 |
 |
Hello all. Thanks Mark for sending this out again, and encouraging us all to get involved in some discussion. I was at the Birmingham meeting and, for me, it felt like a good start to a process of developing some kind of action together as a network. I thought the day felt really productive, and in particular, it seemed that we were able to bring together different perspectives and ideas, and to have a respectful and constructive set of conversations about these big questions. I am still a little uncertain about how much this kind of activity is percieved as worthwhile by people who didn't attend the Birmingham meeting, and even maybe by some of us who did. I am not 100% certain that the approach we have taken is the best way of working collectively towards change. But I don't have any better suggestions for now, and this seems better than doing nothing. At least talking about it seems like a good starting point, and I would welcome some engagement in thinking together about what we're doing, and other alternatives, as well as the content. At Birmingham, one of the things we discussed - when we were working in small groups - was the range of factors that influence us as psychologists, in relation to whether and how to undertake more collective and political action. Amongst the ideas that we discussed was the notion of objectivity (as it pertains to 'science') that is so embedded in much of our training. We talked about the more recent development of a critical perspective on this stance, particularly within qualitative research and clinical psychology. Within these branches of psychology (and many others, no doubt), there is an increasing emphasis on reflexivity and recognition of (what I would consider to be) the inevitable subjectivity that we bring to our work. I wonder whether this long-held emphasis on objectivity and the traditional de-contextualisation of psychological knowledge is one of the things that can generate feelings of uncertainty around taking a wider, more political stance, and taking action in relation to it. We also talked in Birmingham about the way that psychologists may feel less powerful than they are percieved to be by some (but not all) non-psychologists. I think some of us also sometimes feel like we don't know what to do, beyond the narrow range of what we've been trained to do. I would connect this in some way to the emphasis on the scientific method that has held sway for many years within psychology - which seems to function as a means of legitimating and asserting the power of what we (think we) know. Without that, do we know what we have to offer? And without the objective science, is what we have to offer considered relevant to anyone else? Particularly - is it considered to be relevant to those who we percieve to be more powerful than ourselves? So, if the objective stance of the scientist has been used for a long time to (try to) legitimate our positions, is it not very difficult to do something that seems contradictory with this position? Or maybe there are lots of other reasons why it may be difficult to get some discussion going on the list? It's hard to know... Maybe it's also the lack of time in our every-day work to dedicate to thinking about it, and doing something different. Even if this discussion doesn't get going on the list, hopefully the conference at York will give us the necessary space away from the every-day pressures of work, and enable us to take this up again. Wendy -----Original Message----- From: The UK Community Psychology Discussion List [mailto:]On Behalf Of Mark Burton Sent: 19 July 2007 18:12 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: [COMMUNITYPSYCHUK] Does community psychology have any relevance to the big questions of war, imperialism and dispossession, climate change? Does it have any thing to say about the pressing problems of society in this country for that matter? Or is it a limited set of practices that do little more than distract us from real and pressing action priorities? The attached document tries to explore some of this. it is the result of a UK community psychology network event held in Birmingham earlier this year, organised by Carl Harris. The document says something about how the workshop was conducted and presents the results form the group discussions. It also presents as an Appendix the paper that the group used as background. As Carl put it in his original email to the list: We are now handing this information over to the list as a whole, so that the statements can be used by list members (eg in communications with individuals and organisations, such as MPs, the BPS and the media). After the original version was circulated to the list there was little discussion, and as we had tried to be provocative this surprised us. the group has agreed to resubmit the document with, we hope, a clearer signpost to what it is about. Some members of the group will be conducting a workshop on this theme at the September CP fiesta in York - this and any further discussion will act as background material for the event. We are very aware that the papers presented in the document are best seen as work in progress - so constructive commentary and and comradely criticism is most welcome!! From Mark Burton Manchester UK <http://www.compsy.org.uk/> www.compsy.org.uk ___________________________________ COMMUNITYPSYCHUK - The discussion list for community psychology in the UK. To unsubscribe or to change your details visit the website: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/COMMUNITYPSYCHUK.HTML For any problems or queries, contact the list moderator Rebekah Pratt on [log in to unmask] or Grant Jeffrey on [log in to unmask]