Humanism and dialogue – the role of the imagination
Key questions of the research project are:
- How can the imagination contribute to the openness and dialogue humanism aims for?
- How can an existential counseling based on interreligious humanism make use of the imagination in a methodical way?
To understand the (psychological) conditions for inter-worldview dialogue, we need to understand the dynamic ways worldviews differ and change, and guide people’s search for existential meaning. My research project starts from the assumption that for a better understanding of the development of worldviews, we need to gain more insight in the imaginative power of the human mind (cf. Mithen, 2007; Whitehouse, 2008). The various ways ‘imagination’ is defined in psychological studies have in common “a reference to the human mind’s capacity to elaborate concepts, images, and ideas that do not correspond to current or past reality, and that may never be actualized” (Roth, 2007, p.xx). Promising approaches to study this capacity and its role in religion and worldview are found in cognitive and evolutionary psychology. The Canadian psychologist Merlin Donald (1991) sees the imagination as a driving force in the evolution of culture and cognition. It allows for the development of new representational strategies in people’s dealing with reality. Donald distinguishes four of these strategies – episodic, mimetic, mythic and theoretic – that are all employed by modern humans to understand their world. It is important to learn how these strategies interact in contemporary worldviews. In the ‘hybrid’ modern mind, the imagination has a wealth of material to work with, derived from different sources, both religious and secular. The research project will study the ways this influences – both in positive and negative ways – the openness to inter-worldview dialogue. It will also make these cognitive psychological understandings of the dynamics of worldviews useful for further developing (humanist) existential counselling, both theoretically and methodically.
prof.dr. H.A. Alma, University for Humanistics (UvH)
« Back