A Discursive Psychological Approach to Positioning

This article examines the current state of positioning theory as it has emerged in the work of Rom Harré and his colleagues, particularly with respect to its intended alignment with discursive psychology. Although Harré's discursive approach to positioning has been useful for drawing attention to the dynamism of social interactions and the collective construction of sociality, his ethogenic and ontological constructionist assumptions undermine his discursive approach by capitulating to cognitivist assumptions about mind, world, and discourse. Harré's discursive approach overlooks the action orientation of positioning in an attempt to reveal a realm of moral order and social rules. In contrast, I argue for (and illustrate) a discursive psychological orientation to positioning that is not tethered to ethnogenic or ontological constructionist assumptions. Rather, it is a nonontological, epistemological constructionist discursive approach that understands acts of positioning neither through psychological speculation nor cultural exegesis but rather through a close analysis of the relationship between discursive actions and social identities.