end either in self-contradiction or in infinite regress. They ignore this and multiply their difficulties by treating rationality and logic as discourse-specific and optional. They neither `bridge incommensurate discourses' nor offer a `coherent constructivism'. Further, they identify me with a `familiar realism' of their own construction, misattributing to me such doctrines as foundationalism, essentialism, absolutism and belief in transcendent reality. Raskin and Neimeyer, in particular, compound these misconstructions by misrepresenting and distorting my terms and phrases. Thus they undermine their claims to both the epistemic and practical tolerance.
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Affiliation(s)
- Nigel Mackay
- University of Wollongong and Boston Graduate School of Psychoanalysis
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Abstract
This paper develops the use of the concept of positioning as a way of thinking about and analysing the production of relational subjectivity. It discusses some practical implications for both the analysis and production of human subjectivity and relationship in conversation that arise from taking a thorough-going social constructionist stance. Examples from everyday speech are used to discuss the importance of enabling the taking up of agentive positions in the narratives of our own lives, and how these opportunities may be offered through different ‘position calls’. It is suggested that this conceptual tool is useful not only for understanding everyday conversations, but also for understanding personal experiences of exclusions from social interactions. Such considerations arise from a specific focus on therapy, but it is argued that if we are interested in enhancing possibilities for egalitarian relationships and multi-voiced dialogical interaction, it is important to notice the impact of speech action, whether in therapy, in everyday conversation, or in the practices of academic psychology.
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