doing things. The key to culture is that it is a set of doxomeres that are available to all the children who grow up in a certain community, that is segregated from other child-rearing communities by space, language, or social barriers. We might call them demodoxas, meaning the opinions of a people, or peopleways. The key to identity is that it is who we act like, the projected image for reflection on our values and how we got them and continue to hold them. This could be illustrated by calling it our idiomorph, or selfshape when we think of ourself, or when we apply it so someone else, heteromorph or othershape. This is of course a reification; identity does not exist. More useful is the verb, to identify. The unconscious activity is a reference to previous experiences of a situation, in which we or someone who has an emotional loading in our minds faced a similar dilemma. What we do is to ask ourselves (consciously or unconsciously) the question: who should I behave like, and what would they choose to do? We can call this idioparathesis (putting oneself alongside), or self-likening. Why this will not happen This account has treated three words very commonly used in the humanities and nominated replacements. There is, however, no expectation that usage will change as a result. There are several reasons for this. First, the Greek-based alternatives do not resonate with historic learning for most people, so they are unlikely to associate these words with a respected source carrying a positive SM, but rather find it dissonant and excluding, bringing a negative SM. Second, a word survives if it serves the purposes of communication between people, for which it must be understood by both interlocutors, and it must have a wide enough currency to become habitual. This requires that words can only arise within an adequate discursive community. Third, it must bring satisfaction (a positive SM) to each party, which will happen only if there is a positive association such as a sense that in using the word they have ‘got it right’. And finally, we have an inbuilt conservative emotion, referred to as ‘truth’, which ensures that language continues to convey standard meaning over time, without which it could not be used to convey meanings. This can sometimes be countered by a love of neologisms. The aim: a discourse of method The real aim of this article, if not a revolution in the language of psychology, is to redirect emphasis from content to process in the hopes of encouraging original thought in the area of Culture, Identity and Values, to enrich our teaching and our students’ learning. Continued overleaf International Schools Journal Vol XXXII No.2 April 2013
ISJApr2013pages.indd 13
13 28/03/2013 16:02