Agency and Consciousness in Discourse

Agency and Consciousness in Discourse
Author: Paul Thibault
Publisher: A&C Black
Total Pages: 352
Release: 2004-12-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1847142664

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In the past two decades there has been considerable interest in the ways in which subjects are positioned in discursive practice. This interest has entailed a focus on the role of language and discourse in the processes in and through which subjects are constituted in discourse. However, questions of agency and how it relates to consciousness have received less attention. This book explores the ways in which agency and consciousness are created through transactions between self and other. The book argues that it is necessary to regard body-brain interactions in the context of the social and discursive practices which act upon human bodies. These issues of agency and individuation are explored in relation to infant semiosis, as well as in relation to children's symbolic play. Thibault looks at the importance of the self-referential moral conscience in relation to the interpersonal dimension of all acts of meaning-making. This conscience is also connected to the development of a self-referential viewpoint which the book argues is connected to the ecosocial semiotic systems of thinking about consciousness as a complex system operating on many different levels. The author discusses and evaluates the work of linguists, psychologists, biologists, semioticians, and sociologists such as Basil Bernstein, Mikhail Bakhtin, J. J. Gibson, M. A. K. Halliday, Walter Kauffman, Lakoff & Johnson, Jay Lemke, Jean Piaget and Stanley Salthe, to develop a new theory of agency and consciousness.

Agency and Consciousness in Discourse

Agency and Consciousness in Discourse
Author: Paul Thibault
Publisher: A&C Black
Total Pages: 370
Release: 2004-12-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1847142664

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In the past two decades there has been considerable interest in the ways in which subjects are positioned in discursive practice. This interest has entailed a focus on the role of language and discourse in the processes in and through which subjects are constituted in discourse. However, questions of agency and how it relates to consciousness have received less attention. This book explores the ways in which agency and consciousness are created through transactions between self and other. The book argues that it is necessary to regard body-brain interactions in the context of the social and discursive practices which act upon human bodies. These issues of agency and individuation are explored in relation to infant semiosis, as well as in relation to children's symbolic play. Thibault looks at the importance of the self-referential moral conscience in relation to the interpersonal dimension of all acts of meaning-making. This conscience is also connected to the development of a self-referential viewpoint which the book argues is connected to the ecosocial semiotic systems of thinking about consciousness as a complex system operating on many different levels. The author discusses and evaluates the work of linguists, psychologists, biologists, semioticians, and sociologists such as Basil Bernstein, Mikhail Bakhtin, J. J. Gibson, M. A. K. Halliday, Walter Kauffman, Lakoff & Johnson, Jay Lemke, Jean Piaget and Stanley Salthe, to develop a new theory of agency and consciousness.

Narrative Skepticism

Narrative Skepticism
Author: Linda Schermer Raphael
Publisher: Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press
Total Pages: 252
Release: 2001
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9780838639009

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Using narrative, philosophical, and psychoanalytic theory, Linda S. Raphael investigates the development of skepticism in narrative. She argues that as authors explore more deeply the inner life of characters, their narratives become more skeptical about pinning down what it means to lead a good life. This argument is buttressed through a close examination of Jane Austen's 'Persuasion', George Eliot's 'Middlemarch', Henry James's 'The Wings of the Dove', Virginia Woolf's 'Mrs. Dalloway', and Karzo Ishiguro's 'The Remains of the Day.'

The Sense of Agency

The Sense of Agency
Author: Patrick Haggard
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 453
Release: 2015-08-27
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 0190267291

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Agency has two meanings in psychology and neuroscience. It can refer to one's capacity to affect the world and act in line with one's goals and desires--this is the objective aspect of agency. But agency can also refer to the subjective experience of controlling one's actions, or how it feels to achieve one's goals or affect the world. This subjective aspect is known as the sense of agency, and it is an important part of what makes us human. Interest in the sense of agency has exploded since the early 2000s, largely because scientists have learned that it can be studied objectively through analyses of human judgment, behavior, and the brain. This book brings together some of the world's leading researchers to give structure to this nascent but rapidly growing field. The contributors address questions such as: What role does agency play in the sense of self? Is agency based on predicting outcomes of actions? And what are the links between agency and motivation? Recent work on the sense of agency has been markedly interdisciplinary. The chapters collected here combine ideas and methods from fields as diverse as engineering, psychology, neurology, neuroscience, and philosophy of mind, making the book a valuable resource for any student or researcher interested in action, volition, and exploring how mind and brain are organized.

A Spirit of Trust

A Spirit of Trust
Author: Robert B. Brandom
Publisher: Belknap Press
Total Pages: 857
Release: 2019
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0674976819

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In a new retelling of the romantic rationalist adventure of ideas that is Hegel's classic The Phenomenology of Spirit, Robert Brandom argues that when our self-conscious recognitive attitudes take Hegel's radical form of magnanimity and trust, we can overcome a troubled modernity and enter a new age of spirit.

Rhetorical Agency

Rhetorical Agency
Author: Les Belikian
Publisher: punctum books
Total Pages: 207
Release: 2017
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1947447246

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In recent accounts of rhetoric's storied productivity, commentators have implied, along systematically Kantian lines, albeit with the occasional protestation, that agency must be coextensive with subjectivity. But is that all there is (to 2,500 years' worth of hypothesizing about the ways in which communication might promote social change)? Les Belikian's answer, drawing not only on traditional and contemporary rhetorical studies but also on Deleuzean thinking, actor-network theory, and object-oriented ontology, takes the form of a quadruply contrarian thesis: Rhetorical agency inheres, irreducibly so, in subjectivity, in conventionality, in transcendence, and in materiality, all of which are themselves under production. TABLE OF CONTENTS // Chapter 1: Productivity as a Context for Theorizing Rhetorical Transaction - A Miscellaneously Self-Effacing Rhetorical Agency? - Rhetoricity Bound, Unbounded, and Both - Variegation (Not Conglomeration) - Chapter 2: A Four-Folded Rhetorical Agency - Tetradic Due Diligence - Disaggregating a Constitution - A Willfully Productive Rhetorical Agency - Assemblage-Theoretical Resources - Triangulation - An Investigative Itinerary - Chapter 3: Subjectivity in the Social-Structural Landscape - Co-Constructing Constraint - Can the Speaker Speak? - An Ineffectual Agency - Subtracting from Rhetorical Practice - What Else Is Wrong with This Paradigm? - A Chimerical Agency for a Colossal Agent - Chapter 4: Conventionality in the Rhetorical-Humanistic Landscape - De-Leviathanizing the Normative - From Normativity to Shared Values - A Tribe of Equals - Keeping Shared Values between the Ceiling and the Seat - Staying the Same by Doing Something Differently - Maximizing Assent by Minimizing Recalcitrance - Still Missing So Far - Chapter 5: Transcendence in the Existential-Transversal Landscape - Existence, Transcendence, and Transversality - Philosophizing for the Living by Getting Rid of Their Materiality - The Two Styles of Transcendence - The Fideistic Appeal - Correcting Forgetfulness through a Material Phenomenology - Rhetorical Agency and the Existential Self - On Pivoting, Transcendence, and Emergence - The Rhetorical Agent and the Original Body - A Re-Corporealized Transversality - Chapter 6: Materiality in the Material-Semiotic Landscape - A Parable of Materiality-and-Relationality - Assemblaging, Stratification, and Circulating Reference - Entering at Biblical Precept - Crossing over to Race - From Race to Gender - Rescaling the Envoy - And A'n't We a Meshwork? - Chapter 7: Agency in the Rhetorical-Theoretical World - No More Homogenization Now! - On Keeping Difference Different - A Fluctuating Rhetorical Agent

The Discursive Mind

The Discursive Mind
Author: Rom Harré
Publisher: SAGE Publications
Total Pages: 205
Release: 1994-03-15
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 1452253439

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I was delighted that the shortcomings of a causal approach to psychology were so eloquently argued. The authors are adamant that psychological properties (thoughts, feelings, beliefs) are not straightforwardly causal and, although language is socially acquired, our personal applications of meanings are not socially determined. --Self and Society "This fascinating book is an attempt to articulate the principal doctrines of a ′new paradigm′ for psychological inquiry, a paradigm focusing on discourse and discourse analysis. . . . [Chapter] titles can only hint at the novelty of the approach and the richness and depth of the discussions. . . . Upper-division undergraduate through faculty." --Choice "Harré has launched a fertile field of inquiry, one that will receive substantial attention and acclaim from scholars of several disciplines over the next few years." --Clyde Hendrick, Dean, Texas Tech University "This is a bold effort. It aims at no less than a new paradigm for human psychology (a ′second cognitive revolution′). For a work so ambitious, The Discursive Mind is written in a style that is both clear and succinct. Rom Harré and Grant Gillett have a remarkable ability to get to the heart of an issue with a minimum of distraction." --James R. Averill, University of Massachusetts at Amherst "This book provides the best introduction to ′New Paradigm′ psychology. The authors present a masterful outline of the philosophical roots and scientific applications of the emerging field of discursive psychology." --Kurt Danziger, York University "I am impressed with the book′s unusual sweep, erudition, and breadth of scope tying as it does strands from diverse philosophical traditions to the history of contemporary psychology across a wide range of topics. It represents a useful statement of the discursive position and its implications for different psychological issues." --Arie W. Kruglanski, University of Maryland The Discursive Mind presents an exhilarating tour of the key philosophical revolutions that are shaping contemporary psychology. Harré and Gillett herald a new paradigm in psychology, dissolving the Cartesian distinction between mind and body in favor of the discursive turn in psychological theory. This grand, interdisciplinary overview places its emphasis on discourse: the discursive origins of the self, the problem of agency, and a thoroughly social understanding of personality. In the process, the authors elevate the emotions to a far more significant place in our understanding of mind, action, and being. The Discursive Mind is an elegant and lucidly argued book, whose theoretical breadth is matched by its treatment of a remarkable range of subjects including consciousness, the brain, perception, thought, personality, and the emotions. Scholars, professionals, and students in psychology, communication, and sociology will find this volume provocative, insightful, delightful to read, and intellectually challenging.

Authoring the Dialogic Self

Authoring the Dialogic Self
Author: Gergana Vitanova
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 185
Release: 2010
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 902721025X

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This book offers a truly interdisciplinary perspective on key socio-cultural aspects of second language learning. Building on Bakhtin s philosophy of language and the self, it examines the complex intersections among gender, culture, and agency in the everyday discursive practices of immigrants. Bakhtin s dialogic framework still remains on the periphery of second language acquisition research. The book embraces not only Bakhtin s well-known notion of "dialogue" but also his core concepts of "responsibility" and "ethics" in the analysis of immigrants narrative samples. The significance of narratives is underscored throughout the book, and a dialogic, discourse-centered approach to narrative as a genre is suggested. "Authoring the Dialogical Self " targets a range of disciplines. Scholars in applied linguistics, narrative studies, cultural psychology, and communication studies will find the discussed concepts relevant. The rich data samples and detailed analysis make the book appropriate for graduate courses in TESOL, language and identity, or language and gender."