Dialogue, critical consciousness, and praxis

Abstract

Social psychological analyses of communication inevitably encounter the debate between those social theorists convinced of the possibility of genuine communicative exchange, and those who doubt that effective and properly equal forms of communicative exchange are practically achievable at all. However, what is often overlooked in this debate is the role of interaction between self and other in the development of persons in the first place: The psychology of self-other relations shows that while communication between self and other is indeed a difficult process, fraught with contradictory and destructive energies, it also contains a positivity without which there would be no person at all. (Jovchelovitch, 2007, p. 131) As highlighted in the previous chapter, Vygotsky posits that interactions between self and other are the basis for the development of higher cognitive functions in humans. This chapter will explore the role of self-other interaction in the construction of social worlds, and outline the foundational role of communication between self and other in efforts towards transforming those social worlds (social change).