Sociology Plus
De-Centred Self Definition
The de-centred self is a term favoured by postmodern and post-Freudian writers for a conception of selfhood that rejects the idea of a unified, autonomous core to the person, stressing instead the self’s supposed emptiness and its constitution by forces outside it.
Background
The self has always been an awkward notion for sociology. For most purposes sociologists work with common-sense versions of it, but a recognised tension runs between our experience of the self as autonomous — I decide what to do, which job to pursue — and the realisation that the self is conditioned by its surroundings. Explicit sociological reflection on the problem goes back at least to George Herbert Mead.
Postmodern Treatments
More recent writers have returned to the theme, with postmodern and post-Freudian authors dwelling on the alleged emptiness of the postmodern self. Jacques Derrida has likewise been drawn to the conceptual complexities of the idea of the self, which he regards as ideally suited to deconstruction. “De-centred self” has become the preferred term among these writers, though they use it in slightly differing ways.