•

•
...... ersons : ca e or1es •

The fruit of research never falls on previously untilled soil. ot only

are ere likely to be pr evious relevant findings., but e target of e
research will have a label at incorp orates a certain pre-understanding
of its natur e. The discipline of psy cholo tries to discover new owledge
about obj ects at it identifies in terms taken from e co111 111on lan age.,
terms wh ose present meaning was established sorne ti 111e in .......
doing so., e discipline help s to change at meaning, but e change

present-day i1111ovation, circumscribing e conceptual alternatives avail-

able for consideration, li111iting e direction of steps towards a different
ture.
Shadows of e past vary greatly in eir dep and intensi . 1 any
of e obj ects at a act current psychological attention are not all
at old in terms .of human history. Test intelligence, co itive dis- •

sonance, and post-tr aumatic stress disorder, for example, are inven-
tions of e twentie century, and claims at ey were always ere,
ou unac owledged, require somewh at arbitrary historical specula
tions . ''Per sons,'' on e o er hand, have been reco ized as obj ects
wor y of explicit conceptualization for a very long time. The term
and its co ates are among e few in modern psycholo · ''me·m-
ory'' beingano er at have a really deep history. A spec i cally psy -
cholog·ical understanding of persons emerged relatively late in at history
and was effectively sup erimposed on rich layers of alternative meanings .
The relationship between ese levels is so mur at serious doubts
have been expressed about e use lness of ''person'': ''Th e term itself
is already a oroug y abused concept . . . The list of meanings itself

1 K. Danziger, N aming the 1\!11:nd: H ow Ps)!Chology Foitnd its Language (London : Sage, 1997) .

59

•
60 Kurt Danzige1·

could provide us wi a judicial and political ·story of e English

data always require inte retation befare ey acquire any psychologi-

a semantic history. en p ersonali researchers publish eir findings.,

ey are assumed to contribut e to our owledge about sorn e ing at is
already believed to exist., sorne ing already identified and given a label
wi a certain sense in common lan age use. The owl edge in ques-
tion is assumed to be about sorne ·ng identified as ''p ersonali '' and
not as e i11·1111ortal soul or as e moral character., to mention only two
possible but i 111plicitly rej ected alternatives.
Sorne of ose who were most active in founding a viable field of per-
sonali psych olo ., notably Gordon lport., were o y too well aware
. of e need to differentiate e new psychological conceptualization frorn
•

various historical alternatives. But once e field became established ·s-

torical amnesia took over . This has had o unf ortunate consequences.
First of all., sorne of e rnost distinctive characteristics of p ersonali psy-
cholo sirnply became taken for granted., incorp orated in instr1J 111ents
whose use transformed conceptual questions into technical issues. As a
result., sorne of e rnost b asic assumptions of e field disapp ear ed from
view. Second., as in so mu ch of e discipline., e line sep arating e
new approach from what went befare wa s drawn so sharpl)1 at mu ch of
what 111igh t have been productively assi11·1i lated wa s ab and oned to o er
disciplines or simply consign ed to oblivion .
In e last section of e present chapter., I ad ess e st of ese
issues. The earlier sections attempt sorne illurnination of e second issue.
- owever., given e multitu de of meanings attached to ''per son., '' it is
necessary to set sorne bound aries. In principle., ever ·ng at has ever

of ·s concept . Phil osophical or medical works 1r1i ght also carry such
implications., even wh en ey do n ot directly ad ess e topic.

boundless territory is to use e · ·story of a key word and its cognates as

a marker for explicit use of e concept and as a read to follow changes
of use over time. This does not always work., but it works reasonab1}7

2 H. J. Stam, e dispersa!of subjecti ,1it:,r and the problem of persons in p sycholog-}1 • In

W. E . Sm_ e (ed .) Toward a PsJ J chology of Persons (Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, 1998) 22 1 244
(24 1).

•
 Historical p sychology of persons 61
'

well for ''person.,'' wi one notewor y exception: at a certain point.,

e history of ''person'' virtually disappears into e history of ''self."
As I have previously given sorne consideration to is topic, I will <leal

as a historica1 marker avoids questions of translation and interpretation

at would be inappropriate in e present context and are better left to
specialist publications.
The history of concepts., especially over longer periods., <loes not -
ically follow one u 11interrupted course . ore usu ally., ere are inter-
•

ruptions, replacements, new beginnings., and above all., ere is not one
line of development but several at may or may not meet . Concepts of
e person are no exception. Over a long p eriod, ere were several new
starts at added additional layers of und er standing to a category at
was always compl ex. Even in Roman times., p ersons were de ed in two
different ough related contexts, legal and moral . Subs equently, o er
kinds of p erson became important., and each section of is chapter pro-
vides hints regarding eir mo st significant characteristics. These changes
on e level of und erstanding were usually accompanied by correspond-

and scientific institutions. But is is not an institutional history., and so

I have li111ited myself to drawing attention to changes in literary prac-
tices invol · g personal docum ents, especially autobiographies., and to a
crucial scientific practice considered in e al section of e chapter. ·
•

Leg persons

Because of its concern for de itions and its close link to social prac- •

tice legal discourse provides a use 1 entry point to e history of e

concept of ''p erson .'' In medieval Europe and beyond., legal discourse
was strongly ind ebted to b asic principles of jur isprudence at had been

b asic concepts enshrined in Roman law wa s at of e legal p erso_ n .

ough not unchanging., is und erstanding of ''per son'' provided a rel-
atively stable cultural presence against which later developments had to
assert emselves. At e end of e seventeen century e philosopher
o Locke., whose writings ush ered in a new era for conceptualizing e
human individu al., still referred to ''p erson '' as ''a forensic concept .''

3 K. Danziger, The historical formation of selves. In R. D. As ore and L. Jussi1n (eds.)

Self and ldentity: Fund amental lssues 1 ew York: Oxford University Press, 1997) 137 159 .
4 ''From the eleventh cent u1·y to the eighteenth and even beyond., the main feature of legal
change in west ern continental Europe was the Reception of Roman law.'' A. Watson, The
Evolution of 'L%stern Prívate La zJJ (Balti 1nore: Johns Hop · s University Press, 200 1) 193.

•
62 Kurt Danziger

The ustinian Code was itself based on e work of earlier Roman •

ju rists who had developed a set of ndamental concepts at enabled

em to systematize e collection of specific laws handed down frorrt
previous generations. any of e relevant pre- ustinian texts have been
lost., but an important one was rediscovered in e nineteen century.. •

ound 160 AD its au or., Gaius., had formulated e classical jur idical
trini by indicating at ''all e law which we use pertains ei er to per.;..
-
sons or to ings or to actions'' de personis) de rebus) de actionibus .) Laws
pr ovid ed a formal re ation of potential con ·cts in\rolving ese ree
ndamental entities. The legal person was not a standalone concept but •

part of a network of concepts designed to repr esent ose aspects of e

social arder at were e target of formal re latían and legal sancti ons..
These targets rn i ght be a ctions., as in e case of eft or murder., e5r
111ight be ings at could be i erited and possessed., or ey 111ight be
persons who assurned obligations involving o er persons .
In is context., e criterion of p erso ood was e cap acity to enter
into obligations in such a way
•
at one could be held legally responsi-
ble for 1 ling ose obligations. For is reason., young chil en were
not held to be persons . They wer e ''111l nors'' under e ardians 'p;
tutela., of designated adults., usu ally a fa er., wh o was resp onsibl e for
em and eir actions. ornen also had e status of 11·1 inor s. So e
status of ''p erson'' was far from b eing a 1J 11iversal human chara cteristic..
Slaves of wh om ere were many also lacked ·s status . They 'Arere
not 11·1 i nors who had sorne rights but mere p ossessions at co d n O
more enter int o legal obligations an could a domestic animal. ow-
ever., slaves could be freed rough e deliberate choice of eir o er,
and in due course a freed male slave 11t i ght even become a legal p erson, •

Persa ood was sorne ·ng at males co d attain., sometimes by good

for t,_111e., ough more usually by reaching e age of maturi . But when
was at? en one co d b e held responsible for one's obligations., e
criterion stipulated. Legal decision rnaking demanded a distinct resh-
old for p erso ood but it was not easy to reach agreement on e marker
of at reshold. Sorne au orities favored e onological age., o ers e

In is context., e concept of e person singled out a p articular •

of
ts and
obligations. This 111inori was also politically privileged . In
•

- D. R. Kelle-sr, Tlie H unian M easure: Social Thought in tlie Wéstern Lega l Traditions
J

(Cambridge, : Harvard University Press, 1990) 49 .

6 T. G. Leesen, Gaius nz eets Cicero: Law and Rhe toric in the ScJz ool Co1itroversi'es (Leiden:
Nijhoff, 20 1O) . ·
 Historical psychology of persons 63
•

ancient Rome., ey had e status of citizens of e state., and wi n

eir household or ''do1111nion '' ey exercised complete au ori . Legal
p erso ood was also part o_f e p olitical order., ough after e disinte-
gration of e Roman Empire e p olitics of perso ood became more
frag111ented . They also became more complicated because of e growing
influence of a C istian Church at nctioned as a second source of
law., canon law. e Church was com111i tted to a doctrine of 1111iver salism
at attributed to each and every h11111an individu al an i111111ortal soul . In
. e long r1J 11., is meant loosening e exclusivi of e status of person-
hood and gradu ally extending sorne of its benefits to previously excluded
categories of p eopl e.

oral persons

Positive law assumes e existence of sorne sense of ri t and wrong

among ose it covers. Ideally., its appeal is to existing concepts of wh at
is j ust and what is not., and when it con ·cts wi ose concepts it will
be igr1ored or opp osed. It often arises out of an existing moral order., and
L e sanctions it provides are meant to uphold
... at order wh enever it is
flagrantly eatened .
In e case of Roman law., vve can get quite a good idea of e moral
order wi ·n whi ch it originated because e p eriod ju st b efore and during
its systematization produ ced a si ificant b ody of literature dedicated
to moral education., literatur e at was resp ected in its own time and
sometimes influ ential many centuries later. 1 oreover., much of it has
survived . Sorne of ·s literature contains references to e concept of e
p erson., providing us wi e context for a crucial change in e use of
e Latín term persona at had previously referred to e masks worn by
actors on a stage . By e st century BC., e eatre was beco111ing a
metaphor and e term is given a more general meaning at is closer to
''social role'' an to an actor's mask . -
The most explicit and most influ enti al example of is devel opment is
fou r 1d in a book of advice directed at his son by e Roman politician.,
writer and philosopher., 1 arcus Tullius Cícero 106 43 BC . The title of
....e book is usually translated as ''On Duties'' but., as a recent translator
p oints out., ''On Oblig ations '' provides a better rendering of e essentially

too ·easy for e modern reader to overlook e fact at., once it left e
eatre., ''per sona'' was for a very long time a term of moral philosophy.

7 P. G. Walsh., Introdu ction . In ..N1. T. Cicero., 01i Obli'gations (Stanford., CA: Stanford
Univer sity Press., 2000) xvii.
 64 Kurt Danziger
•

roles on stage initially served as a metaphor for e way in which each

human condition . In is vein., Cícero tells his son at in e conduct

of his life he., like o ers., will ha,re to p ay attention to four kinds of
responsibili . In e st place., he ought to conduct himself as a rational
human being., not as a creature governed by impuls e. Second., he needs to
take into account e special fea t tlr es of his own m a k e-up and to realize

ise actors do not always opt for e best plays but for ose most suited
to
rich or poor., noble or co111111oner., assl111·11ng public o ce., ali imp ose
particular obligations on us at should be respected. Finally., we have
to recognize at our own life choices create situations at bring new
obliga tions wi em . T ·s happens when we decide on a certain career.,
for exampl e.
Cicero's attempt at iding his son is use 1 for alerting us to e
lf at separates e modern meaning of ''per sona'' from its ancient
meaning. Th e term is still in use today to refer to e way individuals
pr esent emselves in a particular social situ ation., t o eir literally pl aying
a role. At times ·s simply amol1t1ts to faking it . But is is not what
Cícero is advising his son to go in for. uite · e contrary., each of e
four personae he mentions involves sorne serious moral purp ose. at
he takes from e eatrical analo is not at e actor we aring a mask
is sorne sort of fake but at . e same actor is obliged to co orm to
different requirements in different roles. Each role entails its own set of
obligations; e role requirement is given wi e role . That is why e
idea of a role can serve as an illustration of moral obligation .
at is also important for ·s 1111derstanding of ''p ersona '' is e
notion of perfectibili . Actors can play eir roles well or badly. Sorne
pl ay em superbly. As an actor on life's stage., one ought to p erform as
well as possible., always tr · g to improve . This principle sets e tone of
e ·de b ooks of moral education. For e Stoic philosophers., whom

This is not a significant component in e modern understanding of

''p ersona., '' but it was critical for e moral l111derst andin g of e person
as actor .
•

8
1\1.. T. Cícero, 011 Obligations (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2000) , part I,
114 .
9
P. Hadot, Philosop h)' as a Wa)1 of Lije ( Oxford: Blackvvell, 1995) .
 -·- -- -- - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Historical psychology of persons 65

In ·s understanding., moral values were experienced as part of e

world., not as an individu al preference. There is no prívate subj ective stage
from which an autonomous self regards e world beyond. The individual
person is always embedded in sorne set of public obligations : ''no asp ect of

One's own individuali is not e source of one 's values but e source
of one set of shared obligations among o ers. Our individuali does not
de e us but should be morally respected.
The lives of o ers co d ction as mo dels of upright condu ct or as
b ad examples. In his advice manual., Cícero frequently refers to hist orical
fi res whose lives and deeds pr ovid e specific illustrations of e princi-

e genre of bi ography., ough in is case it is e illustration at occu-

pies e foreground and e moral lesson w ·ch forms e background . In
, his collection of Lives., Plutarch presented e stories of notable individu-
als in such a way as to make eir actions si i qualities of moral char-
acter
did e tradition of moral biography yield to e more modern form at

In contr ast to biography., e genre of autobi ography could hardly be

said to exist in classical antiquity. In his monumental effort t o cover e
history of ·s genre., George 1 ·sch could d only eight cases at 11·1i ght
b e regarded as aut obiographi es for all e centuries of Greek and Latin

extended descriptions of e circumstances of eir lives offered in way

of excuse., exculp ation., or denial of responsibili by individuals who had

similar t o biographies in at ere is an attempt t o present an individual

life as a whole., but such presentations ically take pla ce in a moral or
legal context .

10
T. J. Reiss., J\1irages of the Selfe: Patterns of Personhood in Ancient and Early J'viodem Europ e
(Stanford., CA: Stanford University Press., 2003) 237 .
11
Plutarch, Roman Li7..:es: A Selection of Eigh t Ro nz an Lives., R. Waterfield (trans.) ew
York: Oxford University Ptess., 1999); and also Plutarch., Greek Lives: A Selection of Nine
Greek Lives, R. Waterfield (trans.) 1 ew York: Oxford University Press, 1998).
12
C . Gill., The S tructured Self in H ellenistic and Ronian Thought (Oxford University Press.,
2006) .
13
G. Misch., A History of Autobiography in Ant iquity (London: Routledge., 1950) . This
translation covers only a relatively small part of the author's life work on the hlstory of
autobiography.
14
A. .Ñ1omiglian o, Marcel .lviauss and the quest for the person in Greek biography and
autobiography. In lvi. Carrithers, S. Collins, and S. Lukes (eds.) The Category of the
Person: Anthrop ology) Philosop hy) Hist ory (Cambridge Univer sity Press., 1985) 83 92 .
•
 66 Ku.rt D anziger

Persons of substance

orali and e law were not e only contexts in which e original

texts on rhetoric, an important field in classical antiqui , and also in

gra1·11 111ar, where ree ''persons'' wer e distin ·shed wi respect to e
use of verbs: e sp eaker, e one sp oken to, and e one sp oken about .
This anal ·e usage was generalized to e interpretation of literary and

tion of e persons i 111plicitly pla)ring a role in certain verbal interactions

made a difference to e meaning of e text.
This ra er specialized usage appears to have played a role in e early
development of a field in which questions of ''person'' and ''per sonali ''
• were to become quite pro11·iinent., namely., Christian eolo . For a reli-
gion whose doctrines r elied heavily on sacred texts in a forei lan age
ebrew , e closely related questions of correct translation and exegesis
wer e inescap able. Because in e relevant religious texts divini takes on
at least o forms., fa er and son., and pr obably ree e oly Ghost .,
e relationship among ese forms became a matter of supreme interest
for C istian eologians. A religious institution at was fast b ecom-
ing centralized and aut ocratic required an explicit dogma against which
heresy could be de ed, and questions about e relative status of e
ree forms of divini soon b ecame central for e early Church Fa ers.
As they had often been trained in pre-Christian techniques of text analy-
sis., ey easily adopted a formulation of ese questions in terms of e

lized in e formula tres per sonae> una substantia ree p ersons., one
substance also rendered as one nature. 15 Related debates addressed

human and divine natures in one person.

In medieval eolo , e category of ''person'' was explicitly limit éd to
individual crea tu res wi e gift of rationali!)r: humans., angels., and God.
essential attribute of human individuals was eir i11·1 111ortal- soul, and
·s led to a11 emphasis on e internal uniry, e indivisibili , of e
is day, ough its
origins are not alwa>rs recognized.
Thou all h11111ans rn ight be granted a soul, eir perso ood could
•

be qualified . For exa 111ple, a text dating to 1234 is reported to have

stated at it v.ras '' rou baptism in e Church of C ist at a man

15
Aurelius Augustinus, On the H ol; Trini'ty (Grand Rapids,
1 : Eer ans, 1956) .
16
St. ornas Aquinas, Sunima Theologz:ca ew York: Benzinger Bros., 1947).

•
 •

Historical psychology of persons 67

o

as imperfect ough potentially perfectible. It was very much a matter of

degree ra er an an invariable human a ibute. co essional texts,
individuals constantly compare emselves to persons more perfect an
emselves, to saints and to o er exemplary fi res from sacred or some-
times secular literature. 18
One n t ight say at e key variable for perso ood was now worthi-
ness. Imperfect beings could be accorded various degrees of wor iness,
depending on eir moral conduct and eir social standing. It was a

being able to claim wor iness on e basis of eir actual or p otential

membership of ese classes. In secular texts, ''per son'' carried a con-
notation of social standing, generally involving elevated rank and due
respect., but occasionally e opp osite. It defined individuals in terms of
eir pl ace in a hierarchical network of social p ositions., not in terms of

was not defined in terms of wh at set em ap art from o ers., · eir indi-
vidu ali , but in terms of e way in w ·ch ey exemplified generally

Persons apart

Al ough earlier conceptions of e person never died out completely,

partic arly wh en supported by legal or religious institutions, eir pro111i-
n ence gradually declined as a new understanding of e term emerged.
Sp eaking very broadly., is new und erstanding can be chara cterized as
individu alistic, ou ere were many facets to at., and ese did not
develop in any s chr oniz ed mann er., wi regard t o ei er place or time.
Th ere is a huge literature of p otential relevance to is development, but
ere are certain aspects at must b e regarded as p ar ticularly si ifi-
cant for e later emergence of sp ecifically psychological conceptions of
•
p erso ood . .
First of all, one encounters an e anced sense of e separateness
of each individual . By e seventeen century is receives explicit.,
even radical., expression in a new way of depicting e basic relationship
be een people. is., in e ra er sweeping s1.1111mary of one Fren ch
scholar., is ''

17
A. Gurevich., The Origins of Europ ean lndividualisni (Oxford: Blackwell., 1995) 90 .
18
lvl. Ca t'rithers., The Book of .,M
. emory : A S tudy of M emory in Jviedieval Culture (Cambridge
University Press., 1990) .
19
Gurevich., Origins .
20
G. Poulet., S tudies in H uman Time 1Tew York : Harp er., 1959) 13 .
68 Kurt Danzige·r

earlier times., it had generally been taken for granted at p articipation in a

life shared wi o ers was e natural state of human beings. Individuals
wer e always embedded in social ''cir cles'' of family., kinsfolk., citizenship.,
e ...L

de ·non of perso ood., as we have seen . In reflective discour se ere

was a respect for traditional au ori at seems mispla ced to e mod-
ern reader but was often little more an an expression of solidari wi

15 9 6 165 0 ., e pro111inent sevent een -century p ·1osopher., does not

write as a member of any co111111uni : he reports on his own introsp ective
efforts to work out a viable p ·1osophical p osition and in,rites his read-

expect., his philosophy is much less concerned wi social being an wi

what goes on wi in each separate individual.
- is contemp orary., Th omas obbes 15 88 1679 ., on e o er hand.,
was very interested in working out e social consequences entailed by e
essential sep arateness of each individu al . In doing so., he provided a view
of e person at was very different from what had gone b efore . Peopl e
are natur ally solitary., he claims : '' en have no pleasure but on e con-

be entirely expl ained in terms of mechanical processes wi in sep arate

individuals whose nati l r al relation to each o er is one of -''war of every •

one against every one.'' Peopl e always want wh at o ers ha\re., so ey live
in fear of each o er. owever., ey are rational enough to grasp at

ing to sorne mutual arrangement for lirn lting eir naturally anti-social
tendencies. As a res t., ey enter into ''b onds'' or contracts reciprocally
restricting eir power to harm o ers or obliging em to render cer-
tain services to o ers. This is h ow individuals are able to live wi each
o er. Peace social co-existence is b ased on contr act., not on p eopl e's
inherently social nature.
In is model., all speech is individu al speech and all action is individual
action . A p erson is de ed as e own er of e words and actions at
belong to ·m obbes does n ot consider women . e may enter int o
''covenants'' wi o er persons regarding ese possessions., as he would
•
Wl er
p erson to
•

21 Reiss., M irages; also C. Gill., e ancient self: Issues and approaches. In P. Remes and
J. Sihvola (eds.) Ancient Philosop h)' of the Self e\"\r York: Springer., 2008) 35 56.
22 R. Descartes., A Discoiirse on the M ethod of Correctly Conducting One )s Re ason and Seek i11g
Tri-tth in the Scie1ices., I. Ma clean (trans.) (Oxford University Press., 2006., orig. 1637) .
23
T. Hobbes., Leviathan (Oxford: Clarendon Press., 2006, orig. 165 1) ch. 13.
24
Hobbes, Leviatha1i., ch. 16 .
•
 Historical psychology of persons 69
-
speak or act on his behalf in return for specified services rendered by e
o er person.
•
The idea of de ing persons in terms of ,., eir abili to enter 1nto
• • •
contracts w1 o er per sons was not new, as wesaw 1n e sect1on on
legal p ersons. But relationships governed by formal legal concepts and
requirements had remain ed a r elatively small p art of e domain of social
relationships at linked peopl e to each o er. ·nship., a co1r·1111on lan-
age., a shared s b olic world., and group loyalties ar e just sorne of e

legal concepts. at was new and shocking in e obbesian world was

e claim at contract was e basis for all interaction among individ-
uals, insof ar as at interaction was not antagonistic. By expressing is
claim in a particul arly for ight and brutal way., obbes provided a use-

always a lingering suspicion at it did describe, if n ot a 1.J 11iver sal human

condition, at least a set of beliefs on which many p eople act much of e
tim e in co111 1r1er cial civilization.2 5 One did not n eed to be a obb esian to
see e world as p opul ated by separate comp etitive individuals., each an

of contractual arrangements wi o er individuals. One's identi as a

broad c tural circles, beliefs of is kind became increasingly taken for

granted, and obbesian assumptions are readily detectable in contem-
•

1632 1704 and ean- acques Rousseau 1712 1778 . Bo accepted

- e original and damental sep arateness of individuals but, far from
being Hobbesian mechanisms, eir individuals wer e endowed wi a
compl ex inner life . Increasingly., it is ·s i1111er life at comes to do111i-
nate con ceptions of e p erson until well into e entie century.
'
. After asking wh at ''p erson '' stood for., ohn Locke provided an answer
at relied on a term at had only recently been intr oduced into e
English lan age, namely ''consciousness'': .,

25 For eio- teenth-centll t "Y elaborations., see E . J. Hundert., e European Enli tenment
and the history of the self. In R. Porter (ed.) Re wn:ting the Self: Histories f rom the Renai·s-
sance to the Present (Lond on: Routledge., 1997) 72 83. ·
26 M . Hollis., Of masks and men . In Carrither s et al.., The Category of tlie Person, 2 17 233.
27 J. Martin and J. Sugarman., A theory of personhood for p sychology. In D. B. Hill and
M . J. Kral (eds.) Ab out Psychology: Essays at the Crossroads of History> Theory and PJiz'los-
opl iy (Albany, : State University of New York Press, 2003) 73 87 .

•
•

· 70 Kurt Danziger

For since consciousness always accompanies thin · g, and it is that which makes
every one to be what he calls self and thereby distinguishes hi 111self from all other •

thinking things, in this alone consists personal identity, i.e. the sameness of a
rational being: and as far as this consciousness can be extended bac ards to any
past action or thou t, so far reaches the identity of that person. 28
•

ere, being a person was de ed, not in terms of an individual's social

being, as had been e case in e past, but in terms of i1·1 11er, private
being. at makes me a p erson is my constant awar eness of myself
•

as e same conscious entity now and in e past. On is \riew, moral

accountabili does not de e persa ood but is itself a consequence of
acting consciously. Individuals are to be held responsible for eir actions •

only insofar as ey acted in 1 consciousness of \Vhat ey were doing.

In e years preceding e appearance of Locke's Essa)', members of
sorne Protestant sects had already been promoting a marked inward turn

a sec ar one. Th e conscious self he posited as a p erson's core was not

to be equated wi e Christian immortal soul . It was a is-\\1orldl'57
ph enomenon open to empirical insp ection like any o er natural ph e;..
nomenon . ot surprisingly, Locke's views 1ere taken very seriously in
e course of e Europ ean Enlighte11111ent but aroused resistance among
defenders of more traditional doctrines.
The secular inward gaze had e potential of developing in o ver"3r
different ·rections. One could adopt Locke 's O\\rn sharply anal ·cal atti--
tude to prívate experience and dissect consciousness into its elements-,
That was e pa of David ume and a long succession of mostly
British associationists. But on is pa e individual p erson tende<f
•

to disappear behind a curtain of general psychological laws at applied

28
J. Locke., An Essa)J Concerning H unza1? Understanding ew York: Dover, 195 9)., Book II.,
ch. 27., 449 . The excerpt is from the second ed.ition origin ally published in 1694 .
29
Well known English exa1nples are provided by Richard Baxter (16 15 169 1) and John
Bunyan (1628 1688) . eir writings were anal}rzed from a perspective that is particu-
larly relevant in the present context in K. J. Weintraub., The Vczlue of the Individual: SeZf •

and Circumstanc e in Autobiog raphy (Univer sity of Chicago Press., 1978), ch. 10. For a
more general account of seventeenth-century tendencies to privatize att empts at achiev-
ing salvation., see especially N. Lu ·ann., e individuality of the individual: Historical
meanings and contemporary problems. In T. C. Heller., M. Sosna., and D. E. Well-
bery (eds.) Reconstructing lndividualis1n: Auto noniy) lndividualit)J and the Self in ster1i
Thought (St ord, CA: Stanford Univer sity Press., 1986) 313 325 . e emergence of
autobiography as ''a cultural practice'' and its relation to earlier practices., su ch as diary
keeping., is covered in M. Mascuch, Origins of the lndividuali's t Self: Au tobi.og raph)J a1id
Self-identit.)1 in England) 1571 1791 (St ord., CA: Stanford Universit}7 Press., 1996) .
30
'I bis aspect is stressed in M. Carrither s., alternative social hist ory of the self . In
Carrithers et al.., The Category of the Person., 234-256 .

•
 Historical psycholo gy of persons 71
-
to everyone. Far more consequential for later conceptions of e per-
son were e pre-occupations of a complex cultural phenomenon at
became own as Romanticism. Several of ese pre-occup ations became
•

p art of a co111 111on understanding of perso ood at persisted long after

Romanticism 's ascendance.
at remained was st of all an insistence on e si'ngular ity of indi-
vidual experience at ran col111ter to virtually all previous discourse on
e subj ect of e person. Of course, people had long been aware of e

e same p er sonal qualities. But ose had been regarded as ra er trivial

matters, not at all e sort of consideration at 11·1 i ght affect one's con-

written accounts of eir lives at a post-Romantic reader would rec-

ognize as genuine autobiographies. Sorne had written accounts of eir
deeds and public achievements, o ers of eir religious lives. But almost
always e focus had been on e exempl ary nature of eir experience, not
on its unique nature. T ·s applied even to fi res such as St. Au stine
354 4 30 AD wh o h ad e writing skills of a good autobiographer but
wh o used em in his Con essions to ill11111i nate his religious conversion

is quite fascinated by his own individu ality, by e unique quali of his

life and p er son, by e nuances of his inner life. ot at he had any great
deeds to dwell on; quite e contrary, he was a 111iser able 111i sfit and he
revels in it. at gives valu e to his p erson is an essential individu ali
at is ere, irrespective of any social entanglements . This individuality
is not to be con sed wi e C istian soul, for Rousseau was nei er a
religious person nor was he ''conf essing'' to a religious audience. e was
,

simply giving expr ession to a soon to b e generally held belief at to be

unique was not an exceptional quali b estowed on ''great rnen '' but an
essential aspect of co11·1 111on perso ood.
Closely linked to Rousseau 's highly developed sense of individuaJi ·
was his awareness of his past. e takes his readers ough e experiences
at were important to him over e years, even e early ones. These were
not matters at had any public sig11ificance; he relates em because ey
illustrate what kind of person he carne to be. Thou an essential core
is impli ed, his individuali is not presented as sorne ng ed but as

31 Aurelius Augustinus, St. Confe ssions, H. Chadwick (trans.)- (Oxford Univer sity Press,
199 1) . On Augustine's narrative talent and the way he employed it, see J. Olney, M emory
and 1Varrative: The "Wéai,e aj .Lije WritiJig (Chica go Univer sity Press, 1998) .
32 J.-J. Rou sseau, The Confe ssz'ons of J ean-J acques Roitss eau, J. M. Cohen (trans.) (Har-
mondswo : Penguin, 1953) .
•

72 Kurt Da1iziger
•

sorne ing at can only be understood as developing over a lifetime.•

In ·s respect, too, his autobiography marked + e appearance of a new

dimension in common conceptions of perso ood. uman individuals
•
e uruque
succession of events and experiences at had formed em. ongside
e much older idea of a public and collective history ere now emerged
e notion of a prívate history at each and every person could lay clai111
to.
There had been older acco1111ts representing personal experience as
a pa to a religious goal., an outcome taking individuals bey ond em-
selves. In e late eighteen cen tl1ry and beyond individu als b ecame
increasingly wrapp ed up in eir own history. Only now did autobiog-
raphy develop as a r ecognized literary genre wi its o\\rn conventions

tion and early memories began to be taken seriously. Self-disclosure was

became an important part of being a person.

The life history at now identified a particular person \!\r as al\vays
ought of as sorne ing to be nar rated: its coherence was e coherence
of a narrative . It co d be looked to for help in making sense of a life,
not only one's own life but also at of o ers. In e course of e

sorne of e characteristics at had b ecome com 111on in autobiographies.

In its early days, psychiatry, especially German psychiatry, pr eserved e
moral significance of e revelations 1.111co\1ered by probing life histories.
But such tend encies were soon submerged by e medical imperative of
ordering p ersonal lives in terms of e categories of ''symptoms '' and
''diseases.''3 5

The me ·calized person

a kind of person at had been un own a century earlier., a person wi

a p ersonali disease. CertainlJr, ere had long been p eopl e regarded as

ing wi decent citizens . But even in e ei teen century., madness wa s

only gradually co111i ng to b e regarded as primarily a medical pr oblem .
•

33 L. .t.mderson, Autobiograph) (London: Routledge., 200 1).

1

34 M. Sherin am., Fre11ch Ai,t.tobz:ograph) ' Dei ices and Desires: Rousseau to Perec (Oxford:
1

Clarendon Press., 1993) .

35 G. Verwe}r, Ps;1ch1:a.tr;1 i11 a11 An tl1ropol ogical a1z d B ionz edical Contex t (Dordrecht: Reidel.,
1985).
 Historical psychology of persons 73
•

any case., madness! · defined ·in terms of an individual's loss of rea-

son., pl aced e a icted in an altoge er different category from ordinary
hu 111ans ., whose cap acity for reason had b een a de ing featur e of p er-
so ood since antiqui ., recognized even by e likes of Thoma s obbes.
The mad were a category ap art., aliens among human persons. Their sad
fate was likely to call for religious ra er an medical 11·1inistr ation .
Gradual secularization of hu 111an affairs favored e medicalization of
madness, and in due course at led to e emergen ce of physi cians who
specialized in e car e of e insane. Initially, is br anch of medicine
was closely linked to special instituti ons for e segregation of e insane,
asylums., but in e course of e nineteen century sorne doctors., often
id entified as neurologists, began to treat p eopl e wi ''n ervous com-
plaints'' in
breach in e wall separating e insane from o er people, for here were
p atients wh o had n ot lost eir cap acity for reason but wer e unabl e to
use at cap aci to repair seriously disturbed personal lives. Once ey
had consi ed emselves to medical care, such p atients would h ave eir
situation described in terms of e already co111 111on medical categories
of diseases and eir symptoms .
For sorne time., is form of medicalization could continue wi out
creating any problems for e de 'tion of perso ood. individual
could easily be regarded as a rational and moral being wh o was sim-
ply unfor t l1t 1at e in being pla ed by sorne disorder located in his or her
nerves . owever., during e latter p art of e nineteen century sorne
alienists in France., and en in 1\ 111erica, began to publicize a kind of dis-
order at seemed to affect the p ersonali as a wh ole and not ju st sorne
specific nction . These were cases of so-called alternating or multiple •

p ersonali ., wh ere e same individual would at different times manif est

completely different p ersonal characteristics, attitudes., modes of expres-

a particular personali e.. ibited at one time wo d appear to have no

•
owledge of e same individual's alternate personality e ibited at a
different time .
These were extraordinary phenomena., but eir effect was eatly mag-
nified by e fact at eir existence was not kept hidden in obscure

36 J. Goldstein., Console and Classify : The Fre nch Psy chiatric Pr ofe ssion in the N ineteenth
Centitry (Cambridge Univer sity Press., 1987) .
.... ,..,
.) /
ong numerou s historical accounts of these developments., see especially I. Hack-
ing., Rew1·iting the Soitl: Jvfi tltiple Personaliry a.nd tlie Sciences of Jvf eniory (Princeton., NJ :
Princeton Univer sity Press, 1995); and G. P. Lombardo and R. Foschi., e concept of
p ersonality in l9th-cen t u ry French and 20th-century · erican psychology. History of
Psy chology 6 (2003) 123 142 .
 74 Ku1At D a1·z zige r
•

medical publications but broadcast to an appreciative lay audience by

memb ers of e medical profession and by accomplished p opularizers.,
su ch as T. ·bot., \\1hose Dis eases o the Pe1·sonality reached a broad audi-

nating p ersonali \vould have r ecei\red a supernatural interpretation., but

now e)' could b e accepted as p art of e natural \Vorld to b e elu cidated
bv scientific medicine.
Tho se elucidations quickly led to a rupture in what had become
e or odox western 1111derstanding of p erso ood., e selfed person .
According to is widely a ccepted Lockean or odoxy., e coherence of
e self at formed e core of p ersonhood dep end ed up on e continu-
itsr of conscious memory. enever I ·nk and act., I am aware at it is
I wh o ·nks and acts., and is awareness pro\rides e read at holds
my oughts and acts together as ose of one and e same p erson . So
went e Locke an mantra . But in alternating personalities e read wa s
clearly broken . . at rr i i ght b e happening?
ate\rer e sp ecific details of . e explanations offered by medically
trained experts and a few o ers ., e Lockean conception of e p er-
son had to be changed . early view, linked to e pro1r1inent French
phil osopher and clinician., Pierre anet 185 9 1947 ., turned a label for

tinuity., e mutual accessibili ., of all self-conscious states., it regarded

e person as an assembly of mental contents wi more or less p ermeable
b oundaries between em. Going mu ch r er., Si und Freud 185 6-
1939 proposed a division of e 111ind into e fa111i liar conscious p art
and a mu ch larger unconscious p art . Sorne of e latter \\1as accessible to
consciousness but most of it wa s protected by a strong barrier ar could
only be penetrated under sp ecial conditions., such as occurred in dream-

The self was red·uced to just a p art of is organiz ation of e personality,

and o y sorne of it \Vas conscious. Far from offering a univer sally valid
concept of e human individual., e image of e consciously selfed
p erson had become a di cult ideal imperfectly realizabl e b)r a 111inority
prepared to in\re st considerable time and effort .

38 T. Ribot., Les M aladies de la Perso1inalit.é [Dise ases of the Perso1z ali"t51] (París: Alean., 1885) .
39 P. Janet., L )Aut on1atisn1e Psy cholog ique: Essa1'. de Psy chologi? Exp érin1e11tale su1· les Fo rnies
lnfé rz:eures de l )Ac tivité H umai11e (Paris : . t.\lcan., 1889) .
40 S. Freud., lntroductor) Le ct1{res on Ps)- cl10-a11a1) sis (London: .D. J.len and Un'v\1in., 1922) .
1 1 1

This is a translation., by Joan Riviere., of lectures deli\7ered at the UnÍ\7er si't)7 of Vienna in
1915 1917 that represented Freud's fust e}.'..tended public S"S-7Stematization of his ideas.
e Freud literature is of course enorm ous and onl}' its existence can be · ted at here .
 Historical psychology of persons 75

In + ... . •

son was fast gaining credibility. The quality of uni ., long e essence

place ere app eared a varie of constru ctions at had in co111111on a

view of e p erson as frag111ented into diverse segments whose commu-
nication wi each o er was always pr oblematic. The identification of
ese seg111ents varied, as did e account of eir relationship to each
o er. In e most influential cases., in cluding ose of Freud and Carl
ung 18 15 19 6 1 ., e se ents of e p ersonali were not seen in one
plane but as stacked on top of each o er., wi more p ower concentrated
at e lower., generally unconscious., levels. Instead of uni ., a dimension

•
as 1n ....
at was absent from ese conceptions was any fai in e pre-
established harmony among e segments constituting e p erson . At
best., a degree of harm ony lay at e end of a long pr ocess, but e normal
state of affairs was one of internal con ·et at could easily b ecome man-
ifest in p erp etual u appin ess., p er sonal crisis., uncontrolled action., and
diverse individual oddities identified in e lan age of medical symp-
toms . The boundarv ., between madness and
•
e essential rationali of e
ordinary person had become frayed to e point of disappearance.

The ·ssected person

Even at e height of its influence, e dep psychological conception of

- e p erson was far from being e only model on offer . A maj or reason
for is is to be found in e extraordinary fractionation of owledge
at b egan in e nineteen century and continued at an accelerating
p ace ereafter . ere was of cour se a huge increase of syst ematiz ed
public i ormation., but is accumulation depended on a division of
labor among many groups of owledge pr oducers, each of which sp e-
•
cialized in a p articular kind of product . On e after an o er, ese groups
broke away from older., much broader and looser associations to form e
''disciplin ary'' stru ctures fa1r11liar t o us today. In ea ch case is entailed
a sharp ened focus on a delimited subj ect matter and a com111itment to
p articular norms and pr actices of investig ation at varied among disci-
plin es. This was a ·a ly e cient way of facilitating e accumulation of

41 e term ''depth p sychology'' seems to go back to the Swiss psychiatrist Eugen Bleuler
( 1857 1939) ., Freud's exact contemporary., who also invent ed the term ''schizophrenia ."
42 F. J. Sulloway., Freitd: Bio logist aj ·the 1vf ind 1 ew York: Ba sic Books., 1979) .
T
 76 Kurt Da1zzige1·

owl edge., but it also led to its disper sal among diverse group s at gen-
erally had little incentive for co1111nunicating wi ea ch o er. Economists.,
historians., sociologists., and p sychologists., to n ame o y e biggest
groups in e human sciences, were abl e to develop and maintain sep a-
rate conceptions of e p erson to suit eir p articular agend a . The fact
. at maj or disciplines often fragmented internally tended to compound
the problem .
Ironically., p s}rcholo as a discipline was ab out e last of e human
sciences to make r oom for e p erson . For e founders of experimen-
tal psych ology e human p erson was not on e agenda . Their interest
was strictly in gene1"al re . larities of human nctioning, such as visu al
space perception., sensory j ud ent., reaction tim e., and so on . Persons
did not exist for em as p otential obj ects of investigation . Indi vidit al
di' e1·ences in psychological n ctions did exist., but ese were treated as
error terms: wh at was psychologically significant was e general reg-
ularity of individual experience and a ction., not e differences among

discipline of p sych olo did d room for a sub-discipline., identified as

''p ersonality psycholo ., '' at elab orated its own concept of e human
p erson . For at to happen., ·inte1·-iJzdiv i'di;.,al differences woul d have to be

nents at wer e con11non to all individuals. Th e Romantic vision of e

p erson as a unique whole woul d ha\re t o b e r eplaced by a more anato-
miz ed image of e individual as an assembly of characteristics shared
wi o er individu als. In e nineteen century., phrenologists., and lat er
graphologists.., had already worked wi dístinct comp onents of e p er-
'

son at could be assessed by specialists. E anced social mobili had

opened a new spectrum of occup ational choices at would benefit from

never gained scientific respectabili .

43
•
K. Danziger., Co11structing the S1.í bJ 'e ct: Historical Origins of Ps) chological Research
1

(Ca inbridge Univer sit:}7 Press., 1990) .

44
With very fev.1 exceptions., the sub-discipline of p ersonalit}r p s"S,r chologs.1 long ignored the
social embeddedness of personhood and a,1oided the study of indi\ridual lives. It quickl-s7
distinguished itself from its disciplinar}r ri\Tals b}7 relying very heavil-sr on the statistical
analysis of indi,ridu al differences. See N. B. Barenbaum and D. G. Winter, History of
m odern p ersonality, theor-s,T and research. In O. P . John., R. \Xl. Robins, and L. ..!. \.. Penrin
(eds.) H a11dbook of Personal1'.t) Theor) ' and Researcl1 ... ew York: Guilford Press., 2008)
1

3 26.
45
R. Cooter., The C1.1ltural .i'vI.e ani11g of Popul ar Science: Phre11olog;! and the Organi'z ati'on of
Conse,1t in Ni'netee11th-ce11ttí1) ' Britain (Cambr idge Uni\7ersity, Press, 1984) .
 Historical p s·y chology of p ersons 77
-

A technological advance laid e basis for a science of individual

h eredity., Francis Galton 1822 19 11 turned e focus of social statistics

from e average person to e ínter-individual differences at existed
b etween p ersons . e and his acol e., Karl Pearson 185 7 1936 ., worked
out relatively simple tec iques for analyzing ese differen ces., provid ed
of course ey were formulated quantitatively. If one had several measure-
ments., e .g.., of visual acuity, streng of hand grip., and speed of r eaction.,
from e same set of individuals, one could obtain statistical correla-
tions among ese measures b ased on e ínter-individual differences
wi ·n e set of individu als. At e begi1111ing of e entie century,
Charles Spearman 1863 1945 was already applying ese techniques
t o analyzing tests of intelligence. important p er sonal quali had been
measured and identified. Coul d sorne ing similar be achieved with o er
p ersonal qualities? There was never any doubt ab out e real existence of
intrinsic qualities ascribed to socially sep ar ate individuals, e problem
was h ow to isolate and identi em as p otentially scientific obj ects.
Nleasuring quantitative differences between individuals always
required sorne scale on which all individuals of interest could be assigned

acteristics, such as hei t and weight, provided e proto e for such

comp onents., and e simple psycho-physical measurements us ed in
Galton 's ''an r op ometry'' hewed closely t o ese models. The challenge
for a Galtoni an science of p ersonality was to d comp onents at were
p sychologically more si ificant and yet could be made to fit e require-
ments of e techn olo .
One way of meeting is challenge was to turn from attempts at direct
measurement of p ersonal p erformance to e an alysis of lan age about
p ersonality . ere e term ''trait'' pl ayed a key r ole. 'ke ''per sonali ,''
is was n ot a wid ely used term in English at e time e ''n ew psy chol-
o '' got off e ground . But, promisingly, its use str addled e mo_ral ·
and e scientific realm. One sp oke of char acter traits, but e term also
occurred in biolo ,/ ., esp ecially e n ew science of heredi and its ugly
sister, eugenics. An early systematic attempt at producing a collection
of trait names resulted in The Trait Book., published by e Eugenics
Record O ce in 19 19, which contained a list of about 3., 000 traits '' at
111j ght conceivably be hereditary according to e principle of unitary

46
For a detailed critical account of this development in relation to conceptions of the
p erson., see J. T. Lamiell, Bey ond I11dividiial and Group Diff erences: H unian Ind ividuality)
Scientific Psy chology) and Willi'anz S tern )s Critical Personal·isni (London : Sage., 2003) .
78 Kurt Da1iziger
• •

ing at was far more radically elementaristic an its use in e context

of human character could ever be. A p erson's chara cter was understood
to constitute sorne kind of whole., so at any of its ''traits'' woul d be
one feature of at whole. For e en science of her edi!)r., on e o er
hand., a unitary trait was e expression of a somatic element at had an
existence irresp ective of any sup erordinate organization . \ en Gordon
Allport ma de traits or ra er tr ait names e b asis of e new ps'Srchol-
•

o of p ersonalicy., he indicated ese units were to be seen as features of

did not prevail., and e most influential version of personhood associ-

ated wi is branch of twentie -century psycholo took a radically
elementaristic form at was 'storically unique.
In ·s construction of ''p ersonali .,'' hi l 111an individuals each p ossess
a large number of discrete attributes at are identifiable by e fact
at natural lan ages have words for em. By r er assurn i ng at
such attributes do not change eir identify because e:)r form p art of a
different collection of attributes in each individu al., and are also measur-
abl e., it b ecomes p ossible to assi a valu e for each individu al on each
attribute or trait. This generates a set of indi\ridual differen ces at can
be analyzed by means of classical Galtonian tec iqu es and eir later
developments . The ma ematical analysis yields a somewhat indeter 11·1i -
nate ma ematical result at must b e subj ected to non-ma ematical
criteria and en given sorn e me anin 1 and relevant interpretation in
order to b e regarded as evidence for e existence of ''personalicy factors''
corr1111on to all human individuals. Agreement on what ese are was not
easily achieved., but in e late twenti e century a degree of consensus
emerged at ere were ju st five., no more and no less.
odern PS'S7 cholo also accommodated p ersonalicy studies at did
not follO'A7 • s p a but shared conceptions of e p erson wi sorne of e
older traditions already discussed . Dep p sychology inspir ed much work
in e earlier ph ases of p ersonali psychology., and a turn t o life hist ory

a truly novel conception of e person is to be found only in e approach

•,
47 G. W. Allp ort., Personality : A PsycJz ological Ir1.te1-pretat1'.on Tev. York : Holt., 1937) 236 .
1

48
I. A. M . Nicholson, Invent1:1-zg Person.alit; Gord on Allp ort and tlze Scierz ce of Selfliood
1:

as · gton., DC: .. erican Ps:,1chological Association, 2003) .

49 Three broad conceptual approaches are identified in D. P. i\1.c..t.\.dams , ;._-'\. conceptu al
history of p ersonality psychology. InR. Hogan., J. Johnson, and S. Briggs (eds.) H andbook
of Personalit) Ps) cholog) (San Diego : Academ i c Press, 1997) 3 39 . For a recent over\riew
1 1 1

of the history of this field, see F. Dumont, A Hz"s tor)1 of Perso1ialit)' Ps) cholog)'.' Theor)1)
1

Scie11ce arid Rese arch f ronz H elleni'.sm to tl1e TvJ erz t;'-fi rst CentU,) ' (Nev:.r York: Cambridge
University Press, 20 1O) .
 Historical psychology of persons 79

at became established as is
case, certain assumptions about natural language provide a basis for
• •

Empiricists in e natural sciences have usu ally beg L1n wi ings or

phenomena and en given em names or provided verbal descriptions.,
usually according to sorne syst em . ovvever., since e emergence of p er-
sonali p sycholoe, as a distinct sub-discipline in e l 930s many of its
most pro111i n ent representatives have pur sued an empiricism of words as
...... e royal ·r oad to a owledge of persons . Gordon lport believed at
''men experience a desire to represent by name such mental processes
or dispositions of eir fellows as can be deter111in ed by observation or

and ernployed it as a basis for na111ing attributes on which individuals

could r ate emselves or o ers. Individual differences obt ained in is
way could en b e analyzed as described ab ove . alf a century later., e
rationale for s pa of no111in al empiricism had become more explicit:
''Those individual differ ences most salient and relevant in people's lives
will eventu ally become encoded into eir lang LJ_ age; e more important
such a difference., e more likely is it to become expressed as a single
---,

word .''J .J
Single words are e elements of dictionaries. Indeed, in s concep-
tion e dictionarv .., nctions not onlv.. as a source of material but also as
a silent metaphor for e individual p erson . Dictionaries break natur al
lan age into a list of sep ar ately de ed units., much as e taxonomy
of traits analyzes a living p ersonality . In b o cases., ere is a problem-
atic relationship between a dissected anatomy and a nctioning wh ole.,
natural l an g L1age in e one case, and individual p ersonality in e o er .
Lan g u ages., of course, ar e not collections of separate written words.
They involve structural features_, overlapping semantic fields and prag-
matic nctions. Corr elations in e application of ling LJ_is tic units are •

erefore to be expected, not least when people use language to talk about
....l.

each o er. Tr eating such correlations as an unproblematic reflection of

50 In this historical study I exclude development s of the last tvvo decades. For an historically
i1nport ant overview of the lexical taxono111ic approach., see O. P. John., A. gleitner., and
F. Ostendorf., The lexical approach to personality: A historical review of tr ait taxonomic
research. Eztrope an J o-itrnal oj.Personali'ty 2 ( 1988) 17 1 203.
5 1 Allport., Perso11alit::,) ., 304 .
-0
J .., G. W. Allp ort and H. S. Odbert., Trait nam es: A psychological study. Psy chological
1vf o-¡z og,·apl1s 47 ( 1936) no. 2 11.
- "'
J,) John et al.., e lexical appr oach to personality., 174 .

•
80 Kurt Da1iziger

the ing talked about implies a hidden lin istics at reduces lan age

implies a pre-established conception of what is to be discovered when one

investigates persons scientifically.
Looked at in a more distanced hist orical p ersp ecti\re., e striking fea-
tt1r e of much of t\\rentie -century p ersonality psycholo is e stren
of its fai in e obj ective realityr of \Vhatever it is attempting t o uncover .
From its beginnings., ·s endeavor was spurred on by e conviction

of non-trivial., non-artefa ctual psychological owledge about e single

human individu al as an entity. Such convicti ons are by no means rare
in e hist ory of e human sciences., and wi out em little 111ight ever
be achieved. In e late nineteen century., for exampl e., ere wa s such
a convi ction about e promise and achievability of a science of mem-
ory., and at certainly brought to light sorne ings at were previously
well hidden . Sorne philosoph ers refer to ·s kind of conviction as ''d eep
., owledge., '' a sort of owledge of v\7hat to expect before ere is any real
--
owledge.)) One might ink of it as a owledge niche. A confluence
of deep cultural traditions regarding individuals., a more recent fad for
outing ''personali ., '' a loss of moral certainties., fai in e p ower of dis-
section and of m easurement., comp etition among disciplines : ese and
other factors seem to have produ ced a nich e in whi ch a n ovel con ception

54
C . Ta}rlor., Langu age and human natur e . In C. Taylor., Hunz an Age nC)! and Language:
Ph1:zosop l1ical Pape 1·s 1 (Cambridge Universityr Press., 1985) 2 15 247; F. de Saussure.,
Course in General Linguistics ew York : Philosophical Library., 1959) .
JJ Hac · g., RezJJ r·iting the Soul.
56
The nventieth century was marked by a culture of p ersonality chatter. E1..reryon e} not
merely persons of great accomplis 1 ent., was no\v assu 111ed to have a ''personality"' eas-
il}r described in v.rords . Adje cti1..r al checklists for pll 1·poses of per sonnel selection app eared
early. Entertai n 111ent and self-help literatur e regularly in1..rited its conSlJ_ I ners to engage in
exercises of self-rating and self-evaluation. Talk about personal characteristics that pre-
\rious generations v.rould have considered inappropriate, emb arrassing) or unseeml}' was
now ever}T\vhere. In this resp ect the m odern cult u ral history of ''p ersonality resembled
1
''

that of sexuality; see M . Fou cault, The Histor;) of Se)..1,,t alit)' 1: A n lntroducti'on . . ew York:
Random Hou se., 197 8) .