{"title":"Imaginal dialogue as a method of narrative inquiry","authors":"Nini Fang","doi":"10.1075/ni.18045.fan","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This paper joins the discussions on imaginal dialogue with references to the relational turn in psychoanalysis. It explores imaginal dialogue as a creative, relational endeavour in evoking the unconscious materials. By describing my own imaginal dialogue with Virginia Woolf, it exemplifies the potentiality of reading as an embodied, co-constructed interplay between the reader and the text. The deepening of relational and dialogical engagement with the text not only stirs the affective depth in the reader, but also brings the reader to conjure the presence of the author as an object for relatedness in the process of narrative inquiry. Imaginal dialogue transgresses beyond the poststructuralist allowance of interpretive pluralism to relational processes of working with the encounters with the presence of the author as their imaginary co-inquirer. Imaginal dialogue, I argue, not only provides an alternative kind of narrative framing, but the imaginal relationship becomes the very locus of knowledge creation.","PeriodicalId":46671,"journal":{"name":"Narrative Inquiry","volume":"30 1","pages":"41-58"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9000,"publicationDate":"2020-03-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"2","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Narrative Inquiry","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1075/ni.18045.fan","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"COMMUNICATION","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 2
Abstract
Abstract This paper joins the discussions on imaginal dialogue with references to the relational turn in psychoanalysis. It explores imaginal dialogue as a creative, relational endeavour in evoking the unconscious materials. By describing my own imaginal dialogue with Virginia Woolf, it exemplifies the potentiality of reading as an embodied, co-constructed interplay between the reader and the text. The deepening of relational and dialogical engagement with the text not only stirs the affective depth in the reader, but also brings the reader to conjure the presence of the author as an object for relatedness in the process of narrative inquiry. Imaginal dialogue transgresses beyond the poststructuralist allowance of interpretive pluralism to relational processes of working with the encounters with the presence of the author as their imaginary co-inquirer. Imaginal dialogue, I argue, not only provides an alternative kind of narrative framing, but the imaginal relationship becomes the very locus of knowledge creation.
期刊介绍:
Narrative Inquiry is devoted to providing a forum for theoretical, empirical, and methodological work on narrative. Articles appearing in Narrative Inquiry draw upon a variety of approaches and methodologies in the study of narrative as a way to give contour to experience, tradition, and values to next generations. Particular emphasis is placed on theoretical approaches to narrative and the analysis of narratives in human interaction, including those practiced by researchers in psychology, linguistics and related disciplines.