Psychology without Foundations: History, Philosophy and Psychosocial Theory

Abstract

For many years, for many people social psychology has been deemed a discipline in crisis. Factions within the field have emerged as the field has struggled to find a new identity for what social psychology is. In spite of recent efforts to forge connections across these paradigmatical territories many academics remain locked in perpetual disagreement to this day.This new book proposes a way out of the crisis by letting go of the idea that psychology needs new foundations or a new identity, whether biological, discursive, or cognitive. The psychological is not narrowly confined to any one aspect of human experience; it is quite literally everywhere. Drawing on a range of influential thinkers including Michel Serres, Michel Foucault, AN Whitehead and Gilles Deleuze, the book proposes a strong process-oriented approach to the psychological which studies events or occasions. Aspects of experience such as communication or embodiment are treated as thoroughly mediated – the product of multiple intersecting relationships between the biological, the psychic, and the social. The outcome is an image of a ‘mobile’ reflexively founded discipline which follows the psychological wherever it takes us, from the depths of embodiment to the complexities of modern global politics.The critically important new text is written in a way that is accessible for undergraduate students as well as more advanced readers and could be an exciting gateway into a new understanding of the rich, historical discipline of psychology