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A Methodology for Accessing the Pre-conscious: Obstacles to Senior Women’s

Career Progression

Sadiya Akram

University of Canberra

Contributor Biography

Dr. Sadiya Akram is a Post-doctoral Research Fellow at ANZSIG, University of

Canberra. Her research interests include theories and methodologies of agency and, in

particular, the neglect of the pre-conscious as a characteristic of agency. She also has

research interests in the socio-political theory of Pierre Bourdieu; feminism and

alternative modes of political participation.

Relevant disciplines

Anthropology, Political Science, Sociology

Academic levels

Introductory Undergraduate, Intermediate Undergraduate, Advanced Undergraduate,

Postgraduate

Methods used

Life-history interviews; documenting repression and the dialogic unconscious;

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critical discourse analysis

Keywords

Pre-conscious; unconscious bias; gender; women; obstacles to career

progression; repression, silence, absence; critical discourse analysis

Link to research output

DOI: 10.1111/jtsb.12002

Akram, S. (2012). Fully Unconscious and Prone to Habit: The Characteristics of

Agency in the Structure and Agency Dialectic. Journal for the Theory of Social

Behaviour. 43 (1). 45-65.

Abstract

The methodology to access the pre-conscious discussed in this case study originates

in research which was concerned with highlighting the neglect of the pre-conscious as

a characteristic of agency or people. Through a critique of existing conceptions of

agency in the social sciences, I argue that there is an over-emphasis on characteristics

of agency such as reflexivity and conscious deliberation and a concomitant neglect of

the pre-conscious. Inclusion of the pre-conscious enables recognition that agency

contains depth and complexity and that, whilst agents are often fully conscious and

deliberate in their behaviour, their actions may also be the result of pre-conscious

motivations and the impact of social structures on their pre-conscious.

This case study outlines a methodology based on life-history interviews for accessing

the pre-conscious and examines the particular challenges involved in documenting

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this elusive aspect of agency. This methodology is explored in the context of research

on unconscious bias which is argued to be a key factor which perpetuates gender

inequality in the workplace. ‘Unconscious’ bias refers to the same aspect of agency as

does my notion of the pre-conscious, but the latter term is preferred because it

distinguishes the idea from psychoanalysis’ notion of the unconscious; a very

different concept. It is argued that this literature on unconscious bias in the workplace

doesn’t adequately discuss the aspects of agency involved in this process, or

acknowledge the particular methodological challenges involved in accessing the pre-

conscious. The methodology developed here draws on primary research conducted

with men and women about their perceptions of gender in the workplace in a private

sector organisation called Axis.

Learning Outcomes

• After reading this case study, students will be able to understand and

implement a methodology for accessing the pre-conscious.

• After reading this case study, students will be able to understand the centrality

of life-history interview method to this methodology.

• After reading this case study, students will be able to understand the challenge

of moving beyond what is said in an interview situation, to documenting the

silences, the nearly-said and the absences in an interview.

• After reading this case study, students will be able to understand and use the

set of tools developed by Michael Billig for documenting repression, silence

and absence in an interview.

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• After reading this case study, students will be able to gain an understanding of

Norman Fairclough’s critical discourse analysis as a methodological,

theoretical and political tool, to assist us when documenting the pre-conscious.

Project Overview and Context

Recent decades have seen many make the intellectual, legal and business case for

gender equality in the workplace. Furthermore, these changes have been

institutionalised and there is recognition of the need to address decades of gender

discrimination, through measures such as gender performance targets, gender quotas

and workplace flexibility. Yet, despite all of these positive developments, women

continue to be significantly under-represented in senior positions in the workplace.

The argument that gender parity in the workplace will take time, as the ‘trickle down’

effect takes it course, is unhelpful, given the slow pace of change. It is unlikely that

organisations today would overtly discriminate against, or place a conscious block, on

women’s progression into senior ranks, so how do we explain the gender gap? One

possible explanation, that is gaining increasing attention in the literature, is that

gender discrimination is deeply embedded in society and operates at a systemic

cultural level, which is transmitted through unconscious bias. Accordingly,

perpetrators of the bias are often unaware that they are engaging in discriminatory

practices. As such, whilst society has made significant progress in tackling

discrimination at an overt infrastructure level, gender inequality continues to be

expressed through culture, attitudes and perceptions.

The existence of unconscious bias as a key obstacle to senior women’s career

progression has been noted in a range of studies (Anna Genat et al., Meredith

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Edwards et al., Emma Lo Russo, Catalyst, Ernst & Young and Mckinsey &

Company). Despite the widespread acceptance of ‘unconscious bias’, the concept is

often poorly defined and, in particular, rests on the implicit assumption that people

have the capacity to affect outcomes pre-consciously, without acknowledging that a

notion of the pre-conscious, as an aspect of agency, is largely absent in the social

sciences. In turn, scarce attention has been paid to developing methodological

strategies for accessing the pre-conscious.

In the next section, I discuss the methodologies used by the literature on unconscious

bias, and suggest that it pays little, if any, attention to the fact that unconscious bias

may be difficult to uncover. Indeed, it would appear that, in this literature,

unconscious bias is uncovered through direct questioning about individuals’

understandings of statements about gender roles. As such, the finding that

unconscious bias exists is less about agents having or expressing pre-conscious

thoughts, and more about the cumulative impact of perceptions about gender roles in

the workplace. Whilst this is certainly an interesting and useful observation, this

literature may benefit from understanding how bias operates at an individual and pre-

conscious level. This will require specific methodological strategies for accessing the

pre-conscious, which currently do not exist.

Key Questions

If something is pre-conscious, it is reasonable to expect that the individual may be

unaware of it. In such a scenario, the interviewer must develop specific tools for

accessing the pre-conscious and help to bring forth pre-conscious thoughts. Of course,

some biases may be easier to uncover than others and gentle probing questioning may

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lead to pre-conscious thoughts rising to the surface and becoming conscious. Given

that much of the literature on gender inequality argues that it has accessed

unconscious bias, the questions that I seek to discuss in this case study are:

1. What specific methodological strategies does the literature on obstacles to women’s

career progression use to access unconscious bias?

2. If we accept that some aspects of unconscious bias may be difficult to access, what

methodological tools can we use to access this hard to reach aspect of agency?

A Critique of the Unconscious Bias Literature and the Methodology it uses

Several studies lend support to the observation that unconscious bias operates to

perpetuate gender inequality in the workplace. Almost all of these studies conduct

research into men and women’s perceptions about gender roles through asking direct

questions about gender perceptions (see, for example, AIM, Edwards et al. Ernst &

Young and Mckinsey & Company). The reliance on direct questions as the main

method for uncovering unconscious bias should be questioned because there is an

issue here about whether this research actually reveals unconscious bias, or whether it

is simply bias based on perceptions about gender roles.

The exception here is the work of Howard Ross, who developed the Implicit

Association Test (AIT) for unconscious bias, which has become a popular training

tool for management. Ross’ test goes further than the other research on this issue,

because it identifies specific tactics for avoiding unconscious bias. For example, he

encourages the identification of all biases in the workplace, such as those involved in

conducting interviews, which may negatively impact on women. Ross’ approach is a

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step forward, however many of the strategies are practical tips, and there is limited

theoretical or methodological discussion of the pre-conscious.

Whether quantitative or qualitative in approach, the existing literature on unconscious

bias does not advance beyond asking direct questions and reveals unconscious bias

through an analysis of the statements provided. The extensive use of such a

methodology confirms the view that this research aims to capture basic statements on

issues, rather than to understand unconscious bias as originating in the pre-conscious.

As such, despite the claim to have identified unconscious bias, this literature provides

limited guidance on how to develop strategies for developing a methodology to access

the pre-conscious, which is a task to which I now turn.

Research Design

The aim of the research project was to examine perceptions and understandings of

women and men of the barriers that impede women’s progress in the work place. The

research was carried out between 2012 and 2013 at a private sector organisation. In

order to maintain the anonymity of the organisation, I refer to it as Axis. Sixteen

people were interviewed in total, eight men and eight women. Interviews were

conducted with both men and women at senior and junior levels and interviewees

were asked about their opinions on a range of factors that impact in the workplace and

which may act as obstacles to women’s progression. Issues discussed in the

interviews included salient topics, such as family commitments, flexible working

arrangements, networking opportunities and leadership styles.

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Methodological Principles for Accessing the Pre-Conscious

This case study develops a methodology which will help to access unconscious bias

and the pre-conscious and provides the researcher with a wider toolkit than has been

provided in the literature discussed to date. I advocate an approach to the pre-

conscious whereby the researcher attempts to access the pre-conscious through

sensitively accessing and revealing layers of agency using a range of qualitative

methodological tools. As such, the outermost layer of agency is conceptualised as

being more accessible than the layers at the core, paralleling the progression from

conscious, reflexive and intentional understandings, to those which operate at the

level of the pre-conscious.

The Three Layers of Agency

The first layer of agency can be accessed through the use of qualitative and in-depth

questions, utilising what is usually termed a life-history approach. This can provide an

initial picture of agency. Second, one can delve further into agency by building on

the information provided at the first level and using it to construct hypothetical

scenarios in interviews with respondents. So, one could locate the individual within

these scenarios and ask her or him how he or she would react. For example, in the

research project on Axis, women and men were asked to picture themselves in their

ideal careers and to describe how the hypothetical scenario differed from their current

work place. Finally, for the deepest level of agency, the level that it most difficult to

penetrate, analysis of repression or of the dialogic unconscious, as discussed by

Michael Billig, could be used. Norman Fairclough’s understanding of critical

discourse analysis would also offer a potential route in. Together these three strategies

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could be combined to allow greater knowledge and understanding of an individual

and their pre-conscious.

Life-history Interviews

At the core of this methodology is a reliance on an in-depth interview method,

combined with a life-history approach. This approach incorporates both structured

and unstructured questions in a sensitive way to encourage the interviewee to open-

up, to engage in free-form narrative discussion and to be comfortable and

communicative in a non-threatening interview environment. Life-history interviews

encourage interviewees to set the agenda, to narrate their life story and to select those

elements of a life story that the interviewee regards as being most significant,

focusing upon what is included, what is left out, how events are constructed, to

provide useful insights into the individual’s self-awareness.

In the life history interviews at Axis, I began the interviews by asking the

interviewees to introduce themselves. This question garnered a range of responses,

some provided brief information such as name, age and job title, while others

provided more detailed accounts which discussed their backgrounds, their families

and career and life aspirations. My aim here was to develop a rapport with my

interviewees, to gain some insight into their lives, and for them to become

comfortable talking to me.

The introductory question was followed by a question about the interviewees’ current

position in the organisation and why they worked there. The ‘why’ question was

designed to ascertain whether interviewees were meeting career goals. The use of an

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in-depth interview method combined with a life-history approach was effective with

some of the interviewees, but had limited effectiveness with people who were

reluctant to share personal experiences. In the case of the latter, direct questions were

more effective, although this potentially makes it harder to access the pre-conscious.

Identifying Strategic Points in the Interview

Having created the interview conditions in which an interviewee is comfortable and

engaging in free-flowing expression, the interviewer should then identify strategic

points at which to provide gentle probing which will encourage the interviewee to

reflect and bring to the surface particular pre-conscious understandings, relevant to

the research objectives. As the interviewee is encouraged to engage in a narrative to

show their ‘gestalt’, or understanding, on particular issues, the interviewer can then

take clues from this narrative, and develop questions on this basis. The identification

of these clues is critical for the interviewer, as the interviewer does not have any

privileged access to the interviewee’s pre-conscious and is reliant upon the

information provided by the interviewee in the course of the interview.

A typical example of this approach is that in response to a question about career

aspirations, a junior, part-time, female worker at Axis commented that she ‘could not

see herself’ in any position, other than as an administrative assistant on a junior pay

and responsibility scale. When pressed on why this was the case, she replied it was

because she had two young children and was aware that people think that she now had

‘conflicting priorities’. When asked whether this was true, she replied that it was not

and that ideally she would like to progress in the job. The interviewee went on to state

that ‘there’s an understanding that once you have kids, your mind will never be as

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focused on the job as someone without kids’. As this example illustrates, the pre-

conscious or pre-conscious bias as it operates in the workplace must be teased out in

an interview, because it is often unquestioned and deeply embedded in people.

Documenting Repression and the Dialogic Unconscious

One of the most important principles for this methodology is to attend both to what is

said in the interview and to what is not said, but rather hinted at, or subtly implied. In

this vein, I follow Nick Couldry and Bridget Fowler in arguing for a better

understanding of repression and suggest that interrogating how this relates to the pre-

conscious would be extremely beneficial for researching the latter. Clearly this is a

difficult issue, however Michael Billig's understanding of the dialogic unconscious

offers a potential way forward.

Billig advocates bringing together discursive psychology and psychoanalysis in order

to better understand and methodologically investigate repression and how it relates to

the unconscious. Before examining Billig's work on the dialogic unconscious, it is

important first to briefly discuss the potential problems with integrating discursive

psychology and psychoanalysis.

The Dialogic Unconscious: Theoretical Concerns

According to Billig, discursive psychology developed as a reaction to orthodox

psychology and discourages speculation about 'inner processes' in the mind, which is

the primary concern of orthodox psychoanalysis. It is rooted broadly in Wittgenstein's

later philosophy and, more specifically, in ethnomethodology and conversation

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analysis. Ethnomethodology and conversational analysis are concerned with showing

how social order is reproduced through discursive interaction. As such, discursive

psychology focuses on a micro-level analysis of conversations and argues that

phenomena, which traditional psychological approaches have regarded as inner

phenomena, are, in fact, constituted through social discourse. Discursive psychology

is also appealing in methodological terms because it focuses on observable

phenomena (discourses), rather than unobservable, inner phenomena.

Billig's concept of the dialogic unconscious is based on his observation that the

traditional distinction between discursive psychology and psychoanalysis is

problematic, if one accepts that discursive psychology, in its concern with

conversational analysis, has neglected conversation as a form of repression, and not

only expression. So, he argues that repression can be studied discursively, using the

idea of the dialogic unconscious, and emphasises that conversational interaction can

have repressive, as well as expressive, functions. He contends that conversation

analysts in discursive psychology have tended to overlook this repressive dimension,

concentrating instead upon the presences, rather than the absences, in discourse. As

such, Billig problematises any approach which focuses solely on what is said in

interviews, arguing that the interviewer must also pay attention to what is not said, but

perhaps nearly said, and the reasons for this omission.

The Dialogic Unconscious: Practical Issues

As a methodological approach, Billig's notion of the dialogic unconscious offers a

range of strategies for accessing the pre-conscious. One aspect of Billig's dialogic

unconscious framework which may be particularly relevant to researching the pre-

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conscious, pre-conscious bias and repressive aspects involves examining how issues

are closed down discursively as topics of discussion by the interviewee, who might be

attempting to push conversation away from troubling issues. Further, he highlights the

importance of considering how interviewees use particular linguistic devices for

opening up topics of conversation, thus steering the conversation away from others.

If, for example, an interviewee disagrees with a comment made by another, but

wishes to keep the conversation going and move it in another direction, she may

resolve the dilemma by prefacing the disagreement with markers of agreement, such

as 'yes, but'. In Billig’s view, this is a rhetorical device which 'is not accidental, for a

conversational move towards is simultaneously a conversational move away from’

(1999, 52-53). Let us consider the following extract from a senior male worker at

Axis:

Interviewee: I agree that women and men should be treated the same at work

and they mostly are, but…

Interviewer: Are there any ways in which they are treated differently?

Interviewee: I mean women take long career breaks to look after their babies

and men don’t – that’s just fact. And the fact that women do the whole

pregnancy thing, and men don’t, well that changes things as well doesn’t it… I

don’t know… I don’t condone women being treated differently, but…

‘(B)ut’ and ‘I don’t know’ are used in this statement as rhetorical devices to avoid

concluding sentences with comments that justify treating men and women differently

in the workplace. In addition, these comments have the effect of steering the

conversation in another direction. This comment is also interesting because pre-

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conscious bias is expressed through justifications of ‘fact’, i.e. the biological

difference between men and women.

The interviewee clearly felt uncomfortable after discussing this line of thought for a

few minutes and asked if we could move onto the next question. This is also reflected

in him leaving his answers ‘open’, by not ending his sentences. Discussing

repression, Billig concedes that, although is not necessarily a sign of repression if an

interviewee changes the topic, if this continues to happen when a particular topic is

mentioned, it may point to repression. The interviewer might also find that an

interviewee is unaware of what she is doing, so that avoidance appears automatic,

rather than deliberate. Silence or pauses in the interview may also point to repression.

Indeed, Billig argues that repression can also be identified in the long silences

between spoken words, where an interviewee may avoid difficult issues and

conversations, by using silence as a tool, before attempting to change the topic.

The proposed methodology discussed here embraces Billig's notion of the dialogic

unconscious, but would also supplement this with more focused analysis of the

language used in the interview, as argued by Norman Fairclough, to whom I turn next.

Documenting the Pre-Conscious Through Language: Critical Discourse Analysis

(CDA)

Discourse analysis, as defined by Norman Fairclough, is the study of 'spoken or

written language'. Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) attempts to document how

discourse is shaped, influenced and constrained by social structure, by demonstrating

the extent to which texts construct or position individuals or readers. CDA is a

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methodological approach, but also a theoretical and political approach. It is theoretical

in that it incorporates an understanding of the role of discourse and social structures in

social life. It is political in that it aims to better understand the role of discourse in the

reproduction of social inequality. Fairclough argues that, ultimately, CDA’s success is

measured by its effectiveness and relevance to contributing to social change.

Fairclough regards language as a form of social practice and his account of discourse

is relevant to a methodology for accessing the pre-conscious, because it combines a

focus on what is said by individuals (discourse) with an acknowledgement of wider

social structures and how they shape discourse.

Fairclough’s Three Dimensional Framework

Fairclough develops a three-dimensional framework for the analysis of discourse,

where discourse is seen as text, as discursive practice and as social practice, although

it is textual analysis and social practice, and not discursive practice (the processes

involved in discourse production, distribution and consumption) which are relevant to

the discussion here. Discourses shape the way in which a part of the world is represented, or

imagined, when one speaks or writes. This, in turn links, to social practice because discourses

contribute to the reproduction of social structures, such as gender.

Analysis of the pre-conscious through discourse analysis should begin with a close

analysis of text or discourses expressed in a particular interview. In this way, the goal

is to document patterns in language, which help to create particular discourses, which

in turn shape our understanding of subjects. The strategy here should be on focusing

on the language or vocabulary used in an interview and to link this to broader social

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structural analysis, and in this case of unconscious bias to what this tells us about an

individuals’ understanding of gender or how they use gender. Consider the two

statements below:

‘There’s an expectation that real workers are full-timers (female, junior)’

‘Once they have a baby, women naturally choose to stay at home with their

babies, which makes sense on so many levels - but how should and can

business incorporate this? It’s often difficult to get it right’ (male, senior).

In the first statement, ‘real’ workers are equated with full-time workers. A real worker

here is someone who is committed to the job and is to be contrasted with part-time or

flexible workers, a form of employment where women tend to dominate. In the

second statement, women are described as ‘naturally’ wanting to stay at home with

their children, which suggests that the childcare role is more naturally suited to

women than men. This comment also implies that women choose to stay at home with

their children, when, as has been argued by many, choice is not necessarily open or

unconstrained when one has to decide between looking after a baby or working to pay

for childcare. In the second example, we also see how discourses are linked to create

frames of references, so the natural role of women as primary care giver is tied to

choice, thus suggesting that the two reinforce each other. Fairclough’s approach is

important because it asks us to link particular discourses to social practices, or

broader social structural analysis, thus helping us to understand how gender

discourses help to recreate and reinforce negative gender stereotypes and practices.

Overall, CDA, as advocated by Fairclough, provides a useful methodology with

which to explore the agent's language, as it builds on and extends the traditional

qualitative, in-depth, interview method format. When this is combined with Billig’s

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understanding of strategies to access the dialogic unconscious and repression, we

have a robust framework to interrogate the pre-conscious.

Accessing the Pre-conscious: Broader Methodological Concerns

When attempting to access the pre-conscious through life-history interviews, it is

important to consider some broader methodological issues, such as the relationship

between the interviewer and the interviewee and the role of body language in the

interview. I provide a brief discussion of each of these issues below.

The Interviewer/Interviewee Relationship

The role of the interviewer in the interview situation is important and symbolic

violence, which Pierre Bourdieu describes as the 'gentle, hidden form which violence

takes when overt violence is impossible' (1977, 196), should be avoided, as it may

cause harm to the interviewee during the interview and will also affect the quality of

the data you obtain in the interview. One strategy for avoiding symbolic violence in

the research process is through developing a good relationship with your interviewee.

Of course, symbolic violence may be unavoidable in situations where interviewees

are reluctant to talk to you or where you are asking questions about a difficult issue,

such as gender bias as was being explored in this research project. The overall point

here is to highlight that interviewers must be aware of the effect of their interviewing

on the interviewee and must try to minimize negative impacts where possible.

Documenting Body Language

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In addition to documenting what is said in the interview and what is not said, it is also

important to document body language in the interview. Bourdieu refers to body

language as ‘bodily hexis’, which he describes as how the physical body is affected

by the social world; so, bodily hexis refers to how we walk, talk, sit, facial

expressions, tone of voice or style of speech. For example, if the interviewee is being

defensive in her body language, this should also be documented as part of the

interview and can provide insights into pre-conscious motivations. A word of caution

should also be expressed here, because it is important to avoid over-interpretation of

body language in the interview. For example, an interview may be of a naturally

nervous disposition, or being in an interview may bring on a particular reaction, such

as fidgeting, that should not be attributed to the topic under discussion. My advice in

this scenario is to attempt to separate the interview context and the individual’s own

‘normal’ body language from effects brought on by particular questions. This may be

a difficult task, but can provide some interesting data given that the human body can

also be a vehicle for expression in the same way that language can.

Accessing the Pre-conscious: Practical Issues

Devoting sufficient time and resources to the practical issues relating to the interview

is important, as this will also affect the success of the interview. Below are some

practical tips, which should be taken into account when implementing the

methodology discussed in this case study:

Location

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It is important to ensure that the location of the interview is comfortable, quiet and

accessible to the interviewee. If resources allow, interviewees could be engaged in

deciding a location for the interview.

Recording Devices

Ensure that you have a device, such as a dictaphone, for recording the interview.

Make sure that it has batteries and that you know how to operate it before the start of

the interview. The interviewer may also find it useful to make notes during the

interview, as this will help to document body language, which will obviously not be

picked up by an audio recording device. Having a notepad on hand is also useful for

writing down additional questions, which may come to the interviewer during the

course of the interview.

Time

As mentioned previously, life-history interviews can be time-consuming and may

require repeat visits. As such, it important that both the interviewer and the

interviewee have ample time. Discuss this with the interviewee before the start of the

project.

Accessing the Pre-conscious: Potential Problems

Developing a methodology to access the pre-conscious presents considerable

challenges, not least because the pre-conscious may be elusive, private, intangible and

transient. A further issue to be considered is whether the interviewer can ever know or

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confirm whether they have accessed the pre-conscious, or whether the content being

expressed by the respondent is drawing on some other aspect of agency. The short

answer to this question is that we can never know or confirm whether we have

accessed the pre-conscious because the findings in qualitative research are not

verifiable and often they are not generalisable. The latter issue suggests that the

results we may obtain for one interviewee may be very different to those obtained in

another. Qualitative research aims to capture detailed and specific data, which can be

informed by theory. This data can often be non-generalisable, although it may be used

in the construction of theory, where it is generalisable. This methodology for

accessing the pre-conscious is informed by an argument for the existence of the pre-

conscious as an aspect of agency, which was the subject of previous research that the

author has conducted. At a broader level, it is important to acknowledge that this

methodology may not only shine a light on the pre-conscious, but may also capture

glimpses of reflexivity, intention, decision-making, conscious deliberation and

emotion, because these are all aspects of agency, and together they exists on a

spectrum of agency, and constantly interact. This broader understanding of agency

must supplement the methodological approach developed in this case study.

Conclusion

Whilst references to the pre-conscious, unconscious or sub-conscious are to be

frequently found in everyday life, there is little support for these concepts at a

theoretical or methodological level in the social sciences. The literature on

unconscious bias provides an entry point into this debate. However, as has been

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argued here, this literature provides very limited discussion of the concept and reflects

the general neglect of the aforementioned concepts.

This case study has been concerned with elucidating the key aspects of a methodology

for accessing the pre-conscious. Through a discussion of the methodology used in the

literature on obstacles to women’s career progression and its identification of

unconscious bias, I indicated the paucity of this literature, and the need for clearer

guidance in documenting unconscious bias/the pre-conscious. More specifically, I

suggest that, although it operates with a notion of the unconscious bias, this literature

provide a very limited discussion of the pre-conscious or how it functions, and the

related issue of how this impacts on methodology. The methodology developed here

draws on life-history interviews, but supplements this with Billig’s understanding of,

and methodology for, accessing repression and the dialogic unconscious. In addition,

I also highlight the utility of Fairclough’s critical discourse analysis, in recognition of

the fact that we must attend to the silences, the absences in the interview, but also to

alternative uses of language beyond simply communicating intention. This

framework, it is suggested, goes much further in providing a detailed and in-depth

structure for methodological analysis of the pre-conscious.

Exercises and Discussion Questions

1. This case study outlines a series of methods, which, when combined, help to

document the pre-conscious. Can you think of any other methods that might help in

this task?

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2. The use of a life-history method was advocated as a way in which to document the

pre-conscious. Can you foresee any potential practical problems in using this

approach?

3. Using the methodology developed here, how can we be sure that we are accessing

the pre-conscious and not some other aspect of agency? Is this important?

4. Why is it important to document silences and absences in interviews?

5. How can critical discourse analysis help to document the pre-conscious?

6. Why is it important to develop a methodology to access the pre-conscious?

Further Reading

Akram, Sadiya (2010). Re-conceptualising the concept of Agency in the Structure

and Agency Dialectic: Habitus and the Unconscious (unpublished PhD thesis).

University of Birmingham.

Akram, Sadiya (2012). Fully Unconscious and Prone to Habit: The Characteristics of

Agency in the Structure and Agency Dialectic. Journal for the Theory of Social

Behaviour. Vol. 43 (1). pp.45-65.

References

AIM Insights. (2011). Gender Diversity in Management. Targeting Untapped Talent.

First Steps. White Paper.

Billig, M. (1996). Arguing and Thinking: A Rhetorical Approach to Social

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Psychology. 2nd Edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Billig, M. (1997). The Dialogic Unconscious: Psychoanalysis, Discursive Psychology

and the Nature of Repression. British Journal of Social Psychology. 36, 139-159.

Billig, M. (1998). Rhetoric and the Unconscious. Argumentation. 12, 199-216.

Billig, M. (1999). Freudian Repression: Conversation Creating the Unconscious.

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Bourdieu, P. (1977). Outline of a Theory of Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press.

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