THE NECESSITY OF PERSONHOOD AS EMBODIED BEING

The ontology presupposed in discursive psychology takes persons to be originating centres of activity. Since they are ontologically elementa ry they have no internal psychological complexity. As with the element ary charges and poles that ground the ontology of physics, they are sp ecified wholly in terms of their dispositions and powers. A second imp ortant feature of the social constructionist strain in discursive psyc hology is the thesis that cognitive processes are properties of discou rses, and hence have their primary mode of being in interpersonal symb olic interactions. Persons are singularities and each has its unique a ttributes. Singularity of personhood is tied up with singularity of em bodiment, deeply involved in the human sense of self. In a similar man ner the discursive thesis that emotion displays are embodied expressio ns of judgements also brings the fact of embodiment to the centre of p sychological theory. These considerations dispose of the greater part of Fisher's (1995) criticisms of the discursive/constructionist positi on. We are embodied beings and the rules of discourses are not arbitra ry.