James Cresswell
Biographic Data
| ID | 658062 |
|---|---|
| NAME | James Cresswell |
| GIVEN NAMES | James |
| FAMILY NAME | Cresswell |
| SIGNATURE | CRESSWELL J |
| AFFILIATIONS | Booth University College |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-3757-808X |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 32 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 22 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 32 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1929 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Do you do hymenoplasty? Doctors’ ethical, cultural and social dilemmas when faced with this question
Hymenoplasty is a procedure to surgically restore the hymen, a thin membrane that partially closes the entrance to the vagina and which may be ruptured due to sexual activity. It is requested by women whose culture demands they prove their virginity by bleeding on their wedding night. As a result, this surgery is filled with ethical and legal controversy surrounding virginity, sexual equality, and women's rights to bodily autonomy and self-determ…
Psychosocial Explanations of Spiritual Experiences
One of the challenges of studying religious experiences is that believers may feel that their first-person accounts are potentially profaned when subjected to psychological or anthropological analy
Does Anthropogenic Influence on Habitats Alter the Activity Budget and Home Range Size of Toque Macaques (Macaca sinica)? Insight into the Human-Macaque Conflict
While classified as endemic and endangered, the Toque Macaque (Macaca sinica) is also considered a nuisance species in certain habitats in Sri Lanka due to its increased interactions with humans and crop raiding. This study analyzed the activity budget and home range utilization of two M. sinica troops inhabiting two contrasting landscapes to shed light on the species' rather poorly understood behavioral responses under environments of differing …
On the problem of generalization in cultural psychology
A recent special issue of Culture & Psychology focused on dialogic research and the problem of generalizing research from one context to another. A challenge is that the special issue bypassed a crucial discussion of aesthetics, which is a core feature of dialogical research that is important in the discussion about generalization. Using a dialogical approach influenced by Bakhtin, we discuss aesthetics and how it inspires dialogic research. Two …
Realism and symbolic systems in the practice of scientific psychology
Arocha offers a compelling take on the shortfalls associated with the predominant use of inferential statistics in behavioural research. We will show how the author draws upon an idealized view of the mature sciences. Rather than chasing subject-independent reality, we propose that a more fruitful approach to studying behavior lies in considering the reality of sociocommunally constituted human experience. Recognizing the interindividual, symboli…
When do arts-based methodologies work
This paper discusses the joint-knowledge production that emerged through a community-based research project conducted in partnership with a social service organization. Specifically, we present an unanticipated metaphor (‘Canada is clean’) that became evident through utilizing an art-based methodology. The methodology had five participants assemble photo-diaries over the span of two weeks. Participants took (unedited) photographs of themselves an…
Experiencing visions of Canadian church workers
To better understand the preferred role of faith‐based organizations in secular society, the Canadian Council of Churches partnered with researchers to explore current systems of poverty reduction. The nature of the systems involved in attending to the underlying collective subjectivities (i.e., group/communally‐shaped psychological experiences such as shared motivations, values, and aspirations) often being overlooked was justification for the i…
A Divine Voice, or the Psychology of Faith
In this engaging and highly readable book, Jungian analyst Michael Gellert takes the reader on a guided tour of God’s “inner journey,” as manifest in the principal texts of the three Abrahamic trad
Theories as modern myths
Mills discusses the notion of myth and links it to a discussion of theory. While he does not consider myth and theory to be synonymous, I attempt to close the gap between these two notions even further. This argument is accomplished by discussing theorists that have theorized about theory and aligning their claims with Mills’ claims about myth. I propose that Mills cannot rely on coherence to substantiate good myth/theory and, instead, suggest th…
Pragmatism and the conduct of everyday life
Schraube and Højholt’s edited Psychology and the conduct of everyday life asserts that the conduct of everyday includes research from several authors who all explore the primacy of researching human actions in the contradictory and intersubjective contexts of everyday human life. In this review essay, we discuss the degree to which this work expresses another form of pragmatism as conceived by Rorty . This discussion involves three themes: hostil…
Ideal football culture
This paper discusses cultural psychology and psychological training in football (soccer). Self‐Determination Theory (SDT; Deci & Ryan, 1980) has shown to be pragmatically successful in sport and suggests that being regulated by autonomous forms of motivation leads to better psychological outcomes. Cultural psychologists would be tempted to dismiss SDT because it is predicated on an a‐cultural approach to mind. It is possible to nurture a stronger…
Bakhtin’s chronotope, connotations, and discursive psychology
In this article, we draw on the Bakhtinian concept of chronotope to make the theoretical argument that the turn to embodiment can be supplemented through a consideration of connotation in discursive psychology. We use Billig’s conception of linguistic repression as a test case as to how connotation can supplement discursive analysis, but we use our own interview material to do so. From establishing the case that connotation, understood through th…
Struggles vs Symptoms
An individual-deficit model of diagnosis for mental health asserts that the symptoms of mental illness are the result of personal limitations.1 Such a medical-model defines mental illness in terms
Discussing moral goods and confronting research fetish
We review Valery Chirkov’s “Fundamentals of research on culture and psychology: Theory and methods.” The book is written as a textbook, but clearly takes a position that work in culture and psychology should be “problem-oriented, realist, and case-based” (p. 299). It is an innovative piece that covers philosophical paradigms, planning research, and conducting research. Our review outlines main claims made by the book that are likely provocative t…
Primed analytic thought and religiosity
Cognition, Culture and Religion
The present paper is both a critical analysis of the reductive problems inherent in an evolutionary approach that surfaces in the Cognitive Science of Religion (CSR) and an appeal for an enactive turn that can enhance CSR by better accounting for religious experience – i.e. the phenomenologically experienced realities that are entailed in religious belief. First, we discuss CSR and a basic evolutionary presupposition: that religious experience is…
Psychologists finding religious belief
Cognitive science of religion holds that religious belief emerges via universal pre-given cognitive mechanisms. This position is at odds with cultural psychology, which treats culture and cognition as inseparable, pointing out that phenomena like religious cognition cannot be understood without consideration of the culturally constituted realities people live. We seek to enhance cognitive science of religion with cultural psychology and articulat…
Experience and socio-cultural psychodynamics
Larrain and Haye propose that inner speech is a socially constituted phenomenon. I suggest they provide new directions for understanding inner speech but do not take the reader much beyond discursive psychology. In particular, the authors partially fall into the neglect of embodied experience (i.e., phenomenologically immediate experience) that is already a pitfall of discursive approaches. This commentary attempts to extend some of the ideas alr…
Embodying discourse analysis
Responding to critiques of ‘Including social discourses and experience in research on refugees, race, and ethnicity’, and providing suggestions for future work in discursive psychology, this article expands upon the complex and dynamic character of research in socioculturally informed social science. Through a better understanding of experience and an awareness of broader social discourse, one is able to consider verisimilar ontologies, which are…
Including social discourses and experience in research on refugees, race, and ethnicity
In Discourse & Society, there has been discussion of accounting practices involving refugees, racism, and ethnicity. Some of these articles note that discursive psychology’s emphasis on in-situ constructions leads to a situation where it does not allow us to fully grasp social discourses. This article addresses this critique by discussing conversation analysis and ethnomethodology. It then adds to this discussion by proposing that linguistically …
Bakhtin’s realism and embodiment
How can we understand socially constituted selfhood? H. Hermans has addressed this question with the notion of the Dialogical Self that he draws from the philosopher Mikhail Bakhtin. We focus on Bakhtin’s discussion of realism in relation to how he has been interpreted by Hermans. This notion of realism (which we coined ‘‘expressive realism’’) highlights how sociality is inseparably related to embodied experience, thus making way for a sociocultu…
Being faithful
Postmodern critique has found its way into the psychology of self largely by way of Gergen’s form of social constructionism. This view treats self as socially constructed and changeable, such that a notion like faithfulness to oneself, which is generally thought to belong in the domain of a true core self, is rendered futile. However, Mikhail Bakhtin offers a view of embodied and lived self that expands social constructionist work. It offers a wa…
Out of our heads
Towards a post-critical praxis
Tractatus de divisione multiplici potentiarum animae . Jean de la Rochelle
Towards a post-critical praxis
Including social discourses and experience in research on refugees, race, and ethnicity
In Discourse & Society, there has been discussion of accounting practices involving refugees, racism, and ethnicity. Some of these articles note that discursive psychology’s emphasis on in-situ constructions leads to a situation where it does not allow us to fully grasp social discourses. This article addresses this critique by discussing conversation analysis and ethnomethodology. It then adds to this discussion by proposing that linguistically …
Bakhtin’s chronotope, connotations, and discursive psychology
In this article, we draw on the Bakhtinian concept of chronotope to make the theoretical argument that the turn to embodiment can be supplemented through a consideration of connotation in discursive psychology. We use Billig’s conception of linguistic repression as a test case as to how connotation can supplement discursive analysis, but we use our own interview material to do so. From establishing the case that connotation, understood through th…
Theories as modern myths
Mills discusses the notion of myth and links it to a discussion of theory. While he does not consider myth and theory to be synonymous, I attempt to close the gap between these two notions even further. This argument is accomplished by discussing theorists that have theorized about theory and aligning their claims with Mills’ claims about myth. I propose that Mills cannot rely on coherence to substantiate good myth/theory and, instead, suggest th…
Embodying discourse analysis
Responding to critiques of ‘Including social discourses and experience in research on refugees, race, and ethnicity’, and providing suggestions for future work in discursive psychology, this article expands upon the complex and dynamic character of research in socioculturally informed social science. Through a better understanding of experience and an awareness of broader social discourse, one is able to consider verisimilar ontologies, which are…
Experiencing visions of Canadian church workers
To better understand the preferred role of faith‐based organizations in secular society, the Canadian Council of Churches partnered with researchers to explore current systems of poverty reduction. The nature of the systems involved in attending to the underlying collective subjectivities (i.e., group/communally‐shaped psychological experiences such as shared motivations, values, and aspirations) often being overlooked was justification for the i…
Theistic Monism
Normative Psychology of Religion
Die Geschichte der Christlichen Philosophie
The Spirit of Mediaeval Philosophy
In this translation of Etienne Gilson's well known work L'esprit de la philosophie medievale, he undertakes the task of defining the spirit of mediaeval philosophy. Gilson asks whether we can form the concept of a Christian philosophy and, second, whether mediaeval philosophy is not precisely its most adequate historical expression. He maintains that the spirit of mediaeval philosophy is the spirit of Christianity penetrating the Greek tradition,…
Essays in Thomism
The Maritain Volume of the Thomist
Duns Scotus
Tractatus de divisione multiplici potentiarum animae . Jean de la Rochelle
Towards a post-critical praxis
Bakhtin’s realism and embodiment
How can we understand socially constituted selfhood? H. Hermans has addressed this question with the notion of the Dialogical Self that he draws from the philosopher Mikhail Bakhtin. We focus on Bakhtin’s discussion of realism in relation to how he has been interpreted by Hermans. This notion of realism (which we coined ‘‘expressive realism’’) highlights how sociality is inseparably related to embodied experience, thus making way for a sociocultu…
Being faithful
Postmodern critique has found its way into the psychology of self largely by way of Gergen’s form of social constructionism. This view treats self as socially constructed and changeable, such that a notion like faithfulness to oneself, which is generally thought to belong in the domain of a true core self, is rendered futile. However, Mikhail Bakhtin offers a view of embodied and lived self that expands social constructionist work. It offers a wa…
Out of our heads
Embodying discourse analysis
Responding to critiques of ‘Including social discourses and experience in research on refugees, race, and ethnicity’, and providing suggestions for future work in discursive psychology, this article expands upon the complex and dynamic character of research in socioculturally informed social science. Through a better understanding of experience and an awareness of broader social discourse, one is able to consider verisimilar ontologies, which are…
Including social discourses and experience in research on refugees, race, and ethnicity
In Discourse & Society, there has been discussion of accounting practices involving refugees, racism, and ethnicity. Some of these articles note that discursive psychology’s emphasis on in-situ constructions leads to a situation where it does not allow us to fully grasp social discourses. This article addresses this critique by discussing conversation analysis and ethnomethodology. It then adds to this discussion by proposing that linguistically …
Experience and socio-cultural psychodynamics
Larrain and Haye propose that inner speech is a socially constituted phenomenon. I suggest they provide new directions for understanding inner speech but do not take the reader much beyond discursive psychology. In particular, the authors partially fall into the neglect of embodied experience (i.e., phenomenologically immediate experience) that is already a pitfall of discursive approaches. This commentary attempts to extend some of the ideas alr…
Primed analytic thought and religiosity
Cognition, Culture and Religion
The present paper is both a critical analysis of the reductive problems inherent in an evolutionary approach that surfaces in the Cognitive Science of Religion (CSR) and an appeal for an enactive turn that can enhance CSR by better accounting for religious experience – i.e. the phenomenologically experienced realities that are entailed in religious belief. First, we discuss CSR and a basic evolutionary presupposition: that religious experience is…
Psychologists finding religious belief
Cognitive science of religion holds that religious belief emerges via universal pre-given cognitive mechanisms. This position is at odds with cultural psychology, which treats culture and cognition as inseparable, pointing out that phenomena like religious cognition cannot be understood without consideration of the culturally constituted realities people live. We seek to enhance cognitive science of religion with cultural psychology and articulat…
Discussing moral goods and confronting research fetish
We review Valery Chirkov’s “Fundamentals of research on culture and psychology: Theory and methods.” The book is written as a textbook, but clearly takes a position that work in culture and psychology should be “problem-oriented, realist, and case-based” (p. 299). It is an innovative piece that covers philosophical paradigms, planning research, and conducting research. Our review outlines main claims made by the book that are likely provocative t…
Bakhtin’s chronotope, connotations, and discursive psychology
In this article, we draw on the Bakhtinian concept of chronotope to make the theoretical argument that the turn to embodiment can be supplemented through a consideration of connotation in discursive psychology. We use Billig’s conception of linguistic repression as a test case as to how connotation can supplement discursive analysis, but we use our own interview material to do so. From establishing the case that connotation, understood through th…
Struggles vs Symptoms
An individual-deficit model of diagnosis for mental health asserts that the symptoms of mental illness are the result of personal limitations.1 Such a medical-model defines mental illness in terms
Pragmatism and the conduct of everyday life
Schraube and Højholt’s edited Psychology and the conduct of everyday life asserts that the conduct of everyday includes research from several authors who all explore the primacy of researching human actions in the contradictory and intersubjective contexts of everyday human life. In this review essay, we discuss the degree to which this work expresses another form of pragmatism as conceived by Rorty . This discussion involves three themes: hostil…
Ideal football culture
This paper discusses cultural psychology and psychological training in football (soccer). Self‐Determination Theory (SDT; Deci & Ryan, 1980) has shown to be pragmatically successful in sport and suggests that being regulated by autonomous forms of motivation leads to better psychological outcomes. Cultural psychologists would be tempted to dismiss SDT because it is predicated on an a‐cultural approach to mind. It is possible to nurture a stronger…
Theories as modern myths
Mills discusses the notion of myth and links it to a discussion of theory. While he does not consider myth and theory to be synonymous, I attempt to close the gap between these two notions even further. This argument is accomplished by discussing theorists that have theorized about theory and aligning their claims with Mills’ claims about myth. I propose that Mills cannot rely on coherence to substantiate good myth/theory and, instead, suggest th…
Realism and symbolic systems in the practice of scientific psychology
Arocha offers a compelling take on the shortfalls associated with the predominant use of inferential statistics in behavioural research. We will show how the author draws upon an idealized view of the mature sciences. Rather than chasing subject-independent reality, we propose that a more fruitful approach to studying behavior lies in considering the reality of sociocommunally constituted human experience. Recognizing the interindividual, symboli…
Epistemology (22 works) · Psychology (22 works) · Philosophy (21 works) · Sociology (21 works) · Social Psychology (13 works) · Social Representations and Identity (11 works) · Computer Science (8 works) · Political science (6 works) · Aesthetics (5 works) · Cognitive science (5 works)