ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book is about the evolution, contribution and impact of the body of work known as Discursive Psychology. The book explores the challenging psychology's received ideas about epistemology, theory, method concerned with human accountability and human affairs. It emphasises the diversity of topics, issues, variety and breadth of assumptions, and their place in the discursive psychology project. It shows the two trajectories, and the classic debate between Wetherell and one of the founders of conversation analysis, Emanuel Schegloff. It talks about Cognition, emotion and the psychological thesaurus. It explains about prejudice, racism and nationalism. It then shows that Simon Goodman and Susan Speer address the distinction between naturally occurring and contrived data drawing on the work of Jonathan Potter. It argues against an a priori notion of social categories and identities.
