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(2010) The emergence of somatic psychology and bodymind therapy, Dordrecht, Springer.
The impetus for the contemporary emergence of somatic psychology and bodymind therapy does not come only from within the field of psychology. Rather, there are several entwined developments in twentieth century philosophy and cultural studies that have contributed strongly to this momentum and that contextualize its advance. One critical scheme by which to consider these developments is as follows. Every endeavor of human inquiry has a subject matter, a method for studying that subject matter, and an ethical-political context of forces that create an interest in the subject matter and method to be pursued. The notion of "interests" that animate any pursuit of knowledge has been advanced by Jürgen Habermas (1972), and constitutes this ideological dimension of any investigation (cf., Teo, 2005). The utility of this scheme is that it enables us to examine how subject matters and methods are selected and defined, and how ideological forces impact these processes of selection and definition, in relation to twentieth century philosophy and cultural studies, this chapter will briefly review how a hundred years of deliberation has set the stage for a (re)turn to the experience of embodiment as the essential starting-point and the necessary center of any scientific study of the human psyche.
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Barratt, B. B. (2010). Philosophical and cultural studies, in The emergence of somatic psychology and bodymind therapy, Dordrecht, Springer, pp. 88-96.
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