Relational Dialectics
Leslie Baxter & Barbara Montgomery
Interpersonal Communication—Relationship Maintenance
The Interactional View
Theory Overview (7th Edition)
Abstracts appear in Appendix A of the text
Social life is a dynamic knot of contradictions, a ceaseless interplay between contradictory or opposing tendencies such as integration-separation, stability-change, and expression-nonexpression. Quality relationships are constituted through dialogue, which is an aesthetic accomplishment that produces fleeting moments of unity through a profound respect for the disparate voices. (Phenomenological tradition)