At the Intersection of Psychosocial and Narrative Criminology: Language, the Unconscious, and Affect in Offenders’ Narratives

Abstract

We usually know precisely what we mean, yet we rarely know why we say it the way we do. That is the question! Since the discovery of the unconscious, psychoanalysis has urged the social sciences to address the tension between language and the unconscious. The structuring of the unconscious like a language and its manifestation in the subject’s speech through symptoms necessitates a psychoanalytic perspective on language’s function as a carrier of unconscious intensities and affects. Criminology and criminal justice are by no means exempt from this tension. This article proposes a careful examination of the unconscious and affects in the criminological analysis of offender discourse: Words and expressions always carry affective charges, and the movement of these charges from one word to another is shaped not only by conscious intention but also by the unconscious. Offenders’ narratives and stories—whether in interrogations, courtrooms, or within the lived realities of street and criminal cultures—function as defense mechanisms shaped by affective investments and displacements. As discursive fragments, these narratives construct offenders’ social realities through psychoanalytic categories, such as fantasy. Affect-laden fantasmatic narratives, as narrative-level manifestations of the ego’s defense mechanisms, may serve to conceal the possible wounds of the self dramaturgically presented by the agent or to transform these wounds into a sublimated narrative. To reveal the offender’s unconscious defense mechanisms, narrative criminological analyses should use psychoanalytically-inflected discourse analysis.

Keywords

• Narratives
• unconscious
• affect
• narrative psychosocial criminology

Psikososyal ve Anlatısal Kriminolojinin Kesişiminde: Fail Anlatılarında Dil, Bilinçdışı ve Duygulanımlar

Abstract

Tam olarak neyi kastettiğimizi biliriz, ancak kastettiğimiz şeyi niçin öyle söylediğimizi bil(e)meyiz. İşte tüm mesele burada! Psikanaliz bilinçdışını keşfettiğinden beri sosyal bilimler dil ve bilinçdışı arasındaki gerilimi çözümlemeye çalışmaktadır. Bilinçdışının dil gibi yapılanıp öznenin dilinde semptomlar aracılığıyla tezahür edişi, dilin bilinçdışı yoğunlukları ve duyguları taşıyıcı işlevine psikanalitik bir bakışı gerektirmektedir. Kriminoloji ve ceza adaleti disiplinleri de bu gerilim ve gereklilikten bağışık değildir. Sözcükler ve ifadeler her daim duygulanımsal yükler içerir ve bir sözcükten diğerine bu yüklerin akışı bilinçdışının etkisi altındadır. Böylece, bu yazı, fail söyleminin kriminolojik çözümlemesinde bilinçdışı duygulanımları dikkatle incelemeyi önermektedir: Faillerin anlatıları ve hikâyeleri, ister sorguda ya da duruşma salonunda ister sokakta veya kriminal faaliyet sahalarında olsun, duygulanımsal yatırımların ve yer değiştirmelerin şekillendirdiği bir savunma mekanizması işlevi görür. Anlatı ve hikâye formunda söylemsel parçalar psikanalitik bir kategori olarak fantazmatik senaryolarla failin sosyal gerçekliğini inşa eder. Duygulanım yüklü fantazmatik anlatıların, benliğin (ego) savunma mekanizmalarının anlatı düzeyindeki tezahürleri olarak, failin dramaturjik biçimde sunduğu kendiliğin (self) olası yaralarını örtme ya da bu yaraları yüceltilmiş bir anlatıya dönüştürme işlevi görebileceğine dikkat edilmelidir. Bu bağlamda, failin bilinçdışı savunma mekanizmasını serimlemek amacıyla anlatısal kriminolojik incelemelerde psikanalitik-çekimli söylem çözümlemesi önerilmektedir.

Keywords

• Anlatılar
• bilinçdışı
• duygulanımlar
• anlatısal psikososyal kriminoloji

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