Treacherous narratives and seductive theories. On methodological challenges in psychosocial academic work.

New Zealand Online Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies. Volume 1. Issue 3.

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Treacherous narratives and seductive theories.

On methodological challenges in psychosocial academic work

© Anna Lydia Svalastog. Translated by Dr Brian McNeil.

Inaugural lecture as Full Professor of Psychosocial Work at Østfold University

College, February 13, 2015

[The photos are shot during one-month, autumn of 2013, and they are presented in the order

they are shot. They are all from the municipality of Vinje in Telemark, Norway.

Photographer: Anna Lydia Svalastog.]:


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[Picture 1 Changeable and consistant]

Significant narratives

In psychosocial work, the ―narratives‖ of the individual are an important basis of

knowledge.They are significant sources for the history of the individual and the complex

contexts in which the individual‘s life is lived. Today‘s technology has given the individual‘s

narratives new qualities. We have experienced in the social media how narratives can have the

speed and the range of a revolution. We have also experienced how the social media, like a

curse, can damage the individual and tie him or her fast to narratives. The capacity of the new

data technology to process colossal (―big‖) amounts of data has made available completely

new possibilities to researchers who study diseases that are widespread among us, that is to

say, ―common complex diseases‖ (CCD) such as cancer, cardiac and vascular diseases,

Parkinson‘s, Alzheimer‘s, and diabetes. We call these widespread diseases ―complex‖

because they do not have only one cause, but are the results of a combination of several causal

connections, both external (outside the body) and internal (in the body). In order to

understand the function of the genes before, during, and after the course of a sickness, the

biological material (the biobank material) is analyzed, just as in modern epidemiological

research. But in order to interpret the biological material, researchers need to combine

information about it with information about the life story and the circumstances of the lived

life from which the biological samples are taken. The combination of narratives and new

technology has transformed medical research. The usual sources are medical journals,

demographic information, and cultural knowledge about lifestyles, food, physical activity, and

social well-being; ideally, this is documented by means of questionnaires. Against this

background, one can claim that good quality and relevant narratives are essential to the


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development of new knowledge, so that today‘s medicine may be able to interpret what is

happening on the cellular level and between the cells in the body.

Narratives are also an important basis of knowledge in social and political history. In

the aftermath of secularization (in the sense of the distinction between the public and the

private spheres), the public sphere was perceived as neutral; or at any rate, it was claimed that

those who represented the public sphere were objective and neutral, and represented what it

means to be a human being, the fully valuable human person with the right to vote, with

knowledge, and with the right to form judgments. The private sphere was assigned the role of

a sphere where religion and the subjective emotions of the individual could unfold, at least to

some extent. Wise after the event, we recognize that the distinction between the public and the

private spheres also represented politics, the distribution of power. In keeping with this

inherent contradiction – that the public sphere was represented and administered by a

minority, while these persons also represented the moral and political human being – ever

since the modern states under the rule of law were established and the right to vote was

granted, narratives about and by individuals have been narrated with the intention of revealing

that the human person who represents the public sphere does not represent everyone. The

allegedly objective and neutral element is situated and defined – and that means that it is

delimited. Some of the narratives that have been related and distributed, about events and

persons, about a life that is experienced or about a life that is ―staged‖ in fiction, have become

classics because they renewed our way of understanding, not least with regard to

powerlessness, violence, being an outsider, degradation, assault, survival, transformation, and

struggle. Narratives about individuals have given new perspectives on the connection between

the lived life and the relationships and conditions under which life is lived. In this way, they

have made both life and the world accessible to new critical analyses.

If narratives possess a weight and a structural significance of this kind, what makes a

good narrative? A good narrative is one that can help to give meaning to the phenomenon or

situation one seeks to understand. A good narrative is one that makes it possible to discover

the connections and relationships in and through which a lived life is lived, and that makes it

possible to analyze a lived life in relation to living conditions. The justification for seeking to

analyze a lived life in relation to living conditions can be academic: knowledge for its own

sake. But it is easy to grasp the importance of the fact that there is someone who carries out

these analyses, because others – professionals, educators, policy makers, politicians,

administrators, and people in general – find them useful.


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The position of the researcher: what I regard as important

[Picture 2Demands, expectations, renewal and consequences]

In his book Foucault and Derrida. The other side of reason, Roy Boyne writes about how the

paths taken by the academic lives of these two thinkers crossed. He emphasizes above all how

Foucault and Derrida moved from an initial explicit academic disagreement until both in later

years underlined the necessity of an academic ethical position. Their agreement on this point

is striking. Boyne describes this ethical principle as follows: ―The principle is that social

philosophy must continue to address the rights of the other‖ (Boyne 1990:158). In the hunt for

knowledge, today‘s research, in combination with the wish to conduct societal planning on the

basis of knowledge, can lead to results that have the character of truth. But research is

tentative. It depends on the question that is asked, the material that is used, and the context

that is analyzed. The boundaries between academic disciplines are likewise provisional, and

shift in keeping with changes in time and space. But when we are in the middle of a project, in

one particular academic context, the academic work and its parameters can seem anything but

tentative and provisional. Despite what we may perhaps think, our understanding of the

human person is more obstinate and consistent. We have a responsibility for our

understanding of the human person, irrespective of the currents and trends in research and

through the changes across time. In a Christian tradition, one can say that this affirmation

about the strength of our understanding of the human person – that there is something abiding,

when we get behind the conflicts – is almost Pauline (―the greatest of all is love‖). In my own

research, the capacity for self-reflection and the responsibility for reflecting on my work have

always been closely linked to the understanding of the human person and to ethics. This is not

always easy, because the societal, political, and ethical challenges can differ from those we

are trained to recognize and to avoid.


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All academic disciplines belong to their time and their society, and all have, to a

greater or lesser extent, an interdisciplinary character. From the Second World War and the

Manhattan Project onwards, society itself has wanted to have interdisciplinary teams, because

it has believed that they can solve concrete challenges on behalf of society, transcending

together what the individual discipline can contribute on its own. My own projects have

always had an interdisciplinary character. The various academic traditions contribute both

understanding and specific tools.

[Picture 3Psychosocial work – surface, above and below]

Before one can build up knowledge, one must have tools with which to work, and traditions

that supply possibilities of action: if there are no tools, there are no products. Besides this, the

experience of using the tools provides complexity and precision, so that we are better able to

work on a topic. We can cut through analyses that do not correspond to the problems we are

studying today, and replace these. This experience also helps us to understand the limitations

of the tools.

Taken together, knowledge and experience can supply a sustainable basis – a

knowledge that not only empowers us to act and to direct, but that can also help to maintain

life and to develop society. The tension between what we can do, and what we as individuals

and as society need, is both a challenge and an impetus. Today, in a globalized world that is

changing all the time, the capacity for renewal has become vitally important. Individual and

private renewals are important, if we are to tackle the changes successfully; but individual

changes are not an adequate solution for a society. Individualized responsibility for change or


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adaptation leads to a situation in which the right of the strongest rules; and not even Jack

London, a best-selling writer from a markedly Darwinian era, believed in that (see The Sea-

Wolf). Renewal in a society presupposes something more than individual adaptation. Renewal

presupposes knowledge and experiences that are communicated, understood, and investigated

in common. And although many wise heads are involved, and a large number of outsiders

look at the matter from a different perspective, we live in a mutable and complex world, and

this means that the foreseeable consequencesinclude many surprises. Even knowledge that is

well thought-out and solidly based needs corrections. And sometimes we must (or at least,

should) discard the results that have been reached with so much intelligence.

[Picture 4Treacherous narratives]

Psychosocial work

Psychosocial work is an academic discipline that focuses on the interaction between human

persons and that looks at the link between the individual/psyche and society. This study has

an explicitly interdisciplinary base. Those who apply to study it at the Master‘s level in

Norway must first have a Bachelor‘s degree from a professional training and two years‘

experience of work in the practical field. The Master of Psychosocial Work has focused on

the interaction between people and on topics that can provide new insight for those who work

in public institutions connected to public health care, the educational sector, the probation


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service, or who are users of these institutions. The aim is to provide new insight for other

persons concerned, for society, and for those who are responsible for planning and

organization.

Research into the connection between individual-society-institution is interdisciplinary

and covers research areas with a background in cultural and historical studies, social sciences,

and religious science. These disciplines understand the human person in relation to a wider

context, and they have elaborated key concepts such as society, culture, history, and religion,

in order to conceptualize this. Academic reflection and development are closely linked to the

rest of the academic terminology in which they key concepts are described and discussed. All

these academic disciplines presuppose that the human being has both conscious and

unconscious reasons for what he or she does; that what is meaningful in a person‘s life is both

individual and indissolubly linked to groups and to the rest of society; and that life has a

physical, an intellectual/mental, and an emotional/spiritual aspect. Concrete analyses of the

interaction between individuals in society and at institutions can be carried out in various

ways. Various forms of material oriented to the individual and qualitative material, often

including interviews in various forms, are absolutely central in psychosocial work. Narratives

of this kind play a decisive role in what we are able to understand, but they are also

treacherous.

Treacherous narratives

[Picture 5Cherished and forgotten. Past lives in present society]

In the 1990‘s, I worked on the analysis of interviews, with a particular focus on gender

analysis. After 2000, I had new employers and new fields of responsibility. One field was

research into indigenous peoples; another concerned life sciences and Science and

Technology Studies (STS), with a particular focus on genetics and gene technology, ethics,


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and how to handle risks. It is against the background of these three research areas – gender

and sexuality; the study of indigenous peoples and Sami history; new technology and society

– that I wish to discuss the treacherous aspects connected to academic material and to

academic narratives.

Narratives from private life

In the course of my doctoral work on abortion, I interviewed ―Jan.‖ One of my questions

concerned the reason for an unwanted pregnancy. In this conversation, he said that he had not

really seen contraception as his responsibility. I told ―Jan‖ that one thing the women whom I

had interviewed had said was that they did not want to disturb sexual intercourse by

demanding the use of a condom. ―Jan‖ said that he understood this, especially once they had

―got going,‖ and he added that using a condom was a bit like eating a caramel with the paper

still on it. ―Jan‖ and I also talked about the use of contraception after the abortion. Now he

argued differently: he said that he had now become accustomed to using a condom and that he

would not feel alright if he had the idea in the back of his head all the time that the sex was

not safe and that there was a risk of an unwanted pregnancy. The conversation with ―Jan‖

about the use of contraception before and after the abortion can be understood as two different

narratives, or else as one single narrative in which the experience and the interpretation of

something that happened affected and changed his own experiences and actions. In my

doctoral dissertation, I analyzed the interviews with ―Jan‖ as one single whole. If ―Jan‖ and I

had spoken only about the cause of the unwanted pregnancy, my analysis of abortion and

unwanted pregnancy would have been different, as would my analysis of the link between

gender and sexuality, and my understanding of what can reduce the number of unwanted

pregnancies. I would have come to different results in terms of material, analysis, theory,

policy, and politics. The one outcome would not have been more or less academic than the

other. The academic work would not have been more or less good. But they would have been

different investigations, with different results.

Work on a topic, conducting interviews and creating research material that can

subsequently function as a new base of knowledge for further research, will reflect both what

the interviewer asks about and what the interviewee relates. A narrative that is allowed to go

into details can resemble a good detective novel, in which new information gives new

perspectives and a new understanding of the situations, persons, and events. The

treacherousness that lies hidden in the narratives we create involves shortening them in such a

way that essential and significant connections, relationships, and processes do not emerge into

the light of day.

Qualitative material can be used in order to grasp the complex contexts in individuals‘

lives, experiences, feelings, reflections, and actions, when seen in the light of the relationships

of which the individual is a part, the social circumstances and expectations of the individual,

and the individual‘s relationship to culturally defined hopes and longings and to society‘s

narratives about the possible and the impossible, the true and the false, the important and the

unimportant.


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Narratives from the researcher’s working life

[Picture 6Common grounds and systems of equality. The spirit of democracy.]

I worked at the University of Umeå from 2000 to 2007 both as a teacher and as a researcher

into the Sami people and life sciences. When I returned to the University of Uppsala in 2007,

I was given the task of developing a project about ethics linked to genetic research into the

indigenous peoples, especially the Sami people in Sweden. Since there was no overview of

the history of genetic research into the Sami people in Sweden, I created an interview-based

study, interviewing academics who had been directly involved in this research. I understood,

early on in the interview process, that those I interviewed had a limited overview of the

research community in which they had been involved. Their participation in this research had

a variety of intentions. The contents and the follow-up of their declarations of informed

consent varied, since these were connected to different collections of material. The Regional

Ethical Committees (REK) that receives applications for the ethical approval of medical

research projects are – as the name states – regional. Applications have to be sent to the

Committee responsible for the area where the researcher lives or is employed. This means that

research projects that analyze the material in one particular biobank will be evaluated by

several regional ethical committees, depending on where the researchers have their academic

positions. Accordingly, the ethical committee in the place where the material is located has no

complete overview of the research that is carried out on the biobank material in its own

region. It is not easy to get hold of an overview of the projects that are accepted and

implemented. The interviews also made it clear that international laws about the rights of the

indigenous peoples with regard to marriage and the stewardship of their own history were not


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formalized and included in the routines for ethical approval. Instead, it was up to the

individual researcher to ensure that this was done. The interview material also indicated

problematic academic issues connected to the use or non-use of narratives in this research;

and this was not always clearly mentioned in the published results of the research. Other

issues included representativeness, the understanding of the relationship between ethnicity

and biology, and analyses of contexts in the past and of the way in which the knowledge of

history led to the conclusion that was reached. For example, does a genetic link between a

person and a region mean that the person was an immigrant there, or that the person had

visited the region and interacted with others there?On closer inspection, an apparently well-

established research-ethical praxis turned out to have started from a better and more integrated

place than the place where research landed over the course of time. This was the opposite

movement to what I had expected. There is treacherousness in researchers‘ narratives too.

This applies to narratives that conceal themselves, narratives about connections between

differing and diverging academic praxis, and narratives about relationships and interactions

that lie under the surface of the published results of research.

Qualitative material is used in order to establish a basis of knowledge for questions to

which one does not yet know the answer. This means that someone must ask questions, and

someone must be willing to narrate. Research is a reflexive activity that never comes to an

end. The treacherous aspects in the examples I have employed show the challenges involved

in understanding life and activity in relation to a wider context.

The parameters of academic narratives and power

[Picture 7Psychosocial academic work – the shore of the bay and the horizons not yet seen]


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I shall now employ some examples from my own life as a researcher in order to shed light on

the parameters of academic narratives. When I gave courses in Sami religious history, I

became aware of certain aspects of this research history. There were particularly striking

demands for cultural purity in the research into Sami religious history, Sami life and history.

Authenticity was used as a criterion to weed out whatever was not regarded as genuine. It was

striking to see how often ―the genuine‖ amounted to ensuring a distinction between the Sami

and the non-Sami; only that which was uniquely Sami was defined as ―Sami.‖ Sami religion

became the same as pre-Christian religion, delimited to that which was exclusively practiced

among the Sami people before they became acquainted with Christianity. Such a perspective

fails to communicate adequately the variation, change, and interaction in the course of history.

This was in keeping with theories about Sami history and culture that shifted the Sami people

away from large parts of the Scandinavian Peninsula and out into a mythical landscape in the

high mountains and an Arctic climate. That which is Sami was marginalized and set apart

from non-Sami contexts and persons. In my own research, therefore, I have aimed to make

visible the parameters of national narratives in which I myself am included, and which my

students have encountered in the required reading for the course. The treacherous aspect of

the parameters of academic narratives is the boundaries that are drawn for what counts as a

legitimate academic narrative/history, on the one hand, and the narratives that invalidate and

make invisible the lived life and the contexts that come into being through the lived life, on

the other hand.

There were two units at the University of Umeå that carried out academic work with a

focus on the Sami people. One was the teaching and research unit of ―Sami studies‖ in the

Institute for Archaeology and Sami Studies in the Faculty of the Humanities, which had been

created by Sami researchers who taught Sami culture, history, and language. The other unit

was a research center, the Center for Sami Studies (SESAM), based on non-Sami researchers

who studied political history, demography and the history of illness, nutrition and the history

of organization. This center had no one with competence in the Sami language, and the

researchers represented varying degrees of competence in the Sami culture. Two narrator-

related treacherousness‘s lie hidden in this institutional structure, with two units at one and the

same university. At first glance, and seen from a distance, one could have the impression that

one unit taught, while the other unit engaged primarily in research. But one could equally well

describe the difference between the two units in another way, for example by focusing on the

differences in the basis of knowledge between the two units, which made it impossible for

either of the two units to substitute the other. Knowledge of language, culture, and cultural

history cannot be substituted by knowledge of demography and politics. With two different

starting points, the two units also produce different narratives. The different cultural starting

points, a Sami and a Swedish perspective, constitute two different narrative parameters, where

time is structured differently in history. Does the narrative follow the longer history of the

Sami people, with alternations in prosperity and freedom of action, or does one choose a

delimited temporal perspective, such as parts of the nineteenth century and the gulf between

the majority and the indigenous people with regard to attaining the majority society‘s ideal of

a desired, good, and ideal life? Does one understand the nineteenth century as poor, with the

Sami poorest of all; or does one take one‘s starting point in the prosperity the Sami people had


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in the eighteenth century, thus seeing the nineteenth century not as a beginning, but as the

close of a phase?

In recent years, I have collaborated with scholars in Australia, where public research

has worked for a long time on research into the health of Australia‘s indigenous people/first

nation. Political guidelines reflect the fact that there has been a special interest in, and that

there is still a principal focus on, the so-called gap in the educational level, unemployment,

health, and life expectancy between those who are defined as indigenous persons and those

who are not defined in this way. In the past and in the present, Australia‘s indigenous people

have themselves been interested in other questions linked to the stewardship of their own

culture, the relationship to their own land, and in healing the consequences of colonialization

– the enforced removal of children, attacks and murders, racism, and the loss of history and of

a sense of belonging. The challenge can be formulated as follows: the frameworks that guide

our own thinking are deeper and further-reaching than our insight into what this does to our

narratives, not least when we adopt or reject a narrative, when we retell a narrative, and when

we sing or create new narratives.

♦ Academic psychosocial work

[Picture 8 Changing perspective, standing still: Watching below my feet: Picture one of two

from]

Research in the field of psychosocial work aims at a better understanding of topics that are

directly or indirectly relevant to the practical field, that is to say, to the work that is carried out

by trained professionals. Although the public institutions do not have a monopoly, they are an

essential framework for professional training and practice. This applies not least to the health


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and school sectors, to the probation service, to prisons and the police. It is important to

investigate, to understand, to examine, and to develop the basis of knowledge. It also concerns

how the practical field and the users categorize and are categorized in today‘s society. Most of

us have been in a hospital; perhaps we have been off work through sickness, been fired, or

have got a diagnosis. Categories are tricky, because something is outside and something is

inside. In the case of human beings, this being ―outside‖ and ―inside‖ is measured as greater

and lesser deviations in relation to various understandings of normality. Norway too has

narratives that are painful and unpleasant with regard to the institutionalization of what was

regarded as deviant.

Academic work presupposes a methodical use of concepts and the formation of

concepts. Concepts are words defined in relation to an understanding of reality or to a theory.

The elaboration of a concept is embedded in a wider narrative praxis. With this point, I

conclude the section about the treacherous narratives. When I was young, I was shocked to

see that we in northern Europe could know more about African nature than about African

history and culture. To write a whole people out of history is a special characteristic of

fascistic thinking. To write peoples out of whole continents is an element of colonial thinking.

Both fascism and colonialism are themes that the academic world has worked on for a long

time. The question is whether we have worked on the idea about the other, the need for the

other, the necessity to be separate despite our reciprocal relationships. This is significant for

academic psychosocial work because the institutions that society has established do not catch

hold of the totality of memory and experience. There is a power and a disciplining that is

thought to be for the best of everyone, but in practice, we can see that it does not always

function, or that its functioning works against its intention. Of all the public institutions in

Norway, it is perhaps the social services (NAV for short) that have been most criticized in

recent years (https://www.nav.no/en/Home), although we know that NAV has very limited

possibilities of finding work for unemployed persons. For example, it is well known that 80%

of all vacant jobs are not advertised publicly, and that employers who advertise prefer to

employ people who are already employed rather than unemployed persons. The courses that

NAV purchases and offers unemployed persons primarily seek to strengthen their network

and profile in their curriculum vitae and in job applications. This means that if we are to help

the unemployed, those who are outside the job market, it is not enough for NAV as an

institution to distribute or make accessible information about vacant jobs. The unemployed

person who wants to get into the job market, and the society that wants to have unemployed

people working, needs to understand how the unemployed represent ―the other.‖ This is an

―outside‖ and an ―inside,‖ where we need to know who is a full member of the society to

which he or she belongs. I would claim that ―the other‖ functions as a cultural framework

condition. If we want the situation to change, we need insight into what ―the other‖ means in

our society.

https://www.nav.no/en/Home


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Seductive theories

[Picture 9Changing perspective - standing still Watching stright ahead: Picture two of two]

An interview can be analyzed in various ways. An interview is a text, a narrative that can be

organized to a greater or lesser extent. When a story is called a ―narrative,‖ the point we are

making is that narratives have a structure, where the elements of the text are connected in

various ways. Some academic disciplines, such as folklore studies, anthropology, history, and

the study of films, literature, and languages have the narrative art as the center of their

interest.

Democratization, hierarchies, and knowledge

In analyses of individuals who interact in public institutions, in a school, a hospital, or a

prison, it goes without saying that one must relate to institutionalized power relationships.

Some key words connected to the promotion of democratic values and the prevention of the

institutional use of power are ―user cooperation,‖ ―individual adaptation,‖ and ―informed

consent.‖ Discourse analyses have often been used in analyses of institutionalized power. This

type of power-critical discourse analysis directed against public institutions has its

background in French historical research. In the nineteenth century, history was the central

academic discipline in Europe, so important and weighty that Friedrich Nietzsche wrote a

book entitled Vom Nutzen und Nachteil der Historie für das Leben (―On the Use and Abuse of

History for Life‖). Nietzsche was furious that the German historians of his days made the past

so monumental that their contemporaries were weighed down and lost their creativity, and his

book is regarded as the beginning of the modern theory of history. The German historian

Leopold von Ranke played a central role in the development of the secular academic

discipline of history in the nineteenth century. He formulated the academic methodology for


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this discipline, in which particular criteria became important. Myths had no place in historical

narratives. Primary sources in the form of historical texts were decisive, while secondary

sources were given a status as somewhat less reliable, and so on. The goal was nothing less

than true history. In the hunt for the truth about the past, this could be assembled, using the

new methodological tools, to form an ever larger construction, a monument impregnable to

objections and attacks from the outside.

The twentieth century saw other intellectual currents. Rights and societal change were

important; at the same time, it was important precisely to understanding the connection

between narrative and power. The French journal Annales d’histoire économique et sociale

was founded in 1929, and its principal collaborators formed the starting point of the ―history

of mentalities.‖ This directly opposed German historical scholarship by affirming that history

was about the slow changes in the symbolic universe that we collectively possess. Two central

figures whose doctoral studies were financed in this context were the anthropologist Claude

Lévi-Strauss and the historian Michel Foucault, both of whom made essential contributions to

how we understand narratives today. The inheritance bequeathed by the history of mentalities,

structuralism, and discourse analysis goes hand in hand with critical analyses of society. For

those of us who have read Foucault or other historians of mentalities, it is clear that we are all

part of an age in which the ―normal‖ is something that reflects our history, that the ―normal‖

is what we call a cultural construct. Those of us who have read Jacques Derrida, or worked

with what Anthony Giddens so cheekily calls reflexivity, have learned that the meaning of

what is done or said points backwards to something antecedent; this in its turn points

backwards; and this in its turn … etc. There is a kind of original sin of dialectics in a post-

modern secular world, present but intangible, with the power of history but without

metaphysical rights. When one works with various forms of discourse analysis, the analysis of

power will be central, together with that which is typical of the period and is finite – that is to

say, the symbols that at one period can be regarded as true, but which are seen, over the

course of time, to belong to a complex context. A discursive perspective gives us insight into

that, which is temporary, that which does not persist in the absence of a firm will and the right

to employ effective means. Discourse analysis, as Foucault elaborates it, has specialized in the

public institutionalized conversation and in analyzing the archives of public institutions. The

goal is to uncover the disciplining effect and the normalized form of the discourse.

It is clear that Foucault has his place in relation to psychosocial work, as one

instrument in analyses of institutionalized understandings that have disciplined, both

unconsciously and consciously, the bodies in and through which we live. It has proved both

important and productive to analyze public speech, discourse, as representative power, as

narratives that are not universal truths, but rather truths typical of the period, which acquire

their validity through repetition, disciplining, and the punishment of deviations. This has also

proved fruitful: the analytic approach brings to light the content of the material in such a way

that we get access to strata with meaning. In this context, a good narrative is one that

represents disciplined and institutional behavior. And a good narrative is one narrated by the

fool and the jester, the person who shows how the narratives and the use of the narratives can

be understood when seen at a distance.


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[Picture 10Light in the woods. Partial enlightenment – contextual and directed]

The concept of ―discourse‖ is also interpreted differently than in Foucault. Paul Ricoeur and

Jürgen Habermas work with a concept of discourse that has a clear echo of Plato‘s Socrates.

Each of the various theories about speech actions has an errand of its own; they are important

theoretical contributions to understanding and analyzing conversation and text, and each can

contribute to analyses of the various aspects of psychosocial work. We shall move from

institutionalized and disciplining ―normal‖ realities into conversations with individuals, with

users and therapists, pupils and teachers, etc. What we seek now is something else, or

something more, than how to understand that which is institutionalized. We want to

understand that which is not represented by means of discourse. Leading theories of discourse

are important and essential, but they are also seductive. The power and strength in discourse

analysis can overshadow and completely eliminate other forms of analysis, so that the

individual disappears. On another occasion, the impulse and power in discourse analysis can

encounter a material that is completely unsuitable. In that case, we must change our

perspective and find other theoretical partners. One path is to approach the individual by

discussing various linguistic theories about language and the construction of meaning. To

discuss linguistic theory can be a good exercise that helps us to clarify how we ourselves can,

or choose to, understand meaning. And the conscious choice of linguistic theory can decide

whether or not we are able to see why we ourselves get certain results of analysis when we

tackle an individual-oriented material. Experiences provide another theoretical path we can

choose. Philosophical phenomenology assumes that there exists a world outside the

individual, a world that the individual can reach through his or her experiences, if the

individual succeeds in getting beyond one‘s own prior understanding. There exists something

substantial and real out there, and we are in contact with it.


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[Picture 11The new and the same. Open ended processes.]

Structuralism/discourse theory/postmodern theory, deconstruction/reflexivity and

phenomenology are heavy intellectual currents and theoretical fields, all of which are used in

psychosocial work. They confer a meaning on various aspects of a material and an analytical

process, and their illuminative power makes them seductive. But if one is to look for a lost

narrative, the fact that light exists helps only if it illuminates the place where the narrative is

to be found. What narrative do I want to find? The one that provides better understanding and

communication in an institution, or between those who represent institutions and those who

are users? The one that provides new insight into context, into how interplay functions for one

and the same person in various contexts and between different persons? The one that

demonstrates the lack of correspondence between how we believe something is, and how it

actually is? Or the narrative that sketches new forms and methods that have not yet been tried

out? We could extend the list. The various theories describe reality against the background of

specific problems, and they are in discussion with other theories. They build on some of these

theories; they move further away from other theories by means of argumentation, analyses,

and/or reference to various empirical areas/material. The explanatory value lies in the

correspondence between the problem and the material and the theory. If you have no dialogue

partner, that which is said will be a monologue or a cliché, a repetition instead of assimilation

to new circumstances: and this also applies to the relationship between problem, material, and

theory.

Analysis is a continuing conversation. It does not end, even when the text is

committed to writing. Out in the academic landscape, the text will be read on the basis of

others‘ questions and material, other needs and circumstances; it will become a link in others‘

argumentation as they seek to shed light and to understand. In the argumentation that leads to

one‘s own analysis, it is meaningful to follow some theories, while others are meaningful as a


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contrast. The latter are alternatives that clarify one‘s own material or problem in virtue of the

fact that they are not relevant. One might be tempted to think that what one rejects has no

raison d’être, but this is not necessarily the case.

Theories of development became a dominant theoretical landscape in the nineteenth

century. During the twentieth century, we had a period when ―everything‖ was explained in

terms of hormones, and research was conducted on urine that had been collected from

pregnant women who were full of hormones. After the breakthrough of modern gene

technology in the mid-twentieth century, genes were revalued to become the new universal

key to the innermost essence of the human being. Today, the more recent epigenetics has

completed gene technology.

When one conceptual map wins acceptance and validity, the level of precision in the

argumentation increases. Language is concentrated and is combined with various

understandings of what is essential, what is good and what is bad. In other words, one can

employ the concepts from a ―paradigm‖ to reach very different conclusions. When

evolutionary theories held sway, it was possible to idealize both primeval times and the

present day. The fact that the conceptual map functions as the starting point for analyses and

discussions does not mean that it is ontologically true. It means that it functions in a variety of

research activities and political discussions. A theoretical landscape that simultaneously

functions academically and/or politically is seductive. It is also safe. To give one‘s assent to

something successful is seductive, in the sense that it can give honor and fame in the short

term. But the effectiveness of a theory does not mean that it actually sheds light on what it is

most important to understand, if one‘s analysis is to make progress. It is perhaps more

difficult to understand how the analytical power itself, the light of clarity that a theory can

provide, can be a good experience, a seduction, rather than the expression of an insight that is

analytically and theoretically new. The reverse is also true: the fact that a theory has existed

for a long time does not mean that it is automatically out of date or discarded. A theory may

be complex and concentrated, but it may still be a source of reflection and new interpretation.

Like other good texts, it will have strata of meaning, and it will describe and give insight into

complex contexts.


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Ethics and the understanding of the human person

[Picture 12‗What is man?‘ Human present or presence?]

If methodological choices do not concern only the choice of a qualitative or a quantitative

method, experiments, or algorithms that systematize large quantities of data, but also concern

how the individual investigation is carried out and how the qualitative analysis is constructed

and becomes a research project, it is obvious that an investigation can be carried out in a

variety of ways. Research is tentative. There are many academic perspectives and theories that

aim to shed light on the connections in the material, and they contain differing potential to

contribute to new understanding. Theories correspond to questions, but they do not do so

totally, but always within the framework of their own premises. If these premises change, the

strength of the theory as an analytical tool in a concrete working process also changes. In

academic psychosocial work, we focus on complex interactions, on processes that demand

answers with an interdisciplinary foundation. In many ways, theories have a defining role for

various academic traditions. In a society that is constantly changing, the theoretical

discussions too must be on the move, and this means that academic boundaries too are

necessarily provisional. If we know that the intellectual overview is not total, and if we accept

that the narratives can be treacherous, that insights are limited and theories seductive, a

governing principle can be a clear view of the human person that puts up resistance and that

demands answers. The goal must be that the human person remains a full human person with

a dignity of his or her own, even when narratives and theories explain things away, instead of

embracing them. I believe that we must rediscover the interrelatedness in fragments and parts.


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Suggested readings

Boyne, Roy (1990), Foucault and Derrida. The other side of reason, Routledge

Foucault, Michel (1977) Orders of Discourse translated by Robert Swyer, Social

Science Information, 10/2 April. The translation was reprinted with the title The

Discourse on Language in 1972 in The Archaeology of Knowledge, New York:

Pantheon Books. First published in 1971 as L’Ordre du discours, Paris: Gallimard.

London, Jack (1904), The Sea-Wolf, Macmillian

Wilson, Shawn (2008), Research is Cermony. Indigenous Research Methods, Halifax:

Fernwood & Winnipeg Publishing

White, Hayden (1978), Tropics of Discourses. Essays in Cultural Criticism,

Baltimore: The John Hopkins University Press

List of Publications

In Print

Anna Lydia Svalastog (2015c), ―Interpreting Gene Myths in a globalized world‖ (ca. 9.000

words), to be published in Ulrika Mårtensson red. Deliberating Religion, Science and

Progress in the Global Public Sphere NTNU Trondheim, The Netherlands: Numen, Brill

publisher

Anna Lydia Svalastog, chapter in book (2015b) ―Religion och makt‖ [Religion and Power], In

David Thurfjell ed. Varför finns religion?

Anna Lydia Svalastog, chapter in book (2014c): ―Mapping Sami life and culture‖ (size:

9.703 words + 13 illustrations). Anna Lydia Svalastog & Gunlög Fur (ed.) Visions of Sapmi,

Oslo: Arthub Publisher AS.

Published

27. Svalastog Anna Lydia, Maria Damjanovicova (2015a),‖ Society and Bio-objects‖,

Croatian Medical Journal (CMJ) 2014 April CMJ

26. Richard Chenhall, Lucia Martinelli, Janice McLaughlin, Berit Smestad Paulsen, Kate

Senior, Anna Lydia Svalastog, Håkan Tunon, Lars Werdelin, (2014), ―Culture, science and

bioethics: Interdisciplinary understandings of and practices in science, culture and ethics‖,

New Zealand Online Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies. Volume 1 Issue 2, pp. 1-25.

http://www.nzojis.co.nz/

http://www.nzojis.co.nz/


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25. Svalastog, Anna Lydia (2014b), ―On Teachers‘ Education in Sweden, school curriculums,

and the Sámi People‖. In Johan Gärdebo, May-Britt Öhman, Hiroshi Maruyama (ed.)

Re:Mindings. Co-Constituting Indigenous/Academic/Artistic Knowledges. Uppsala

University: Uppsala Multiethnic Papers 55 / The Hugo Valentin Centre. Uppsala 2014,

pp.153-171

http://www.valentin.uu.se/Publications/Publicationsseries/uppsala-multiethnic-

papers/remindings/

24. Svalastog, Anna Lydia (2014a), ―The value of Bio-objects – on bio-objects and policy

discourses in Europe‖, Croatian Medical Journal (CMJ) 2014, April, No.2

http://www.cmj.hr/2014/55/2/24778104.htm

DOI: 10.3325/cmj.2014.55.167

23. Svalastog, Anna Lydia, Joachim Allgaier, Lucia Martinelli and Srecko Gajovic, 2014, ―

Distortion, confusion, and impasses: could a public dialogue within Knowledge Landscapes

contribute to better communication and understanding of innovative knowledge?‖ Croatian

Medical Journal (CMJ) 2014, February, No.1 http://www.cmj.hr/2014/55/1/24577828.htm

DOI: 10.3325/cmj.2014.55.54

22. Svalastog, Anna Lyida and Lucia Martinelli 2013, ―Representing life as opposed to being:

the bio-objectification process of the HeLa cells and its relation to personalized medicine‖

Croatian Medical Journal (CMJ) 2013, August, No.4


DOI:10.3325/cmj.2013.54.397

21. Anna Lydia Svalastog, 2013, ‖Making it Transparent. On Naming, Framing and

Administrating Biobank Research on Native People in Sweden‖ New Genetics and Society

Volum 32, Issue 3 2013:209-242

DOI:10.1080/14636778.2012.760265

20. Anna Lydia Svalastog, 2012, ―Gene Myths in Public Perceptions‖. Public Understanding

of Science, 21(4);478–494,

http://pus.sagepub.com/content/early/2010/09/09/0963662510376284.abstract

DOI:10.1177/0963662510376284

19.Anna Lydia Svalastog, 2012, ―The Sámi are Just Like Everyone Else?‖ A scientist of

religion looks at the encounter between Christian missionary religion and the Sámi ethnic

religion‖. Håkan Tunón, Marit Frändén, Carl-Gösta Ojala & May-Britt Öhman ed. Uppsala

mitt i Sápmi. Rapport från ett symposium arrangerat av Föreningen för samiskrelaterad

forskning i Uppsala, Upplandsmuseet 4–5 maj 2011, Uppsala: CBM:s skriftserie 55:22–27

(3194 words)

http://www.cbm.slu.se/publ/skrift/cbm-skrift55.pdf

18. Anna Lydia Svalastog, 2011, Review: ―Tisa Wenger, We Have a Religion. The 1920

Pueblo Indian Dance Controversy and American Religious Freedom‖. Marburg Journal of

http://www.valentin.uu.se/Publications/Publicationsseries/uppsala-multiethnic-papers/remindings/

http://www.valentin.uu.se/Publications/Publicationsseries/uppsala-multiethnic-papers/remindings/




http://pus.sagepub.com/content/early/2010/09/09/0963662510376284.abstract

http://www.cbm.slu.se/publ/skrift/cbm-skrift55.pdf


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Religion Vol. 16 No 1 http://www.uni-

marburg.de/fb03/ivk/mjr/pdfs/2011/reviews/rev_svalastog_2011.pdf

17. Anna Lydia Svalastog, Stefan Eriksson, 2010, ―You Can Use My Name: You Don´t Have

to Steal My Story—A Critique of Anonymity in Indigenous Studies‖. Developing World

Bioethics Volume 10 Nr 2 2010 p. 104–110.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1471-8847.2010.00276.x/abstract and

DOI:10.1111/j.1471-8847.2010.00276.x

16. Anna Lydia Svalastog, 2009, ―Att analysera och teoretisera kön och religion. Förslag till

nytt religionsbegrepp‖ [Analysing and Theorizing Gender and Religion. Introducing a New

Concept of Religion]. Marburg Journal of Religions, (spring 2009).

http://www.uni-marburg.de/fb03/ivk/mjr/past_issues/2008-2010

15. Michael Pye, Anna Lydia Svalastog, September issue 2007, ―Colonial and Missionary

Perceptions of Sami and Ainu in Sweden and Japan‖. The CSSR [The Council of Societies for

the Study of Religion] bulletin, associate editor Kirstine Munk

http://cohesion.rice.edu/CentersAndInst/CSSR/emplibrary/bull363Cover.pdf

14. Anna Lydia Svalastog, Stefan Jansson, Petter Gustafson, 2006, ―Comparative Analysis of

the Risk-handling Procedures for Gene Technology Applications in Medical and Plant

Science‖. Volume 12, No 3 (July), 2006 Science and Engineering Ethics

http://www.springerlink.com/content/32572425057031g2/

DOI:10.1007/s11948-006-0045-4

13. Anna Lydia Svalastog, 2006: ―Sápmi år 1000. Tiden som försvann‖ [Sápmi, year 1000.

The time that was lost]. Andrea Amft and Mikael Svonni (ed.) SápmiY1K—Livet i samernas

bosättningsområde för 1000 år sedan, Umeå universitet: Sami dutkan, Samiska Studier, Sami

Studies Nr 3. Skriftserie om samernas språk, kultur och samhälle utgiven av Sami dutkan,

Samiska studier vid Umeå universitet, p.115–134.

12. Anna Lydia Svalastog, 2004 ―Sammanhangets betydelse och kontexternas dynamik: Om

riskhantering av genmodifierade växter i Sverige‖ [The Importance of Relations and the

Dynamics of Contexts: On Risk-handling of Genetically Modified Plants in Sweden]. Christer

Nordlund (ed.) Livsföreställningar. Kultur, samhälle och biovetenskap, Kungl. Skytteanska

Samfundet, p.107–130.

11. Anna Lydia Svalastog, 2002 ―Rituella övergrepp—vår kulturs hemliga hjärta? Om rit,

modernitet, kultur och kontextualitet‖ [Ritual Abuse – the Secret Heart of our Culture? On

Rite, Modernity, Culture and Contextuality] Michael Stausberg, Olof Sundqvist and Anna

Lydia Svalastog (red.) Riter och ritteorier. Religionshistoriska diskussioner och teoretiska

ansatser, Nora: Nya Doxa (s.41–83).

―Reflektioner‖, [eight reflections, one for each of the articles in the book], i Michael

Stausberg, Olof Sundqvist & Anna Lydia Svalastog red. Riter och ritteorier.

Religionshistoriska diskussioner och teoretiska ansatser, Nora: Nya Doxa (p.38–40, 84–87,

http://www.uni-marburg.de/fb03/ivk/mjr/pdfs/2011/reviews/rev_svalastog_2011.pdf

http://www.uni-marburg.de/fb03/ivk/mjr/pdfs/2011/reviews/rev_svalastog_2011.pdf

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1471-8847.2010.00276.x/abstract

http://www.uni-marburg.de/fb03/ivk/mjr/past_issues/2008-2010

http://cohesion.rice.edu/CentersAndInst/CSSR/emplibrary/bull363Cover.pdf

http://www.springerlink.com/content/32572425057031g2/


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132–134, 154–156, 216–219, 238–240, 254–256, 264–266).

10. Eva Lundgren & Anna Lydia Svalastog 2001: ―Kapittel 8: Den kontekstuelle kroppen‖;

[Chapter 8: The Contextual Body] ―Kapittel 9: Moderne identitet: betvingende begjær i

kroppen‖; [Chapter 9: Identity and Modernity: The Body‘s Supressing Desire] ―Kapittel 10:

Subjektet—individuelt og relasjonelt‖ [Chapter 10 : The Subject – Individually and

Relationally], Eva Lundgren Ekte kvinne? Identitet på kryss og tvers, Oslo: Pax, p. 212–314

(the last three chapters of the book).

9. Anna Lydia Svalastog,1998b, ―Det var ikke meningen… Om konstruksjon av kjønn ved

abortinngrep, et feministteoretisk bidrag‖, [I Never Meant To … On Abortion, Myth, and the

Construction of Gender. An Empirical Inquiry, and a Feminist Theoretical Contribution]

Uppsala: Uppsala University, 288 pages (monograph).

8. Anna Lydia Svalastog, 1998a: ―Reproduktion och könsdikotomisering. En

problematisering av feministiska teoretiska antaganden rörande kopplingen mellan kroppslig

reproduktion och könsskillnader‖ Reproduction and Gender Dichotomisation. A Discussion

of Feminist Theoretical Assumptions on Bodily Reproduction and Gender Differences],

Kvinnovetenskaplig tidskrift [Nr 1, p.65–72.

7. Anna Lydia Svalastog, 1997c: ―Reproduksjon og kjønnsdikotomisering. Feministteoretiske

antagelser om kroppslig reproduksjon og kjønnsulikheter‖, [Reproduction and Gender

Dichotomisation. Feminist Theoretical Assumptions on Bodily Reproduction and Gender

Differences] Working Paper Series. Kjønnssorter(ing). Forskning om køn och makt. Festskrift

till Professor Eva Lundgren Nr 1, Uppsala: Sociologiska institutionen, p. 139–153.

http://www.soc.uu.se/publications/fulltext/wp01_inn.html

6. Anna Lydia Svalastog,1997b, ―Abortprosessen: kjønnsdikotomisering og konstruksjon av

kroppslighet‖, [The Process of Abortion: Gender Dichotomisation and Embodyment]

Nätverket. Kulturforskning i Uppsala. Tema Genus & heterosexmatrisen Nr 7/8, Uppsala:

Etnologiska avdelningen, Institutionen för Kulturantropologi och Etnologi vid Uppsala

universitet, p. 30–35.

5. Anna Lydia Svalastog,1997a, ―Feministisk myteteori—en kulturanalytisk utfordring‖,

[Feminist Theories of Myth – a Suggestion] Olof Sundqvist and Anna Lydia Svalastog red.

Myter och mytteorier. Religionshistoriska diskussioner och teoretiska ansatser, Uppsala:

Religionshistoriska forskningsrapporter från Uppsala Nr 10, p. 21–54.

4. Anna Lydia Svalastog, 1993, ―Seksualitet som nytelse og seksualitet som reproduksjon.

Om kjønnsdikotomisering og mannlig maktpotensiale‖, [Sexuality and Pleasure, Sexuality

and Reproduction. On Gender Dicotomizing and Male Power Potencial] Nord Nytt Nr 50, p.

30–42.

3. Anna Lydia Svalastog,1991, ―Paraplytrille med parasoll. Om kontekstuell forståelse‖,


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[Qualitative Methodolgy. On Interpretation and Context] Nord Nytt Nr 44, p. 107–112.

2. Anna Lydia Svalastog,1990b, Uppsala: recension, Arne Bugge Amundsens

doktoravhandling [Review] Svenska Kyrkohistoriska Föreningen.

1. Anna Lydia Svalastog, 1990a, «Abort og kjønnsidentitet» [Abortion and Gender Identity] i

Nord Nytt Nr 41, s. 24–36.

Eight Popular Texts and Debate

Centrum för samtidsanalys 2004 http://www.samtidsanalys.nu/PDFer/Riten.pdf

Vårt Land October 5, 2000

Skien Menighetsblad November 4, 1999 (with Borgny Svalastog)

Morgenbladet April 23, & June 11, 1999

Bang nr. 2 1998 (with Stina Jeffner)

Expressen July 2, & September 3, 1998 (with Eva Lundgren & Anna Höglund)

http://www.samtidsanalys.nu/PDFer/Riten.pdf

Treacherous narratives and seductive theories. On methodological challenges in psychosocial academic work.

Documents