Time, space, power, and the liminal transformation of the psychologised “self ”

Abstract

Drawing on the concept of liminality, we provide an alternative language for understanding how time, space, and power intersect to impact upon the relationship that individuals hold with themselves as “self.” A historical (re)contextualisation is presented that traces the genesis of a notable development in British war-time psychiatry, the “Northfield experiments,” to its contemporary parallels in the democratic therapeutic community in prisons and Psychologically Informed Planned Environments. Links are made between the development of these “liminal events” and aspects of Foucault’s works on the technologies/techniques of objectification and subjectification/self, his critique of the object of painting and his critical analytics of “other” spaces. It is argued that the therapeutic community can be (re)contextualised as a highly functional liminal event that held/holds significant implications for how patients subjectively experience(d) “self” as certain forms of psychological power and knowledge were/are given (material) effect within this point in time and space.