On crafting a cultural mind: a comparative assessment of some recent theories of 'internalization' in psychological anthropology

Abstract

This article reviews a number of recent publications in psychological anthropology that draw in varying degrees from psychoanalytic premises in order to theoretically address problems concerning the internalization of cultural meaning. The article begins with a discussion and critical comparison of Spiro's and Obeyesekere's perspectives on internalization that are in line with a number of classical formulations in anthropological and psychoanalytic theory, before turning to explore what appears to be an emerging new wave of perspectives in contemporary psychological anthropology that set out to discuss problems of internalization in the context of a complex modeling of psychological, social, and cultural processes. The article concludes with a brief discussion of where researchers may need to turn to further our understanding of 'internalization' in relation to those intrapsychic, interpsychic, and extrapsychic processes underpinning the crafting of cultural minds.