Abstract

Reviews the book, The mind's we: Contextualism in cognitive psychology by Diane Gillespie . In this text the author has both expanded on several of the key insights previously outlined in the critical literature and provided a congenial introductory text for the newcomer; a text to serve as a conceptual bridge between traditional cognitive psychological approaches and their newly emergent contextualist alternatives. As stated in her preface, Gillespie's purpose in preparing this book was to "bring together the work of psychologists who are interested in telling the contextualist story of cognition" and to "reveal and strengthen their insights and perspectives" . Given the philosophical range and theoretical diversity of those interested in telling such a story, the task is certainly a formidable one, but it is nonetheless one that she accomplishes with a commendable degree of elegance. Gillespie clearly articulates the diverse work of a large number of psychological theorists into a coherent and meaningful account that will do much toward imposing order on a field that is, by its very nature, somewhat scattered and contentious. Each of the book's six chapters proceeds carefully through a detailed and representative historical and conceptual analysis of traditional mechanistic approaches to human cognition prior to advancing their contextualist critiques and alternatives. Through a systematic analysis of the manner in which this "contextualist story" has arisen within the mechanistic milieu of traditional scientific psychology, she is able to clarify both the implications and relative merits and liabilities of two, quite often antithetical, conceptualizations of human cognitive phenomena. 2012 APA, all rights reserved)