First published in 1984, Social Texts and Context illustrates the ways in which familiar psychological concepts – femininity, the environment, groups, the self – are constructed in discourse. Novels by Thomas Hardy, Barbara Cartland, Doris Lessing, C. P. Snow, Charles Dickens and Robert Musil are examined, and the theoretical approaches of Roland Barthes, Rom Harre, Jonathan Culler, Henri Tajfel, Irving Janis and Paul Willis are discussed. Development in literary theory – such as semiology and deconstruction and in theories of social action – such as ethogenics and discourse analysis – make it difficult to treat literary and psychological texts as a neutral medium of communication. Instead, texts should be seen in terms of their fundamental constructive role in the organization of social life. As the authors demonstrate, contemporary life in both its personal and professional spheres is hedged around by discourse, conversations, newspaper articles, novels, scientific reports. This book will be of interest to students of literature and psychology.

Written by some of the leading figures in the fields of conversation analysis, discursive psychology and ethnomethodology, this book looks at the challenging implications of new discourse-based approaches to the topic of cognition. Up to now, cognition has primarily been studied in experimental settings. This volume shows how cognition can be reworked using analyses of engaging examples of real life interaction such as conversations between friends, relationship counselling sessions, and legal hearings. It includes an extended introduction that overviews the history and context of cognitive research and its basic assumptions to provide a frame for understanding the specific examples discussed, as well as surveying cutting edge debates about discourse and cognition. This comprehensive and accessible book opens up important new ways of understanding the relation between language and cognition.

Written by some of the leading figures in the fields of conversation analysis, discursive psychology and ethnomethodology, this book looks at the challenging implications of new discourse-based approaches to the topic of cognition. Up to now, cognition has primarily been studied in experimental settings. This volume shows how cognition can be reworked using analyses of engaging examples of real life interaction such as conversations between friends, relationship counselling sessions, and legal hearings. It includes an extended introduction that overviews the history and context of cognitive research and its basic assumptions to provide a frame for understanding the specific examples discussed, as well as surveying cutting edge debates about discourse and cognition. This comprehensive and accessible book opens up important new ways of understanding the relation between language and cognition.

The brief, practical texts in the Essentials of Qualitative Methods series introduce social science and psychology researchers to key approaches to capturing phenomena not easily measured quantitatively, offering exciting, nimble opportunities to gather in-depth qualitative data. In this book, Alexa Hepburn and Jonathan Potter provide an introduction to conversation analysis, a qualitative approach that examines the actions and interactions that take place in face-to-face conversations, phone calls, texts, and various forms of media. Conversation analysis details how people interact with one another, adjusting their behavior accordingly, and attentiveness to one another. Learning how to effectively communicate is particularly important to improving communication in fields such as couples counseling, health communication, parent effectiveness training, suicide hotlines, and more. About the Essentials of Qualitative Methods book series: Even for experienced researchers, selecting and correctly applying the right method can be challenging. In this groundbreaking series, leading experts in qualitative methods provide clear, crisp, and comprehensive descriptions of their approach, including its methodological integrity, and its benefits and limitations. Each book includes numerous examples to enable readers to quickly and thoroughly grasp how to leverage these valuable methods.

"Build me a house of words, / A house of how and why, / and I will live in it with you/ Under the silent sky, / For we will tell each other/ Things we would deny/ And believe them by and by." Jonathan Potter's House of Words is a collection of poems arranged in four movements echoing the structure of an Elizabethan sonnet. Each poem here represents a single stressed syllable pursed between lips, cobbling pillar and post, rafter and roof, where stars are nails and the night is a hammer falling. The book opens in wonder, dwelling in a world in which words and the gestures of language provide access to the freshness deep down things. But even in that initial movement, a gap is evident which grows as it confronts contradiction and death. Subdued recedings of resignation follow, tentatively emerging into the light of faith. House of Words is the inaugural publication of Korrektiv Press.

Focus Group Practice is unique in providing a picture of focus group moderation and interaction that is based on the study of what actually happens in high-class market research focus groups and in using recent theories of interaction, for example discourse and conversation analyses, to throw light on the practice of moderation. It is written in clear, engaging and non-technical manner and richly illustrated by examples from focus groups in a wide range of different contexts. New moderators will find the basic elements of focus groups described and explained, and experienced moderators will find new ways of understanding what they do which will help them to develop their skills.

Focus Groups moderation is understood in terms of the cutting edge theories of interaction. It concentrates on the basic and subtle processes through which moderators elicit opinions, manage disagreements, and generate a range of views. How are participants encouraged to be animated and involved, and how are the arguments and anecdotes discouraged? How are responses guided to in the required direction? This book addresses these pertinent questions.

Above all, how does a moderator keep participants focused?

This unique book will be essential reading for all involved in focus group practice. It is accessible to broad readership, including undergraduate students.

The topics of 'race' and 'racism' are often treated narrowly and unimaginatively in social scientific literature; they are usually viewed as sub-categories of 'stereotyping' or 'prejudice' or 'social class.' In this exciting new book, Margaret Wetherell and Jonathan Potter extend their work on the use of discourse analysis to tackle racism and issues of social structure, power relations and idology.

Part I, "Theory and Method," reviews and criticizes mainstream sociological and psychological theoretical approaches to the topic of racism and introduces the challenges to them posed by discourse analysis. Also examined are the ways in which some recent developments in literary theory, post-structuralism, semiotics and cultural studies might be applied to the social and psychological study of racist practices.

Part II, "Discourse in Action," examines how white New Zealanders make sense of their own history and actions towards the Maori minoriy. The authors' contention is that, in order to combat racism, we need to address the commonplace forms of explanation used by "ordinary" people rather than concentrate on obvious bigots and extremist groups. They conclude that many 'liberal' and 'egalitarian' arguments can be used to sustain racism and exploitation.

"Mapping the Language of Racism" is a pioneering book which suggest genuinely new ways of thinking and acting on a topic of grave social concern.

How is reality really manufactured? The idea of social construction has become a commonplace part of much social research, yet precisely what is constructed, how it is constructed, and what constructionism means are often left unclear or taken for granted. In this major work, Jonathan Potter explores the central themes raised by these questions. Representing Reality explores the different traditions in constructivist thought--including sociology of scientific knowledge; conversation analysis and ethnomethodology; and semiotics, poststructuralism, and postmodernism--to provide a lucid introduction to several key strands of work that have overturned the way we think about facts and descriptions. Potter illustrates his points throughout with varied and engaging examples taken from newspaper stories, relationship counseling sessions, accounts of paranormal events, social workers' assessments of violent parents, informal talk between program organizers, political arguments, and everyday conversations. Representing Reality offers the student and scholar in social psychology, rhetoric and discourse, and related fields a critical introduction to constructivism.

This accessible text introduces the key elements of a discursive approach to psychology. This focuses on how discourse - naturally occurring talk and text - can be studied and understood as the accomplishment of social action. Building on discourse analysis, the authors present an integrated discursive action model which leads to a radical reworking of some of psychology's most central concepts - language, cognition, truth, knowledge and reality. The implications of a discursive perspective for such topics are explored alongside a sustained argument against the perceptual-cognitivist emphasis that currently dominates psychology. A particular theme is the reconceptualization of memory and attribution. The authors examine the communicative and interactional work performed when individuals, with interests, describe and explain past events, construct factual reports and attribute mental states. They draw on a wide range of empirical materials to demonstrate the methods and analysis underpinning their approach. Reframing fundamental issues of language and mind as social practices realized in discourse, Discursive Psychology offers a profound challenge to existing orthodoxies while also establishing an exciting new agenda in the social and human sciences.

Although much has been written about discourse analysis in recent years, little of it has been intelligible to the average undergraduate or graduate student. It has become a field in which terminological confusions abound and a bewildering variety of theoretical perspectives compete. Discourse and Social Psychology is the first systematic and easily understood introduction to the theory and application of discourse analysis within the field of social psychology. Beginning with an insightful discussion of the theoretical roots of discourse analysis in linguistic philosophy, ethnomethodology, and semiotics, the authors continue by exploring those concepts which are at the heart of the study of social psychology: rules, accounts, the self, and social representations. Concluding chapters not only tackle some of the broader and more controversial issues, but also offer suggestions as to the direction future research should take. In addition, the authors provide an exhaustive bibliography which will help acquaint students with all the relevant literature in the field. "A provocative little text, that is pitched at the advanced student of social psychology. . . . Concrete observations, evolving definitions, changing circumstances, and dynamic variability, are central ideas to their refreshing approaches in current social psychology. An extensive bibliography supplements this text." --Choice "An invigorating breath of fresh air--clear, innovative, and compelling. With bold theoretical vision and a range of creative research strategies, the volume brings social psychologists into catalytic connection with communication specialists, micro-sociologists, linguists, and philosophers of social science. A significant step toward a post-modern psychology." --Kenneth J. Gergen, Swarthmore College "Potter and Wetherell have genuinely presented us with a different way of working in social psychology. The book's clarity means that it has the power to influence a lot of people ill-at-ease with traditional social psychology but unimpressed with (or simply bewildered by) other alternatives on offer. It could rescue social psychology from the sterility of the laboratory and its traditional mentalism." --Charles Antaki, University of Lancaster "This book represents a lucid and entertaining introduction to the study of language and discourse. The authors analyze social texts of all kinds and offer interesting exemplars to illustrate important concepts and theoretical ideas. Although I disagree with the authors' critique of the neo-positivist research tradition, I still found the book provocative." --Mary Anne Fitzpatrick, University of Wisconsin "Just about the best book that could have been written at the moment as an introduction for psychologists to discouse analysis, its scope and its problems, given the current state of the art. . . . An impressive effort. It is a book I shall use in my own courses." --Current Psychology "Potter and Wetherell provide accessible and compelling short reviews of key issues in Chomskyan, speech act, ethnomethodological and semiological traditions." --Journal of Language and Social Psychology "Potter and Wetherell have genuinely presented us with a different way of working in social psychology. The book's clarity means that it has the power to influence a lot of people ill-at-ease with traditional social psychology but unimpressed with other alternatives to offer. It could rescue social psychology from the sterility of the laboratory and its traditional mentalism." --Times Higher Education Supplement