Possibilities and Limitations of Self-Narration

Paper submissions are invited for the special issue/collection of Topoi entitled: Possibilities and Limitations of Self-Narration. This special issue aims to explore the socio-culturally shaped conditions of self-narrative practices. Furthermore, it seeks to scrutinise the positive or negative impact of self-narration on agents’ wellbeing and mental health.

Special issue article publications often bring higher citations and visibility than regular papers and attract more relevant readership due to its scope. Topoi is indexed in the Web of Science under AHCI, currently in Quartile 1 and placed in the top-10 ranked Philosophy-Category journals, with a 2022 IF of 1,4 and CiteScore of 2,8.

Guest Editors

Regina E. Fabry, Department of Philosophy, Macquarie University, email

Emily Hughes, Department of Philosophy, University of York (UK), email

Most of us frequently engage in self-narrative practices. We create, shape, and revisit narrative configurations of our personal experiences in everyday face-to-face conversations, in various modes of writing, and across a range of other media. For several decades, research in philosophy of mind and cognition has assigned a special role to these various forms of self-narration. Some have argued that the self-referential narrative configuration of one’s remembered or imagined experiences plays an important role for self-understanding and sense-making, especially in situations of experiential disruption and loss. Others have explored the possibility that self-narration can shape how we remember the past, experience the present, and imagine the future. While progress has been made in determining the roles of self-narration for our mental lives, important aspects are ripe for further exploration and scrutiny. These aspects include the various socio-culturally shaped forms and norms of self-narration, as well as the epistemic, affective, social, and cultural possibilities and limitations of self-narration. The Thematic Collection aims to showcase research that systematically investigates self-narrative practices and their beneficial or harmful roles for agents’ mental lives from the perspective of philosophy of mind and cognition, phenomenology, and philosophy of psychiatry. Furthermore, it seeks to integrate philosophical theorising with research in cognitive literary studies, psychology, psychiatry, history, and cognate disciplines.

Possible topics include (but are not limited to):

-The possibilities of self-narration for understanding self and other

-The limitations of self-narration, epistemic, affective, and otherwise

-The influence of socio-culturally shaped norms, expectations, and practices on self-narration

-The development, continuation, and change of self-narrative practices within and across historical time, media, and cultures

-The beneficial or harmful impact of self-narration on wellbeing and mental health

INVITED CONTRIBUTORS:

-Anna Bortolan

-Alexandra Effe

-Francesco Fanti Rovetta

-Shaun Gallagher

-Merril Howie

-Daniel D. Hutto

-Allan Køster

-Karin Kukkonen

-Katsunori Miyahara & Shogo Tanaka

-Doug McConnell

-Richard Menary & Hoda Mostafavi

-Albert Newen & Katja Crone

-Aidan Ryall & Nick Willis

-Glenda Satne

-Marilyn Stendera & Julia Hamilton

-Jon Toke Brestisson & Birgit Ærenlund Bundensen

-Penny Van Bergen

Submission DEADLINE Please submit your paper by 31 March 2025. Should you not be able to meet this deadline, please contact the Guest Editors.

Online SUBMISSION: Please use the journal’s Online Manuscript Submission System Editorial Manager®. Do note that paper submissions via email are not accepted.

Author Submission’s GUIDELINES: Authors are asked to prepare their manuscripts according to the journal’s standard Submission Guidelines.

EDITORIAL PROCESS:

When uploading your paper in Editorial Manager, please select “SI: Self-Narration (Fabry/Hughes)” in the drop-down menu “Article Type”.

Papers should not exceed a maximum of 9000 words.

All papers will undergo the journal’s standard review procedure (double-blind peer-review), according to the journal’s Peer Review Policy, Process and Guidance

Reviewers will be selected according to the Peer-Reviewer Selection policies.

Once papers are accepted, they will be made available as Online first articles publications until final publication into an issue and available on the page Collections.

CONTACT: For any questions, please directly contact the Guest Editor: Regina E. Fabry, regina.fabry@mq.edu.au