Power, Self, and Psychosis: Examining Political Subjectivity Through Schizophrenia

Abstract

A meaning‐oriented approach is employed to analyse recurring themes in the psychotic speech of a young woman inpatient diagnosed with schizophrenia in Istanbul, Turkey. The analyses aim to investigate the form and nature of the relationship between the subjective content of psychosis and the local sociocultural context. This article illustrates the significant role played by semiotic processes in embedding the individual sense of self and identity within collective systems of meaning. More specifically, this article highlights the ways in which local structures of power and meaning become intertwined with the sense of self at the deepest levels of the organisation of subjective experience. The notion of political subjectivity is proposed as a descriptive term for that process.