Portraying The Self

Irish Literary Studies Series No. 26.

A notable contribution to our understanding of ourselves. This book explores the realm of human behavior in social situations and the way that we appear to others. Dr. Goffman uses the metaphor of theatrical performance as a framework. Each person in everyday social intercourse presents himself and his activity to others, attempts to guide and cotnrol the impressions they form of him, and employs certain techniques in order to sustain his performance, just as an actor presents a character to an audience. The discussions of these social techniques offered here are based upon detailed research and observation of social customs in many regions.

Volume 16 of Progress in Self Psychology, How Responsive Should We Be, illuminates the continuing tension between Kohut's emphasis on the patient's subjective experience and the post-Kohutian intersubjectivists' concern with the therapist's own subjectivity by focusing on issues of therapeutic posture and degree of therapist activity. Teicholz provides an integrative context for examining this tension by discussing affect as the common denominator underlying the analyst's empathy, subjectivity, and authenticity. Responses to the tension encompass the stance of intersubjective contextualism, advocacy of "active responsiveness," and emphasis on the thorough-going bidirectionality of the analytic endeavor. Balancing these perspectives are a reprise on Kohut's concept of prolonged empathic immersion and a recasting of the issue of closeness and distance in the analytic relationship in terms of analysis of "the tie to the negative selfobject." Additional clinical contributions examine severe bulimia and suicidal rage as attempts at self-state regulation and address the self-reparative functions that inhere in the act of dreaming. Like previous volumes in the series, volume 16 demonstrates the applicability of self psychology to nonanalytic treatment modalities and clinical populations. Here, self psychology is brought to bear on psychotherapy with placed children, on work with adults with nonverbal learning disabilities, and on brief therapy. Rector's examination of twinship and religious experience, Hagman's elucidation of the creative process, and Siegel and Topel's experiment with supervision via the internet exemplify the ever-expanding explanatory range of self-psychological insights.

Portraying the other in international relations significantly shapes interaction among actors in the international field, consequently colouring views of the other and legitimating behaviour toward the other. This edited volume presents current analyses by international scholars on othering processes and self-other constructions within international relations, attempting to fill a gap in the debate on this fascinating topic and its socio-political implications. Othering is illustrated in three thematic sections: I) Othering in interstate and interregional relations, II) Othering in the policy field of terrorism and counterterrorism, and III) Possible transformations of othering. Contributions discuss othering from diverse angles and with different conceptual approaches, illustrating the multiple forms othering can take. They show how othering can be studied and its dynamics and consequences critically analysed and more comprehensively understood, but also the limits to these attempts. Various motivations for engaging in othering are elaborated. The images, ways of representations and stylistic means that are applied are exposed, and their internal logic as well as effects on thinking and behaviour in the international arena examined. Furthermore, possibilities for modifying othering processes, that is, how negative self-other constructions may be transformed, with the goal of enabling the peaceful existence of different groups, are presented.

Portraying Authorship argues that the medieval Castilian writer Juan Manuel fashioned a seemingly modern authorial persona from the accumulation and synthesis of medieval authorial roles. In the manuscript culture of medieval Castile and across Latin Europe, writers typically referred to their work in ways that corresponded to their role in the bookmaking process: scribes took credit for preserving the works of others, compilers for combining disparate texts in productive ways, commentators for explaining obscure works, and authors for writing their own words. Combining literary analysis with book history, Anita Savo reveals how Juan Manuel forged his authorial persona, “Don Juan,” by adopting all four medieval writerly roles, thereby reaping the ethical benefits of each one. Each chapter in Portraying Authorship highlights a different authorial role to show how Don Juan – and others who wrote in his name – assumed responsibility for that role and adapted its rhetoric to his vernacular literary project. The book concludes that Don Juan’s authorial self-portrait not only gave the humanist writers of the fifteenth century a model to imitate, but also persuaded subsequent scribes, editors, and translators to portray him as an individual author. In doing so, Portraying Authorship illuminates how Juan Manuel’s concept of authorship helped to secure him a privileged position in narratives of Spanish literary history.

Cicero has played a pivotal role in shaping Western culture. His public persona, his self-portrait as model of Roman prose, philosopher, and statesman, has exerted a durable and profound impact on the educational system and the formation of the ruling class over the centuries. Joining up with recent studies on the reception of Cicero, this volume approaches the figure of Cicero from a ‘biographical’, more than ‘philological’, perspective and considers the multiple ways by which different ages reacted to Cicero and created their ‘Ciceros’. From Cicero’s lifetime to our times, it focuses on how the image of Cicero was revisited and reworked by intellectuals and men of culture, who eulogized his outstanding oratorical and political virtues but, not rarely, questioned the role he had in Roman politics and society. An international group of scholars elaborates on the figure of Cicero, shedding fresh light on his reception in late antiquity, Humanism and Renaissance, Enlightenment and modern centuries. Historians, literary scholars and philosophers, as well as graduate students, will certainly profit from this volume, which contributes enormously to our understanding of the influence of Cicero on Western culture over the times.

Well-organized collection of over 60 columns on leadership excellence for nurses covering topics such as the challenges of being new on the job, what change really means, managing resistance, developing others in challenging times, and coaching your boss Practical advice based on real circumstances in real healthcare organizations offering true to life examples and successful solutions that apply to nurse leaders at all levels. Emphasis on self-awareness reflecting the extensive research validating that the more self-aware we are, the better leaders we become Concrete and immediate solutions providing uncommon insight and guidance for even the most intractable challenges

This remarkable collection of original essays, written by prominent scholars recognized for their achievements in a wide range of disciplines, defines trauma as a disruption in the fragile process of symbolization, or the human capacity to imbue life with meaning by representing the self's immortality. The contributors analyze the multiple meanings and deeper significance of trauma, whether of shell-shocked war veterans or victims of sexual abuse, and they discuss its manifestations, both subtle and obvious, in human behavior and memory. Organized as an honorary volume to Robert Jay Lifton, who identified trauma as the core psychological issue of the postmodern world, this book demonstrates how trauma and other fundamental breaks in human continuity inform psychiatric, historical, religious, literary, political, cultural, and scientific interpretations of the self.