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After finishing my Ph.D. at Temple University in social psychology, I worked as a psychological consultant for AT&T on their longitudinal study of managers' lives. I began my career at Penn State, Brandywine in 1984 in Psychology and Women's Studies. My intellectual focus originates at the intersection of social psychology, feminist theory, and social constructionist ideas. I have worked on gender issues, primarily using narrative methods. My most recent book, Social Construction, was written with Kenneth J. Gergen www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/kgergen1/ (Taos Institute Publishing, 2004), and we have also edited Social Construction, A Reader (Sage, 2003). My feminist theory books include Feminist Reconstructions in Psychology: Narrative, Gender, & Performance (Sage, 2001), as well as an edited volume with Sara N. Davis, Toward a New Psychology of Gender, (Routledge, 1997). I have been innovating with forms of performative psychology, which involves dramatic presentations as a way of doing social science. I teach a variety of subjects in psychology, including Introductory Psychology, Social Psychology, and Personal Adjustment and Mental Health. In all of my classes students are required to do Action Assignments, which are activities that take them out into the community, where they apply what they are learning in the classroom to practical situations. I am also a great believer in open discussions, group projects and a high level of student-teacher interactions.
Outside Penn State, I travel internationally to give lectures and workshops, and I am often involved on examination committees and as an external examiner for Ph.D. theses from many countries. I am a founder of the Taos Institute, a non-profit organization dedicated to the development of social constructionist ideas within diverse practice areas, including therapy, organizational consulting, and education. Our website is http://www.taosinstitute.net/ I am also a co-creator of a website dedicated to positive aging. Our website is http://www.healthandage.com/ (see newsletter area).
Selected Publications:
Feminist Psychology. Entry for the Encyclopedia of Psychology, Alan E. Kazdin (Ed.). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association (2000).
The new aging: Self construction and social values. In K.W. Schaie (Ed.) Social Structures and Aging. New York: Springer Publishing. (with K.J. Gergen) (in press, 2000).
Qualitative Inquiry: Tensions and transformations. In N. Denzin & Y. Lincoln (Eds.). Handbook of Qualitative Research, 2nd Edition. (with K.J. Gergen). (in press, 2000. pp. 1025-1046).
Innovative methods: Resources for research, teaching and publishing. Psychology of Women Quarterly. 1999, 23, 431-456. (with Joan C. Chrisler & Alice LoCicero).
What is this thing called love? Emotional scenarios in historical perspective. Journal of Narrative and Life History, 1995, 5, 221-238. (with K. J. Gergen).
Free Will and psychotherapy: Complaints of the draughtsmen’s daughters. Journal of Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology, 1994, 14, 13-24.
Epistemology, gender, and history: Positioning the Lenses of Gender. Psychological Inquiry.1994, 5, 86-92.
Narratives of the gendered body in the popular autobiography. In R. Josselson & A. Lieblich (Eds.). The Narrative Study of Lives. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1993, (pp. 191-218). (with K.J. Gergen).
Life stories: Pieces of a dream. In G. Rosenwald & R. Ochberg (Eds.). Storied Lives , New Haven: Yale University Press. 1992, pp. 127-144. Reprinted in M. Gergen & S. Davis (Eds.), 1997, New York: Routledge.
Broken hearts or broken bonds: Love and death in historical perspective. American Psychologist 1992, 47, 1205-1212. ( With M. Stroebe, K. Gergen, & W. Stroebe).
Finished at forty: Women’s development within the patriarchy. Psychology of Women Quarterly. 1990, 14, 451-470.
From mod masculinity to post-mod macho: A feminist re-play. The Humanist Psychologist.1990, 18, 95-104.
Talking about menopause: A dialogic analysis. In L.E. Thomas (Ed.) Research on adulthood and aging: The human sciences approach . Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 1989. (pp. 65-87).
Towards a feminist methodology. In M. Gergen (Ed.) Feminist Thought and the Structure of Knowledge. New York: New York University Press, 1988. (pp. 87-104).
Narrative structures in social explanation. In C. Antaki (Ed.) Analysing lay explanation: A casebook of methods . Beverly Hills, CA: Sage, 1988.(pp. 94-112).
Narrative and the self as relationship. In L. Berkowitz (Ed.) Advances in experimental social psychology . San Diego: Academic Press, 1988. (with K.J. Gergen). (pp.17-56).
Narrative form and the construction of psychological science. In T.R. Sarbin (Ed .) Narrative psychology: The storied nature of human conduct. New York: Praeger, 1986, (with K.J. Gergen). (pp. 22-44).
The discourse of control and the maintenance of well-being. In M. Baltes & P. Baltes (Eds.) Aging and control . Hillsdale, N.J: Erlbaum, 1986 (with K.J, Gergen). (pp. 119-137).
Books:
Feminist Reconstructions in Psychology: Narrative, Gender and Performance , Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2000.
Toward a New Psycholgy of Gender, New York: Routledge, 1997. (with Sara N. Davis).
Statistics: A Conceptual Approach. New York: Springer-Verlag. 1997. ( with Gudmund Iversen, who is first author)
Psychology: A Beginning , San Diego: Harcourt, Brace & Jovanovich,
1989. (M. Gergen, first author, with J. Suls, R. Rosnow, & R. Lana).
Feminist Thought and the Structure of Knowledge (Ed.).(1988). New York:
NYU Press. Translated into Portuguese, O pensamento feminista e a estrutura do conhecimento. Rio de Janiero: Editora Rosa dos Tempos, 1993.
Historical Social Psychology . Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, 1984.
(edited with K.J. Gergen).
Social Psychology . New York: Harcourt, Brace & Jovanovich, 1981
(with K.J. Gergen, first author). Second Edition, New York: Springer-Verlag, 1986. Translated into French, Italian, and Spanish. Psychologie Sociale, Editions Vivant, revised 2nd edition, (with S. Juras). 1992.
Performative Psychology Pieces:
"All the Gold in Fort Knox,"
Symposium: Perforative Psychology V. American Psychological Association, Boston, MA, Aug. 16-20, 1999.
"Woman as Spectacle,"
Kongress fur Klinische Psychologie. "Lust und Last," Berlin, Feb. 15-20, 1999.
Arts Bank Theater on South Street, Philadelphia, PA March 1998.
Penn State Faculty Forum, January 1999.
"Creating Culture: A Dialogic Demonstration," Co-presenter K.J. Gergen.
Symposium: Performative Psychology III. American Psychological Association, Chicago, IL, Aug. 15-19, 1997.
"Relationalia: A Hyperlogue" Co-presentation with K.J. Gergen.
Presentations at:
Western Speech Communications Association Meetings, Monterey, CA Feb.15-19, 1997.
Constructionnisme Social, Resonances et Postmodernisme. Conference organized by l’Institut d’Etudes de la Famille et des Systemes Humains. Brussels, Belgium, May, 1997.
First International Convention on Family Therapy. University of Athens, Athens, Greece, July 3-7, 1996
Refiguring the Human Sciences: New Practices of Inquiry. A Project on Rhetoric of Inquiry Symposium. University of Iowa, Iowa City, June 22-24, 1995.
Understanding the Social World, Towards an integrative approach. Huddersfield University, England, July 17-19, 1995
"Corpo-(un)reality; Embodied Specie-ous",
Presentation at Performative Psychology I, Symposium at the American Psychological Association Meetings, New York City, August, 1995.
" Skipping Stone on a pond: Feminism, postmodernism and psychology"
Social Construction, Culture, and the Politics of Social Identity. The New School of Social Research, Dept. of Psychology, New York City, April, 1995.
"Performative Psychology", Co-presentations with KJ Gergen.
Discourse and the Construction of Knowledge Conference, Adelaide, Australia. Feb., 1996.
"Dialogic processes and the creation of selves".
Department of Psychology, Rutgers University, March, 1992 (with K. J. Gergen as co-symposiast, doing original performative psychology pieces on the production of selves)
"From mod masculinity to post-mod macho: A feminist re-play."
Symposium: Postmodernity and Psychology. Center for Kvalitativ Metodeudvikling, University of Arhus, Denmark, June, 1989.
Personal InformationGrowing up in Minnesota, I chose to go to the “U” where I received my B.S. in English, and Education, with a minor in speech and theatre. My proudest moment in college was being elected to Phi Beta Kappa. As a Delta Gamma, I have fond memories of playing touch football against the Thetas, something that was later admonished by the alumni board as unlady-like, and being chosen as a Homecoming princess, complete with convertible parade through downtown Minneapolis. I also received an M.S. in Educational Psychology, with a specialization in counseling at the University of Minnesota. Later I moved to the Boston area and worked at Harvard University as a research assistant. It was quite exciting to work in William James Hall, where the names on the office directory were the who’s who of the Social Sciences at that time. In 1969 after a year in Rome, my husband, Ken, and I moved with children, to the Swarthmore area. In following years we spent sabbaticals (his and mine) in Kyoto, Japan, Paris, Heidelberg, and The Netherlands. Summers we also traveled to many countries around the world. When I'm not sitting at the computer, teaching or doing other intellectual work, I like to go to plays, movies, and art shows, read the newspaper, have good conversations, go out with my husband, entertain family and friends, and play -- both rule-bound games, especially tennis and golf, and less organized ones, including those that involve dogs and grandchildren
