Harlene Anderson: Writings

Thoughts from Harlene Anderson, Ph.D.*

Postmodern/social construction Assumptions: Invitations for Collaborative Practices

“How can our “theories” and practices have relevance for the people that we work with?” is an ever-present question for me. I situate my response in a body of intangible assumptions associated with a postmodern/social construction orientation. These assumptions inform a perspective or framework for the way that we think with, talk with, respond with, and create with the people that we meet in our everyday work and lives. Drawing primarily from the works of Bahktin, Gergen, Lyotard, Shotter, and Wittgenstein, I will briefly discuss six interrelated assumptions and the invitations that each presents for our practices. (See Anderson, H. (2008) Collaborative Practices (www.taosinstitute.net) for a more extensive discussion of this topic).

1. Maintaining skepticism. A postmodern/social construction perspective suggests that holding a critical and questioning attitude about knowledge (i.e., established dominant discourses, meta-narratives, universal truths, or rules) as fundamental and definitive is primary. We are born into and live within ingrained institutionalized knowledge traditions that are mostly invisible and taken-for-granted. In turn, we are at risk to blindly buy into and unwittingly reproduce such knowledge traditions that can lead to forms of practice that are out of sync with and alien to our fast changing contemporary societies and their members. This does not suggest that we abandon, or can for that matter, our pre-understandings (i.e., professional knowledge and discourses, psychological theories, a priori criteria, or research data): any and all knowledge can be useful. Nor does it suggest that postmodern/social construction assumptions form an unchallengeable meta-knowledge narrative: inherently, they must be open to the selfcritique. The invitation is to remember that we are prejudiced by our pre-understandings and experiences that are influenced by our knowledge traditions, and yet given this, we must remain humble about our knowing, realize that we can never have complete and coherent understanding of another person, and always be open to learning from and about their uniqueness and the novelty of their life.

2. Avoiding the risks of generalization. Though knowledge such as dominant professional discourses and theoretical truths can be generalized and applied across all peoples, cultures, situations, or problems, the usefulness of such is doubtful. Thinking in terms of such ahead-of-time knowledge (i.e., theoretical scripts, predetermined rules, or given methods) can create categories, types, and classes (i.e., people, problems, solutions) which can inhibit our ability to learn about the uniqueness and novelty of each. We are accustomed to (and sometimes trained to) viewing, wittingly or unwittingly, the people and the events of their lives that we encounter in our practices knowingly and as familiar rather than not-knowingly and as exceptional. Knowing and familiarity tempt us to proceed based on our gap-filling knowledge which in turn can risk depersonalizing the other, preventing us from learning about their specialness, and being out of sync with their timing, and thus limiting their and our possibilities. Instead, learn about the distinctiveness of the other and their life directly from them and see the familiar in an unfamiliar or fresh way. The invitation is to listen, hear, and respond with the other in such a way that what we bring to the encounter does not close us to their meanings, descriptions, and understandings of their lived experiences, but rather engages us in dialogue with them.

3. Knowledge as an interactive social process. Embedded as it is in culture, history, and language, knowledge (i.e., theories, ideas, truths, beliefs, or how to) is produced within and through social discourse. The construction of knowledge is an interactive interpretive process in which all parties contribute to its creation, fluidity, sustainability, and change; therefore, it is not fundamental, definitive, fixed nor discovered. So, we cannot instill knowledge upon another; it cannot literally be transmitted from the head of one person to another. It occurs, so to speak, in the metaphorical space between us. The invitation is to act as a catalyst for a conversational partnership: a space, a relationship, and a process in which each person participates in dialogical construction of newness and has a sense of ownership of it.

4. Privileging local knowledge. Local or home-grown knowledge (i.e., expertise, truths, values, conventions, narratives, etc.) created within a community of persons (i.e., family, organization, classroom, etc) who have firsthand knowledge and experience of themselves and their situation is important. Knowledge formulated within a community is the product of relational expertise and will be more relevant, pragmatic, and sustainable for that community. This does not suggest consensus or agreement. Such indigenous knowledge, of course, always develops against the background of dominant discourses, meta-narratives, and universal truths and is influenced and will continue to be influenced by these conditions. The invitation is to ensure that each member of the community has the opportunity to participate as an equitable contributor to the conversation, including the design of the designated activity and its outcome.

5. Language as a creative social process. Language in its broadest sense (i.e., any means by which we try to communicate, articulate, or express verbally or otherwise with ourselves and with others) is the medium through which we create knowledge. Language, like knowledge, is dynamic and creative; words, for instance, are not meaning-reflectors but rather gain their meaning as we use them and in the way we use them. In addition, the meanings that the interlocutors bring with them to an encounter, will influence and be influenced by a number of other things such as the context in which they are used, the intent with which they are used, and how we express ourselves (i. e., our tone, our glances, our sighs, our gestures). Language and words are relational: as Bakhtin (1984) suggests, “No utterance in general can be attributed to the speaker exclusively; it is the product of the interaction of the interlocutors, and broadly speaking, the product of the whole complex social situation in which it has occurred” (p. 30). The invitation is to remember that our clients, as we do, bring their language (i.e., words, descriptions, meaning, beliefs) with them and that it is in the encounter and interaction of our different languages that dialogic transformation is possible.

6. Knowledge and language as transforming. Knowledge and language are relational and generative, and therefore intrinsically transforming: in this kind of “withness” process as Shotter calls it, transformation— whether in the form of a shift, modification, difference, movement, clarity, etc—occurs. Each person, as well as their utterances and responses, is partly constructed and reconstructed by the other and the other is likewise. That is, when engaged in the use of language and in the creation of knowledge we are involved in a living activity (i.e., dialogue with oneself or another) and cannot remain uninfluenced or unchanged and cannot fully determine or predict the outcome of the relationship and the dialogue. The invitation is remember that we are not change agents but rather engaged with others in mutually transformational relationships and conversations. These assumptions simply offer a different language or set of assumptions from which to experience, describe, and perform our daily lives with each other which give us more options and agency for, as Wittgenstein suggests, ways to “go on.” Important for practitioners, they present an alternative to formulaic, recipe-like institutionalized practices, a dialogical alternative that is more collaborative and therefore more relevant to our clients’ lives and desires and filled with potential possibilities. They do not suggest an oppositional perspective, nor do they suggest an abandonment of our knowledge and language conventions and inherited discourses. Nor do they suggest a meta-(or better)-narrative since self-critique is inherent.

Tips for Collaboration

• Make room for and give the client the choice to tell his/her story in his/her own manner and pace;
• Be genuinely interested in and curious about the client’s story; • Listen attentively, carefully, and sincerely;

• Respond (i.e. comment, ask questions) with coherence to learn more about what the client is saying rather than what the practitioner thinks the client should be saying;
• Hear to try to understand the client’s situation from his/her perspective or sense-making map rather than from the practitioners; • Notice how the other person responds before continuing;
• Pay attention to the clients words and do not make assumptions about their non-words;
• Check-out through comments, questions, and alternative words if you have heard what the other wants you to hear rather than silently interpreting, and misinterpreting, them;
• Pause and allow silences for listening, hearing, and reflecting spaces; and
• Allow each person to choose to respond to what peaks his/her interest and in their own way.

*Appeared in the Taos Institute Newsletter, January 2009