Critical Distinctions Between Positionless and Positioned Spaces

Abstract

This article offers a series of distinctions, not always made by Avdi and Winslade, to clarify my argument that persons can find themselves outside of workable subject positions, but that they are inherently predisposed to actively seek out positioning. First, I distinguish between the study's theoretical aims and the “data” used in its service, highlighting that I am neither supporting nor especially critiquing Bugental's therapeutic style. Second, the interactive “dance” of therapy stressed by Avdi and Winslade must be distinguished from, because it does not fully determine, the experiences of one of the dancers. Laurence is not merely a function of the therapeutic relationship, or of the therapist's power. To see him in that way effectively erases the integrity of his personal experience. Third, we should be careful not to conflate persons’ experiences with the culturally derived stories we want to tell about them. I wonder if Avdi's theorizing entails an imposition of psychoanalytic discourse on Laurence's experience of meaninglessness. Fourth, in response to Winslade, I suggest that it is useful to distinguish between language and narrative, and I argue that Laurence's use of language does not automatically qualify his words as narratives or discourses, as Winslade claims. Finally, Avdi's suggestion that one can stand “in the spaces” between positions creates an image of stranding before a feast of buffet options. But experience is not always like this, and so I suggest that occupying such liminal spaces can also be experienced as more akin to a discursive famine.