Mon chapitre en anglais dans le livre issu des recherches allemandes sur l'institutionnalisation de la parapsychologie vient d'être mis en ligne gratuitement. C'est l'occasion de découvrir cet excellent travail collectif. J'y traite des étapes de constitution et durcissement des frontières entre psychologie et parapsychologie au tournant du XXe siècle, avec une conclusion proposant une synthèse des six fonctions que l'hétérodoxie peut jouer vis-à-vis de l'orthodoxie.
Evrard, R. (2016h). The Orthodoxization of Psychology in France at the Turn of the 20th Century. In : A. Lux, S. Paletschek (dir.), Okkultismus im Gehäuse. Institutionalisierungen von Parapsychologie im 20. Jahrhundert in internationaler Perspektive (pp. 173-199). Berlin : De Gruyter Oldenbourg. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110466638-007
Voici la vidéo d'une de mes interventions au congrès PA 2019 Evrard, R. (2019, juillet). The "Amneville RSPK case": An illustration of social elusiveness ? Parapsychological Association 62th Annual Convention, Paris, 4-6 juillet 2019.
THE “AMNEVILLE’S RSPK CASE”: AN ILLUSTRATION OF SOCIAL ELUSIVENESS
Renaud Evrard1,
1University of Lorraine, Nancy, France
Abstract
During the summer 2014, at less than 2 kilometers from my house, started a seemingly RSPK case which attracted media attention in France and abroad. An old couple with a teenage nephew observed unexplained displacements and destructions of objects in several rooms of their house. Neighbors, policemen, and journalists quickly arrived and added their own testimonies which deepened the strangeness. In few months, the case was partly “solved”, not through a scientific enquiry, but by the self-accusation of the old “hysterical” woman and a trial that concluded a dismissal of all charges (“non-lieu”). Without having the possibility to interview the protagonists themselves, despite two attempts, I stayed as an observer of the social treatment of this paranormal story. I collected all press articles, video reports, online discussions, and also informal local discussions to document the various socio-psychological reactions at the different steps of the case. Following the Model of Pragmatic Information’s application to RSPK case (Lucadou & Zahradnik, 2004), I will illustrate the four phases of this case: surprise, displacement, decline, and suppression phases. This model allowed me to make public predictions which were verified. Then, I will focus on the “suppression phase” where there is a kind of social influence to restore normality instead of the disturbing paranormality. I suggest to call this action “social elusiveness” (Evrard, 2012) and to discuss its place in parapsychology.
Le texte complet :
Evrard, R. (2019). The "Amnéville RSPK case": An illustration of social elusiveness? In : G. Mayer (dir.), N equals 1. Single case studies in Anomalistics (pp. 377-393). Berlin : LIT.
