Group Dynamics: Connections and Divergences: Historical Avatars and Taxonomic Groundwork
Type de matériel :
14
The discipline that Kurt Lewin coined “group dynamics” is misunderstood: the decisive character of the last three years of Lewin’s life and of the three subsequent years is overlooked; many people only refer to the writings prior to his focalization on the group and animation of groups; there are many taxonomical incongruities, and the “dynamic” and “restraining” constructs are poorly understood. From 1945 to 1947, Lewin introduced: the use of the neologism “group dynamics”; the creation of a doctoral program at MIT; the project of training social psychologists there in animating groups; the emergence of “sensitivity training,” i.e., experiential learning by each person during the elucidation of group processes; the preparation of the first “training laboratory” in group practices, conceived as societal re-education via structured experiences. After Lewin’s death, we witnessed a process of the “death of the father”: a split occurred between research “academics” at the Research Center for Group Dynamics and “practitioners” working at the National Training Laboratories held annually at Bethel; there was identity substitution of “basic skills training groups” into diagnostic groups; a subsequent confusion emerged between “T-group” and “sensitivity training”; and the Lewinian re-educative project was not integrated into university circles. Since then, the animation of groups and the post-Lewinian group-dynamic paradigm have developed in the context of action science, independently of social psychology and group psychoanalysis. A strengthening of connections between research, analysis, and post-Lewinian group dynamics would be justified.
Réseaux sociaux