Book by Doris J F Mcilwain
Impatient for Paradise: charisma, personality and charismatic new religious movements.
- NB This book was originally a thesis, submitted in 1990, which was awarded the H. Tasman Lovell... more - NB This book was originally a thesis, submitted in 1990, which was awarded the H. Tasman Lovell University Medal at the University of Sydney.
- This book asks two questions: why does one person (rather than another) feel drawn to New Religious movements? And why are they drawn to one style of movement rather than another?
- It reconsiders the adequacy of existing explanatory accounts of recruitment to New Religious Movements [NRMs], from being brainwashed to being an active seeker. By NRMs I mean those groups defined by their doctrinal innovation or importation from another culture, and formed around a charismatic leader.
- I propose a new model of personal change. I call it the Rites de Passage model to acknowledge its beginnings in Anthropology in 1908 with Van Gennep’s work. It actually is made up of three broad rites. Many researchers have suggested the same three, which include the disruption of the life environment and sense of identity, transition where one is not what one was, nor yet what one will become – a vulnerable, troubled and doubting time for many, and reincorporation where one arrives at a new sense of self, new lines of association, with a new socially-sustained identity and, sometimes, a new name. I suggest that conversion can be viewed as an example of re-socialisation.
- This book addresses two forms of differential involvement asking i) why does one individual rather than another become involved ii) with a given genre of movement rather than another?
- To explore these questions, four groups of affiliates to three different eastern NRMs are compared to a therapy group, (Richardson and Kilbourne, 1984), two control groups (a student sample, and a sample from the general population) and a western NRM. There are 160 people who were involved overall.
- In summary, it is shown that those drawn to New Religious Movements of an eastern kind are indeed non-traditional, have a high incidence of recent life events and suffer a sense of community isolation and loneliness. These are considered as factors which might lead a person to modify an unfulfilling lifestyle by seeking a social solution. More is needed to explain a person becoming a seeker.
- A portrait of a seeker is lightly (sketched against a background of this dissatisfaction) which includes personality variables like an impulsive, present-oriented pleasure/pain regulatory style, being high on absorption - a mystical perceptual style, and having both an intensity and a congruence of spiritual orientation with that of the ideology of the movement approached. These are considered potential influences on the genre of movement contacted, and are suggested as explanatory of the second facet of differential openness to movement involvement.
- Disruption sets a person seeking; personality shapes to which appeals s/he is open. The relative privilege of the Western NRM in terms of reduced stress, availability of community and intimate social support suggests that involvement does provide a relief effect, though caution must be exercised in interpreting this difference as these groups differ in membership status and spiritual orientation. The distress and neediness of those contacting movements for the first time is apparent, which suggests that movement contact might be a response to felt dissatisfaction interpreted within a spiritual worldview. An eastern spiritual worldview is a highly significant distinguishing feature of affiliates, and is the final phase of the Rites de Passage Model.
- I offer a final chapter which haunted the footnotes of the original work and which I presented to a specialist group at the University of Sydney in 1992. This chapter addresses why Freud got it so wrong in proclaiming that religion an illusion with a limited future. It explores the familial and cultural origins of charisma and shows why psychoanalysis got it so right about why many seek a world of demand and response rather than one of cause and effect.
Emotion and Personality Theory by Doris J F Mcilwain
Philosophical Psychology, Jan 1, 2006
Individual differences in theory of mind, Jan 1, 2003
Psychoanalytic Theory by Doris J F Mcilwain
The two elements of a prolonged infancy and the fact of that infancy being experienced in a nucle... more The two elements of a prolonged infancy and the fact of that infancy being experienced in a nuclear family mark two central features of a psychoanalytic account of religion: wish fulfilment, and the need to deal with guilt. The wish (for protection by and union with a powerful other) springs from the helplessness of total dependency and vulnerability which characterises human infants; concern with guilt is part of the aftermath of the culpability of having desired one's parents which resulted in a system of morality arising out of the Oedipus Complex of the nuclear family. This two-fold function of religion is not evenly considered by Freud who neglects religion's promise of wish-fulfilment and the regressive dependency entailed in that aspect, and deals almost exclusively with its promulgation and assuaging of guilt.
By briefly considering classical Freudian psychoanalytic accounts of the origin and function of religion, we open the way to a considering how its specific focus on western religions precludes concern with the role of pre-oedipal relationships on the form of religious longings, specifically, how relations to the mother might have influenced the manner of expression of religious impulses and mystical phenomena.
Freud neglects religion's promise of wish-fulfilment and regressive dependency, dealing exclusively with its promulgation and assuaging of guilt. This seemingly leaves 'uncanny' charismatic and mystical phenomena beyond the explanatory reach of classical Freudian psychoanalysis. Reasons for this neglect are addressed and explorations made of an unused path already there in Freud's thought, unused because of a leap he made from analysing the father of childhood's effect on religious impulses, to those of the primal father, bypassing consideration of the importance of earliest relations. In returning by this unused path new links are made between charismatic relationships and psychoanalytic transference on the one hand, and pre-oedipal fusion with the mother, charismatic relationships and the romantic impulse on the other. Charisma, suggestion and transference owe an uncharted legacy to that developmental epoch, hinted at by their shared 'uncanny' features. Consideration of primary narcissism contributes to an understanding these phenomena bringing their uncanny features within explanatory reach.
Experimental Personality Psychology by Doris J F Mcilwain
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Book by Doris J F Mcilwain
- This book asks two questions: why does one person (rather than another) feel drawn to New Religious movements? And why are they drawn to one style of movement rather than another?
- It reconsiders the adequacy of existing explanatory accounts of recruitment to New Religious Movements [NRMs], from being brainwashed to being an active seeker. By NRMs I mean those groups defined by their doctrinal innovation or importation from another culture, and formed around a charismatic leader.
- I propose a new model of personal change. I call it the Rites de Passage model to acknowledge its beginnings in Anthropology in 1908 with Van Gennep’s work. It actually is made up of three broad rites. Many researchers have suggested the same three, which include the disruption of the life environment and sense of identity, transition where one is not what one was, nor yet what one will become – a vulnerable, troubled and doubting time for many, and reincorporation where one arrives at a new sense of self, new lines of association, with a new socially-sustained identity and, sometimes, a new name. I suggest that conversion can be viewed as an example of re-socialisation.
- This book addresses two forms of differential involvement asking i) why does one individual rather than another become involved ii) with a given genre of movement rather than another?
- To explore these questions, four groups of affiliates to three different eastern NRMs are compared to a therapy group, (Richardson and Kilbourne, 1984), two control groups (a student sample, and a sample from the general population) and a western NRM. There are 160 people who were involved overall.
- In summary, it is shown that those drawn to New Religious Movements of an eastern kind are indeed non-traditional, have a high incidence of recent life events and suffer a sense of community isolation and loneliness. These are considered as factors which might lead a person to modify an unfulfilling lifestyle by seeking a social solution. More is needed to explain a person becoming a seeker.
- A portrait of a seeker is lightly (sketched against a background of this dissatisfaction) which includes personality variables like an impulsive, present-oriented pleasure/pain regulatory style, being high on absorption - a mystical perceptual style, and having both an intensity and a congruence of spiritual orientation with that of the ideology of the movement approached. These are considered potential influences on the genre of movement contacted, and are suggested as explanatory of the second facet of differential openness to movement involvement.
- Disruption sets a person seeking; personality shapes to which appeals s/he is open. The relative privilege of the Western NRM in terms of reduced stress, availability of community and intimate social support suggests that involvement does provide a relief effect, though caution must be exercised in interpreting this difference as these groups differ in membership status and spiritual orientation. The distress and neediness of those contacting movements for the first time is apparent, which suggests that movement contact might be a response to felt dissatisfaction interpreted within a spiritual worldview. An eastern spiritual worldview is a highly significant distinguishing feature of affiliates, and is the final phase of the Rites de Passage Model.
- I offer a final chapter which haunted the footnotes of the original work and which I presented to a specialist group at the University of Sydney in 1992. This chapter addresses why Freud got it so wrong in proclaiming that religion an illusion with a limited future. It explores the familial and cultural origins of charisma and shows why psychoanalysis got it so right about why many seek a world of demand and response rather than one of cause and effect.
Emotion and Personality Theory by Doris J F Mcilwain
Psychoanalytic Theory by Doris J F Mcilwain
By briefly considering classical Freudian psychoanalytic accounts of the origin and function of religion, we open the way to a considering how its specific focus on western religions precludes concern with the role of pre-oedipal relationships on the form of religious longings, specifically, how relations to the mother might have influenced the manner of expression of religious impulses and mystical phenomena.
Freud neglects religion's promise of wish-fulfilment and regressive dependency, dealing exclusively with its promulgation and assuaging of guilt. This seemingly leaves 'uncanny' charismatic and mystical phenomena beyond the explanatory reach of classical Freudian psychoanalysis. Reasons for this neglect are addressed and explorations made of an unused path already there in Freud's thought, unused because of a leap he made from analysing the father of childhood's effect on religious impulses, to those of the primal father, bypassing consideration of the importance of earliest relations. In returning by this unused path new links are made between charismatic relationships and psychoanalytic transference on the one hand, and pre-oedipal fusion with the mother, charismatic relationships and the romantic impulse on the other. Charisma, suggestion and transference owe an uncharted legacy to that developmental epoch, hinted at by their shared 'uncanny' features. Consideration of primary narcissism contributes to an understanding these phenomena bringing their uncanny features within explanatory reach.
Experimental Personality Psychology by Doris J F Mcilwain
- This book asks two questions: why does one person (rather than another) feel drawn to New Religious movements? And why are they drawn to one style of movement rather than another?
- It reconsiders the adequacy of existing explanatory accounts of recruitment to New Religious Movements [NRMs], from being brainwashed to being an active seeker. By NRMs I mean those groups defined by their doctrinal innovation or importation from another culture, and formed around a charismatic leader.
- I propose a new model of personal change. I call it the Rites de Passage model to acknowledge its beginnings in Anthropology in 1908 with Van Gennep’s work. It actually is made up of three broad rites. Many researchers have suggested the same three, which include the disruption of the life environment and sense of identity, transition where one is not what one was, nor yet what one will become – a vulnerable, troubled and doubting time for many, and reincorporation where one arrives at a new sense of self, new lines of association, with a new socially-sustained identity and, sometimes, a new name. I suggest that conversion can be viewed as an example of re-socialisation.
- This book addresses two forms of differential involvement asking i) why does one individual rather than another become involved ii) with a given genre of movement rather than another?
- To explore these questions, four groups of affiliates to three different eastern NRMs are compared to a therapy group, (Richardson and Kilbourne, 1984), two control groups (a student sample, and a sample from the general population) and a western NRM. There are 160 people who were involved overall.
- In summary, it is shown that those drawn to New Religious Movements of an eastern kind are indeed non-traditional, have a high incidence of recent life events and suffer a sense of community isolation and loneliness. These are considered as factors which might lead a person to modify an unfulfilling lifestyle by seeking a social solution. More is needed to explain a person becoming a seeker.
- A portrait of a seeker is lightly (sketched against a background of this dissatisfaction) which includes personality variables like an impulsive, present-oriented pleasure/pain regulatory style, being high on absorption - a mystical perceptual style, and having both an intensity and a congruence of spiritual orientation with that of the ideology of the movement approached. These are considered potential influences on the genre of movement contacted, and are suggested as explanatory of the second facet of differential openness to movement involvement.
- Disruption sets a person seeking; personality shapes to which appeals s/he is open. The relative privilege of the Western NRM in terms of reduced stress, availability of community and intimate social support suggests that involvement does provide a relief effect, though caution must be exercised in interpreting this difference as these groups differ in membership status and spiritual orientation. The distress and neediness of those contacting movements for the first time is apparent, which suggests that movement contact might be a response to felt dissatisfaction interpreted within a spiritual worldview. An eastern spiritual worldview is a highly significant distinguishing feature of affiliates, and is the final phase of the Rites de Passage Model.
- I offer a final chapter which haunted the footnotes of the original work and which I presented to a specialist group at the University of Sydney in 1992. This chapter addresses why Freud got it so wrong in proclaiming that religion an illusion with a limited future. It explores the familial and cultural origins of charisma and shows why psychoanalysis got it so right about why many seek a world of demand and response rather than one of cause and effect.
By briefly considering classical Freudian psychoanalytic accounts of the origin and function of religion, we open the way to a considering how its specific focus on western religions precludes concern with the role of pre-oedipal relationships on the form of religious longings, specifically, how relations to the mother might have influenced the manner of expression of religious impulses and mystical phenomena.
Freud neglects religion's promise of wish-fulfilment and regressive dependency, dealing exclusively with its promulgation and assuaging of guilt. This seemingly leaves 'uncanny' charismatic and mystical phenomena beyond the explanatory reach of classical Freudian psychoanalysis. Reasons for this neglect are addressed and explorations made of an unused path already there in Freud's thought, unused because of a leap he made from analysing the father of childhood's effect on religious impulses, to those of the primal father, bypassing consideration of the importance of earliest relations. In returning by this unused path new links are made between charismatic relationships and psychoanalytic transference on the one hand, and pre-oedipal fusion with the mother, charismatic relationships and the romantic impulse on the other. Charisma, suggestion and transference owe an uncharted legacy to that developmental epoch, hinted at by their shared 'uncanny' features. Consideration of primary narcissism contributes to an understanding these phenomena bringing their uncanny features within explanatory reach.
Strauss and Corbin’s (1998) Grounded Theory to conduct qualitative research with 10 professional
musicians to investigate their experience of music performance. We find performance to extend
temporally beyond time spent before an audience and to include performers’ rituals of separation
from everyday life. Using the abridged version of the model emerging from this data that we present
in this article, we investigate how professional musicians’ experience of music performance centers
on forging ‘connection’ with an audience and the ways in which this process is facilitated by the pre-
and post-performance routines in which musicians engage. We find musicians’ understandings and
experiences of ‘connection’ during performance to differ greatly, being influenced by their positioning
on two spectra that emerge in this study and indicate the extent to which, during performance,
musicians: a) value attentiveness and/or attunement in an audience and b) are open to variability.
with which they are faced during performance. To further explore this apparent paradox and the way in which it is negotiated by expert musicians, this article profiles theories presented by Roger Chaffin, Hubert Dreyfus and Tony and Helga Noice. For Chaffin, expert skill in music performance relies solely upon overarching mental representations, while, for Dreyfus, such representations are needed only by novices, while experts rely on a more embodied form of coping. Between Chaffin and Dreyfus sit the Noices, who argue that both overarching cognitive structures and embodied processes underlie expert skill. We then present the Applying Intelligence to the Reflexes (AIR) approach — a differently nuanced model of expert skill aligned with the integrative spirit of the Noices’ research. The AIR approach suggests that musicians negotiate the apparent paradox of expert skill via a mindedness that allows flexibility of attention during music performance. We offer data from recent doctoral research conducted by the first author of this article to demonstrate at a practical level the usefulness of the AIR approach when attempting to understand the complexities of expert skill in music performance.
ables within his control. In order to achieve this, JK must engage in ongoing monitoring of his performance, whereby the spotlight of his attention pans across a vast array of disparate performance
processes (and levels within these processes) in order to ascertain how he can most effectively meet the specific demands of a given performance situation. It is hoped that future research compiling data from numerous interviews and sources as well as using different research methodologies will further unlock the potential that the AIR approach holds for understanding expert performance."
The study empirically explores a rites of passage model that addresses the breakdown in social structures that sustain identity, as well as an encounter with relationships and belief systems that carve the aching sense of lack into a nuanced ideology that promotes conversion. The role the leader plays in embodying and giving voice to that vision of the possible is lightly explored.
Largely - this is a lock and key look at charisma and conversion - what produces a seeker? How are we to understand movement appeal?