This is a book about imaginative work and its relationship with the construction of knowledge. It is fully acknowledged by epistemologists that imagination is not something opposed to rationality; it is not mere fantasy opposed to intellect. In philosophy and cognitive sciences, imagination is generally “delimiting not much more than the mental ability to interact cognitively with things that are not now present via the senses.” For centuries, scholars and poets have wondered where this capability could come from, whether it (...) is inspired by divinity or it is a peculiar feature of human mind. The omnipresence of imaginative work in both every day and highly specialized human activities requires a profoundly radical understanding of this phenomenon. We need to work imaginatively in order to achieve knowledge, thus imagination must be something more than a mere flight of fantasy. Considering different stories in the field of scientific endeavor, I will try to propose the idea that the imaginative process is fundamental higher mental function that concurs in our experiencing, knowing and understanding the world we are part of. This book is thus about a theoretical idea of imagining as constant part of the complex whole we call the human psyche. It is a story of human beings striving not only for knowledge and exploration but also striving for imagining possibilities.​. (shrink)

The article aims at integrating the cultural psychology perspective of into the multidisciplinary field of border studies. It analyses the border phenomenon as a co-genetic system. The authors investigate the psychological side of people who relate to the border out of different motives. Then, it expands some of the theoretical concepts current in border studies by introducing psychological dimensions such as intentionality and directionality. Finally, the framework is applied to two case-studies representing the northern and southern European Union frontiers: the (...) case of Estonian officer Eston Kohver in the Setumaa region on the Estonian–Russian border; and the experiences of border guards in the re-bordering process on the Spanish–Moroccan border. It offers an innovative conceptual resource based on a triadic co-genetic epistemological approach, which allows us to overcome the binary oppositions still very present in the contemporary debates in borders studies. (shrink)

Giambattista Vico (1668-1744) was an Italian philosopher, rhetorician, and historian. As one of the great thinkers of the Enlightenment, he exerted tremendous influence on the social sciences. He was the first to stress cultural and linguistic dimensions in the development of both the human mind and social institutions. Although his ideas on the relationship between mind and culture and his epistemology have inspired the work of many scholars in psychology, his sizeable influence has been scarcely acknowledged. The volume is organized (...) in two sections. The first locates Vico in his historical context and in the landscape of contemporary human and social sciences. The second part presents those of Vico's concepts that seem promising for the development of a new way of looking at psychological phenomena. In the book's conclusion, Luca Tateo gathers the ideas of the volume's contributors to suggest future development of the psychological sciences. This book aims to show how Vico's insights can inspire future research in the psychological sciences. It collects multidisciplinary contributions of leading international scholars that draw upon the thought of this original thinker. Collectively, the contributors remind us of the legacy and continuing influence of this inspiring historical figure. (shrink)

Besides the general agreement about the human capability of reflection, there is a large area of disagreement and debate about the nature and value of “reflective scrutiny” and the role of “second-order states” in everyday life. This problem has been discussed in a vast and heterogeneous literature about topics such as epistemic injustice, epistemic norms, agency, understanding, meta-cognition etc. However, there is not yet any extensive and interdisciplinary work, specifically focused on the topic of the epistemic value of reflection. This (...) volume is one of the first attempts aimed at providing an innovative contribution, an exchange between philosophy, epistemology and psychology about the place and value of reflection in everyday life. -/- Our goal in the next sections is not to offer an exhaustive overview of recent work on epistemic reflection, nor to mimic all of the contributions made by the chapters in this volume. We will try to highlight some topics that have motivated a new resumption of this field and, with that, drawing on chapters from this volume where relevant. -/- Two elements defined the scope and content of this volume, on the one hand, the crucial contribution of Ernest Sosa, whose works provide original and thought-provoking contributions to contemporary epistemology in setting a new direction for old dilemmas about the nature and value of knowledge, giving a central place to reflection. On the other hand, the recent developments of cultural psychology, in the version of the “Aalborg approach”, reconsider the object and scope of psychological sciences, stressing that “[h]uman conduct is purposeful”. (shrink)

In the last decade, a great variety and volume of scholarly work has appeared on mind-wandering, a mental process involving a vast range of human life, connected with “first-person perspective” and “personhood”, submental thinking, mental autonomy, etc. While different and emerging features that flow into and out of one another (second field, mental travel, visual imagery, inner speech, unspecific memory, autobiographical memory, fantasies, introspection, etc.) and negative and positive approaches seem to describe mind-wandering, we offer an interdisciplinary theoretical and empirically (...) informed and informative overview on mind-wandering studies and methodologies oriented toward the educational field. The aim is to transform and enrich the debate on mind-wandering but also to show how theoretical arguments and research findings could inform the teaching-learning context. This groundbreaking book, moves along three representations of developed scientific knowledge: imaginary lines, circles and spirals. The first section, “The Lines”, develops new lines of inquiry on attention (selective and sustained) and mind-wandering, the influence of age and mind-wandering, embodiment, consciousness and experience and mind-wandering. In the second section, the “Circles”, groups of Chapters on the same topic, methodology (tasks and measurement), intervention (auditory beat stimulation and mindfulness practices) and creativity, recreate a dance of interacting parts in which there are always profitable, decisive and retroactive exchanges between the information that each group or author activates. The last section, “The Spirals”, critically discusses the absence of a unified theoretical perspective, in the pedagogical field, attentive both to the processes of emergence and the interactions between parts. (shrink)

What is the place and value of reflection in people’s lives? The answer requires a careful discussion about the relationship between our epistemic performances, our intellectual capabilities and competencies, our affective relationships with the environment, our actions and our interpersonal interactions. It is a fact that for us to navigate and interact with the world and with our society, we sometimes think about our reasons, we give reasons, we change our minds, and even think about our habits and character traits (...) in order to make them virtuous. And it seems that at least most of the times, it is by reflection that we do it. -/- This book brings together the following chapters: “Animal Versus Reflective Orders of Epistemic Competence” by Ernest Sosa; “The Status of Reflection in Virtue Epistemology” by Christopher Kelp; “The Social Value of Reflection” by John Greco; “Disagreement, Intellectual Humility, and Reflection” by Duncan Pritchard; “Philosophical Reflection and Rashness” by Plinio J. Smith; “Between Feeling and Symbolization: Philosophical Paths to Thinking about Oneself” by Robert E. Innis; “Mirrors and Reflexive processes” by Raffaele De Luca Picione; “Bodily origin of self-reflection and its socially extended aspects” by Shogo Tanaka; and “Psychological reflection, thought and imagination as epistemic skills” by Miika Vähämaa. (shrink)

We live in societies emphasizing security and its complementary side of fear. In this work, I analyze the peripheral messages disseminated in the urban environment, whose function is that of regulating human and collective conduct through orienting specific forms of affective meaning-making. According to the perspective of Cultural Psychology of Semiotic Dynamics, affect and cognition work always together. Affect has the primacy in the relationship with the world and on top of affective distinctions we build conceptual distinctions. Thus, I describe (...) a type of semiotic process I have called “atmos-fear,” that works through the production of empty representamen that frames meaning. The concept of “atmos-fear” could be fruitfully developed to understand phenomena of politics, communication and construction of the Other in contemporary societies, where the dialogical relationship between security and fear is at stake. (shrink)

This book explores the relationship between cultural psychology and aesthetics, by integrating the historical, theoretical and phenomenological perspectives. It offers a comprehensive discussion of the history of aesthetics and psychology from an international perspective, with contributions by leading researchers from Serbia, Austria, Portugal, Norway, Denmark, and Brazil. The first section of the book aims at summarizing the debate of where the song comes from. It discusses undeveloped topics, methodological hints, and epistemological questions in the different areas of contemporary psychological sciences. (...) The second section of the book presents concrete examples of case-studies and methodological issues to stimulate further explorations. The book aims to bring art back into psychology, to provide an understanding for the art of psychology. An Old Melody in a New Song will be of interest to advanced students and researchers in the fields of educational and developmental psychology, cultural psychology, history of ideas, aesthetics, and art-based research. (shrink)

The Italian philosopher Giambattista Vico developed a theoretical framework for the study of human sciences that exerted a strong influence on psychology and other human sciences. He backed the unity of the knowledge about human mind and culture, including history, linguistics, philosophy, philology, epistemology, psychology, and for the first time proposed a method for their study that he ambitiously called ‘new science’. The article presents an overview of Vico’s thought and discusses some of the main axioms of his theoretical system. (...) His critique of Cartesianism as the alternative epistemology he outlined is put forward as a thoughtful tool for reflection on contemporary psychological science. This retrospective look at Vico’s idea would finally provide useful insights for a programmatic view on cultural psychology. (shrink)

Cultural psychology is developing the endeavor of bringing back a focus on the general theory of the human psyche into the horizon of psychological sciences. In this chapter, I discuss some of the relevant philosophical issues of this theoretical framework, such as the focus on the future-oriented nature of psychological processes, the aesthetic dimension of psychological processes, the role of personal agency, and the co-construction between mind and culture. Finally, I discuss the imaginative process as a higher psychological function that (...) can illustrate the approach of cultural psychology. (shrink)

Human beings are eager producers and consumers of aesthetic experiences. They are able to reach the highest peaks of beauty and mystic ecstasy, and the deepest abysses of terror and abjection. The word “aesthetic” has the narrow meaning of a pleasant experience of beauty, pleasure of contemplation, or a mode of artistic consumption peculiar to contemporary societies. In this volume, the term “aesthetic” means a form of human experiencing, in which affective, ethical, and cognitive dimensions exist as a totality. I (...) would distinguish “aesthetic” from “reflective”; the latter is a way of producing meaning that poses the process of experiencing itself as an object. However, I do not oppose “aesthetic” to “rational,” as I think the authors in this volume clearly demonstrate that aesthetics are a legitimate form of knowing. (shrink)

The article aims at integrating the cultural psychology perspective of into the multidisciplinary field of border studies. It analyses the border phenomenon as a co-genetic system. The authors investigate the psychological side of people who relate to the border out of different motives. Then, it expands some of the theoretical concepts current in border studies by introducing psychological dimensions such as intentionality and directionality. Finally, the framework is applied to two case-studies representing the northern and southern European Union frontiers: the (...) case of Estonian officer Eston Kohver in the Setumaa region on the Estonian–Russian border; and the experiences of border guards in the re-bordering process on the Spanish– Moroccan border. It offers an innovative conceptual resource based on a triadic co-genetic epistemological approach, which allows us to overcome the binary oppositions still very present in the contemporary debates in borders studies. (shrink)

Since the famous passage in which Socrates (Plato 38a5-6) says that the unexamined, and therefore non-reflected, life is not worth living, “reflection” has been a diffuse and iterant term in ethics, moral philosophy, epistemology, political philosophy, but also in psychology. This volume opens a new perspective on the topic of reflection, considering the most recent approaches in both philosophy (namely in epistemology ) and cultural psychology.

I develop an exploratory analysis of “post-mortem photography”, a social practice existing in different cultures. The study, part of a larger project in Denmark, “The culture of grief”, combines Dialogical Self Theory, mainly concerning verbal and textual objects, with the iconic framework of affective semiosis to discuss the function of taking and keeping pictures of dead persons as if they were still alive or just sleeping. How can this practice and artifact culturally mediate the experience of death and the elaboration (...) of grief? What kind of inner dialogue is developed through the internalization of this specific kind of presence/absence? These are some of the preliminary questions I will try to answer by discussing some examples of post-mortem photography from the 19th and 20th centuries in different countries. (shrink)