Critical Discursive Psychology [Hardcover]

Critical Discursive Psychology addresses issues in critical discursive research in psychology, and outlines the historical context in the discipline for the emergence of qualitative debates. Key critical theoretical resources are described and assessed and a series of polemics is staged that brings together writers who have helped shape critical work in psychology. It also sets out methodological steps for critical readings of texts and arguments for the role of psychoanalytic theory in qualitative research.Introduction: Theoretical Discourse, Subjectivity and Critical Psychology PART I: ENLIGHTENMENT, REALISM AND POWER (and their reverse) Against Postmodernism: Psychology in Cultural Context Against Relativism in Psychology: On Balance Against Wittgenstein: Materialist Reflections on Language in Psychology PART II: THE TURN TO DISCOURSE AS A CRITICAL THEORETICAL RESOURCE Discursive Psychology Uncut Discourse: Definitions and Contradictions PART III: CRITICAL DISCURSIVE RESEARCH, SUBJECTIVITY AND PRACTICE Reflexive Research and Grounding of Analysis: Psychology and the Psy-Complex Tracing Therapeutic Discourse in Material Culture Constructing and Deconstructing Therapeutic Discourse Critical Reflections

' Critical Discursive Psychology collects more than a decade's intellectual work into a single volume...readers now have easy-access to some of the most pertinent, theoretically inspring, and discursively engaged of Parker's contributions.' - Catriona Macleod and Lindy Wilbraham, Psychology in Society

IAN PARKER is Professor of Psychology in the Discourse Unit at Manchester Metropolitan University where he is managing editor of the Annual Review of Critical Psychology. He is a member of Psychology Politics Resistance.