An Invitation to Social Construction [Paperback]

Kenneth Gergen's new book, An Invitation to Social Construction (Sage 1999), may be the best introduction to the scholarship on social constructionism available today -- but, that's not all it is. It is also an inspiring and optimistic vision of what we can do to create better lives for ourselves.

To present this vision, Gergen performs the service of a personable tourguide, cutting a path through the jungle of philosophy while making suggestions for action along the way. For example, instead of merely presenting George Lakoff's theory of everyday metaphor, he points to the way Lakoff has shown us that discussions are modeled on war (p.65). Why not, Gergen suggests, find "alternative metaphors"? Why conduct conversation as war? And Gergen does not just present Derrida's deconstructionism. Instead, he says, "Let us put this argument into action" (p.27). Deconstructionism, he explains shows that any direct statement of truth disguises a mountain of ambiguity and uncertainty. So, rather than fear that uncertainty, he tells us, why not embrace it as part of our lives? It need not cripple us, because, as Wittgenstein says, we do not need metaphysical clarity to go on together. Even with our uncertainty we can cut bold and exciting paths to better lives. It is just that our new paths need to be provisional. We will need to be ready to revise them in collaboration with others -- but that is the pleasure.

I would summarize Gergen's general philosophy like this: Beware of authors who would sell you a model of any truth. Any model that presents itself as the simple truth will be deconstructed early tomorrow. However, don't let that discourage you from bold and audacious theorizing. It is the theorizing itself, the excitement, the adventure, the inspiration, the dialogue that will bond us together and create our good future, not the specific content of any particular theory.

Then, in the spirit of his own suggestions, Gergen constructs just such an audacious theory, a theory full of specific yet provisional answers.

First, he suggests, we need to quiet the battles in our personal warzones. To do that we must deconstruct our ideology of individualism. This classical American ideology has us thinking that each person is an island to herself deserving individual credit and individual blame. Individualism undercuts the impulse for dialogue. It shortcircuits the conversational melding and shifting of our individual minds. Individualism makes us forget, against all odds, that every human action is also re-action, and that every reaction is also action. Individualism confines us forever in the tragic culture of mutual blame. Let us replace it then, he advises, with a fresh vision of a collaborative world.

Next, he suggests we stop staring out the back window of our culture with our eyes on the past. I am convinced by Gergen's argument that Foucault was such an author. He was trapped by his eternal resistance to past traditions (p.40), left without sufficient vision to nourish ideas for how to go on. We cannot wipe out these traditons. Our vision for the future must be pieced from the cloth of the past.

In practical terms, as Gergen puts it, this means we should learn to replace individual monologs with transformative dialogues. These are conversations that help us locate "ourselves within each other" (p.160), help us grow comfortable with a continuous revision of our evolving positions (p.162). We should turn to transformative dialogues because it is here that we will find ways to promote the flowering of the not yet said.

I am simply enchanted by all of this, by the dream of a collaborative creation of dialogic culture, a culture in which the unsaid finds ways to be spoken, a culture in which new answers emerge in generative and audacious theorizing showing us paths we have not yet seen and inspiring us with the spirit of doing what has not been done. This is what Gergen's book does for me.

And if these ideas inspire you as well, then Gergen's new book is a key book for you to read.