The embedded self

i and thou revisited

Ruthellen Josselson

pp. 91-106

in: Daniel K. Lapsley, F. C. Power (eds), Self, ego, and identity, Berlin, Springer, 1988

Abstract

Psychoanalytic developmental theory takes as its premise that the central thrust of human development is movement from a state of dependence and merger to a state of independent, differentiated selfhood. When we think about the self, or identity, we are inclined to envision a person standing alone, somehow being what he or she is, apart from all others. Our quest as theorists has similarly been for a conceptualization of selfhood as a purely internal function, as though one can have selfhood, or identity, independent from embeddedness in a social matrix.