Philosophy

09 Feb An Exploration of Psychology’s Glorification of the Individual

Posted at 22:59h in Critical psychiatry, Human Development, Philosophy, Politics, Psychology, Psychology of Becoming, Training/Classes 0 Comments

Hello to my blog followers and fans of The Overweight Brain. If you live in the NYC metro area I’d love for you to join me IN PERSON for a Revolutionary Conversation on psychology’s glorification of the individual—taking place the evenings of Monday March 1 and 8 at the East Side...

02 Feb Words to Ponder #21

Posted at 03:05h in Creativity, Human Development, I Like This, Philosophy, Psychotherapy, Social Therapy, Words to Ponder 3 Comments

For the next few months I’ll be using "Words to Ponder" to share some words of Fred Newman—the public philosopher, creator of social therapy, political activist, “architect” of a new progressivism, and my friend and intellectual partner for 35 years. I hope you are moved and/or provoked by them. The...

30 Jan Activist-Scholars: A Story within a Story

Posted at 01:53h in Activity Theory, Community Organizing, Culture, Education, Human Development, Language, Learning Environments, Outside of School, Philosophy, Play, Politics, Postmodern Marxism, Psychology, Publications, Social Therapeutics, Vygotsky, Youth Development 0 Comments

I want to introduce you to a unique activist-scholar community that played an especially important role in my development. It's the Laboratory of Comparative Human Cognition (also known as LCHC or, simply, the Lab). Housed at the University of California San Diego since 1979, the Lab is a community of...

04 Jan The Subjectivity of Objectivity

Posted at 16:33h in Culture, Philosophy, Psychology of Becoming, Publications 0 Comments

I posted a new chapter of The Overweight Brain a few days ago and am so pleased with the great feedback I'm receiving so far. Here's a snippet: Science relies on and perpetuates the distinction (dualism) between subjective and objective—subjective being beliefs, attitudes, and other mental processes that are “inside,” and objective being...

17 Dec John Shotter: Relational Becomings

Posted at 03:24h in Culture, Language, Philosophy, Psychology, Psychology of Becoming 4 Comments

Renowned scholar John Shotter passed away on December 8, 2016 after a long illness. John loved to talk and to listen, to create conversation about everything, most especially about conversation itself. His contributions to social constructionism, Open Dialogue and a radically humanistic psychology are acknowledged and studied the world over. I...

12 Nov The Individual—Psychology Glorifies What It Doesn’t Care About

Posted at 19:27h in Human Development, Philosophy, Psychology, Psychology of Becoming 3 Comments

As many readers of this site and the writings of the East Side Institute are aware, Fred Newman and I are among the vocal critics of psychology’s obsession with and glorification of the individual. We agree with our colleagues that psychology developed alongside and played a central role in the...

27 Oct Vygotsky Continues to Work and Play

Posted at 18:51h in Activity Theory, Community Organizing, Creativity, Culture, Education, Human Development, Learning Environments, Outside of School, Performance Movement, Philosophy, Play, Psychology of Becoming, Psychotherapy, Publications, Social Therapeutics, Social Therapy 8 Comments

I'm happy to report that the expanded second edition of my book, Vygotsky at Work and Play is just three weeks away from publication (11/17/16). To give you a preview, here's an excerpt from my Introduction to the second edition. In his thoughtful and very generous Foreword to the first edition...

08 Sep Psychology, Theatre, Fact and Value—Newman’s Manifesto

Posted at 18:19h in Culture, Performance Movement, Philosophy, Psychology, Psychology of Becoming, Theatre 3 Comments

I'm immersed this week in final preparations for the 9th Performing the World event, PTW '16: Can We Perform Our Way to Power? (September 23-25) and in working on the science chapter for my online book The Overweight Brain. One thing led to another, as they always do. I was beginning to...

06 Aug Psychological Ethics

Posted at 01:21h in Culture, Philosophy, Politics, Psychology, Psychology of Becoming 0 Comments

The Ethics of Diagnosis and Alternatives to It—An Invitation for Inquiry This week the American Psychological Association holds its annual convention in Denver. I had been planning to attend and present as part of a symposium, “The Future of Diagnosis: Ethics, Social Justice, and Alternative Paradigms.” The topic I planned to...

16 Jul What is PTW?

Posted at 20:52h in Applied Theatre, Clowning, Community Organizing, Creativity, Culture, Education, Events, Health Care, Human Development, Outside of School, Performance Movement, Philosophy, Play, Politics, Psychology, Psychology of Becoming, Psychotherapy, Theatre, What's New, Youth Development 0 Comments

Performing the World (PTW) is a cross-disciplinary gathering of practitioners and scholars from every continent. Participants include performers and performance scholars, psychologists and social workers, physicians and nurses, educators and youth workers, community organizers and activists, and all others for whom performance, play and the creative/expressive arts offer a new...