| Abstract: | ![]()
Reviews the book, A critical psychology: Interpretation of the personal world by Edmund V. Sullivan (1984). In this book, the author gives an indication of what an alternative psychology might look like. In doing this he draws on the ideas of a number of European philosophers and social scientists whose work has been generally ignored by North American psychologists. What distinguishes Sullivan's critical psychology from other alternatives to the mainstream is his insistence that the conditions for human action be traced not simply to the intentional activity of individuals but to the social structures of domination in which individual intentions are embedded. These are the structures of ethnicity, gender, and class. What Sullivan criticizes is that "psychologists take structural relationships of power such as capital over labour, men over women, and change them into intrapsychic phenomena." This book is an important contribution to the growing literature on alternatives to mainstream psychology. It is distinguished by its intellectual sophistication and by its marshalling of perspectives that run counter to local cultural traditions. At the very least it is a volume that ought to provoke an expansion of all too narrow disciplinary horizons. Incidentally, the very concept of intellectual "horizon" is one that the author analyses in a particularly constructive way, showing its relevance in the context of psychological research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved) |
