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A History of “Relevance” in PsychologyTheorizing “Relevance”

A History of “Relevance” in Psychology: Theorizing “Relevance” [In psychology, it is usually the case that “relevance” functions as an adjective, with disciplinary trends either lauded as “relevant” or dismissed as “irrelevant.” The adjectival form of “relevance,” however, obscures a historical significance that can only be enabled through a focus on its nominal usage. With this alternative focus, “relevance” becomes transformed into a concept that, like any other, is the bearer of its own history. To be sure, Chapter 2 represented an attempt at a conceptual analysis of “relevance”—its primary observation was that calls for “relevance” and conditions of social upheaval have tended to coincide—although the chapter revealed more about the world in which psychology is situated than it did about the discipline itself. Accordingly, in this chapter, I present a series of theoretical perspectives in order to demonstrate how the durability of debates about psychology’s “relevance” depends as much on rapid social change as it does on the historical character of the discipline and the discursive quality of “relevance.”] http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png

A History of “Relevance” in PsychologyTheorizing “Relevance”

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Publisher
Palgrave Macmillan UK
Copyright
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2016. The author(s) has/have asserted their right(s) to be identified as the author(s) of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
ISBN
978-1-137-47488-9
Pages
49 –67
DOI
10.1057/978-1-137-47489-6_3
Publisher site
See Chapter on Publisher Site

Abstract

[In psychology, it is usually the case that “relevance” functions as an adjective, with disciplinary trends either lauded as “relevant” or dismissed as “irrelevant.” The adjectival form of “relevance,” however, obscures a historical significance that can only be enabled through a focus on its nominal usage. With this alternative focus, “relevance” becomes transformed into a concept that, like any other, is the bearer of its own history. To be sure, Chapter 2 represented an attempt at a conceptual analysis of “relevance”—its primary observation was that calls for “relevance” and conditions of social upheaval have tended to coincide—although the chapter revealed more about the world in which psychology is situated than it did about the discipline itself. Accordingly, in this chapter, I present a series of theoretical perspectives in order to demonstrate how the durability of debates about psychology’s “relevance” depends as much on rapid social change as it does on the historical character of the discipline and the discursive quality of “relevance.”]

Published: Jun 24, 2016

Keywords: Discursive Practice; Critical Realism; Original Emphasis; Social Relevance; Discourse Practice

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