Self and dialogical multiplication

Abstract

Departing from a Lockean illustration in the context of the history of the notion of Self, this article presents a discussion on dialogism as an effort to overcome ethnocentric views of human psychological phenomena. Dialogical approaches in psychology focus tensions between different viewpoints in face of an object of social representation (Marková, 2006). It is assumed that the socio-cultural polyphony is internalized during one’s life trajectory (Hermans, Kempen and van Loon, 1991; Valsiner, 2007b). From a typical dialogical approach, the notion of dialogical multiplication is proposed addressing the creative cultural process in which multiple positions in face of an object is taken into account, but also multiple objects of reference are created under a semiotic construction. Finally, the article focus upon a clinical case formerly reported and analyzed by Ernst Boesch (1991), showing how dialogical multiplication is processed in the setting of psychotherapeutic I-other relationships and within the Self.