The Making of a Dialogical Theory
Social Representations and Communication

An exploration of the theory of social representations and communications as a case in the making of a dialogical theory.

Ivana Marková (Author)

9781009294997, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 6 July 2023

280 pages
23.5 x 15.8 x 2.3 cm, 0.6 kg

Creating a stimulating social theory with long-lasting in?uence for generations of scholars is driven by multiple interacting factors. The fortune of a theory is determined not only by the author's creative mind but also by the ways in which principal concepts are understood and interpreted. The proper understanding of a social theory requires a good grasp of major historical, political, and cultural challenges that contribute to its making. Considering these issues, Marková explores Serge Moscovici's theory of social representations and communication as a case study in the making of a dialogical social theory. She analyses both the undeveloped features and the forward-moving, inspirational highlights of the theory and presents them as a resource for linking issues and problems from diverse domains and disciplines. This dialogical approach has the potential to advance the dyad Self–Other as an irreducible intellectual, ethical, and aesthetic unit in epistemologies of the human and social sciences.

Part I: 1. Socio-political Sources of the Theory of Social Representations
2. A Political Refugee in Paris
3. The 'Age of Intellectual Innocence' in Psychoanalysis 1961
4. The Durkheimian in Psychoanalysis 1976
5. The 'Great Smoky Dragon'
6. Pseudo-dialogues and Building Bridges
Part II: 7. Social Representations and Common Sense
8. Meanings and Knowledge as Semiotic Processes
9. They 'Made Flowers Grow Where It Seemed Impossible'
10. Social Representations as Unique Phenomena: Dynamics and Complexity
11. Social Theories as Dialogues
Afterword
References
Index.

Subject Areas: Educational: Social sciences [YQJ], Social, group or collective psychology [JMH], Communication studies [GTC]