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 CONTENTS

About the author vi

Preface vii
Acknowledgements x

Part One Theory 1

1 Discursive psychology 3

2 DP and other forms of discourse analysis 31

Part Two Methods 59

3 Developing a research question 61

4 Data collection and management 73

5 Transcribing and coding data 89

6 Analysing data using DP 113

7 Discursive devices 146

8 Writing up and presenting DP analyses 177

Part Three Applications 195

9 DP topics, case studies and project ideas 197

10 Applications and future developments 221

FAQs 232
Glossary 241
References 249
Index 266
 ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Sally Wiggins is a senior lecturer in psychology at the Department of Behavioural

Sciences and Learning, Linköping University, Sweden. Previously, she was based in
the School of Psychological Sciences and Health, University of Strathclyde, Scotland,
for 12 years. She has co-edited two books (Critical Bodies and Discursive Research in
Practice) and written numerous book chapters and journal articles featuring discursive
psychology as the analytical approach. Her research focuses on the social interactional
processes around eating, particularly during family mealtimes. This work has begun to
examine the ways in which appetite, food preferences and gustatory pleasure/disgust
are enacted and consequential for children and parents in everyday mealtime situations.
 PREFACE

The aim of this book is to demystify discursive psychology (DP): from the theoretical
principles on which it is based, to the method of how to ‘do’ DP and use it in different
ways. It is designed to be a practical and accessible guide, cutting through difficult the-
ory and providing a clear account of the analytic processes. It offers basic starting points
and discusses more advanced issues. It is therefore aimed at students and researchers at
all levels, from undergraduate through to postgraduate and beyond. It will provide the
scaffolding as you develop your understanding and skills, and allow you to progress at
your own speed. There will be activities along the way, to help you practise on your own.
DP should not be regarded as difficult or for expert researchers. With a little time and
care, anyone can use discursive psychology.

The politics of writing a book

I write this book as someone who has been involved in the field of discursive psychology
for some time. I am not so established as to have been there at the very start, nor am I
so fresh as to not be aware of the political manoeuvring and pot shots from critics in all
directions during the intervening years. I was fortunate enough to undertake my doctoral
research under the supervision of Jonathan Potter at Loughborough, with Charles Antaki,
Mick Billig, Derek Edwards and many others just an office away. I have also been, and
continue to be, inspired and supported by many others in discursive and interactional
research across the world. I do not consider myself to be particularly politically moti-
vated. Those who know me would be hard-pushed to define me as radical. And yet this
book feels like something of a political argument. I have witnessed the various criticisms
from many angles: from cognitive psychologists who do not consider discursive work
to be anything more than ‘just talk’ and subjective interpretation, to phenomenologists
who argue that we are missing the very nature of what it means to be human, to other
discourse analysts who argue that we are neglecting the big issues and have been hood-
winked by the conversation analysts, and finally to conversation analysts, who wonder
why we aren’t doing CA when we’re almost there anyway.
My stance is that while I have endeavoured to be even-handed in my treatment of
various issues, I have also aimed to provide a clear and practical guide to DP research, to
enable it to continue to flourish and develop. This means that I am fairly prescriptive in
places: I have erred on the side of being specific and detailed to provide the ‘scaffolding’
which I mention in the book. Some readers may find it too prescriptive. They may be
disheartened at the inclusion of the stages of analysis of DP, for example, as set out in
Chapter 6. They risk turning DP into a formula, restricting creativity and synthesis across
 Preface

different forms of discourse analysis. They also possibly undermine the skilled way in
which established researchers can read a short extract of data and produce a brilliant
and eloquent analysis, while the rest of us are still figuring out what all the transcription
symbols mean. So yes, there is a risk. But I think it a risk worth taking. We need some
scaffolding to support new researchers – whether undergraduate students with one class
on discourse analysis or postdoctoral researchers tasked with the discursive analysis of
six months’ worth of data – to ensure the growth and development of work in this area.
Politics also bubble under the surface of the data examples I use throughout the book.
These are infused by my own research interests in eating practices and family mealtimes.
It is my book, after all. But it might seem that using examples from family mealtimes are
trivial or banal, that they don’t really tackle the important things, like inequalities, pov-
erty, conflict, prejudice, death and illness. Or perhaps worse, that these kinds of issues
are inherent in food and eating, and yet still I ignore or gloss over these and focus instead
on the features of mundane interaction. But perhaps food and eating is in some ways
more fundamental than any of those; that if we don’t eat, nothing else is possible. So yes,
family mealtimes are just one small aspect of life, and no, we don’t all have children. But
we all start out as children and we all need to eat. And for those reasons alone, I think it
worth researching.

How to use this book

The book is in three parts: the first deals with the theoretical side of DP and how it stands
in relation to four other discourse analytical approaches. This should give you an under-
standing of what DP is ‘about’ and when you might use it. The second part deals with the
practical aspects of DP: how to actually do it, from the stages of deciding on a research
question, to collecting and analysing data, and to presenting your work in different for-
mats. The third part provides some ‘what next’ issues; inspiration from some of the early
and contemporary work in DP, as well as some ways in which we might consider the
application of either theory or practice.
Each chapter stands alone as a complete unit, so you can dip in and out, in any order.
It may be that you only need guidance on understanding the different forms of discourse
analysis, so Chapter 2 will show you how these differ both theoretically and in terms of
analysing data. Or you may have been given some data extracts to analyse using DP for
an assignment, and so Chapter 6 will help you there. Chapter 1 provides the main theo-
retical and conceptual structure of DP, so that will help you to make sense of the rest of
the book, but it can be challenging in places if you are new to some of these concepts.
You might find it useful to skim through Chapter 1, then come back to it again once
you’ve had a chance to work through some of the practical chapters in Part 2 of the book.
Remember, becoming confident and competent with DP is a skill and it won’t happen
overnight. You need to spend a little time working through some of the core principles of

viii
 Preface

DP and applying these in practice. Then, once you’ve done that, you might find yourself
wanting to dig a little deeper into some of the issues raised by Chapter 1.
Throughout the book, references within the text have been kept to a minimum. This
was a deliberate move, to keep the text uncluttered and to avoid overwhelming you
with names and dates. In terms of learning, I tend to argue that less is more; I have
given a couple of references at the end of each chapter, and a few scattered throughout.
You will, however, find a whole heap of references in Chapter 9, where I overview DP
research in different areas.
The book contains features to help you apply the theory and methods to your own
research, whether you have just one lecture on DP and don’t ‘get it’, a coursework
assignment to do by this time last Tuesday, or your dream PhD project. There are boxes
throughout each chapter which provide: discussion points on key issues, checklists,
brief activities, hints and tips, and student reflections. There is a glossary at the end of
the book, covering a range of key concepts and ideas in discursive research to help you
to learn the jargon. There is also a FAQ (frequently asked questions) section providing
suggested responses to some of the questions that you (or your colleagues) may have
about DP.
The book is assisted at various points by a short piece of family mealtime data, which
was recorded especially for the purposes of teaching students about DP. The full video
clip (around four minutes) can be accessed at: www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtKaXw-
6WqYM. It is used in Chapter 2 to demonstrate the difference between five forms of
discourse analysis, in Chapter 5 to illustrate the transcription process, and Chapter 6 to
provide a worked example of DP analyses. You might use it to practise your own tran-
scription, coding and analysis skills, or practise using the discursive devices in Chapter 7.
Most of all, have fun. There are few approaches that we can so readily apply to our
own lives, to practise while we’re listening to other people or engaged in social interac-
tion. Let’s see how far we can go.

ix
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

To those who, like me, always read the acknowledgements page first, here is a glimpse
into the machinery behind this book. It is, in many ways, the culmination of around
20 years of being immersed in discursive psychology (DP) research and teaching. I was
introduced to DP by Nick Hopkins in my final year as an undergraduate psychology stu-
dent at the University of Dundee. I still have my set texts for that class (Billig, 1987, and
Potter & Wetherell, 1987; bought for £13.95 each in October 1996 at Blackwell’s book-
shop on campus), with notes scribbled enthusiastically (pencil, of course) in the margins.
So those of you who are still studying, keep your mind open and be kind to your tutors.
You never know where new ideas will take you. My thanks therefore go first to my main
tutors in DP: Nick Hopkins, Jonathan Potter and Derek Edwards. There are many others
who helped along the way.
Thanks to those who helped to make this book happen:
To Michael Carmichael for getting me started on this adventure and to Luke Block
and Lucy Dang for seeing me through to the end. Your encouragement, unwavering con-
fidence and patience were like good coffee; they kept me focused and made me want to
write. You also have three of the coolest names in publishing.
To those who provided guidance, FAQ suggestions or support: Adrian Coyle, Stephen
Gibson, Gillian Hendry, Emily Hofstetter, Judith Horne, Bogdana Humǎ, Ryan Kelly,
Eric Laurier, Jessica Lester, Abi Locke, Clare MacMartin, Robert McQuade, Jane
Montague, Jonathan Potter, Sarah Riley, Sarah Seymour-Smith, Liz Stokoe, Margie
Wetherell and Sue Widdicombe. Stephen Gibson, Clare MacMartin and Sarah Riley
deserve particularly fond thanks for their detailed and critical comments on some of the
draft chapters. You improved the book in many ways, though any remaining flaws are,
of course, my own.
To the Scottish family who so kindly offered to record their meal and let me use the
video as ‘data’ for the book, may your food always fire your rockets.
To all the undergraduate and postgraduate students who I have tutored over the years,
I hope I made some sense. To those who really ‘got’ DP and, even better, were as excited
about it as I am: you made it all worthwhile.
And so to home. I wrote most of this book into the night at my beloved writing bureau.
Thanks to Kate Bush, First Aid Kit, Florence & the Machine and London Grammar for
the soundtrack, and to Lucy for sleeping by my feet and taking me for walks. To Mum
and Dad, for providing an unexpected writing retreat in my old bedroom and for the
many, many times that you cared for me when I needed to rest, and cared for the boys
and dog when I needed to write. To Phil and my extended family, for all your support
and for coping very well despite having an academic in the family. To Beth and Rach, for
showing me that every obstacle can seem daunting at first, but that we can do amazing
 Acknowledgements

things when we help each other. To Angus and Callum, for filling my days with love
and laughter, the comfort of daily routines and a good excuse to always bake. You’re
both still the most enjoyable projects I’ve ever undertaken, and the best reasons I have
for doing anything. Sorry for hogging the my laptop and working so often. This book is
proof that I wasn’t watching Minecraft videos on YouTube, as you may have suspected.
To H, for all and everything. Thank you for always believing in me. It is time for new
adventures now.

xi
PART ONE
Theory
 1
DISCURSIVE PSYCHOLOGY

Chapter contents
What is discursive psychology? 4
What discursive psychology is not 6
Core principles of discursive psychology 8
What inspired discursive psychology? (The backstory) 16
From there to here: how discursive psychology emerged
and developed 23
The ‘difficult relationship’ between discursive and cognitivist
psychology 28

Discursive psychology (DP) is one of the most vibrant and exciting approaches to emerge
within the social sciences in the past thirty years. It provides a lens through which we
can examine the social world, to render visible the social practices through which people
and their practices are made accountable and factual. It enables us to make sense of talk
and text, of the activities that we are engaged in whenever we are interacting with other
people. It captures the moments in which psychology is produced and made consequential
in the social world. As such, not only does it offer a radical re-working of psychological
concepts, it also holds enormous potential for applied research (indeed, it has been argued
that it is, by its nature, already applied; see Chapter 10). This chapter will introduce you
to the basic underlying principles of DP: what it is, what it isn’t, what inspired it, how
it developed, and how it contrasts with cognitivist approaches within psychology. It will
distil the core arguments of DP to provide you with a clear, practical way to get to grips
with DP whether you are completely new to this field or building your analytical skills.
There are, however, two things that you need to know before you proceed. First,
the theoretical arguments and principles that underpin DP are intellectually challenging;
they require us to think and reflect on what we are studying, and why we are studying it.
There will be ideas that challenge what we know about talk, about cognition, and indeed
about reality. So yes, you will need to work hard. And yes, it might change you. You
 Discursive Psychology: Theory, Method and Applications

might never consider talk and interaction in the same way again. Second, there will be
arguments, critiques and political rhetoric. This is a feisty and dynamic area of research
to be in. Like any approach that challenges the mainstream, there are vehement critics of
DP, and this is before you even consider the academic wrangling that goes on within the
field of discourse analysis. As my Dad always says, it would be a dull world if we were
all the same. So all this debate makes for a rather exciting and interesting place to be.

What is discursive psychology?

Let us begin, then, with the basics, and start with a definition:

Discursive psychology is a theoretical and analytical approach to discourse

which treats talk and text as an object of study in itself, and psychological
concepts as socially managed and consequential in interaction.

The version of DP that is the focus of this book was developed by Derek Edwards and
Jonathan Potter, at Loughborough University in the UK, following from earlier work
developed with Margaret Wetherell. It treats talk and text as, first and foremost, part of
social practices rather than as a reflection of inner cognitive processes. It treats discourse
as doing things in interaction and examines the ways in which psychological concepts
are produced and made consequential in interaction.
DP is a form of discourse analysis, and as such is part of a much broader framework
of approaches for understanding discourse (see Chapter 2). It is interdisciplinary, cut-
ting across disciplinary boundaries (such as between psychology and linguistics) and
within subject boundaries (such as between the topics of memory and attributions in
psychological research). As such, it is predominantly a qualitative approach, in that it
analyses words, but is not against quantification. It does, however, challenge the notion
that psychological practices can be reduced to numbers. In this sense, it is more akin to
a methodology than a method: a programme of work (Edwards, 2012) or a meta-theory
(Edwards & Potter, 1992; see also Potter, 2003). There are a set of core principles that
underpin the approach DP takes to research and analysis, and when we use DP we need
to embrace both the theoretical assumptions and the methods of doing research. This
means that it cannot be taken ‘off the shelf’ as just another way of analysing discursive
data, but it also means that it is a coherent, theoretically grounded, and rigorous approach
to research.
DP is concerned with psychological issues, but psychology as it is lived by people
in everyday life – for example, how people make the minds, identities or emotions of
others relevant in interaction – by their practices and social interactions rather than
their individual thoughts or experiences. It therefore starts with social practices rather
than psychological states. Psychological concepts become the object of study, not the

4
 Discursive Psychology

framework that determines theory and analysis. So a psychological concept such as

‘attitudes’ or ‘food preference’ is not treated a priori as a fact; instead, the focus is on
how this concept is described, invoked and consequential for social interaction. DP
does not try to ‘get inside’ people’s minds or attempt to understand their motivations or
attitudes. This is a subtle but important difference. Like other psychological concepts,
the issue of cognition is treated as an analytical object (something we study without
first making assumptions about what it is) rather than an analytical framework (some-
thing we make assumptions about and which then directs what we study).
Let us consider an example to illustrate what DP is and why we might use it. The short
extract below represents a brief section of conversation between a boy (Joseph) and his
Mum at the family dinner table. Some of the family members have finished eating, but
Joseph still has quite a lot of food on his plate. The transcript here is presented in turn-
by-turn order (as you will see later in the book) but is simplified to make it easier to read:

Mum: could you eat a bit more Joseph please, instead of staring into space
Joseph: no, I don’t like it
Mum: a little bit more if you don’t mind
Joseph: no ((shakes head))

There are many ways in which we might approach this piece of interaction, to under-
stand what is going on between the mother and her son. We might try to figure out why
Mum is asking her son to eat more; perhaps she is concerned that he is not eating enough
or she may be trying to avoid wasting food. We might also approach it from Joseph’s
point of view: why does he not like it? Is there another reason that he does not feel like
eating it? Alternatively, we might look more broadly at the cultural conventions that
determine how food is eaten in a particular way, with family members sitting round a
dinner table, and with it being normative that a mother (or parent) is in part responsible
for how much, and what, a child eats.
In each of these possible interpretations, we would be making assumptions about
what people are thinking or feeling, or about the existence of cultural norms that shape
how we eat. These interpretations are potentially limitless, and hard to evidence from the
basis of a single piece of conversation. In contrast, DP focuses attention on the social
interaction at just this point in time: on what actions are being performed (requests to
eat more food, refusals) as well as the psychological business that is being managed
(Joseph’s appetite and his food preferences, as well as Mum’s authority to ask him to eat
more food). For example, what is being accomplished when Joseph says ‘I don’t like it’,
as an addition to the ‘no’? We do not have to look ‘behind’ the words to find out what
is going on here. We can examine the interaction as a piece of interaction, in a specific
context, and as consequential for the people therein. In this case, it is what gets eaten,
and who is held accountable for not eating food. As we will see later, there are problems