History of Psychology: From Antiquity to Modernity, A, CourseSmart eTextbook, 7th Edition

A History of Psychology: From Antiquity to Modernity provides a narrative history of psychology from the development of folk psychology as the key adaptation of humans at the dawn of history through the Classical, medieval, and early modern periods to present day psychology, including scientific, applied, and professional psychology.  Unlike other texts, this book takes a largely externalist perspective on psychology’s history.  Although theoretical and empirical arguments inside psychology about the nature of mind and behavior are not neglected, A History of Psychology shows how psychology’s development has been shaped by social, economic, and political forces external to it, and, in turn, how the mature psychology of the late twentieth century has begun to shape the society in which it arose.  It is a critical history, not in the sense of criticizing psychology, but in the sense of carefully examining how concepts and issues in psychology are not merely scientific ones, but reflect and affect concepts and ideas that lie outside the technical concerns of psychology as a science and as a profession.  The critical, externalist perspective is enhanced by imagining a Martian anthropologist who chooses to study psychology as a science and social institution, and who periodically interrupts the text with blogs (text boxes) commenting on psychology from a very outside perspective.  A blog website will be established when the book is published to continue these comments in a dialogue with students and others who take an interest in the history and nature of psychology.

Introductory Essay

 

Chapter 1: Science, History, and Psychology

 

Unit I. Background.

Chapter 2: The Legacy of Ancient Greece EEA - 323 BCE

Chapter 3: Antiquity 323 BCE – 1000 CE

Unit I Bibliography

 

Unit II. Constructing the Modern World.

Chapter 4: The Premodern world 1000 CE - 1600

Chapter 5: The Scientific Revolution 1600 - 1700

Chapter 6: The Enlightenment 1700 - 1815

Chapter 7: The Ascent of Science 1815 – 1914

Unit II Bibliography

 

Unit III. Founding Psychology

Chapter 8: The Psychology of Consciousness

Chapter 9: The Psychology of the Unconscious

Chapter 10: The Psychology of Adaptation

 

Unit IV. Psychological Science in the Modern World

Chapter 11: Behaviorism 1892-1956

Chapter 12: Cognitive Science 1956 – 2000

Unit IV Bibliography

 

Unit V. Applied Psychology in the Modern World

Chapter 13: The Rise of Applied Psychology 1892-1939

Chapter 14: The Psychological Society 1940-2000

Unit V Bibliography

 

Concluding Thoughts