ABSTRACT
Reflexivity remains a cipher in social theory. Neither what it is nor what it does has received the attention necessary for producing clear concepts of reflexivity or a clear understanding of reflexivity as a social process. These two absences are closely related andmutually reinforcing. On the one hand, the fact that there is no concept of reflexivity in common currency means that, just as Molière’s Monsieur Jourdain spoke prose all his life without knowing it, everyone from the founding fathers through all normal lay people to today’s social theorists have constantly been referring to reflexivity or tacitly assuming it or logically implying it under a variety of different terms. On the other hand, because the terminology that subsumes reflexivity is so
varied – from the portmanteaux concepts of academics, such as ‘consciousness’ or ‘subjectivity’ through Everyman’s quotidian notion of ‘mulling things over’ to the quaint, but not inaccurate, folkloric expression ‘I says to myself says I’ – the process denoted by reflexivity has been underexplored, undertheorised and, above all, undervalued. Reflexivity is such an inescapable, though vague, presupposition and so tacitly, thus non-discursively, taken for granted that it has rarely been held up for the scrutiny necessary to rectify its undervaluation as a social process. Because reflexivity has been so seriously neglected1 redressing this state of affairs means making some bold moves. The intent behind the present book is finally to allow this Cinderella to go to the ball, to stay there and to be acknowledged as a partner without whom there would be no social dance. Our human reflexivity is closely akin to our human embodiment, something
so self-evident as not to have merited serious attention from social theorists until ‘the body’ was ‘reclaimed’ during the past two or three decades. However, whilst all passengers on the Clapham omnibus would concur that, indeed, they have bodies, most would be stumped by ‘reflexivity’ if asked whether or not they practise it. In fact, as will be shown in Chapter 2, nearly all subjects agree that they do if the question is rephrased to avoid using theword. Because the term is ill-defined and not in everyday use, let us begin from the ordinary activities to which it refers amongst ordinary people: ones that they do recognise and can discuss if ordinary language is used. At its most basic, reflexivity rests on the fact that all normal people talk to
themselves within their own heads,2 usually silently and usually from an early age.
In the present book this mental activity is called ‘internal conversation’ but, in the relatively sparse literature available, it is also known inter alia as ‘self-talk’, ‘intra-communication’, ‘musement’, ‘inner dialogue’ and ‘rumination’. Indeed, it seems probable that some people engage in more internal dialogue than external conversation at certain times in life and under particular circumstances: those living alone and especially the elderly, those employed in solitary occupations or performing isolated work tasks, and only children without close friends. What are they doing when they engage in self-talk? The activities involved range over a broad terrain which, in plain language, can extend from daydreaming, fantasising and internal vituperation through rehearsing for some forthcoming encounter, reliving past events, planning for future eventualities, clarifying where one stands or what one understands, producing a running commentary on what is taking place and talking oneself through (or into) a practical activity to more pointed actions such as issuing internal warnings and making promises to oneself, reaching concrete decisions or coming to a conclusion about a particular problem. Two things are clear about this (non-exhaustive) list. Firstly, not all of these
activities are fully reflexive, because they lack the crucial feature of the ‘object’ under consideration being bent back in any serious, deliberative sense, upon the ‘subject’ doing the considering. For example, a worker tackling a new procedure or someone erecting a wardrobe from a flat-pack asks herself ‘What comes next?’ and often answers this by consulting an external source such as themanual or instruction leaflet. Of course, this could be viewed as weakly reflexive because their question also stands for ‘What do I do next?’But it is weak because the response is to consult the rule-book rather than thrashing it out through internal deliberation about subject in relation to object and vice versa. Hence, the dividing line between reflexive and non-reflexive thought is far from clear-cut because anyone’s thoughts can move back and forth between the two. Secondly, not all of the mental activities listed above concern social matters
because the object over which a subject deliberates need not concern people or society. For example, solo climbers talk themselves through handholds and footholds, and riders ask themselves how many strides their horses should fit in before jumping an obstacle. However, it can always be maintained that sporting activities like these are weakly social; they are usually reliant upon manufactured equipment, often entail human artefacts, such as route maps and fences, and frequently presume some social context, such as the existence of mountain rescue or the right to jump some farmer’s hedges. Although it is usually possible to invoke some social element of the above type, neither analytically nor practically are such elements primary to the activity. The dividing line can be fuzzy in practice, although the analytical distinction is clear enough. The present book deals only with strongly reflexive processes and its concern is
with reflexive deliberations about matters that are primarily and necessarily social.3
Reflexivity itself is held to depend upon conscious deliberations that take place through ‘internal conversation’. The ability to hold such inner dialogues is an
emergent personal power of individuals that has been generally disregarded and is not entailed by routine or habitual action. Myers summarises the unwarranted neglect of this personal property as follows:
