The turn to discourse in social psychology.

We discuss the emerging turn to discursive social psychology as an alternative to experimental social psychology. We note that the barriers to change are rooted in the history of the discipline, in the failure of researchers to recognize the distinction between movements and actions and in their reluctance to switch from positivist to post-positivist criteria. We outline the tenets of discursive psychology and of its associated method, discourse analysis. Illustrations of discourse analysis are drawn primarily from a recent study of date rape. Throughout, we emphasize the centrality of discourse in social life and the definition of the social being as Homo loquens. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)