Völkerpsychologie: The Synthesis that Never was

One of the aims of Culture & Psychology has always been to synthesize past ideas in order to enhance the tools we use to look at the phenomena we want to understand. In order to do so, we also need to understand the approaches our intellectual forefathers applied. The present article brings to light a ‘forgotten’ approach to studying people bound by common language, myth and customs. Völkerpsychologie is the historical predecessor to cultural psychology; however, readers not familiar with the history of psychology may not know what this ‘forgotten’ discipline attempted to achieve. The article focuses on Völkerpsychologie as its founders, Lazarus and Steinthal, conceived of it (including the often overlooked continuation of their journal after 1890), as well as Wilhelm Wundt’s considerable contributions to the discipline. Possible new directions for this approach are suggested in order to make it more suitable for 21st-century cultural psychology.

Knitting mochilas: A sociocultural, developmental practice in Arhuaco indigenous communities

The purpose of this article is to analyze the psycho-cultural processes involved in knitting “mochilas” (traditional bags), a common craft in the Arhuaco indigenous community located in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, Colombia. The article is structured in three parts, as follows: first, issues related to child development are discussed; then, the analysis method used to study the processes involved in the practice of knitting is presented and, finally, we reflect on the importance of recovering the sense and meaning of this everyday practice as a way to study child development.

Striving for the new: Cultural psychology as a developmental science

Cultural psychology is a developmental science in its nature because it assumes that all the humans beings (as well as groups, social institutions, communities) are developing dynamic systems constantly striving for the new. The focus of investigation is, thus, the circumstances under which novel organizational forms emerge. Any attempt to focus on a complex issue like culture in psychology requires an interdisciplinary integration between social sciences and a general historical orientation (that is, de facto, developmental) on culture. From the outset, Culture & Psychology has promoted linkages between theory and empirical work. For exploring the complex role of the culture in psychology, mere demonstrations of the effect of the culture on a variable do not produce any theoretical advancement, neither it does a pure theoretical speculation. It is only by looking for both the theoretical and empirical elaboration (as a unity) that a breakthrough in the intellectual machinery of a given science is possible. What we need is a consistency between theory, methods, and empirical phenomena. Thus, the question is what kinds of scientific concepts and methodology are adequate for creating theories of dynamic and meaningful phenomena.

The “&” has emerged. Seeking “culture” and “psychology” for Culture & Psychology

On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of Culture & Psychology, the author retrospectively evaluates the journal’s metatheoretical and theoretical developmental trajectories. For this purpose, seven editorials were treated as the primary texts in the foreground as evaluative reflections of the knowledge field themselves. And in the background, the author’s own readership and conceptualizations inevitably provided the additional intellectual material for this brief essay. First, she highlights the journal’s initial aspirations for culture-inclusive psychology scholarship it welcomes, the necessary and (im)possible tasks and the evaluative standards it sets for itself. They are presented as the identity developmental markers and grouped around seven axiomatic themes. Second, the possible sources of “developmental delays,” “deviations” from its valued norms, or for the “unattained” ideals as judged by its own standards, are sorted out in terms of implicit/explicit knowledge positions presupposed within the heterogeneity of the scholarship. Third, the achievements and/or determinate decisions are acknowledged. Lastly, the author critically reflects from within her own perspectivally prospective perspective towards further transformations of contemporary psychology as culture/culture as psychology.

What cultural psychologies need: Generalizing theories!

Culture and Psychology has by now been around for two decades. As its Editor, I like to look forward, rather than backward, to consider what might be necessary for further advancement of the area. While the discourses in the different subdomains of cultural psychologies 1 have stabilized over the two decades, elaborations of relevant cultural phenomena have been well established, and the field continues in its deeply international and transdisciplinary ways—there are still serious obstacles on its way of further advancement. I would outline two—the need of theory construction, and development of new methodology that honors the qualitative, dynamic, and holistic nature of cultural phenomena.

“Silent” monologues, “loud” dialogues and the emergence of hibernated I-positions in the negotiation of multivoiced cultural identities

Drawing on dialogical self theory (Hermans, 2001) and employing a case study approach, this article aims to provide insights into the dialogical processes through which two British-born siblings of Pakistani background construct and negotiate their cultural identities. The analysis suggests that both young people were moving towards their multivoiced cultural identities through a constant positioning and re-positioning within their communities, which resulted in dialogical negotiation of aspects of differences/similarities and belonging within their majority and minority communities as well as living in a multicultural society. When their negotiation is a struggle shaped by issues of racism and religious discrimination, two opposing processes are constructed, a dynamic dialogical and a monological one. We introduce the notion of hibernated I-positions as a resource to deal with rapid change, threat and uncertainty. I-positions that are inactive, or are in a hibernated state and silenced, are always available to re-emerge and become engaged in a new dialogue to help retain identity continuity. In this article, we challenge linear assumptions which assume that all immigrant groups undergo the same kind of psychological acculturation process.

Amerindian anthropology and cultural psychology: Crossing boundaries and meeting otherness’ worlds

Addressing integrative possibilities between psychology and anthropology, this paper aims to design conceptual linkages between semiotic-cultural constructivist psychology and the anthropological theory of Amerindian perspectivism. From the psychological view, it is the interdependence between the structural and processual dimensions of the personal culture that makes parallels with Amerindian perspectivism fruitful. This anthropological frame proposes an experiment with native conceptions, which I argue similar to what Baldwin (1906) called sembling. Hence, it can be considered an active imitation of otherness’ viewpoint in order to approach indigenous worlds. It is supposed that this procedure leads to the emergence of new symbolic elements configuring the cultural action field of each agency in interaction. It is proposed that ‘‘making-believe’’ the Amerindian is convergent with the dialogic-hermeneutic approach of semiotic-cultural constructivism. As a result of the present integrative effort, is designed a meta-model that multiplies the genetic process of concrete symbolic objects.

Addressing the Other in Dialogue

The dialogical self, defined as a dynamic multiplicity of I-positions, has been taken up in multiple ways in psychology generally and cultural psychology specifically. As a self unfolding dynamically with others in a world, the dialogical self is at its foundation ethical. Self scholars have recognized the ethical nature of the dialogical self, but have not yet described how the self navigates its course in light of the demands and considerations of others. We examine this by turning to the phenomenological and hermeneutic account of self offered by Paul Ricoeur. Ricoeur provides a dialectical and cultural theory of the self that shares important similarities with the dialogical self, meriting a theoretical comparison. Most importantly, Ricoeur gives a detailed description of the self’s ethical framework. We employ his insights in the current paper to reveal the manner in which the dialogical self is oriented toward the good in lived experience.

Shifting loyalties: reconsidering psychology's subject matter

Schwarz (IPBS: Integrative Psychology & Behavioral Science 43:3, 2009) cogently demonstrates that in conjunction with scientific conventionalism psychology has developed a rather deficient view of their subject matter: the human being. Psychology based on an impoverished notion of empirical has rendered subjectivity or 'the measuring apparatus man' invisible. As his story implicitly demonstrates, psychologists supported by a positivistic view of science (in part to be empirical) and notion of 'objectivity' have learned to trust their 'rigorous' methods instead of their participants as capable of revealing important and interesting phenomena. If we are going to take subjectivity and experience seriously there should be a cultivation of a new attitude or orientation regarding psychology's subject matter (i.e., the human being) and science. This commentary discusses Mark Freeman's (2007) argument that the first requirement of science should be 'fidelity to the phenomena' and elaborates on the implications for psychology grounded in this view of science.

Cultural Psychology Today: Innovations and Oversights

Culture & Psychology has developed from a small start-up journal in 1995 into the key trend-setter in the field. This editorial analysis continues the tradition of inquiry started in previous efforts (Valsiner, 2001, 2004a) and extends it to the needs of psychology as a whole for the study of dynamic, meaning-making human beings. Cultural psychology—using the term culture as a generic term in various versions—continues to be an arena where innovations can occur. Separate research fields— such as the dialogical self, social representation processes, semiotic mediation, symbolic action, and actuation theories—have all been co-participants in this new advancement of ideas. Yet the central problem—an innovation of empirical research methodology which would appropriately capture human active meaning-making—has not been solved. Likewise, cultural psychology has only marginally touched upon the lessons from indigenous psychologies—the richness of folk psychological terms, and the cultural over-determination of objects used in human everyday living. Contemporary cultural psychology turns increasingly towards the study of objects as cultural constructs. Editing a journal is itself an act of construction of a cultural object, and the current state of contemporary scientific journals indicates a re-construction of the social nature of knowledge. Moving beyond its postmodernist and empiricist confines, psychology is set to return to the level of an abstracted generalization of its culture-inclusive theories. Culture—in terms of semiotic mediators and meaningful action patterns—is the inherent core of human psychological functions, rather than an external causal entity that has `effects' on human emotion, cognition, and behavior.

Commentary: How Far Is Brazil from Africa?

The article by Keller, Demuth and Yovsi et al. holds a special interest for Brazilian psychology because of the influence of African culture on Brazilian ways of living and identity. It contributes to knowledge, assuming a clear position alongside the qualitative differences and the dialogical co-existence of the dimensions of autonomy and relatedness implicit in intra-individual and inter-individual variability. At the same time, the authors look for similarities, showing that tradition and novelty co-exist and that their manifestation depends on contextual dynamics. The commentary offers an overview of Brazilian historical ethnical formation to emphasize some political aspects of these contextual dynamics. I also comment on some similarities and differences based on a study with Brazilian afro-descendents. Finally, this commentary presents some questions about physical punishment, education as a value, complexity and linearity, translation and betrayal, the concepts of independence and autonomy.

The Multi-voicedness of Independence and Interdependence: The Case of the Cameroonian Nso

It is often claimed that independence and interdependence are two dimensions that are part of any culture and the psychology of any human being. While previous studies have considered these two concepts merely as a matter of degree, this article argues that, in fact, they can be of different quality and have a variety of meanings depending on the specific socio-cultural context. From a systemic approach, the study addresses the dialogical co-existence of these dimensions and views culture as an open system that allows for adaptation and constant reorganization according to the given context. Interviews with 10 mothers from the ethnic group of the Cameroonian Nso on their ideas on childrearing revealed that different conceptions of autonomy and interpersonal relatedness not only co-exist in this ethnic group but may serve different purposes and change depending on the specific socio-cultural conditions in which the mother lives.

Collapsing Self/Other positions: identification through differentiation

There is a widely recognized tendency for people to positively differentiate Self from Other. The present paper asks: What counter dynamic constrains this othering tendency? A phenomenon, termed identification through differentiation is presented in which the positive differentiation of Self from Other collapses in a moment of identification. This phenomenon is demonstrated and explored using quasi-naturalistic group discussions with tourists in India. Three excerpts are analysed. The first demonstrates a tourist's attempt to positively differentiate him from other tourists. The second demonstrates how such an effort can collapse in a moment of identification with the previously derogated 'other' tourists. The third is used to explore how issues of self-presentation complicate identification through differentiation. The discussion uses concepts from Mead (1934) and Ichheiser (1949) in order to theorize about the preconditions, interactional mechanisms and wider applicability of the phenomenon.