Approaches that view the self as constituted by socio-cultural processes and as plural, consisting of a multiplicity of states, positions, functions, etc., have flourished in the last decades. This paper explores the multi-voiced nature of the self, drawing upon Lacan's theory of subjectivity and Bakhtin's concept of dialogism. Subjectivity is seen as constituted through language as expressed in the speech of the subject's important early others. The psychoanalytic concept of transference, understood as a semiotic process of enacting early interpersonal patterns in the subject's present relations, provides a link between the unfolding of subjectivity in the present and its historical continuity. The articulation of subjectivity is discussed through a micro-analysis of extracts from sessions of a long-term psychoanalytic psychotherapy. The analysis demonstrates the enactment of transferential dialogical positions at the beginning of the therapy and traces their recognition by the client through the gradual development of increasingly reflexive subject positions towards the end of therapy. It is argued that the aim of therapy should be the facilitation of a complex subjectivity, whereby the different subject positions can be fluently articulated within an overall reflexive frame.
The range of conceptualisations of narrative in the studies reviewed, from a representational psychological view to a constructionist social view, reflects tensions within narrative psychology itself. Moreover, two trends can be discerned in the field reviewed, narrative analysis of therapy, which draws from narrative theory and utilises the analytic approaches of narrative research to study psychotherapy, and analyses of narrative in therapy, which study client narratives using non-narrative qualitative methods. Finally, the paper highlights the need for integration of this diverse field of research and urges for the development of narrative studies of psychotherapy which employ a broader social understanding of narrative production and transformation.
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