Twenty five years of Discursive Psychology

British Journal of Social Psychology, 2011

This paper reviews the progress of discourse-analytic approaches in social psychology from the late 1980s to the present day, with a particular focus on the way conceptual and methodological contributions from within the Discourse and Rhetoric Group at Loughborough University have negotiated a positive role for innovative studies of language in the discipline of psychology. Social psychology has become a key site for the accumulation of a series of empirical studies that have seen the flourishing of a distinctive form of 'discursive social psychology' that has succeeded in moving from the margins of the discipline to a more accepted position. The paper traces this trajectory of discourse analysis from the limits to the centre of social psychology attending to five features that now characterise its contribution to psychology; an emphasis on everyday conversation, a concern with interpersonal interaction, explication of formal sequences; an insistence on empirical claims; and fidelity to the ethos of its host discipline. The paper concludes with some comments on the wider context of this new approach inside psychology today.

This paper considers one theme in the contemporary legacy of Potter and Wetherell's (1987) Discourse and Social Psychology. It overviews the context that led to that book and considers a series of critical responses from both experimental and critical/qualitative social psychologists. It refutes criticisms and corrects confusions. Focusing on contemporary discursive psychology, it highlights (a) its rigorous use of records of actual behaviour; (b) its systematic focus on normative practices. In methodological terms, it (a) highlights limitations in the use of open-ended interviews; (b) considers the way naturalistic materials provide access to participants' own orientations and displays; (c) builds a distinctive logic of sampling and generalization. In theoretical terms, it (a) highlights the way discourse work can identify foundational psychological matters; (b) offers a novel approach to emotion and embodiment; (c) starts to build a matrix of dimensions which are central to the constructing and recognizing of different kinds of social actions. It now offers a fully formed alternative social psychology which coordinates theory and method and a growing body of empirical work.

Loughborough University Institutional Repository (Loughborough University), 2016

This is a book about the evolution, contribution and impact of the body of work known as Discursive Psychology (DP). Beginning in psychology, over the past twenty-five years DP has developed into a massively influential field with trajectories throughout the range of academic disciplines and substantial national and international impact on how we understand and study psychology and particularly how we conceptualize language and social action. From its 'undisciplined beginnings' (Billig, 2012) DP developed into an original and innovative program of research into the "normative order of everyday life" (Edwards, 2012, p. 434). DP's early eclecticism has sprung into a systematic approach to all things social-from everyday interactional encounters to institutional settings and the analysis of wider social issues and social problems. To define DP, we borrow one from one of its founders and main proponents, Derek Edwards. To do DP "is to do something that psychology has not already done in any systematic, empirical, and principled way, which is to examine how psychological concepts (memory, thought, emotion, etc.) are shaped for the functions they serve, in and for the nexus of social practices in which we use language" (Edwards, 2012, p. 427). This volume takes DP's respecification of these concepts as its subject matter and is designed to give the reader an enriched understanding of the particular background of discursive psychology. The main aim of this volume is to invite a clearer recognition of, and engagement with, the early intellectual debates, origin stories, that have driven the discursive psychological project forward. It also aims to give the first systematic representation of its contemporary intellectual image. We have collected in this volume commentaries and reflections on key ideas of the discursive project in social psychology found in 'classic studies' written by current and former members of the Discourse and Rhetoric Group at

Over the past twenty five years discursive psychology has become an influential field in its home discipline of psychology, as well as in many other academic disciplines, with national and international impact. This is the first collection that systematically and critically appraises its foundational, classic studies, exploring central concepts in social psychology and discursive psychology’s contribution to foundational critique and respecification in social psychology. Discursive Psychology explores how discursive psychology has accommodated and responded to assumptions contained in classic studies and discusses what can still be gained from an intellectual dialogue with these classic studies, and which epistemological and methodological debates are still running, or are worth resurrecting.

It will soon be thirty years since the publication of three seminal books in discursive psychology: Discourse and social psychology, Common knowledge, and Billig's (1987) Arguing and thinking. However, there are numerous other texts from these authors and other scholars in the form of journal articles and book chapters that have been foundational in the development of discursive psychology. Discursive Psychology: classic and contemporary issues claims to be the first collection to systematically and critically appraise these 'classic' articles in the field of discursive psychology. The editors describe the book as being "about the evolution, contribution and impact of the body of work known as Discursive Psychology" (p.1).

Qualitative Research in Psychology, 2020

Since its inception in 1987, Discursive Psychology (DP) has developed both methodologically, for instance by drawing closer to Conversation Analysis, and theoretically, by building a body of knowledge which outlines the discursive accomplishment of mind-world relations. One of DP’s contributions to psychology consists in the respecification of mainstream topics (like attitudes, identity, memory, and emotions). This editorial outlines the meta-theoretical underpinnings of DP’s respecification programme. The empirical studies comprised in this special issue showcase state-of-the art discursive psychological research that respecifies core psychological topics: attitudes, persuasion, emotions, agency, personality, uncertainty, and socialisation. The editorial also delineates the place of DP within contemporary psychological science and reviews DP’s theoretical and methodological contributions to key matters including open science, research ethics, and integrity and rigour in qualitative research. The special issue concludes with an insightful commentary by Sally Wiggins on DP’s relationship with mainstream psychology.

Jahoda's (2012) paper presents a critique and reflection on the status of social psychology as a whole, and on experimental social psychology (ESP) and discursive social psychology (DSP) as "the opposite poles of a continuum" (ibid., p.1). We welcome this contribution to discussion and reflections on and within, social psychology. Our position is as researchers who have varying levels of involvement with the DSP realm which Jahoda critiques, and so our response is focussed on challenges to that realm. This paper may also have relevance for Jahoda's challenges to ESP, but we leave the response to those critiques to those who have more experience in ESP or related research. As Jahoda himself concedes, his critique is not new (see also , and it develops a rather loose set of comments on DSP (as "critical social psychology" in Jahoda, 2007). Our concern here is to address and counter some of the assertions made within Jahoda's paper, which are particularly damaging to the DSP approach. Specifically, we argue that Jahoda's paper is at risk of exemplifying exactly the kinds of errors that he points to himself: subjective over-interpretation of a highly selective, small sample of papers which are used to illustrate a particular point.

2011

I begin this chapter by tracing the discursive turn's emergence in social psychology with reference to my personal trajectory. I identify two characteristic themes: critique of the unitary rational subject of traditional (cognitive) psychology with its sealed off view of mind, and the enduring question about the relative effectivity of inner and outer influences in forming subjectivity. I then focus on the widespread criticism of discursive psychology for failing to theorise subjectivity, therefore falling into a reductionist external account. I keep a dual perspective on theory of subjectivity and empirical methodology, aiming to show how these are inextricable and how methods can hide (and reveal) important facets of subjectivity. This leads to an account of how some discursive psychologists have used psychoanalysis to make good their 'empty subject' and I give a brief account of the rationale for my development of psychoanalytically informed interviewing and observation methods. This is illustrated by detailing the principles underpinning the design of an empirical research project on identity change, after which I return to the key notion of positioning as a lens through which to discuss some differences between a discursive and psycho-social approach.