Commentary on ‘Being positive about schizophrenia’

Abstract

flict and potential personal and social change' (Burr 1995, p. 44). Berger & Luckmann (1966) argue that the mechanism governing the genesis and maintenance of the successful social construction of reality is the process of externalization, objectification and internalization; to quote from Burr (1995, p. 10):'People "externalise" when they act on their world, creating some artefact or practice . . . [for example] . . . by telling a story or writing a book . . . this then enters into the social realm, and once in this . . . begins to take on a life of its own. The idea that it expresses has become an 'object' of consciousness for the people in that society . . . and has developed a kind of factual existence or truth . . . which appears . . . "natural", issuing from the nature of the world itself rather than dependent upon the constructive work and interactions of human beings . . . they "internalise" it as part of their consciousness . . .'