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Towards a phenomenological model for a critical psychotherapy
- Gennrich-de Lisle, Peter Hirzel
- Authors: Gennrich-de Lisle, Peter Hirzel
- Date: 1985
- Subjects: Psychotherapy , Phenomenology
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3106 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1004513 , Psychotherapy , Phenomenology
- Description: This thesis aims to establish a model of psychotherapy that is based on experience, but which takes social structure into account. To do this it first sets up a theoretical model of psychotherapy. Thereafter the model is used to analyse four protocols as a way of examining its effectiveness. The analysis of the protocols provides the basis for coming to certain conclusions about the nature of psychotherapy. The theoretical phase first examines the area traditionally known as etiology, but here the approach is from a broadly existential perspective. Thus this section starts by proposing a view of human nature, and then it goes on to say how this nature comes to be disrupted. The influence of the broader social context upon human existence is also considered here. Secondly, there is an attempt to understand how psychotherapy works. Drawing on existential and cultural anthropological material, various themes of psychotherapy are examined, and these are then placed within their social context. Finally, the theoretical phase brings together the themes emerging from the two foregoing sections and integrates them into a single model of "etiology" and "cure". In the following chapter, the adequacy of this model is examined by using it to analyse four protocols written by subjects on their experience of therapy. In the final chapter various conclusions are drawn.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Gennrich-de Lisle, Peter Hirzel
- Date: 1985
- Subjects: Psychotherapy , Phenomenology
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3106 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1004513 , Psychotherapy , Phenomenology
- Description: This thesis aims to establish a model of psychotherapy that is based on experience, but which takes social structure into account. To do this it first sets up a theoretical model of psychotherapy. Thereafter the model is used to analyse four protocols as a way of examining its effectiveness. The analysis of the protocols provides the basis for coming to certain conclusions about the nature of psychotherapy. The theoretical phase first examines the area traditionally known as etiology, but here the approach is from a broadly existential perspective. Thus this section starts by proposing a view of human nature, and then it goes on to say how this nature comes to be disrupted. The influence of the broader social context upon human existence is also considered here. Secondly, there is an attempt to understand how psychotherapy works. Drawing on existential and cultural anthropological material, various themes of psychotherapy are examined, and these are then placed within their social context. Finally, the theoretical phase brings together the themes emerging from the two foregoing sections and integrates them into a single model of "etiology" and "cure". In the following chapter, the adequacy of this model is examined by using it to analyse four protocols written by subjects on their experience of therapy. In the final chapter various conclusions are drawn.
- Full Text:
A phenomenological explication of the artistic creative experience of a painter, a writer and a playwright
- Authors: Lambie, Eileen
- Date: 1988
- Subjects: Phenomenology , Art -- Philosophy , Artists , Creation (Literary, artistic, etc.)
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSocSc
- Identifier: vital:3115 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1004605
- Description: The aim of the thesis was to explore two focus questions using the phenomenological approach. Firstly, what it meant to be an artist for three particular artists; a painter, a writer and a playwright. Secondly, what a general explicitation (after Van Kaam, 1958) of the three subjects' artistic creative experience and working processes revealed in essence. The taped data of the three artists were reduced and explored through a number of phenomenological strategies. This led to the formulation of four essential descriptions for each artist, which were based structurally on Van den Berg's experiential categories in A Different Existence. Thus, the essential descriptions reflect each artist's relationship with his/her world, body, fellow people and time. The final step was the achievement of a general extended description. The major conclusion arising from the phenomenological explication is that art affords a way through which artists are able to live an authentic existence. That is, the body and world of the artist are in harmony and the artist's art roots him in the past, is manifest in the present and indicates the future direction of his work. Another conclusion is that the artist is Janus-faced and this enables him/her to balance subjectivity and objectivity in the Lebenswelt and to communicate what he/she sees to others in a healthy way through art. The artist's relationship with world, body, fellow people and with time, is postulated as being qualitatively richer than that of the nonartist. The two focus questions were successfully answered through the research explication and were validated by two independent judges. The viability of the phenomenological approach in the field of artistic creativity was therefore demonstrated. Suggestions for future research were made, one of which was that more phenomenological research aimed at eliciting specific information on the creation of art works might render more information on the artistic creative process.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Lambie, Eileen
- Date: 1988
- Subjects: Phenomenology , Art -- Philosophy , Artists , Creation (Literary, artistic, etc.)
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSocSc
- Identifier: vital:3115 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1004605
- Description: The aim of the thesis was to explore two focus questions using the phenomenological approach. Firstly, what it meant to be an artist for three particular artists; a painter, a writer and a playwright. Secondly, what a general explicitation (after Van Kaam, 1958) of the three subjects' artistic creative experience and working processes revealed in essence. The taped data of the three artists were reduced and explored through a number of phenomenological strategies. This led to the formulation of four essential descriptions for each artist, which were based structurally on Van den Berg's experiential categories in A Different Existence. Thus, the essential descriptions reflect each artist's relationship with his/her world, body, fellow people and time. The final step was the achievement of a general extended description. The major conclusion arising from the phenomenological explication is that art affords a way through which artists are able to live an authentic existence. That is, the body and world of the artist are in harmony and the artist's art roots him in the past, is manifest in the present and indicates the future direction of his work. Another conclusion is that the artist is Janus-faced and this enables him/her to balance subjectivity and objectivity in the Lebenswelt and to communicate what he/she sees to others in a healthy way through art. The artist's relationship with world, body, fellow people and with time, is postulated as being qualitatively richer than that of the nonartist. The two focus questions were successfully answered through the research explication and were validated by two independent judges. The viability of the phenomenological approach in the field of artistic creativity was therefore demonstrated. Suggestions for future research were made, one of which was that more phenomenological research aimed at eliciting specific information on the creation of art works might render more information on the artistic creative process.
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Towards an existential phenomenological interpretation of C.G. Jung's analytical psychology
- Authors: Brooke, Roger, 1953-
- Date: 1989
- Subjects: Jung, C G (Carl Gustav), 1875-1961 , Existential phenomenology , Phenomenology , Psychoanalysis , Psychology
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:3208 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1011983
- Description: The central aim of this study was to interpret the psychology of C.G . Jung in the light of existential phenomenology, thereby to lay the foundations for an integrated phenomenological analytical psychology. It was recognised that although Jung introduced a poetic understanding of psychological life he tended to adhere theoretically to a Cartesian and natural scientific epistemology and ontology, in which the knower is separated from the known, and psychological life is encapsulated inside the human subject. Thus the main task, which defined generally the study's scope and limitations, was to undercut the lingering Cartesianism in Jung's thought, thereby to recover the world in which one lives as intrinsically and authentically psychological, and one's psychological life as irreducibly world-related. The ontological guidelines for this endeavour were taken primarily from Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty, but it was consistently argued that this hermeneutic movement towards an existential understanding is given within Jung's work itself. Thus: Jung's method is primarily hermeneutic-phenomenological; the psyche is not "mind" or an inner realm more or less linked to the body, but is the embodied life-world, and Jung's descriptions of it - of its autonomy, spatiality and bodiliness, for instance - achieve ontological clarity when it is articulated as Dasein; the self as the totality of the psyche is interpretated in terms of Dasein, and individuation involves differentiation, personalisation and appropriation within existence itself; the complexes, archetypally grounded, are the vital densities of incarnate life, ambiguously conscious and unconscious, known and lived; the archetypes are the fundamental necessities of psychological life, autonomous imaginal structures within which both body and world are founded. Imaginal autonomy is revealed ontically as the metaphorical reality of things, but since imaginal autonomy has no ground thought about psychological life is ultimately poetic. Where relevant, recent theoretical developments in analytical psychology were discussed, particularly the Developmental and Archetypal movements. A clinical study was presented to illustrate some of the main themes of the thesis. In conclusion, the main themes of an integrated phenomenological analytical psychology were outlined, and the central contributions of analytical psychology and existential phenomenology were highlighted.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Brooke, Roger, 1953-
- Date: 1989
- Subjects: Jung, C G (Carl Gustav), 1875-1961 , Existential phenomenology , Phenomenology , Psychoanalysis , Psychology
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:3208 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1011983
- Description: The central aim of this study was to interpret the psychology of C.G . Jung in the light of existential phenomenology, thereby to lay the foundations for an integrated phenomenological analytical psychology. It was recognised that although Jung introduced a poetic understanding of psychological life he tended to adhere theoretically to a Cartesian and natural scientific epistemology and ontology, in which the knower is separated from the known, and psychological life is encapsulated inside the human subject. Thus the main task, which defined generally the study's scope and limitations, was to undercut the lingering Cartesianism in Jung's thought, thereby to recover the world in which one lives as intrinsically and authentically psychological, and one's psychological life as irreducibly world-related. The ontological guidelines for this endeavour were taken primarily from Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty, but it was consistently argued that this hermeneutic movement towards an existential understanding is given within Jung's work itself. Thus: Jung's method is primarily hermeneutic-phenomenological; the psyche is not "mind" or an inner realm more or less linked to the body, but is the embodied life-world, and Jung's descriptions of it - of its autonomy, spatiality and bodiliness, for instance - achieve ontological clarity when it is articulated as Dasein; the self as the totality of the psyche is interpretated in terms of Dasein, and individuation involves differentiation, personalisation and appropriation within existence itself; the complexes, archetypally grounded, are the vital densities of incarnate life, ambiguously conscious and unconscious, known and lived; the archetypes are the fundamental necessities of psychological life, autonomous imaginal structures within which both body and world are founded. Imaginal autonomy is revealed ontically as the metaphorical reality of things, but since imaginal autonomy has no ground thought about psychological life is ultimately poetic. Where relevant, recent theoretical developments in analytical psychology were discussed, particularly the Developmental and Archetypal movements. A clinical study was presented to illustrate some of the main themes of the thesis. In conclusion, the main themes of an integrated phenomenological analytical psychology were outlined, and the central contributions of analytical psychology and existential phenomenology were highlighted.
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Changing words and worlds?: a phenomenological study of the acquisition of an academic literacy
- Authors: Thomson, Carol Irene
- Date: 2008
- Subjects: Education -- Study and teaching (Higher) -- South Africa , Universities and colleges -- South Africa , College student development programs -- South Africa , Literacy -- South Africa , Education, Higher -- Philosophy , Educational change -- South Africa , Phenomenology
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:1446 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1003327
- Description: This study is contextualised within the field of post-graduate, continuing teacher education, and the vibrant and demanding policy context that has characterised higher education in post-apartheid South Africa. Situated within a module specifically designed to address what is commonly understood to be the academic literacy development needs of students in the Bachelor of Education Honours programme at the former University of Natal, it aims to unveil the lived experiences of students taking this module. The module, Reading and Writing Academic Texts (RWAT), was developed in direct response to academics’ call that something be done about the ‘problem’ of students’ reading and writing proficiency. As a core, compulsory module, RWAT was informed by Systemic Functional Linguistics and drew on Genre Theory for its conceptual and theoretical framework. It foregrounded the genre of the academic argument as the key academic literacy that was taught. The motivation for this study came from my own increasing concern that the theoretical and conceptual framework we had adopted for the module was emerging as an inherently limiting and formulaic model of literacy, and was resulting in students exiting the module with little or no ‘critical’ perspective on any aspect of literacy as social practice. I was also keen, in a climate of increasing de-personalisation and the massification of education, to reinstate the personal. Thus, I chose to focus on individual lives, and through an exploration of a small group of participants’ ‘lived’ experiences of the RWAT module, ascertain what it is like to acquire an academic literacy. The key research question is, therefore: What is it like to acquire an academic literacy? The secondary research question is: How is this experience influenced by the mode of delivery in which it occurs? For its conceptual and theoretical framing, this study draws on social literacy theory and phenomenology, the latter as both a philosophy and a methodology. However, although the study has drawn significantly on the phenomenological tradition for inspiration and direction, it has not done so uncritically. Thus, the study engages with phenomenology-as-philosophy in great depth before turning to phenomenology-as-methodology, in order to arrive at a point where the methods and procedures applied in it, are justified. The main findings of the study suggest that, despite the RWAT module espousing an ideological model (Street, 1984) of literacy in its learning materials and readings, participants came very much closer to experiencing an autonomous model of literacy (Street, 1984). The data shows that the RWAT module was largely inadequate to the task of inducting participants into the ‘situated practices’ and ‘situated meanings’ of the Discourse of Genre Theory and/or the academy, hence the many ‘lived’ difficulties participants experienced. The data also highlights the ease with which an autonomous model of literacy can come to govern practice and student experience even when curriculum intention is underpinned by an ideological position on literacy as social practice. Finally, the study suggests that the research community in South Africa, characterised as it is by such diversity, would be enriched by more studies derived from phenomenology, and a continuing engagement with phenomenology-as-a-movement in order to both challenge and expand its existing framework.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Thomson, Carol Irene
- Date: 2008
- Subjects: Education -- Study and teaching (Higher) -- South Africa , Universities and colleges -- South Africa , College student development programs -- South Africa , Literacy -- South Africa , Education, Higher -- Philosophy , Educational change -- South Africa , Phenomenology
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:1446 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1003327
- Description: This study is contextualised within the field of post-graduate, continuing teacher education, and the vibrant and demanding policy context that has characterised higher education in post-apartheid South Africa. Situated within a module specifically designed to address what is commonly understood to be the academic literacy development needs of students in the Bachelor of Education Honours programme at the former University of Natal, it aims to unveil the lived experiences of students taking this module. The module, Reading and Writing Academic Texts (RWAT), was developed in direct response to academics’ call that something be done about the ‘problem’ of students’ reading and writing proficiency. As a core, compulsory module, RWAT was informed by Systemic Functional Linguistics and drew on Genre Theory for its conceptual and theoretical framework. It foregrounded the genre of the academic argument as the key academic literacy that was taught. The motivation for this study came from my own increasing concern that the theoretical and conceptual framework we had adopted for the module was emerging as an inherently limiting and formulaic model of literacy, and was resulting in students exiting the module with little or no ‘critical’ perspective on any aspect of literacy as social practice. I was also keen, in a climate of increasing de-personalisation and the massification of education, to reinstate the personal. Thus, I chose to focus on individual lives, and through an exploration of a small group of participants’ ‘lived’ experiences of the RWAT module, ascertain what it is like to acquire an academic literacy. The key research question is, therefore: What is it like to acquire an academic literacy? The secondary research question is: How is this experience influenced by the mode of delivery in which it occurs? For its conceptual and theoretical framing, this study draws on social literacy theory and phenomenology, the latter as both a philosophy and a methodology. However, although the study has drawn significantly on the phenomenological tradition for inspiration and direction, it has not done so uncritically. Thus, the study engages with phenomenology-as-philosophy in great depth before turning to phenomenology-as-methodology, in order to arrive at a point where the methods and procedures applied in it, are justified. The main findings of the study suggest that, despite the RWAT module espousing an ideological model (Street, 1984) of literacy in its learning materials and readings, participants came very much closer to experiencing an autonomous model of literacy (Street, 1984). The data shows that the RWAT module was largely inadequate to the task of inducting participants into the ‘situated practices’ and ‘situated meanings’ of the Discourse of Genre Theory and/or the academy, hence the many ‘lived’ difficulties participants experienced. The data also highlights the ease with which an autonomous model of literacy can come to govern practice and student experience even when curriculum intention is underpinned by an ideological position on literacy as social practice. Finally, the study suggests that the research community in South Africa, characterised as it is by such diversity, would be enriched by more studies derived from phenomenology, and a continuing engagement with phenomenology-as-a-movement in order to both challenge and expand its existing framework.
- Full Text:
Reflective accounts of childhood inter-species experiences in a Southern-African context: a phenomenological-hermeneutic exploration
- Authors: Rump, Samantha
- Date: 2008
- Subjects: Child psychology -- South Africa , Child development -- South Africa , Human-animal relationships -- South Africa , Children and animals -- South Africa , Animal psychology -- South Africa , Hermeneutics , Phenomenology
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3045 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002554
- Description: The aims of this research were to describe in rich phenomenological detail the recollected childhood experiences described by three South African adults of growing up with animals in the context of a traditionally African cultural perspective in South Africa; as well as to document the emotional, physical and social effects of inter-species relationships as described by these participants, in order to explore and situate these experiences in relation to broad international perspectives on the contribution of animals to human development. The question of how these described experiences correlate with broad international perspectives on the contribution of animals to human development comprised the hermeneutic of the study. Here it was found that the experiences of these South African individuals were generally in keeping with the trends found in the literature. Participants attributed to their childhood relationships with animals a variety of benefits. These benefits occur on a range of levels, from the physical to the cognitive, and the psychosocial. The emotional attachment of the participants to animals with whom they had interacted in childhood correlated with the nature of interspecies relationships as anticipated by the literature. Cultural differences in the conceptualisation of inter-species relationships, between western and traditionally African ideologies, appeared to influence the moral and ethical positions assumed by the participants, while the subjective nature of the described attachment between participants and animals remains qualitatively similar across cultures, when explored in relation to international research. The similarities between the experiences of the participants and international research findings lend credence to Wilson’s hypothesis that all human beings are potentially able to connect in deep and profound ways with their natural environment, and that this connection contributes to the development of social and cognitive skills, as well as constituting emotional support and stability. The research concludes with an examination of its own limitations and suggestions are made for further research.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Rump, Samantha
- Date: 2008
- Subjects: Child psychology -- South Africa , Child development -- South Africa , Human-animal relationships -- South Africa , Children and animals -- South Africa , Animal psychology -- South Africa , Hermeneutics , Phenomenology
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:3045 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002554
- Description: The aims of this research were to describe in rich phenomenological detail the recollected childhood experiences described by three South African adults of growing up with animals in the context of a traditionally African cultural perspective in South Africa; as well as to document the emotional, physical and social effects of inter-species relationships as described by these participants, in order to explore and situate these experiences in relation to broad international perspectives on the contribution of animals to human development. The question of how these described experiences correlate with broad international perspectives on the contribution of animals to human development comprised the hermeneutic of the study. Here it was found that the experiences of these South African individuals were generally in keeping with the trends found in the literature. Participants attributed to their childhood relationships with animals a variety of benefits. These benefits occur on a range of levels, from the physical to the cognitive, and the psychosocial. The emotional attachment of the participants to animals with whom they had interacted in childhood correlated with the nature of interspecies relationships as anticipated by the literature. Cultural differences in the conceptualisation of inter-species relationships, between western and traditionally African ideologies, appeared to influence the moral and ethical positions assumed by the participants, while the subjective nature of the described attachment between participants and animals remains qualitatively similar across cultures, when explored in relation to international research. The similarities between the experiences of the participants and international research findings lend credence to Wilson’s hypothesis that all human beings are potentially able to connect in deep and profound ways with their natural environment, and that this connection contributes to the development of social and cognitive skills, as well as constituting emotional support and stability. The research concludes with an examination of its own limitations and suggestions are made for further research.
- Full Text:
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