Abstract
This chapter addresses the issue of stability and change of personality, self and identity through the prism of narrative theorization. The chapter begins by sketching the context of discussion of the issues of personality stability and change in academic psychology. It then outlines a range of positions in literary studies on the issue of narrative continuity. Narrative, change and self are thus positioned as connected by a matrix of functional links that create a range of possibilities in thinking through the issue of change. The chapter then demonstrates how some of these possibilities are realized in McAdams’s model of identity as a life story, Hermans’s dialogical self theory, and White and Epston’s narrative therapy.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
Vladimir Propp published Morphology of the Folktale, in which he analyzed the underlying structure of Russian folktales and developed a classification of plots, in Russian in 1928. However, it was not translated into English and French until 1958, and only its second edition in 1968 attracted attention beyond the fields of literary theory.
- 2.
For methodological implications of Vygotsky’s view on development see J. Valsiner, ‘Development, Methodology, and Recurrence of Unsolved Problems: On the Modernity of ‘Old’ Ideas’, Swiss Journal of Psychology, vol. 55 no. 2–3, 1996, pp. 119–125.
References
Bakhtin, M.M. 1973. Problems of Dostoevsky’s Poetics. 2nd edn. Trans. R.W. Rotsel. Ann Arbor, MI: Ardis.
Bakhtin, M.M. 1981. The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays, ed. M. Holquist. Trans. C. Emmerson and M. Holquist. Austin: University of Texas Press.
Bamberg, M. 2004. Considering Counter Narratives: Narrating, Resisting, Making Sense. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Bamberg, M. 2010. Who am I? Narration and its Contribution to Self and Identity. Theory & Psychology 21(1): 1–22.
Barthes, R. 1997. Roland Barthes. Trans. R. Howard. New York.: Hill and Wang.
Bengston, V.L., M.N. Reedy, and C. Gordon. 1985. Aging and Self-conceptions: Personality Process and Social Contexts. In Handbook of the Psychology of Aging, 2nd ed, ed. J.E. Birren and K.W. Schaie, 544–593. New York: Van Nostr and Reinhold.
Brooks, P. 1992. Reading for the Plot, Design and Intention in Narrative. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Bordwell, D. 1997. Narration in the fiction film. New York: Routledge.
Bruner, E. 1986b. Ethnography as Narrative. In The Anthropology of Experience, ed. V. Turner and E. Bruner, 139–155. Chicago: University of Illinois Press.
Bruner, J.S. 1986c. Actual Minds, Possible Worlds. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Bruner, J.S. 1990. Acts of Meaning. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Bruner, J., and R.W. Rieber. 2004. Introduction to Section I. In The Essential Vygotsky, ed. R.W. Rieber, D.K. Robinson, et al. New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers.
Costa Jr., P.T., and R.R. McCrae. 1989. Personality Continuity and the Changes of Adult Life. In The Adult Years: Continuity and Change, ed. M. Storandt and G. Vanden Bos, 41–78. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Costa Jr., P.T., and R.R. McCrae. 1994. Set Like Plaster? Evidence for the Stability of Adult Personality. In Can Personality Change? ed. T.F. Heatherton and J.L. Weinberger, 21–41. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Erikson, E.H. 1963. Childhood and Society, 2nd ed. New York: Norton.
Erikson, E.H. 1982. The Life Cycle Completed: A review. New York: Norton.
Freud, S. 1933. New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis. New York: Norton.
Georgakopoulou, A. 2006. “Thinking Big with Small Stories in Narrative and Identity Analysis.” In Narrative – State of the Art. Special issue of Narrative Inquiry, edited by Bamberg, M., Vol 16, no. 1 (pp. 122–130).
Gibson, J., and S.D. Brown. 1992. Counselling Adults for Life Transitions. In Handbook of Counselling Psychology, ed. S.D. Brown and R.W. Lent, 285–313. New York: John Willey & Sons.
Gregg, G.S. 2007. The Raw and the Bland: A Structural Model of Narrative Identity. In Identity and Story: Creating Self in Narrative, ed. D.P. McAdams, R. Josselson, and A. Lieblich, 63–89. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Habermas, T., and S. Bluck. 2000. Getting a Life: The Emergence of the Life Story in Adolescence. Psychological Bulletin 126: 748–769.
Heatherton, T.F., and J.L. Weinberger (eds.). 1994. Personality Change? Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Hermans, H.J.M., and A. Hermans-Konopka. 2010. Dialogical Self Theory: Positioning and Counter-Positioning in a Globalizing Society. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hermans, H.J.M., and H. Kempen. 1993. The Dialogical Self: Meaning as Movement. San Diego: Academic Press, Inc.
Hermans, H.J.M., T.I. Rijks, and H.J.G. Kempen. 1993. Imaginal Dialogues in the Self: Theory and Method. Journal of Personality 61: 207–236.
Holquist, M. 1990. Dialogism: Bakhtin and His World. London: Routledge.
Jameson, F. 2005. Archaeologies of the future. London: Verso.
McAdams, D.P. 1985. Power, Intimacy, and the Life Story: Personological Inquiries into Identity. New York: Guilford Press.
McAdams, D.P. 1994. Can Personality Change? Levels of Stability and Change Across the Life Span. In Can Personality Change? ed. T.F. Heatherton and J.L. Weinberger, 299–314. Washington: American Psychological Association.
McAdams, D.P. 2006. The Redemptive Self. Oxford, NY: Oxford University Press.
McAdams, D.P. 2013. The Psychological Self as Actor, Agent, and Author. Perspectives on Psychological Science 3: 272–295.
McAdams, D.P. 2015. The Art and Science of Personality Development. New York: Guilford Press.
McLean, K.C., M. Pasupathi, and J.L. Pals. 2007. Selves Creating Stories Creating Selves: A Process Model of Self-development. Personality and Social Psychology Review 11(3): 262–278.
Miller, W.R., and J. C’de Baca. 1994. Quantum Change: Towards a Psychology of Transformation. In Can personality change? ed. T.F. Heatherton and J.L. Weinberger, 253–281. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Morson, G.S. 1994. Narrative and Freedom: The Shadows of Time. New Haven/London: Yale University Press.
Raggat, P.T.F. 2006. Multiplicity and Conflict in the Dialogical Self: A Life Narrative Approach. In Identity and Story: Creating Self in Narrative, ed. D.P. McAdams, R. Josselson, and A. Lieblich, 15–37. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Ricœur, P. 1984–1988. Time and Narrative, Vol.1–3. Trans. K. McLaughlin and D. Pellauer. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Rogers, C.R., and R.F. Dymond. 1954. Psychotherapy and Personality Change: Coordinated Studies in the Client-centred Approach. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Roof, J. 1996. Come as you are: Sexuality and narrative. New York: Columbia University Press.
Schaefer, J., and R. Moos. 1992. Life Crises and Personal Growth. In Personal Coping: Theory, Research, and Application, ed. B. Carpenter, 149–170. Westport, CT: Praeger.
Smith, B.H. 1980. Narrative version, narrative theories. Critical Inquiry 7: 209–218.
Stewart, J. 1982. The Course of Individual Adaptation to Life Changes. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 42: 1100–1113.
Taylor, S.E. 1983. Adjustment to Threatening Events: A Theory of Cognitive Adaptation. American Psychologist 38(1983): 1161–1173.
Tedeschi, R.G., and L.G. Calhoun. 1995. Trauma and Transformation: Growing in the Aftermath of Suffering. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Vaillant, G.E. 1977. Adaptation to Life. Boston: Little Brown.
Vygotsky, L.S. 1986. Thought and Language. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Vygotsky, L.S. 2004. The Essential Vygotsky, edited by R.W. Rieber, D.K. Robinson et al. New York: Kluwer Academic.
Wertsch, J.V. 1985. Vygotsky and the Social Formation of Mind. Harvard: Harvard University Press.
White, M. 2007. Maps of Narrative Practice. New York/London: W.W. Norton & Co.
White, M., and D. Epston. 1990. Narrative Means to Therapeutic Ends. New York/London: W.W. Norton & Co.
Žižek, S. 2006. The Parallax View. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2016 The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Vassilieva, J. (2016). Narrative Subject: Between Continuity and Transformation. In: Narrative Psychology. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-49195-4_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-49195-4_4
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-137-49194-7
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-49195-4
eBook Packages: Behavioral Science and PsychologyBehavioral Science and Psychology (R0)