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Subjectivity and Method in Psychology. Gender, Meaning and Science

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Its [this book's] main purpose is 'to show how psychology can be done differently.' From a standpoint which views knowledge as produced and reproduced within specific historical conditions and power relations, Wendy Hollway criticizes the 'almost intentional blindness of psychology to its own conditions of production.' She describes her own method in her research on subjectivity and gender difference as well as the subjective, cultural and theoretical conditions within which it was developed. She outlines a theory of how meaning is achieved within discourses and discusses how the theory can be used to understand and analyse accounts and their production. She explains how her theory helped her to understand the production and reproduction of gender difference in adult relations. Then, using a framework which connects psychodynamic processes, power relations and gender-differentiated positions, she analyses the production of a range of mainstream psychologies. Central to the book is a radical reappraisal of the concept of subjectivity and its use as a tool for psychological understanding. The author concludes with an analysis of the way in which gender difference and subjectivity are involved in dominant concepts of psychology as a science. She explores the implications of this analysis for feminist psychology and other psychologies with emancipatory goals. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)

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... Debo destacar, que las tablas ilustran distintas posiciones discursivas para los objetivos planteados (Henriques et. al, 1998;Hollway, 1989;Hollway y Jefferson, 2000;Iñiguez, 2003). ...
... Utilicé el análisis crítico del discurso como herramienta teórica, metodológica y política en función de las preguntas y objetivos de investigación, y mi posicionamiento como investigadora. Desde los aportes de Hollway (1989), Wokak y Meyer (2003), Stecher (2009) y Van Dijk (2016) el ACD es una de técnica de análisis cualitativo de las posiciones subjetivas que ocurren en la actividad conversacional inmersa en eventos intersubjetivos situados sociohistóricamente. Para Iñiguez (2003) es una herramienta política, mientras que Wetherell (1998) se centra en la identificación de los repertorios interpretativos, Fairclough (1995Fairclough ( , 2008 plantea un modelo tridimensional conformado por prácticas discursivas, textos y prácticas socioculturales. ...
Thesis
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La infancia y adolescencia que participa en dispositivos psicosociales del Estado, ha sido construida como un “otro”. Esta alteridad (re) produce discursos y procesos de subjetivación, que tensionan la noción de sujeto de derechos. En este estudio exploré los discursos y procesos de subjetivación que (re)producen los/las adolescentes e interventores(as) psicosociales que participan en dispositivos de infancia y adolescencia en el Servicio Nacional de Menores de Chile. Para ello, efectué cuatro entrevistas semiestructuradas a adolescentes y a nueve a interventores psicosociales. Asimismo, realicé notas de campo que sirvieron para una posterior triangulación de datos. Trabajé con Análisis Crítico del discurso, como una herramienta teórica, política y metodológica, orientada a evidenciar las relaciones de poder y cómo estas producen exclusión y dominación. A partir del análisis crítico del discurso y las notas de campo, produje tres dimensiones argumentativas significativas en los relatos: “Construcciones discursivas de la(s) identidad(es) de las infancias y adolescencias”, “De los discursos y procesos de subjetivación normativos a prácticas de resistencia” y “La ayuda mutua y la resignificación de la infancia y adolescencia”. En el análisis destaco los distintos significados de la “infancia y adolescencia” que participa en estos dispositivos, en los que se circulan tres posiciones de sujeto básicas: el “sujeto de cuidado y objeto de protección”, el “sujeto amenazante y objeto punitivo” y el “sujeto con agencia social y política”. Así también, que los discursos y procesos de subjetivación no normativos permiten resignificar a la infancia y adolescencia como sujeto de derechos y definirlos con agencia crítica respecto a sus propias vivencias de vulneración. En esta investigación, subrayó la importancia de intervenciones psicosociales en infancia y adolescencia basadas en el reconocimiento y participación de los niños, niñas y adolescentes como agentes sociales y políticos, los cuales, permiten revertir los procesos de estigmatización y violencia institucional.
... Debo destacar, que las tablas ilustran distintas posiciones discursivas para los objetivos planteados (Henriques et. al, 1998;Hollway, 1989;Hollway y Jefferson, 2000;Iñiguez, 2003). ...
... Se realizó análisis crítico del discurso (más adelante ACD) para visibilizar los discursos, los problemas sociales, las relaciones de poder, ideología, la historia y su acción social. Desde los aportes de Hollway (1989), Wokak y Meyer (2003), Stecher (2009) y Van Dijk (2016) el ACD es una de técnica de análisis cualitativo de las posiciones subjetivas que ocurren en la actividad conversacional inmersa en eventos intersubjetivos situados socio-históricamente. Según Iñiguez (2003) es una herramienta política, y Fairclough (1995Fairclough ( , 2008, el ACD está conformado por prácticas discursivas, textos y prácticas socioculturales. ...
Article
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Este estudio exploró los discursos y sus procesos de subjetivación que realizan los interventores psicosociales de infancia y adolescencia que participan en dispositivos del Estado de Chile. A partir de la metodología cualitativa, entrevistas semiestructuradas y análisis crítico del discurso. Los resultados muestran significados de la infancia y adolescencia asociados al cuidado, al peligro y a un sujeto de derechos con agencia. Este último, resiste a la violencia institucional mediante el apoyo mutuo entre pares y con los interventores. Esta investigación subraya la importancia de intervenciones psicosociales participativas con una infancia y adolescencia como agentes sociales y políticos.
... As Radley and Billig (1996) argue regarding health research, these interview accounts should be deemed to be more than just views about what people in society should do to avoid disease, they also articulate a person's situation in the world and indeed articulate that world in which the individual will be held accountable to actions. Subjectivities are produced through the accounting process (Hollway 1989). Talk is as social action, through talk we routinely and pre-reflectively use membership categories as devices to organise our characters of what we hear/see. ...
... A representation should be understood not as a true and accurate reflection of some aspect of the social world, but as something to be explained and accounted for through discursive rules/themes that predominate in a particular socio-historical context. Hollway (1989) argues in her approach for a combination of personal experience and the idea from Foucault that 'truth' is a historical product and therefore no knowledge is absolute. This led her to begin to see participants' accounts in her own research as only one among an infinite set of possibilities. ...
Thesis
p>This thesis explores the health beliefs and behaviours of thirty women who identify themselves as British Asian mothers. The study is situated in the midlands town of Leicester and is based on semi-structured interviews with British Asian mothers, that is Asian women either born in or who have lived in Britain from the age of five who have at least one dependent child. The research engages with and develops theoretical frameworks used in research on ethnicity and identity to explore the idea that the beliefs and behaviours of British Asian mothers within the study are syncretic. A theoretical framework of syncrecy is used to investigate the way in which the women draw on different types of health discourses, both western and non-western. The research also explores the role of contextual and material circumstances on beliefs and behaviours. The findings indicate that women's beliefs and behaviours are syncretic. There is a need however to ground syncretic beliefs and behaviours within the contextual circumstances of the women researched. In particular the thesis shows that syncrecy within the women's accounts is influenced by: particular illnesses; family and position in the life-cycle; community, religion and identity; and space and globalization. Overall, the women research identify their position as 'British Asian' women, as members of a particular ethnic and generational group that affords them access to a plurality of discourses. These discourses are then used syncretically and conditionally according to context. Within the study women identify changes in their beliefs and behaviours over time. Respondents predicted a continued syncrecy within their beliefs and behaviours but suggest a shift in content of that syncrecy, favouring different discourses at different times. Women within the study also suggested a decreased use of non-western health discourses among the beliefs and behaviours of their children's generation.</p
... These acts are constructed as pieces of behaviour that transgress social nonns and conventions, here evaluated as essentially a bad thing. For instance, discourses surrounding appropriate romantic behaviour (Hollway, 1989) are used to construct the act of kissing a stranger as abnonnal, whilst intensifiers such as "bad" or "wildly" help to construct such behaviour as essentially lacking personal control. The consequences of their actions in tenn of social ostracism are constructed as enduring in that they live on anecdotally as pmi of people's ongoing narratives (and reconstructions) of events (although in the first study such drunken anecdotes were seen to be constructed in more positive tenns, as part ofthe wild rebellious identity constructed around social acceptance rather than ostracism). ...
... Such a discourse also constructs males as themselves "dangerous" and in this extract works to position females in a way that they cannot therefore afford to "let their guard down" and leave their drink unattended. The prevalence of these discourses may tie in to historical discourses around sex and morality which portray men as the instigators of sex and women the passive recipients (Hollway, 1989). However, as was seen in the first study reported in this thesis, drinking is often constructed by young women as a means to obtain pleasure, and one of the ways of doing this is through having sex. ...
Thesis
p>Alcohol education programmes, based on mainstream psychological research, have been developed in an attempt to reduce the level of harm but have met with limited success. An alternative theoretical and methodological approach to the phenomenon of underage drinking was therefore proposed. Foucauldian discourse analysis, a qualitative methodology grounded in critical theory, was therefore used to analyse four different sets of data. These datasets were i) young people’s talk around drinking (obtained through the use of focus groups), ii) educational leaflets targeted at young people, iii) a selection of educational sessions held in the classroom and iv) young people’s own talk around alcohol education (again, obtained through the use of focus groups). Young people’s talk around drinking was found to comprise dominant discourse around pleasure and the enjoyment of risk, all underpinned by a fundamental need to be able to lose control. Both sets of educational data, on the other hand, comprised discourses around the essential "vulnerability" of young people, and the need for young people to maintain control through the adoption of a self-monitoring , self-regulating identity (the Foucauldian self). Young people’s talk around education appeared to show they had assimilated and accepted these latter discourses. However, the relative failure of educational programmes, coupled with the strength of the ‘pleasure’ discourses expressed by many young people in their talk around drinking, suggests this apparent success may be illusory. Educational programmes, rather than engaging in a convert programme of control, therefore need to acknowledge to a far greater degree the fundamental role alcohol use, particularly ‘binge’ drinking, plays in young people’s lives. They need to find a way to connect with young people’s experiences if they are to have any success in preventing some of the genuine harm that may arise as a result of such drinking.</p
... In other words, as I and others have demonstrated elsewhere, Western hegemonic heterosexuality is often male-centered and patterned in ways that can support and obscure men's sexual violence against women. Some of the social norms that make up hegemonic heterosexuality and that I refer to throughout this paper hold that: men are biologically driven to persistently desire and seek sex; women are gatekeepers responsible for controlling men's sex drives and determining when to engage in sex; heterosex is natural or biological and progresses naturally; and women and men communicate differently, which causes miscommunication (Frith and Kitzinger 1997;Gavey 1992Gavey , 2005Gavey et al., 2001;Hollway 1989Hollway , 2005Waldby et al., 1993). Although some of these norms construct sexuality and sexual violence among lesbian women, gay men, and others (Braun et al., 2009;Gavey, 2005), I am interested in this paper in the entanglements of normative heterosexuality and men's sexual violence against women, and the limitations of consent in this context. ...
... A consent focus allows men to hold women responsible for communicating (non)consent A consent focus is limited in its capacity to define and promote ethical sex and prevent sexual violence because it allows men to hold women responsible for consent and communication. Traditional social norms hold that men are sexual actors and women are reactors or gatekeepers of sex (Allen, 2003;Gavey, 2005;Hird and Jackson, 2001;Hollway, 1989) and a consent focus is not enough to disrupt such norms. Although recent research finds evidence for emerging norms of consent and mutuality among young men and adolescent boys, it also finds that many continue to hold women responsible for setting and clearly communicating sexual boundaries (Cense et al., 2018;Barata, 2019, 2020;Kirtley Righi et al., 2021). ...
Article
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In this paper, I first critically review previous research on normative heterosexuality and its intersections with sexual violence to demonstrate that the common focus on consent in Western sexual justice politics, sexuality education, and sexual violence prevention is inadequate for defining and promoting ethical sex and preventing sexual violence. In particular, I demonstrate that a consent focus allows men to (a) hold women responsible for communicating (non)consent; (b) define the conditions of sexual interactions; (c) achieve consent through violence and coercion; (d) accept “yes” as unfettered consent; and (e) minimize and justify sexual violence. I then articulate an alternative view of ethical sex that moves beyond consent and centers care, empathy, co-determination, and ongoing communication and attention, and highlight the importance of social norms and gender transformative approaches to sexual violence prevention.
... The discursive layer of the interpretive process was driven by a close reading of women's accounts of their coerced experiences, paying attention to the language they used and the discourses within which they positioned themselves. This analysis was supported by the insights provided in feminist research on the dominant discourses of heterosexuality (Hollway, 1984(Hollway, , 1989 and the way these work to "scaffold" heterosexual coercion (Gavey, 2005), as well as research specifically tracing the normalization of heterosexual anal sex within popular media (e.g., Faustino, 2020aFaustino, , 2020b. ...
... The male sexual entitlement that is manifest through women's accounts of coercion, and seems to drive this coercion in the first place, strongly intersects with the male sex drive discourse (Hollway, 1984(Hollway, , 1989; see also Gavey, 2005), which presumes that male sexual desire is naturally limitless and almost uncontrollable. The male sex drive discourse has been strongly linked with the coital imperative (Gavey, 2005), which holds vaginal intercourse as the standard and natural centerpiece of (hetero) sex, supported by a biological framework due to its reproductive potential. ...
Article
In this article, we explore the gendered dynamics of coercion described by 18 women we interviewed about their experiences of unwanted and nonconsensual heterosexual anal sex. Several women referred to what they believed to be the normative status of heterosexual anal sex. In many cases, the socially coercive effects of perceived norms intertwined with threads of interpersonal coercion, leaving women feeling pressured to agree to, or little room to refuse, anal sex they did not want. We discuss the ways that new sexual norms can translate into new pressures for women within the gendered framework of heterosexual relationships.
... In feminist discourse analyses, one of the first discourses identified regarding sex and sexuality was Hollway's (1984Hollway's ( , 1989 male sex drive discourse that claims male sex drive is biologically driven, natural, and uncontrollable. She and others who have followed her (Gavey et al., 2001) suggest that this discourse helps to maintain gender inequality and forgive men's sexual offenses. ...
Article
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Ethical sexual regret refers to regret for acts during a sexual experience that questions one’s ethical behavior and may be an important concept in understanding and preventing sexual assault. Although sexual regret is relevant to discussions of consent and unwanted/coerced sex, few researchers have explored the concept, even fewer have explored the phenomenon in men, and none in queer men. In this discourse analytic study, we focused on male-identifying participants who were asked to write about a sexual experience about which they felt ethical regret. Discourses were categorized into five themes that informed the analysis. Several discourses revealed that heteronormative gendered social norms may offer men a way to position themselves as good men who had lapses of judgment rather than men who disregard their own morals for sexual advantage. When men were on the receiving end of sex that was uncaring, unfair, coercive or otherwise unethical, they positioned themselves as responsible for the harm, perhaps indicating a lack of availability of a victim discourse. We also noted an absence of a discourse that focused on care for the sexual partner. We discuss how examples of ethical sexual regret may guide future work related to facilitating sexually ethical encounters for men across sexual and gender identities.
... A key tenet of Connell's (1987) discourse on 'institutionalised heterosexuality' is the biological and universal 'male sex drive'. Men are driven by biological necessity to seek out sexual relations with women (Hollway, 1989). This traditional script of masculinity is therefore seen as being unproblematic. ...
Article
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Citation: Govender, K. (2010). 'Living in a box': rhetorical dilemmas in the (re) production of young heterosexual masculinities. African Journal of Rhetoric, 2(1), 159-178. Abstract 1 This paper seeks to empirically explore and theorize how one grade 11 boy creates and seek out spaces from which to enact his masculinity through traditional heterosexual discourses, including being 'at risk' of getting AIDS. The paper will draw on a year-long ethnographic study of how boys construct their gender and sexual identities in two South African high schools. In this study, the narrative of a student, nicknamed Patrick, focuses on his personal struggle with the non conventional views on heterosexual relationships of his friend, whom I shall call Siswe 2. This paper gives central prominence to the notion of 'doing' compulsory heterosexuality (Rich, 1980) and also to ideological dilemmas related to processes of masculinity making. Given the psychological complexity in processes of identification, it is suggested that opportunities for interventions with boys should exploit the contradictory nature of sexual identities in boys (and versions of masculinities) in peer spaces with boys and girls in order to actively challenge hegemonic discourses of heterosexuality.
... Women who fail to abide by and/or who actively resist those scripts may be met with severe consequences, including sexual coercion, assault, and rape (e.g., Cahill, 2020;Gavey, 2019;Pugh & Becker, 2018). Since the previously discussed sexual liberation movement, constructions of (female) heterosexuality have changed, with an increased emphasis on agency, permissiveness, reciprocity, and mutual pleasure in heterosex (Braun et al., 2003;Hollway, 1989;Jackson, 1984). Despite these changes, however, differences in sexual engagement and access remain, where who (i.e., men) can have sexual relations when (i.e., whenever they please) is clearly understood. ...
Article
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Amid changes in the North American socio-cultural/political and dating landscape, there exist questions about whether the sexual double standard and the inequality (e.g., of pleasure) in sex still exist for young women today. In this study, we explored the discourses that shape young women’s navigation of and talk about heterosexuality, or heterosex. Young, heterosexual women of diverse demographic and relationship backgrounds aged 18–24 (N = 28) attended one of five online focus groups. Informed by feminist post-structuralism and discursive psychology, we analyzed women’s talk about doing heterosex. Many participants mobilized a discourse of expectations of compulsory heterosex practices in casual and committed contexts. Within that discourse, young women were positioned as both constrained and regulated in their sexual lives and as needing to comply with unwanted sex. Risks of non-compliance included the risk of being perceived as being defective and/or “bad.” Participants’ talk also linked coercion, assault, and other male-perpetrated violence against women with how heterosex is done in today’s context. Our findings suggest that despite #MeToo and other exposés of rape culture, young women remain constrained by heterosexual norms. However, their language, ability, and willingness to challenge the current situation concerning heterosex is more sophisticated than previously observed. These advancements are promising, as they suggest the importance of continued research and activism in this area and carry several practical implications, including for sex education programming and counselling and support services in sessions with young women.
... The sequential model has been critiqued by feminist scholars as not only ignorant of many young women and girls' social realities but also imposing a narrow patriarchal ontology of sexual and intimate behaviour (Mojola, 2014). Hollway (1989) has similarly referred to this model of sexual behaviour as framed within a "haveholds" discursive view of femininity. The sequential model referred to seem not inclusive of cohabiting relationships as young women might be perceived to deviate from the cultural norms of intimate relationships. ...
Article
In this article, we critically reflect on the literature on intimate partner violence and the importance of an African feminist lens to understanding the influence of cultural discourse and practice in cohabitating relationships. We focus on intimate partner violence experienced by young black women in cohabiting relationships among the Vhavenda cultural group in South Africa. We reflect on the concept of matula, which views and constructs cohabitation as a taboo practice. We ask: what does it mean to intervene and respond to incidences of intimate violence in a relationship that is already socially and culturally negated? We interrogate the relevance of African feminist epistemology that prioritises cultural beliefs, customs, traditions, values and behaviour. Such epistemology, we argue, reflects the importance of thinking of gender and gender-based violence in the context of culture as dynamic and constantly negotiated by community members. Lastly, we explore the relevance of the African feminist perspective as part of the work of disrupting essentialising cultural and traditional practices that function to entrench gendered power dynamics. This study is conceptualised from a qualitative approach with in-depth, unstructured one-on-one interviews. Ten interviews with young women between the ages of 18 and 24 years were conducted through the Thohoyandou Victim Empowerment Programme in the Vhembe District, South Africa.
... Key interventions in these debates include Tony Jefferson's (1994) explication of psychoanalysis, poststructuralism, and discourse analysis in theorizing masculine subjectivity -clearly influenced by Wendy Hollway's (1989) writing and precursor to their joint work. Since the late 1980s, Jefferson has written, within the field of criminology, on the need to go beyond what he calls "the social break with orthodoxy: power and multiple masculinities" (2005, p. 217-218). ...
Chapter
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This chapter reviews empirical and theoretical work within critical studies on men and masculinities (CSMM), drawing on extensive empirical and theoretical studies relevant to psychology and social psychology. The chapter focuses on gender relations and power dynamics, social structures, intersectionality, bodies, practices, and identities, both individual and collective. The chapter first maps the key theoretical developments of CSMM, historically and conceptually, before moving to focus on two important contemporary issues: first, the development of more egalitarian masculinities, and, second, the explanations for various non-egalitarian masculinities, such those linked to incel and Alt-Right movements, both online and offline.
... Para essa pesquisa, utilizamos o método psico-social (Hollway, 1989) para a investigação de fatores pessoais, sociais e relacionais da experiência emocional do imigrante. Para tanto, entrevistamos 12 brasileiros utilizando a Entrevista Narrativa por Associação Livre (Hollway & Jefferson, 2008). ...
Poster
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Essa pesquisa se justifica por duas vias. A primeira, gerar contribuições a clínica psicológica, considerando o aumento de imigrantes à procura de atendimento psicológico e a escassez de profissionais multiculturalmente preparados. A segunda via, é a produção de conhecimento que pode orientar intervenções clínicas, sociais, educacionais, e culturais para diversas áreas do saber acerca da saúde mental de imigrantes.
... West (2008) went further to highlight the "harms of consensual heterosex" and the (gendered) societal pressures which shape "choices" of con sent. Examples include the pressure for people to have intercourse with their spouse, because it is assumed as a required part of marriage, or for a man to feel pressured to consent to sex, because it is assumed that men should always desire and be ready for sex (see also Hollway, 1989). Furthermore, con temporary critical feminists have demonstrated the manner in which normative heterosexuality (and constructions of gendered male and female sexuality) con tinue to provide the scaffolding for sexual coercion, harassment, assault and rape (Gavey, 1992(Gavey, , 2019. ...
... The difference is that psychological processes can be understood as discursive processes. Thus understood, they are not intrapersonal processes but rather interpersonal processes (Hollway, 1989). As such, they can be measured through their physical record in communicative actions such as speech and writing (Lakoff, 1975). ...
... To do this we drew on Foucauldian discourse analysis (FDA) (Willig, 2008), which is inspired by the writings of Michel Foucault and other post-structuralist scholars who explored the role of language in the construction of social and psychological life (Hook, 2007). FDA studies the availability of discursive resources within a culture and the implications that this carries for those living within that culture (Hollway, 1989;Burman, 1992;1995;Parker, 1992;Burman & Parker, 1993). To bring discourses into visibility analysts typically study "texts", which are broadly interpreted as any collection of writings, speech (such as interview transcriptions), or even visual materials. ...
... Wendy Hollway's (1989) highly influential poststructuralist work identifies three salient discourses around heterosex that produce different subject positions for women and men: (1) a male sexual drive discourse that constitutes men as inherently (or biologically) sex-focused and driven, and, once aroused, as requiring gratification via coitus/orgasm; (2) a have/hold discourse that situates sex within a monogamous marriage-type relationship-the woman is sexually passive, but effectively "gives" sex to her male partner so that her (true) relational and domestic desires can be fulfilled; and (3) a permissive discourse that situates both men and women as desiring sexual agents in which "anything goes, as long as no one gets hurt" (Braun, Gavey, and McPhillips 2003: 238). Within this discourse, heterosex is positioned as inherently good and as a right for men and women to enjoy. ...
Chapter
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This handbook is currently in development, with individual articles publishing online in advance of print publication. At this time, we cannot add information about unpublished articles in this handbook, however the table of contents will continue to grow as additional articles pass through the review process and are added to the site. Please note that the online publication date for this handbook is the date that the first article in the title was published online. For more information, please read the site FAQs.
... The CA approach to participants' constructions of, and orientations toward, identity, has been criticized for inattention to the ubiquity of broader structural phenomena such as gender or race, and for ignoring the operation of power, culture, and identity politics (Hollway, 1989;Speer & Stokoe, 2011, Stokoe, Hepburn, & Antaki, 2012Weatherall, 2000;Wetherell, 1998). CA's approach to identity does present a challenge to studies that treat the casting of identities in descriptions of self and others as a reflection either of internal cognitive states or of deterministic social forces, where the relations between broader "macro"level structures and people's identities are treated as given (Hogg, 2018;Oakes, Haslam, & Turner, 1994). ...
Chapter
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Conversation analysis (CA) is an empirical approach to the study of social life that takes interaction in context as its primary focus. It is fundamentally ethnomethodological in its concern to discover the methods people use to collectively organise and navigate the everyday social world. For CA, identity is something that people actively use, make reference to, and put to work, in order to bring about a social action or outcome, such as to establish or resist membership of a category or social group. CA has been used in the study of gender identities, race, family roles, youth subgroups, and chatrooms; in mainstream media interaction, in studies of institutional exchanges such as in education, healthcare, advice and legal settings, and in sales environments, both online and face to face. To see what and how identities are achieved, CA explores sequences of embodied interaction, the primary source of data, carefully recorded and transcribed, so that we can identify patterns, including in how people bring off and attribute certain characteristics to their own and others’ membership of particular identity categories. Detailed analyses of real interaction enable us to grasp how matters relevant to identity are raised, made relevant and dealt with in real time. In applying this approach we can observe and report on the kinds of identity problems that members are solving in the here and now. In this chapter we provide a brief survey of the development of an ethnomethodological and conversation analytic approach to identity and describe how it offers verifiable insights into the inventive capacity of people to make attributions and inferences of identity consequential to social actions. We offer an example of a conversation-analytic procedure, looking at how kinship carers handle matters of family identity in a support group environment. Kinship carers’ parental status is poorly understood and at times overtly challenged by others. In our analyses we demonstrate how kinship carers interactively establish recognisable attributes and features of a common and valid identity in their complaints about the actions and dispositions of absent third parties. We end by considering how an ethnomethodological CA approach contributes to identity research, its limitations and its future directions.
... There is also an absurdity about the Greedy Girl. As Farvid (2014, p. 121) suggests, women's sexual desire has either been framed as 'passive and responsive to male sexuality (Gavey and McPhillips 1999), associated with reproduction (Hollway 1989) and as tightly bound to emotionally or romantic love'. Furthermore, there are few spaces for women to express their sexual desire without fear of shame or marginalization (Muise 2011). ...
Chapter
This chapter explores how transgressions take place within the sex club. First, using a group sex encounter, it highlights the ways in which different forms of heteroeroticism can be understood as contesting the everyday routines of the club and broader notions of heteronormativity. Embedded within this section of the chapter is the notion of gaze and how this is a reversible process of looking and being looked at. The second part of this chapter focuses on sex between women. Whilst initially framing this as taking place within a heteropatriarchal gaze driven by forms of neo-liberal sexual entrepreneurialism, the chapter reflects on this approach by suggesting that it is within the limits of neo-liberalism where transgressive sexual practices might emerge. Finally, the chapter tentatively explores transgender experiences. In particular, it argues that transgression is not always a positive experience but can also result in sexual violence. The chapter concludes by arguing that where sexual practice exceeds economies of desire, it can be the source of intense sexual pleasure. At the same time, such transgressions can be physically and emotionally dangerous.
... There is also an absurdity about the Greedy Girl. As Farvid (2014, p. 121) suggests, women's sexual desire has either been framed as 'passive and responsive to male sexuality (Gavey and McPhillips 1999), associated with reproduction (Hollway 1989) and as tightly bound to emotionally or romantic love'. Furthermore, there are few spaces for women to express their sexual desire without fear of shame or marginalization (Muise 2011). ...
Chapter
This chapter explores how dark rooms within sex clubs shape and configure men and masculinities. Using interviews with men who have used and visited dark rooms, this chapter explores the erotic subjectivity of men. The starting point for this chapter is that the norms and values of the club that are embedded in the erotic hierarchies that circulate in the rest of the club help to define what happens in the dark room. The chapter by examining respectable masculinities then explores the same-sex practices between men and consent. The chapter then argues that by leaving behind a sexual performance based on masculinity, men in the dark room demonstrate an alternative way of configuring masculinity and sexuality. It is suggested as the chapter progresses that new forms of erotic configurations are assembled in the dark room that point to the possibilities of a post-masculinity. The chapter concludes by highlighting that sex clubs do have the possibility to produce a radical subjectivity that may signal an epistemological break with existing approaches to men and masculinity.
... There is also an absurdity about the Greedy Girl. As Farvid (2014, p. 121) suggests, women's sexual desire has either been framed as 'passive and responsive to male sexuality (Gavey and McPhillips 1999), associated with reproduction (Hollway 1989) and as tightly bound to emotionally or romantic love'. Furthermore, there are few spaces for women to express their sexual desire without fear of shame or marginalization (Muise 2011). ...
Chapter
This introductory chapter welcomes readers to the sex club. This chapter explains what the book is about and what readers should expect. The book then highlights the ethnographical research method that is used predominantly throughout the book. In so doing, it critically reflects on the limits of using ethnography to describe sexual encounters. The chapter then provides a synopsis of the chapters that are furnished with ethnographic encounters. Overall, this chapter provides an introductory insight into the sex clubs in the UK. The chapter concludes by describing the experience of the end of the night at a sex club and highlighting what we are yet to know about sex clubs.
... There is also an absurdity about the Greedy Girl. As Farvid (2014, p. 121) suggests, women's sexual desire has either been framed as 'passive and responsive to male sexuality (Gavey and McPhillips 1999), associated with reproduction (Hollway 1989) and as tightly bound to emotionally or romantic love'. Furthermore, there are few spaces for women to express their sexual desire without fear of shame or marginalization (Muise 2011). ...
Chapter
This chapter begins by framing sex clubs as a place of secrecy and discretion. It then begins to define what a sex club is, a potted history of sex clubs and their position within the law and planning permissions. The chapter then provides a short discussion of methodology, before moving on to provide information on who visits sex clubs, what their sexual preferences are and how we might think about sex clubs geographically. A number of key findings emerge from this chapter that include sex clubs are not simply places for swingers but are part of a more diverse range of erotic practices; it highlights how the majority of women visiting the club are likely to identify as bisexual or bi-curious; clubs are geographically located and clustered; it provides an understanding of the racial dynamics of those who attend clubs and begins to map out sexual practices with geographical locations. In summary, this chapter provides important background information behind sex clubs.
... There is also an absurdity about the Greedy Girl. As Farvid (2014, p. 121) suggests, women's sexual desire has either been framed as 'passive and responsive to male sexuality (Gavey and McPhillips 1999), associated with reproduction (Hollway 1989) and as tightly bound to emotionally or romantic love'. Furthermore, there are few spaces for women to express their sexual desire without fear of shame or marginalization (Muise 2011). ...
Chapter
The chapter focuses on the racialization of black men within sex clubs. It begins by recognizing the ways that clubs promote thematized events. Such events create a way of promoting fantasies that may lead to the satiating of desires. The chapter moves from discussing the commodification and fetishization of the body to considering how it is practiced within clubs. It discusses the notion of the ‘Black Bull’ and how black bodies become naturalized as through an appeal to animality. It is argued that this animality is historically located in the notions of black slavery. The chapter then explores how white women utilize this racialized desirability as a form of erotic consumption. The chapter argues that the role of women in black men’s slavery provides the contours for how they consume and commodify black bodies within the club. The chapter then moves on to discuss cuckolding and hotwifing and the implications this has for white masculinity. The chapter concludes by highlighting the role of racialized sex nights in clubs as a source of pleasure and agency for the men involved.
... Out of foundational critical psychology narratives emerged new paradigms for the study of selfhood (Henriques et al., 1984), personal and collective identities (Bhavnani & Phoenix, 1994), LGBTQI+ identities (Brown, 1989), gender (Gergen & Davis, 1997), women's stories and psychology of women (Fine, 1980;Gergen, 1990), experience and memory (Danziger, 2008;Middleton & Brown, 2005), attitudes (Potter & Wetherell, 1987), cognition (Edwards, 1997), prejudice and discrimination (Wetherell & Potter, 1992), race and racism (Durrheim et al., 2009), common sense (Billig, 1987;Moscovici, 1988), the nature of scientific knowledge (Haraway, 1988;Harding, 1986;Hollway, 1989). ...
Article
This chapter explores the particular background of critical psychology and its links with political psychology. We discuss of some of the most significant features of critical perspectives in political psychology: historical awareness and critique, and the pursuit of social justice. In the remainder of the chapter, we focus specifically on the ways in which the discursive turn in psychology has advanced our understanding of two key topics of interest to political psychologists: prejudice, and political discourse. We end with a discussion of how alternative ways of advancing intellectual critique can drive new political psychology projects on the most pressing social problems of our age.
... 2. I refer to subjectivity as the process of being/becoming a subject-as-agent, as opposed to an object. To use Wendy Hollway (1989) understanding of subjectivity, it can be "glimpsed as a process of finding yourself becoming a subject over the course of an infinite series of encounters" (p.17). Thus, subjectivity is held both through individuality and social context. ...
Article
Torture and exile shatter a person’s sense of self, their trust in others, and produce isolation and an array of post-traumatic sequelae. This article explores the experiences of therapists working with torture survivors at a London-based charity. It explores what, for them, constitutes the process of bearing witness to narratives of trauma in therapeutic encounters. An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) was employed, using semi-structured interviews. Analysis was underpinned by intersubjectivity and psychoanalytic social theory. The findings illuminate the significance of engaging in affective relationships of political solidarity and validation against the backdrop of the structural disavowal of the ‘hostile environment’ in the UK context. Witnessing was described as the interplay of ‘staying with’ people’s trauma without attempting to ‘fix’ or pathologize. Participants described witnessing multi-dimensional aspects of a person. The article concludes by discussing the implications of witnessing for therapists working with survivors of torture.
... This study was situated in a post-structuralist context of gendered social constructionism where young people's knowledge and experience, and their sexuality is constructed, mediated and constrained by language (Burr, 1995;Holland et aI., 1994;Hollway, 1989). Post-structuralism has a similar focus to social constructionism on sexuality, but the emphasis is different (Ussher, 1994); that is, the dichotomy between individual and society is seen as invalid, as both are regarded as products of discursive practises, with no pre-given entities or facts. ...
Thesis
p>This thesis investigated an innovative construct referred to as sexual self-awareness . The initial operationalisation of sexual self-awareness incorporates three main aspects; these are 1] Sexual self-knowledge – how young people identify, differentiate and understand their physical and emotional sexual feelings, and how these interact with their sexual activity, 2] Sexual self-exploration – how comfortable they feel exploring their body, including masturbation, and the emotions attached to this, and 3] Sexual self-expression – how they express their needs and desires with potential and current sexual partners, and factors that appear to influence, or have influenced this. This research initially explored sexual self-awareness through in-depth interviews with heterosexual young women allowing sub-themes to emerge within the three aspects of sexual self-awareness. The findings of the quantitative study and previous research formed the basis for a large number of questionnaire statements in an online survey completed by young women and men. Through factor analysis, these statements were reduced to a reliable scale of twenty-two statements that included aspects of sexual self-knowledge, self-exploration and self-expression, indicating that not only can sexual self-awareness be operationalised but that it can also be measured. The key findings were that a number of social and sexual demographics associated sexual self-awareness and its sub-scales with young people as a means of identifying different levels in their self-awareness. It concludes that the implications of these findings for policy-makers and educationalists are that UK sex education needs to broaden its scope to encompass comfort with bodies, including male and female masturbation, communication with parents/caregivers as well as sexual partners, and sexual desires and pleasure of men and women.</p
... Discursive psychology is the gold standard conceptual stance amongst prominent scholars and writers, such as Long, of the South African critical psychology movement in efforts to decolonise psychology's tendency to individualise social challenges, thus emptying out and denying social realities and responsibility, at the expense of championing a free, well-adjusted, and self-actualised neo-liberal individual subject. However, scholars with psychosocial acumen such as Valerie Walkerdine (1987), Wendy Hollway (1989), Stephen Frosh (2006), Eugenie Georgaca (2005), Brendan Gough (2009), Lisa Saville-Young (2009), Ian Parker (2010) among numerous others observe that discursive psychology, alone, lacks an account of individual agency that goes beyond simply producing discourse-determined versions of subjectivity, as constituted by discourse, discursive resources, subject positions etc. All too often, discursive psychology produces 'blank' or 'empty' subjectivities that reduce people's emotional realities and lived experiences as merely effects of discourse and language. ...
... We were aware that this approach would not adhere to a traditional scientific conceptualization of generalizability (Williams, 1976;Law, 2006) however, we decided to align ourselves with the work of Hollway (1989) who suggests that "generalizability has to be established according to theoretical rather than statistical principles" (p. 16). ...
Article
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This paper reports on a study of teachers’ perceptions of teaching and learning in Scotland during the COVID-19 pandemic through the lens of engaged pedagogy and the ideas of bell hooks. It aimed to explore the different ways that teachers experienced teaching and learning during this time and the impact this may have had on teacher identity. Sixty teachers and head teachers were interviewed using MS Teams in the period April-June, 2020. For this paper, 18 transcripts were analyzed by members of the research team. Four key themes emerged from the interview data: Working from home, parental engagement, teacher identity, and changes in pedagogy. Each of these themes were discussed in terms of concepts such as engaged pedagogy, agency, self-actualization, recognition and boundary transgression situated in the work of bell hooks. The idea of boundaries wove itself throughout our data as teachers expressed how the transgression of boundaries was occurring in multiple, and often contradictory, ways in pedagogical, professional, institutional and personal spaces and systems. We see in our data evidence of a shift in practice not just in the way teachers are ‘doing’ education but also, perhaps, in the way that teachers are ‘being’ as educators as they adapt to different ways of knowing. This study provides a unique exploration of a time and space in Scotland during 2020. However, the themes and understandings that emerged are of relevance to educators internationally. Schools across the world were impacted by various lockdowns imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic and teachers faced a common set of challenges that were resolved via re-negotiation and recognition of individual and collective agency to create new pedagogies.
Article
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The purpose of this Symposium is to explore critically ideas concerning knowledge construction and on-line environments. Three papers are offered which raise some general issues grounded in particular contexts These papers are addressing three overarching questions: what do we mean by knowledge construction? do we have a sound foundation for believing that knowledge construction takes place in on-line environments? and, what constitutes evidence for knowledge construction? The first question leads us to review attempts to theorise about knowledge creation through on-line discussion. These accounts derive from broadly social constructivist theories of learning and often place particular emphasis on communities of practice. They have a particular relevance in a 'late modern age' when professional knowledge is subject to rapid change and more open to contestation. A common point of reference in this Symposium is the distinction between propositional knowledge and 'practical' knowledge or 'know-how'. We ask how far this distinction is helpful in our consideration of constructing knowledge within and about the on-line learning community. The second question leads us to explore specific examples of online learning and the judgements we have reached about their effectiveness. We recognise the value of on-line learning in giving learners opportunities to share knowledge; to provide peer support; to enable a more measured and reflective type of discourse. At the same time we are aware of the constraints of time and access in the forums we have evaluated and the reticence of some learners to take part. Our experience of evaluating on-line working leads to our third question concerning the evidence of knowledge construction. We have conventional means to evalauting on-line working, such as questionnaires surveys, learners diaries and interviews, as well as new possibilities including dialogues within on-line forums and access to on-line discussion transcripts. We have worked within broadly action research perspectives that have given rise to particular issues concerning the purposes and politics of research and the validation of findings in the experience of learners. Our research poses particular ethical problems to of accountability, confidentiality and permission. Writing about such research, there is a need to acknowledge the personal nature of knowledge and the issues that arise from the researcher's construction of case 'narratives'. Our attempts to consider professional knowledge creation within on-line forums bring us back to considering how we ourselves create our own professional knowledge. Papers: Discourses on collaborative networked learning Catherine Edwards Construction of Professional Knowledge within an On-line Environment: the Case of Teacher On-line Forums Michael Hammond Researching Networked Learning and Teaching: a Case Study in Practitioner Knowledge Construction Philippa Levy
Article
Content and Focus: A brief post-structuralist analysis of recent changes to the criteria for anorexia nervosa in the DSM-5 is presented. These changes are examined in the context of the political and social forces described in existing literature. The main idea that emerges from the analysis is that the creation of diagnostic criteria is a value-driven practice which, in the case of anorexia nervosa, encourages a somatic and controlling clinical approach. A clinical example is then used to illustrate how social and therapeutic discourses might affect therapists and clients in an inpatient setting. A tentative formulation of how post-structuralist theory can be applied in a way which considers how therapist and client are positioned by discourses is also advanced. Conclusion: In the context of the changing diagnostic criteria for anorexia nervosa, it is concluded that poststructuralist theory can be applied usefully for therapists and clients in inpatient settings. This necessitates a degree of reflexive practice which may suit counselling psychologists well. Such an application may also fit in with and improve understanding of existing therapeutic approaches rather than simply deconstructing them.
Article
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يفتقر التحليل الموضوعاتي إلى التحديد، ونادرا ما يحظى بالاعتراف؛ ومع ذلك، فهو منهج تحليلٍ كيفي منتشر الاستعمال في علم النفس. وفي هذه المقالة، سنحاجُّ بأنه يوفر مقاربة نظرية مرنة وقريبة المنال لتحليل البيانات الكيفية والولوج إليها، وسنوضح ماهيته، ونموقعه أولا بين مناهج التحليل الكيفي الأخرى الباحثة عن موضوعات أو أنماط، وثانيا بين المواقف الإبستمولوجية والأنطولوجية المختلفة، ثم سنُقدِّم إرشادات واضحة للراغبين في الشروع فيه أو إجرائه على نحو متأنٍّ وصارم، وسنكشف المزالق التي قد يقع فيها من يُجري تحليلا موضوعاتيا؛ وأخيرا، سنحدد عيوبه ومزاياه، ونختم مقالتنا بمناصرة التحليل الموضوعاتي بوصفه منهجا مفيدا ومرنا للبحث الكيفي في علم النفس وخارجه.
Thesis
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This study employs Foucauldian discourse analysis within a critical psychological framework to compare and contrast the workings of two popular South African magazine advice columns, “Ask Dr Louise” and “Vra Dr Adri”. Thematic content analysis provides an overview of the central themes of the two advice columns while Foucauldian discourse analysis examines the relationships between discursive constructions, discourses and gendered subjectivity.
Article
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Introducción: El análisis del discurso es un abordaje alternativo de investigación de sistemas de salud. Objetivo: Describir la producción científica que investiga los sistemas de salud utilizando el análisis del discurso como perspectiva teórico-metodológica. Métodos: Revisión sistemática exploratoria de literatura, que incluyó la búsqueda de textos en inglés y español en cinco bases de datos (SciELO, MEDLINE, PubMed, EBSCO y ScienceDirect). Se utilizaron los descriptores "sistema OR salud" AND "análisis OR discurso" y sus traducciones al inglés. Se incluyeron artículos originales con metodología cualitativa, revisiones sistemáticas exploratorias de la literatura, ensayos y tesis doctorales, cuya metodología o tema de revisión fuese expresamente descrita como análisis de discurso de sistemas de salud, de sus funciones o estructura organizativa, publicados en el periodo entre enero de 1994 a diciembre de 2019; se excluyeron textos con metodología cuantitativa, estudios mixtos y metaanálisis. Resultados: Se incluyó un total de 27 textos en la revisión, se describió en cuatro categorías la forma como el análisis del discurso puede ser utilizado en el estudio de los sistemas de salud: el concepto del proceso salud enfermedad, la autonomía del sujeto, los discursos de gestión y los sistemas de salud como política pública. Discusión: Los sistemas de salud son campos para el ejercicio de las relaciones de poder que construyen sujetos, configuran la autonomía del sujeto y determinan las intervenciones del proceso salud-enfermedad. Conclusiones: Esta revisión identificó que el discurso es utilizado como dispositivo de poder que configura sujetos y la forma como se interviene el proceso salud-enfermedad.
Book
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Declaración de principio: el presente se trata de una traducción libre, no revisada, realizada con fines estrictamente académicos, a saber: dar a conocer a la comunidad académica hispanohablante, y de la lengua portuguesa si se quiere, esta interesante obra que bien podríamos ubicar en el “naciente” campo de los “estudios lacanianos de las organizaciones y el trabajo”. Este esfuerzo académico lo hemos adelantado en un trabajo colectivo e intergeneracional entre profesor, Johnny Orejuela, y las estudiantes, Carolina Valle y Valentina Muriel; queremos, continuando con el espíritu de la obra original: darlo a conocer al mundo en versión de “libre acceso” o “acceso abierto” (open acces) para que circule y se democratice así el valiosísimo conocimiento aquí concentrado para descifrar el mundo subjetivo del trabajo.
Article
Content and Focus A brief post-structuralist analysis of recent changes to the criteria for anorexia nervosa in the DSM-5 is presented. These changes are examined in the context of the political and social forces described in existing literature. The main idea that emerges from the analysis is that the creation of diagnostic criteria is a value-driven practice which, in the case of anorexia nervosa, encourages a somatic and controlling clinical approach. A clinical example is then used to illustrate how social and therapeutic discourses might affect therapists and clients in an inpatient setting. A tentative formulation of how post-structuralist theory can be applied in a way which considers how therapist and client are positioned by discourses is also advanced. Conclusion In the context of the changing diagnostic criteria for anorexia nervosa, it is concluded that poststructuralist theory can be applied usefully for therapists and clients in inpatient settings. This necessitates a degree of reflexive practice which may suit counselling psychologists well. Such an application may also fit in with and improve understanding of existing therapeutic approaches rather than simply deconstructing them.
Article
Feminist therapy is rooted in women’s knowledge, in women’s help and ways of help (Burstow 1992, p.viii). Feminist counselling is not just a technique or style. There is no school of feminist counselling (Chaplin 1991, p.2).
Chapter
In this chapter, we focus on a specific event that is often advertised at a sex club: a Greedy Girl night. ‘Greedy Girl’ nights are promoted by clubs to encourage men and women to attend a specific event where a woman has sex with multiple men and couples either at the same time or one after another. A key theme that is explored throughout this chapter is how the club context provides the possibilities for women to live out and experience non-normative intimacies that may not be driven by a need for pleasure to cohere with patriarchy and men as sexual predators. This chapter is very much a conversation about women’s sexual agency in the club and explores this through a number of sexual encounters that include women’s sexual selection, pleasure through gang bangs, a radical passivity of the black female body. The chapter covers a range of areas such as masochism, post-feminism, neo-liberalism and sexual entrepreneurship. The chapter concludes by arguing that this is a space, a public space where clubs enable sexual pleasure that may not be cohered through patriarchy.
Article
The Cambridge Handbook of Political Psychology provides a comprehensive review of the psychology of political behaviour from an international perspective. Its coverage spans from foundational approaches to political psychology, including the evolutionary, personality and developmental roots of political attitudes, to contemporary challenges to governance, including populism, hate speech, conspiracy beliefs, inequality, climate change and cyberterrorism. Each chapter features cutting-edge research from internationally renowned scholars who offer their unique insights into how people think, feel and act in different political contexts. By taking a distinctively international approach, this handbook highlights the nuances of political behaviour across cultures and geographical regions, as well as the truisms of political psychology that transcend context. Academics, graduate students and practitioners alike, as well as those generally interested in politics and human behaviour, will benefit from this definitive overview of how people shape – and are shaped by – their political environment in a rapidly changing twenty-first century.
Thesis
p>Two models of fatherhood dominate academic discussions, an older more traditional form and a newer more 'liberal' form. The older model is generally defined as instrumental and detached whilst the newer model is viewed as more egalitarian and engaged. These are polarised models, which sets up the framework for a potential revolution in fatherhood, with a move away from the older model in favour of newer. However, despite dramatic shifts in motherhood, the 'revolution' in fatherhood is generally seen to have lagged behind. This failure of the 'new man' model of fathering to be realised more fully in practice has created something of a sociological puzzle, since both academic and popular accounts present instrumental fatherhood as being deficient and emotionally unsatisfying. This thesis explores why the expected revolution is unrealised and investigates the space between 'old' and 'new' models of fatherhood, a space that that is neglected in the literature. It is argued that if we engage with this space a shift towards a more expanded emotional fathering can be discerned. However, this is a model of fathering that encompasses elements of both the 'old' and 'new' models. Models of fatherhood are generally measured in reference to changes in the domestic division of labour, with most theorists arguing that there has been little change in the way domestic labour is organised. The methodology of this thesis explores the diverse meanings that fathers themselves place on fathering rather than looking at fathering practice, and uses a qualitative research framework. 43 fathers were interviewed about their experiences of fathering. It is argued that closer investigation of the meanings of fatherhood reveals a sphere of transition, and a new form of fathering that makes sense of the apparent paradox of liberal attitudes and illiberal behaviour. Both instrumental fathering and liberal fathering are emotionally important to the men in this study. The men viewed 'liberal' fathering in terms of their emotional connection with their children rather than in terms of an egalitarian or symmetrical division of labour. Their particular construction of 'liberal' fathering reduced the contradictions between beliefs and practice, since their stress on 'emotional' fathering was still consistent with the instrumental model.</p
Thesis
p>This thesis examines discourse within the chiropractic encounter and describes the interests and consequences of different discursive strategies. It is organised into three parts after I have first introduced the background to the study, exploring how our understandings of pain, health, illness and embodiment are co-constructed and what interests or motivations might be participant in those constructions. These understandings are situated within a cultural and historical frame of reference and I consider how constructs are socially and linguistically co-constituted. In the first part I use discourse analysis to examine the analytic themes which emerged in interviews with chiropractors. I describe the employment of rhetorical devices which establish legitimacy as part of the ongoing construction of professional identity. Talk regarding chiropractic and chronic pain is analysed within a critical framework that problematises the situating of patients as disembodied objects. In the second part I again use discourse analysis to examine the lived experience of chronic pain patients attending chiropractic clinics. The use of narratives in the construction of self, identity and meaning is explored, and rhetorical devices analysed. The use of CAM is considered as a possible agentic strategy/attempt to recover the self and enable objectified bodies to become embodied subjects. Finally, in the third part, I stand back from the study and focus on issues of reflexivity in the research, discuss specific implications arising from my analysis and make suggestions for further work.</p
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