Narrating Embodied Aims. Self-transformation in Conversion
Narratives—A Psychological Analysis
Ulrike Popp-Baier
Abstract: This article presents a case history concerning a young woman's narrative about being
cured from her eating disorder by converting to the Charismatic-Evangelical version of Christianity.
The psychological-narrative analysis of the interview relies on the conversion research of Peter
STROMBERG (1993) He maintains that converts who relate their conversion story use a type of
speech that always comprises referential and constitutive forms of communication: canonic discourse
which refers to a certain religious context of meaning, becomes constitutive (i.e. meaningful
in a broader sense) by linking canonical language directly with individual experience. This
connection enables verbal expression of previously inaccessible or unacceptable desires while
deepening the commitment to faith. In this sense the conversion narrative constitutes the narrator's
self-transformation. The case history presented in this article tries to show how the interviewee
came to terms with unbearable embodied aims by telling her conversion story in the framework of
the canonic language of Charismatic-Evangelical Christianity.
Table of Contents
1. Narrative Conversion Research
2. The Canonic Language of Charismatic-Evangelical Religion
3. Andrea's Story
3.1 Methodical remarks
3.2 Andrea's self-narrative: a summary from the narrator's point of view
3.3 Life before conversion: Body troubles
4. Conversion and Self-Transformation
References
Author
Citation
1. Narrative Conversion Research
Conversion stories have played a role in psychology research since the
discipline's emergence as an academic field (cf. e.g. STARBUCK 1899, JAMES
1902, FREUD 1928). In classical psychology research on conversion, religious
conversion (i.e. the practice of changing religion in the broadest sense) was
perceived as a fairly radical personal change related to the adoption of a new
interpretative framework. Until the 1980s empirical studies focused primarily on
the role of personality traits and psychological functions or conflicts related to
conversions (cf. e.g. SILVERSTEIN 1988, PALOUTZIAN, RICHARDSON &
RAMBO 1999). In this context the conversion stories are thought to convey the
conversion procedure and were thus—at least implicitly—regarded as a fairly
accurate account of the conversion event. [1]
© 2001 FQS http://www.qualitative-research.net/fqs/
Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung / Forum: Qualitative Social Research (ISSN 1438-5627)
Volume 2, No. 3, Art. 16
September 2001
FORUM: QUALITATIVE
SOCIAL RESEARCH
SOZIALFORSCHUNG
Key words: case
history,
Charismatic-
Evangelical
language,
conversion
narrative, eating
disorder, self-
transformation,
chronotope,
biographical
inversion
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Research based on the "linguistic turn" in social sciences valued conversion
stories differently. Especially in conversion research within sociology of religion,
conversion stories were no longer interpreted only in terms of their possible
referential function but were understood primarily as acts of speech, as acts of
communication, and were analyzed as such (cf. e.g. BECKFORD 1978,
BISCHOFBERGER 1992, KNOBLAUCH, KRECH & WOHLRAB-SAHR 1998,
LUCKMANN 1987, SNOW & MACHALEK 1984, STAPLES & MAUSS 1987,
STROMBERG 1993, ULMER 1988). Considering conversion from the perspective
of conversion stories involves two types of empirical research. On the one hand,
the aspects that can be "observed" and described in the conversion process are
emphasized. These are the communicative reconstructions in conversion stories
which have a structure that lends itself to empirical analysis.1
[2]
The other type of empirical research, which focuses on the conversion stories, is
associated with a narrative new conceptualization of conversion. This kind of
narrative conversion study includes the religious sociological study by SNOW and
MACHALEK (1984) and especially the study by STAPLES and MAUSS (1987).
SNOW and MACHALEK (1984) interpret conversion according to a concept of
George Herbert MEAD as a change of the universe of discourse. This concept of
the discourse universe designates the socially constructed frame of reference of
self-evident assumptions about mankind and the world in which individuals
structure their actions and experience them as purposeful. STAPLES and
MAUSS (1987) agree with SNOW and MACHALEK (1984) and recommend
interpreting these changes primarily as self-transformation and the corresponding
acts of speech as methods for converts to achieve such self-transformation. Their
empirical studies reveal that biographical reconstruction is the specific rhetorical
indicator for a conversion story in which (according to the authors) only this act of
speech will enable such self-transformation. Following Ralph TURNER (1976),
STAPLES & MAUSS distinguish the real self from the spurious self. In this
context self-transformation signifies the creation of a new vision of who we really
believe we are when all our social roles and self-presentations are stripped away
(STAPLES & MAUSS 1987, p.137). [3]
This narrative conceptualization also implies that conversion stories are told as
life stories, that they are a special form of autobiographical narrative. According
to MCADAMS (1997), from a psychological perspective live stories may be
viewed as personal myths. We construct these myths in order to place the
multiplicity and complexity of our daily life and actions in a meaningful context.
Creating a personal myth involves creating a story about oneself as a temporal
being that has a past, and relating the present to this past in order to form a
1 Cf. especially the works of LUCKMANN (1987) and ULMER (1988, 1990), which deal with
formal aspects of conversion stories. In his attempt to identify communicative genres (cf.
LUCKMANN 1986), which he applies to the conversion stories, LUCKMANN (1987) emphasizes
that conversion stories conform to special preconceived models. Converts telling their stories
adopt, according to LUCKMANN, communicative models of their conversion experiences; more
accurately put, they adopt models of telling conversion experiences. Conversion stories become
models of a reconstructive genre that presumes to relate "actual" experiences. In an empirical
study of conversion stories, ULMER (1988, 1990) aims to elaborate both the genre's general
traits and the basic components of such stories and their function in the overall composition of
such a reconstructive genre.
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perspective of the future. We can discover what else it means by following the
considerations of Paul RICOEUR (1991) concerning the narrative function of the
so-called plot. With reference to Aristotle's Poetics, RICOEUR (1991) defines the
act of plotting as an integrative process, which provides the dynamic identity of a
narrated story. According to RICOEUR (1991), the plot is a synthesis of the
heterogeneous in a threefold way:
1. It is a synthesis of multiple events or incidents with the complete and singular
story.
2. It unifies "components as widely divergent as circumstances encountered
while unsought, agents of actions and those who passively undergo them,
accidental confrontations or expected ones, interactions which place the
actors in relations ranging from conflict to cooperation, means that are wellattuned
to ends or less so, and, finally, results that were not willed ..."
(RICOEUR 1991, p.426).
3. It synthesizes a succession of incidents, a pure chronology, into a temporal
meaningful unity which is characterized by beginning, integration, culmination
and ending. It derives a configuration from a succession. [4]
These characteristics of stories in general are also typical of life stories, of
personal myths. Accordingly, we can view conversion stories as self-narratives,
as personal myths, which are narratively structured by the "plot" of the
communicative model of conversion.2
That implies a decisive change in the life of
the story's implicit author as a main issue in this kind of story. [5]
STROMBERG (1993) ties in with this conception of conversion. In his analysis of
conversion stories from Evangelical circles in the United States, he assumes that
religious discourse is decisive in enabling believers to reconcile conflicting desires
and consequently to transform themselves. Borrowing from speech act theory
STROMBERG (1993) distinguishes between two forms of communicative
behavior: the form of the referential and that of the constitutive. When we use
linguistic symbols in a referential manner, we assume implicitly a general consensus
in a certain social reference group concerning the meaning of these
symbols. Communicative behaviors that are visible as activities in which one
communicates by doing something are designated constitutive communicative
behaviors. Their meanings depend upon the contexts in which they occur.
According to STROMBERG (1993, p.10) these behaviors always entail a
breakdown between communication and situation. For example, when I say "I
have a headache" that may be a referential communicative behavior if I want to
tell someone that I feel pain in my head, and I implicitly assume that everyone
who understands English will understand this utterance. In a different context,
however, the same utterance may form a constitutive communicative behavior,
i.e. a polite hint that someone should leave. In this case the meaning of the
communicative behavior depends on the social context in which it is spoken.
Another example of constitutive communicative behavior is communication that
occurs through symbolic systems other than verbal language. For example, I
2 Cf. Note 1.
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choose to convey the message that I am wealthy by purchasing an expensive car
(cf. STROMBERG 1993, p.10). [6]
STROMBERG (1993) maintains that converts who narrate their conversion story
use a type of speech that always comprises these two forms of communication,
the referential and the constitutive: canonic discourse, which refers to a certain
religious context of meaning, becomes constitutive (i.e. meaningful) in a broader
sense by establishing a direct link between canonic language and individual
experience. STROMBERG (1993) argues that this connection enables verbal
expression of previously inaccessible or unacceptable desires while deepening
the commitment to faith. In this sense the conversion narrative constitutes the
self-transformation of the narrator. Usually this kind of self-transformation will
dialogically be sustained by a variety of social interactions within the respective
religious groups. According to this perspective, conversion does not seem like a
singular occurrence in the life of an individual. Rather, it concerns a gradual
procedure in which subjects attribute meaning to their experiences. This
attribution of meaning is not contained within a single story that is constantly
repeated with each narration. Rather, STROMBERG stresses—in part by
regarding the conversion story as a ritual—that the story's actual performance is
an essential constituent of the procedure which can be perceived as conversion
in the sense of self-transformation. [7]
In this article I will perform a psychological analysis of the conversion story told by
a young woman who "cured" her eating disorder by embracing the CharismaticEvangelical
version of Christianity. Next, I will address general characteristics of
the language of the Charismatic-Evangelical movement, which will be followed by
a summary of my interviewee's conversion story. I will then go further by
presenting a narrative-psychological analysis of the story as a personal myth
structured around a personal change. [8]
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2. The Canonic Language of Charismatic-Evangelical Religion
I use the term Charismatic-Evangelical religion to refer to the religious
orientations of all groups and movements influenced by the Evangelical
movement3
and by the Pentecostal movement4
. Their religious life is based
mainly on the following convictions:
1. Belief in the divine inspiration of the Bible, which is the supreme authority on
all matters concerning faith and everyday life.
2. Belief in the need for a personal conversion, which requires devoting one's life
to Jesus Christ (usually in the presence of witnesses). This conversion is
directly linked with (or is in some cases followed by) the experience of being
born again in the faith in Jesus Christ by the Holy Spirit. The convert firmly
believes that only born-again Christians are eligible for eternal salvation.
3. Belief in the gifts (charismata)5
of the Holy Spirit, which are available to every
believer (born-again Christian). These gifts include speaking in tongues
(glossolalia), faith healing, casting out demons and prophecy.
4. Being convinced of the need for a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, so
that individuals may experience the Lord's work in their own life. The main
experiences include one's own conversion, answers to prayers, and healings.
5. Being convinced of the priesthood of all believers, who have a duty to provide
each other with pastoral care, to proclaim the gospel throughout the world and
to testify about the Lord's work through examples from their own life. [9]
3 The origins of the Evangelical movement lie in the Great Awakening of the eighteenth century in
America, which brought together several movements including above all New England
Puritanism, continental Pietism, Baptist antiestablishment democratic impulses and Methodism
(cf. MARSDEN 1987). Contemporary Evangelicalism maintains that religion is a matter between
the individual and God and is therefore above all the experience of the individual that may
create a significant link with the divine. The Bible (and not the Church) is the only trustworthy
guide in moral and spiritual matters for the individual. Evangelicals reject liberal ideas in ethics
and Biblical criticism (cf. e.g. STROMBERG 1993). For more information about history, theology
and political and social aspects of the Evangelical movement, see e.g. HUNTER 1983.
4 The Pentecostal movement originated with the Pentecostal revival in the United States at the
start of the twentieth century.
"Pentecostals trace the beginnings of their movement to the day of Pentecost described in
Acts. ... They believe that the experience of spirit baptism and the practice of the gifts of the
spirit that occurred on that day were meant to be normative in the life of the church and of
each believer. They maintain that although the charismata ceased in the main body of the
church soon after the apostolic age, one can trace an intermittent history of charismatic
practices among sectarians like the Montanists, Anabaptists, Camisards, Shakers, Irvingites,
Mormons, and the various nineteenth-century Holiness groups. The twentieth-century
Pentecostal and charismatic movements, therefore, mark the restoration of the charismata to
the church" (ANDERSON 1987, p.231).
According to ANDERSON (1987, p.230), the early Pentecostals were the heirs to the
evangelical faith of the late-nineteenth-century Holiness movement. The distinctive doctrine was
that of baptism in the spirit, and a distinctive practice became the water baptism for adults. The
so-called Charismatic or Neo-Pentecostal movement is the name of a Pentecostal revival within
the non-Pentecostal Christian communions launched during the 1960s. The "Charismatics" are
generally organized as transconfessional lay movements or as prayer groups within their nonPentecostal
churches (cf. ANDERSON 1987). For more information about the Pentecostal and
the Charismatic movement and their different relational links with the Evangelical movement,
see e.g. HUNT, HAMILTON & WALTER 1997, POEWE 1994.
5 "Charismatic derives from the Greek charism, meaning supernatural gifts of the Spirit, which are
most often considered those listed in 1 Corinthians 12-14" (ANDERSON 1987, p.229).
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These principles render explicit and imply certain motives, which characterize the
religious culture of these groups. According to CSORDAS (1994, p.22)
"the concrete character of the Charismatic world can be found in the movement's
specialized vocabulary of motives (Mills 1940). The motives are words with
specialized religious meaning which are constantly circulated in the genres of ritual
language. ... The motives of Charismatic ritual language name and identify the
following features of Charismatic life: 1) forms of relationship among individuals or
between individuals and God; 2) forms of collectivity or collective identity; 3) qualities
or properties of individuals or relationships; 4) activities or forms of action essential to
life within the movement; 5) negativities or countermotives that refer to threats to the
Charismatic ideal". [10]
These motives form—in both senses of the word—important elements of the
Charismatic-Evangelical discourse on the one hand and patterns of actions and
orientations of the Charismatic-Evangelical form of life on the other hand. The
following motives can figure prominently here6
: 1) the father relationship as the
prototype of an authoritative relationship is very important. Individuals should
learn to recognize the Lord as the loving Father who represents supreme
authority over the way they lead their life. Social life companionships, marriage
and family are depicted according to an analogous patriarchal structure. The man
or father is the head, and the women and children are subordinate. 2) The
believers form communities of various orders of magnitude: fireside chats, Bible
groups, congregations, chapters of international groups, etc. 3) Each individual is
assumed to have a spirit, a soul and a body. A complex pathology considers
various relationships and possible effects between these three entities. 4)
Community gatherings revolve around the community spirit. Practices that foster
this sense include joint worship, singing and rhythmic movements, such as
dancing, clapping, etc. The participants enhance the community experience by
applying the different "gifts of the Spirit" (charismata). One person may speak in
tongues, while another may explain these statements. Another person may share
prophecies, prayer healings can take place, novices can convert, etc. Such
activities or versions of such activities also structure daily life outside the
community gatherings. A lot of time is dedicated to daily prayer. "Inner healing" is
an important form of pastoral prayer in which someone tries to come to terms
with his or her own past by working through pain and suffering and "personal
sins" in the intimate dialogue with another/other believer/s. Over time these
psychic traumas are healed by praying for forgiveness for those responsible for
the pain and by requesting the Lord to forgive one's own sins. 5) CharismaticEvangelical
doctrine has several personal powers of transcendence in which a
personified devil confronts the personified God in a struggle for world supremacy.
If individuals do not live by the Lord's commandments (as they appear in the
Bible) and "sin", they may be controlled by Satan and his demons. This outcome
can also result from occult activities (reading horoscopes, using a talisman, tarot
6 I am providing only a few examples here. CSORDAS (1987) submits that his list of such motives
is virtually exhaustive. Cf. CSORDAS (1994, 1997). For other works, which do not deal with the
motive concept but nevertheless analyse religiosity or religious culture of the CharismaticEvangelical
world, cf. NESTLER 1998, POPP-BAIER 1998.
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readings, etc.) within families or from undergoing certain forms of psychotherapy.
In such cases a person may be possessed by a demon and may contract certain
diseases as a consequence. [11]
With respect to the stated principles and the motives presented as examples, the
Charismatic-Evangelical religion clearly forms a "world" of its own.7
Participation
in this (new) world, the individual adoption of the corresponding "universe of
discourse", occurs e.g. through the ritual of conversion narrative through the
repeated (and from time to time, better) reconstruction of the own life story in the
canonic language of the Charismatic-Evangelical religion. In the following case
history8
I want to give an example of a narrative-psychological analysis of a
conversion story. The questions are: how can the biographical reconstructions
function as a self-transformation, and what are the typical features of the
personal myth of a young woman adopting the Charismatic-Evangelical universe
of discourse? [12]
3. Andrea's Story
3.1 Methodical remarks
In the context of my psychological research on the religious orientations of
women in the Charismatic-Evangelical movement (cf. POPP-BAIER 1998), I also
had a so-called biographical-narrative interview with a 26-year-old woman (I will
call her Andrea) who told me about her eating disorders and her recovery. The
interview method was devised by Fritz SCHÜTZE (cf. e.g. SCHÜTZE 1976, 1983,
1992, ROSENTHAL 1993). In biographical-narrative interviews, the
autobiographical narrators are asked by means of an initial opening question to
tell their life story and to narrate events and experiences from their own life
without an interruption by the interviewer during the first part of the interview.9
[13]
The database for the further analysis consists of the transcribed text of such a
biographical-narrative interview. This data analysis follows GEERTZ's (1993)
suggestions for interpretative studies of culture. Following GEERTZ we can make
a distinction between a "thick description" and a "diagnosis" as different steps of
an interpretative analysis of an interview. According to GEERTZ (1993), thick
descriptions are actor-oriented interpretations. They consist of the researcher's
7 Here I avoid the term subculture, since the multicultural society probably requires different
analytical distinctions to examine the complex relationship between the different "cultures"
appropriately.
8 STRAUSS (1987) finds it useful to distinguish between case studies and case histories.
According to Strauss a chief feature of case histories is
"that they cover some temporal span or interlude in social life—a biography, an occupational
career, a project, an illness, a disaster, a ceremony. Also, the case history involves a story
about one social unit—a person, group, organization, relationship" (STRAUSS 1987, p.218).
9 "The ensuing story, or 'main narrative', is not interrupted by further questions but is encouraged
by means of nonviable and paralinguistic expressions of interest and attention, such as 'mhm'.
In the second part of the interview—the 'period of questioning'—the interviewer initiated, with
narrative questions, more elaborate narrations on topics and biographical events already
mentioned. In addition the interviewer asked about issues that had not been addressed"
(ROSENTHAL 1993, p.60).
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FQS 2(3), Art. 16, Ulrike Popp-Baier:
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interpretations of the way people interpret their own actions and those of other
people speaking and acting in everyday life. In other words, thick descriptions try
to capture and elaborate the actor's point of view, the so-called emic perspective.
Diagnoses are critical interpretations which aim to transcend the actor's
perspective and advance another kind of meaning or some meanings that differ
from the one/s proposed by the actor. In a (relative) distinction of the thick
description as an inscription, GEERTZ (1993) calls the diagnosis a specification.
In my case history I want to start with an inscription of the interview text of Andrea
and then go further to the specification of Andrea's self-narrative by using e.g. the
theoretical concept of self-transformation mentioned above. [14]
3.2 Andrea's self-narrative: a summary from the narrator's point of view
The first step of my analysis contains a short summary of the story of my
interviewee. In it, I try to follow the narrator's point of view. Accordingly, my
summary is a kind of "formulating interpretation" (cf. BOHNSACK 1991) which
tries to paraphrase the main issues of the story without transcending the
narrator's framework of experience, expectation and knowledge. All explanations
and interpretations of behavior or events given in this summary are those Andrea
herself gave; I reproduce her words as closely as possible. [15]
Andrea is the second eldest of five siblings. Her childhood was "happy until about
fifth grade"10
, when she started to encounter problems. She experienced the
transition from primary school to gymnasium as the transition from her familiar
village surroundings to a city life in which she did not meet the norm. The city kids
were superior, "more fit and more intelligent". She wanted to leave the school.
Her father's dedicated support helped her. She not only became as good as the
city kids, she became better than them. Until tenth grade her father checked her
homework assignments daily and made sure she studied a lot. It was "often, well,
hard". As an example, she described her essay for a German class. She had to
sit with her father for hours in the evening until she produced the phrases he
wanted. Andrea attributes her outstanding school performance not to skill but to
her indefatigable efforts, which continued even after her father stopped
supervising her. She studied day and night. She views this focus on achievement
and her perfectionism, which she experienced as compulsion ("imprisonment")
and closely resembled her fear of failure, as the theme of her life at the time: she
hoped to gain recognition through her good performance. [16]
After attaining the top mark of 1.0 on her Abitur (German examination at the end
of secondary school), she decided not to go on to university despite everybody's
expectations. She wanted to escape her focus on achievement, which had become
unacceptable and unbearable, and to realize her ideal: to be free, to rise above
things and finally to enjoy life. She therefore entered a training program for engineer's
assistants that would be less demanding than a university curriculum. [17]
10 Quotations from the interview transcript, i.e. striking formulations used by the interviewee are
surrounded by quotation marks. In this article her formulations appear in English translation.
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She had to leave her parents' home for her training program and move to another
city. Looking back on this period, she remembers "being in shock": the strict
supervision she had had at home had hardly taught her to be independent. She
had difficulty with simple administrative procedures and felt insecure. She did not
get along with her new roommate in the hostel and felt inferior to her in all
respects. Under these circumstances Andrea went back to studying day and
night, as she was "programmed" to strive for "perfectionism" and to "achieve". But
her usual success was not forthcoming. She was unfamiliar with computer
science and found the instruction difficult to understand. She had had no
experience with this type of situation. [18]
Around this time her "binge days" began. Before Christmas, for example, she
would eat whole packets of Nürnberger Lebkuchen (a special kind of German
Christmas cakes) within a few minutes, and realized she had lost control. She put
on weight quickly and felt "bloated" and "disgusting". These "binge days"
continued until the spring. When Andrea found that her skirts from the previous
year no longer fit her, she became furious with herself and resolved to lose
weight. She started fasting systematically, consuming as few calories as possible
and investing virtually all her energy in the effort. She brought home books about
health and fitness, tirelessly counted calories, starved herself, grew weak, wasted
away and had to drag herself to school. She lost over 10 kilos and related that
she thought she had been "truly on the verge of anorexia". By the following
winter, she was pale and thin, had short hair and was delighting in "looking
wasted". At that time she also sat for her exams at school, and "naturally was
among the best". [19]
By then she had had her fill of studying and decided to stop immediately. In her
story Andrea mentions a decision but also says that she simply could not bring
herself to study for 2 or 3 years. She found a job in the company where she was
learning to become an engineer's assistant and was assigned to the department
where she had done her practical training. But she did not enjoy the work,
because she did not receive specific instructions and was free to decide how to
do her work. The nature of her work bothered her as well. She then started doing
voluntary work, since now she was no longer studying, she found weekends to be
a "gaping void". [20]
This involvement became one of the "most difficult periods" of her life. Andrea
was assigned as a helper to the locked ward of an institution for the mentally
handicapped. She had become very weak from losing so much weight, and
dealing with these people was physically and psychologically draining. She felt as
though she, too, had gone mad. Around this time she had her first experience of
overeating and then compensating for breaking her diet by regurgitating the food.
She started putting on weight. Desperate to resist this process, she maintained
such a strict diet that she consumed only about 100 calories a day. She weighed
herself every day, and if the scale indicated she had gained a few pounds, she
would become so furious that she actually bit herself. Her job remained the same
daily "nightmare". She did not know what to do and "struggled" through the day.
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Then she fell ill with a type of influenza from which she simply did not recover. She
kept calling in sick and on one occasion stayed home for about four weeks. [21]
During this time she would start thinking as soon as she woke up about how she
could get through the day without eating and whether she could manage to eat so
little. She became totally immersed in this pattern. She lost control of herself and
binged and vomited almost daily. When she returned to work, she suffered from
migraine and tension, and often the pain was unbearable. Finally she consulted a
physician, who referred her to a psychiatrist. The psychiatrist prescribed
admission to a psychosomatic clinic. [22]
Andrea looks back on her stay at the clinic as one of the most horrible periods of
her life. Group therapy was common there, and she was constantly with other
people whose problems differed from hers. Andrea emphasized that she kept
brooding and analyzing why and how she had ended up like this, and often
"pondered obsessively". At those times she needed support from the therapists,
but received none. Nor did she receive a code of conduct. At the clinic she was
"dry" for about three days and then found herself surrounded by food again.
There were no rules or supervision. Near the end of her ten weeks at the clinic
she perceived no improvement; in fact, she felt worse. All she had experienced
was analysis. The knowledge that her parents were clearly to blame for her
problems—after all, it had to be somebody's fault—was of little use to her.
Increasingly, she felt she was going insane. Several times she thought of
throwing herself in front of a car and actually felt a force pulling her in that
direction. She often thought she had lost control, and that throwing herself in front
of a car would be an escape. That was "one path". [23]
Along with this account of her experiences, she wanted tot tell how she had come
to embrace faith at this time. During the many hours she spent sick at home, she
read extensively, pondered the meaning of life and "pored over" all possible
books because of her "crying need". She met people from various religious
movements, such as those from the New Apostolic Church, Methodists and many
others. She also explored religions from the Orient, meditation, autogenic
training, yoga, etc. Nothing helped. She had been raised as a practising Catholic
and attended Mass every Sunday, as was customary. Eventually she heard about
a Charismatic-Evangelical free-church congregation and went to one of their
Bible study evenings. The routine seemed comical and mad. For example, most
people stood up and raised their hands, moving to the music. Still, she saw that
they were joyful and free inside. She made friends with a Mrs. M who lived
around the corner from her and also attended these Bible evenings. [24]
It was Mrs. M who suggested that Andrea devote her life to Jesus Christ. Andrea
declined, as she thought it would be like entering a convent. Around this time, she
was admitted to the clinic. She had not yet found her faith and was counting on
the stay at the clinic to solve her problems. When her hopes were dashed and
she hit rock-bottom, she cried out for help. Two women from the congregation
came to visit her at the clinic. By then Andrea was ready to devote her life to
Jesus: she said a prayer and gave herself to Him. This moment of surrender
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overwhelmed her. She started weeping and, unlike any previous experience, "felt
engulfed in warmth" and at peace. As she watched the women leave, she
assumed the wonderful sensation would be gone the next day: she had seen so
many "soap bubbles" that she thought the Lord must be one too. However, when
she awoke the next morning, she felt the same and realized she had actually
made a decision. Had she merely felt she had had just another spurious
experience, she probably would have committed suicide. She could not have
continued her old way of life. [25]
Although she had given her life to Jesus, she often felt "possessed" and thought
she had been controlled by other powers at the time. Upon leaving the clinic she
began her recovery, which was tough and involved many struggles. She woke up
every morning wondering whether she would manage it. She had some binge
attacks but did not vomit. The pastoral care she received from other women led
to "inner healing". She worked through the past in her prayers and prayed that
many of the wounds from her childhood would heal. She realized she was
"gradually" recovering. Andrea explained that the concept of inner healing is
based on the assumption that the Lord rules time and space and can therefore
enter the past. Accordingly, people can relive shocking experiences from the past
in their prayers and can ask Jesus to heal the wounds and offer forgiveness.
Andrea had been through a lot with her parents. Many long-forgotten experiences
resurfaced and had to be forgiven. Her stay at the clinic had stirred up a lot of
aggression and hatred toward her parents. She managed to purge herself of all
these feelings. Though Andrea loved her parents with all her heart, she hated
them after her stay at the clinic. Her father had beaten her so many times. Today
she could remember those scenes without feeling the inner pain she used to
experience. She understood that she would heal through prayer, not with help
from psychologists. [26]
Andrea also noticed during the healing process that she was shattered. She
understood how miserable she was and how weak, just when she thought she
was strong. These feelings were deeply humiliating and forced her to rely on
others. In the preceding years, she had constantly stretched her strength to
breaking point. She became increasingly dependent on others. After leaving the
clinic she gained about 20 kilos within a year. The experience was horrible and
unbearable. Everything was so broken inside her—even physically—that she
became bloated. Even today, she needs to watch her weight carefully and easily
puts on weight. She is learning, however, that others do not form opinions of her
or love her for looking exceptionally good or for doing outstanding work. She
needs to learn that she will be accepted by others when she can accept herself,
and not because she does something special or is "super". [27]
Andrea believed she had found herself, whereas before she was constantly
searching, even for life. She attributed her salvation to allowing Jesus into her life.
In doing so she found what she was seeking. She has received answers to many
things she did not understand and feels alive again. Before, she "vegetated".
Now, all the voids within her have been filled. She wants to learn to be a child.
Everywhere, hierarchical thinking and perfectionism prevail. She knows she is
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highly susceptible to these feelings, having "been down that road before". She
understands that she needs to make a decision and wants to become more
childlike and to enjoy life's simple pleasures. If people are not careful, they wind
up in this mess and go into overdrive. She feels she is changing, and that she is
becoming more relaxed and can take each day as it comes. In the past, she used
to plan ahead. Now she knows that she will get the strength she needs when she
needs it. This sense calms her. All is well. [28]
3.3 Life before conversion: Body troubles
The main theme in Andrea's self-narrative is her eating disorder, which she was
able to overcome by converting to the Charismatic-Evangelical religion. Therefore
the first step towards a psychological "specification" of the interview text is to
compare Andrea's story to psychological analyses of eating disorders11
. [29]
The eating disorders described by Andrea are characteristic of an illness known
as bulimia nervosa. The main symptom is the uncontrolled consumption of huge
quantities of food (bingeing). The growing fear of unstoppable weight gain leads
to rigid modes of conduct to eliminate the weight gain, including extended periods
of fasting followed or self-induced vomiting, which eventually becomes a reflex
("puking"). The disease primarily affects girls and young women12
. [30]
Most studies on the emergence of bulimia report several influences. In
industrialized Western societies, the prevailing idea of being thin, which has
become an ideal norm for women, is undoubtedly one of the sociocultural
conditions underlying such a symptomatology. A thin body is becoming a
metonym for attractiveness, beauty, social recognition and success. The view
that this ideal is attainable primarily through weight loss therefore implicitly and
explicitly belongs to the cultural myths of our era and therefore to the stuff from
which personal myths are fabricated. "Against this cultural backdrop that
encourages women to achieve like men and still remain feminine, thinness can
be understood as a way to have the power, strength and success of a man and to
look beautiful and feminine" (WEISS, KATZMAN & WOLCHIK 1994, see also
ORBACH 1978). WEISS, KATZMAN and WOLCHIK (1994, p.172) have provided
a brief overview of the feminist models devised to explain the aetiology of bulimia.
One conclusion is especially important:
"Numerous authors ... have emphasized that eating disorders can best be
understood within the wider context of the psychology of women and of their
relationships to others. Women have been socialized to please other people and not
11 Concerning the function of theoretical contrast horizons within a concept of text interpretation as
constant comparative analysis, cf. e.g. STRAUSS and CORBIN (1990).
12 Thus far, exact figures on the excessive rise in bulimia are either unavailable or difficult to
interpret (cf. e.g. HABERMAS 1990, WEISS, KATZMAN & WOLCHIK 1994). Surveys in the
Federal Republic of Germany indicate a frequency of 2—4% among women ages 18 to 35 (cf.
FICHTER 1985). Sociodemographic studies in the Federal Republic of Germany have revealed
that most victims were women between 20 and 30. Only 16% were older and 22% younger than
this. Over 60% had completed the Abitur or a form of higher education (cf. FEIEREIS 1995).
Many studies reveal that the disease is becoming more widespread and is increasingly affecting
men (cf. e.g. the literature in ARONSON 1993).
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pay attention to their own inner needs. They are socialized to deny their basic hungers
and deprive themselves in order to be pleasing to others and to feel related." [31]
Studies of the personality traits of women suffering from bulimia nervosa have
revealed that bulimics were more depressed and had lower self-esteem, a poorer
body image, higher self-expectations, greater need for approval and more
restraint than the corresponding control group. Family background studies reveal
that many bulimics have suffered sexual and physical abuse (cf. FEIEREIS
1995). [32]
With regard to this information we shall see what understanding of Andrea's
eating disorder we can get from her own autobiographical narrative13
. The
predominant theme in Andrea's life story is her focus on achievement and her
desire for perfection. She suffers from this life orientation and would like to
abandon it. When her first attempt proved unsuccessful, she developed an eating
disorder. According to her, the disorder consisted of three stages. The first was a
period of bingeing, the second was one of starvation, and the last was one of
bingeing and vomiting, in which she described herself as being in danger of
committing suicide. [33]
In the narrative interview, the "pre-history" to Andrea's disease story was the
emergence of her focus on achievement and her pursuit of perfection. Her father
was essential to this process. Andrea described studying with her father as a
rough period in which he often beat her. Considering Andrea's example of studying
with her father (having to formulate her essays just the way he wanted), she
probably had an extreme experience with learning to focus on other people and to
satisfy the demands of others, rather than to develop a sense of her own wishes
or needs. At around sixteen, Andrea apparently began to internalize the focus on
achievement performance "inscribed on her body". By her account, she had become
a perfectionist and studied day and night, even when she was on the verge
of collapse and perpetually afraid of failure because of her low self-esteem. [34]
After finishing school Andrea wanted to abandon this perspective and to start
enjoying life. Unfortunately, she underestimated the difficulties she would
encounter at work and in social interaction. She experienced that her focus on
achievement and pursuit of perfection were not optional and could not be
replaced with another goal. They appeared to have become part of her personal
habitus14
. As a result, she had no choice but to study day and night. She did not,
however, repeat the success she had had at secondary school. Around this time
her days of bingeing started. When talking about this, Andrea's narrative style
varied between "I" and something else that begins within her, happens to her and
lies beyond her sphere of influence. This distinction vanished when Andrea
described her intense anger at herself for gaining weight and decided to lose
13 The following explanations convey the essence of a text interpretation based on a sequential
analysis of the interview transcript.
14 Here, habitus refers to BOURDIEU's conception of a mode of conduct that emerges mainly as a
primary socialization process and serves as the actor's second nature (cf. BOURDIEU 1987,
WILLEMS 1997).
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weight ("... like the way I pulled myself through school, I thought to myself, 'We'll
manage it, you'll take the weight off' ..."). The "we" may have referred to the
"father-daughter team" which managed the demands imposed by the school
during childhood and which had become an "inner voice" in her youth. Thereby
Andrea internalized other aspects of the father role as well. She began to control
the body her father had beaten by depriving herself of food, and eventually grew
very weak. Andrea enjoyed this weakness ("In a certain way I enjoyed being
wasted"). Finally, her weakness was a clear sign of the success of her efforts to
satisfy the demands placed on her, namely achieving the body of a perfect
woman in our society. Around this time she also completed her training and was
(of course) "among the best". Her achievement orientation and her perfectionism
yielded overall success: she had obtained control of her body (by losing 10 kilos)
and had mastered the material in her discipline. [35]
She entered a new stage in her eating disorder when she grew dissatisfied with
the job she obtained following her training and tried to compensate for the void in
her free time by helping others in a way that overtaxed her psychologically and
physically. The social demands changed and Andrea became unable to structure
important aspects of her life as achievement situations (i.e. as situations imposing
clear requirements on her) that she could satisfy perfectly through her efforts. In
this situation, which was out of her control, she lost her grip on herself and was
unable to maintain her strict diet. She started bingeing again and tried to reverse
the effect by vomiting. Eventually, however, her entire eating pattern spun out of
control, and she started bingeing and purging almost daily. When she sought
medical help and ended up in the psychosomatic clinic, she did not get the
support she had expected. Without an acceptable explanation for her disease
and no clear rules of conduct or control of her eating pattern, she became
desperate and contemplated suicide. [36]
At this point in Andrea's self-narration she describes her life as changing
dramatically. She decided to give her life to Jesus Christ. As a result of this
conversion, she relates that she recovered from her eating disorder and finally
abandoned her focus on achievement and could quietly get on with her life. How
should we "specify" this personal change? [37]
4. Conversion and Self-Transformation
Andrea's self-presentation concerning her personal change contrasts markedly
with my own impression of her. When I tried to schedule an interview with her, I
learned that her calendar was fully booked for weeks to come. Another woman I
interviewed mentioned that Andrea was her role model because of the diligence
and energy she invested in the Charismatic-Evangelical circles. Once again,
Andrea appears to be "among the best". The interview transcript also reveals a
vocabulary which stresses control and achievement: Andrea describes her
healing as a daily struggle. Every morning she wonders whether she will
"manage" it. What has changed? In my view, the change does not concern her
habitus but her habitual means of expression and her opportunities to symbolize
and cultivate her effort to achieve and control in an appropriate context. In
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FQS 2(3), Art. 16, Ulrike Popp-Baier:
Narrating Embodied Aims. Self-transformation in Conversion Narratives—A Psychological Analysis
psychological terms, Andrea's story shows that her life orientation derives
primarily from internalizing the authoritarian father-daughter relationship. Thereby
bodily aspects always played an important role: the painful beatings from her
father, her unrestrained cravings for food, her control of her weight by starving
herself, and finally her uncontrollable attacks of bingeing and vomiting. The
embodiment of this perspective on life, which took on a life of its own through an
eating disorder, deteriorated into a crisis. Eventually, Andrea saw giving her life
by converting as the only solution. This conversion was experienced by Andrea
as a significant personal change: adopting the Charismatic-Evangelical
movement's canonic language has given her a new frame of reference which
allows her the verbal expression of unacceptable feelings or experiences15
and
allows her to synthesize the multiple events in her life into a singular conversion
story. The related symbolic opportunities provide a sphere of experience that
corresponds with her habitus and at the same time the possibility to create a new
vision of who she really believes to be or wants to be. [38]
This new world of experience includes symbolizations which can be labeled as
externalizations. In her interview Andrea explained that she was finally learning to
be a child and was no longer, as one might put it, simultaneously father and child.
She was externalizing the internalized father figure and simultaneously
dismantling his deceitful characteristics. In the frame of the CharismaticEvangelical
language the figure could be symbolized as a personal God, a loving
father who cares for her. This step also transposed the origin of her own action
outside and led her to interpret her own actions primarily as obeying God's
commands. Andrea cannot fail at these tasks, as she also receives the strength
from God to rise to the occasion. Any actions that do not fit this description,
because they seem like an uncontrollable encroachment on her new selfperception
as a child of God (e.g. bingeing, which Andrea continued to do
occasionally after her conversion), may be designated a sign of "being
possessed" in the context of the Charismatic-Evangelical doctrine of demons and
as the influence of personal powers that belong to the "Realm of the Evil". [39]
In this new world, Andrea has the potential to maintain interpretative control over
everything and has thus labeled and consequently exorcised the uncontrollable
aspects of life. The conversion, and that means the conversion story in which
Andrea reconstructs her biography by using the corresponding motives from the
Charismatic-Evangelical universe of discourse (see above), allows her to
formulate reflexively the life orientation which has determined her actions and
decisions until now. By telling her conversion story she could come to terms with
her unbearable embodied aims. By using the canonic language of CharismaticEvangelical
Christianity, especially the communicative model of conversion,
Andrea formulates her life orientation (before "conversion") and replaces it with
another one (after "conversion"). But at the same time the canonic language
became constitutive by reframing the experiential world of the convert. In this way
it was possible for Andrea to abandon her achievement orientation and her desire
15 For example Andrea did not mention the beatings when she narrated how she had to study with
her father. The only moment she could speak about this, was the moment when she narrated
her "inner healing".
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FQS 2(3), Art. 16, Ulrike Popp-Baier:
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for control on the level of referential meaning, because on the level of constitutive
meaning her new "self-concept" is structured by an authoritative relationship
which allows her to live "controlled" as usual in an universe of discourse to which
the notion of control belongs as an important motive. Every new performance of
her conversion narrative will improve this kind of self-transformation and also
allow Andrea to interpret this subjectively as a process of healing. [40]
With reference to BACHTIN's (1989) narrative analytical category of the
chronotope, we can try to formulate a certain type of narrative conversion
narrative. BACHTIN (1989) uses the concept of chronotope to refer to the mutual
connection of time and space, which in literature are fused into one meaningful
concrete whole. Regarding our case history, we can say that the conversion
narrative of Andrea is an example of a certain chronotope, which I call biographical
inversion16
: Certain intentions, wishes or feelings, which fulfill an
important function in the life story but at the same time are not acceptable to the
narrator, are dedicated to the own past, from which the narrator can go forward
because of a personal change. This inversion, which becomes possible through
the plot of the conversion, allows at the same time a temporal classification of the
own life story: a past which the narrator can leave behind and an acceptable
presence which is connected to chances for the future. This temporal
classification is connected to a certain space, with which it forms a meaningful
and concrete whole, namely—in our case history—the "religious world" of the
Charismatic-Evangelical faith with its "topical" characteristics. [41]
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Author
PD Dr. Ulrike POPP-BAIER, Associate Professor
for Psychology of Religion, current research
interests: cultural psychology, psychology of
religion, theoretical psychology, qualitative
methods in the social sciences.
Contact:
Ulrike Popp-Baier
University of Amsterdam
Faculty of Humanities
Oude Turfmarkt 147
NL-1012 GC Amsterdam
E-mail: popp@hum.uva.nl
Citation
Popp-Baier, Ulrike (2001). Narrating Embodied Aims. Self-transformation in Conversion Narratives
—A Psychological Analysis [41 paragraphs]. Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung / Forum:
Qualitative Social Research, 2(3), Art. 16, http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs0103165.
Revised 3/2007
© 2001 FQS http://www.qualitative-research.net/fqs/