The Meaning of Gestalt
Once some one asked me, what is the meaning of Gestalt? I had hard time to explain the word in a way
that the person could understand. I talked about Gestalt in term of whole, in term of whole humans
functional behaviour. I talked about feelings, sensations, contact environment of humans and the more I
described and explained, the more that person and I got confused. Experiencing such confusion
motivated me to search for a proper definition that everyone could understand the meaning of Gestalt.
I looked at my school papers from five years ago and it did not satisfy me because it was more
complicated therefore, I started searching within Dictionaries and after several of those Dictionaries I
came a cross with the Penguin Dictionary of Psychology. I am finding this Dictionary is explaining the
word Gestalt in a quite simple way and of course this is my idea. As a result of my conclusion I am
deciding to copy those in this page and hoping this would help some people who are anxious to know
about Gestalt. Gestalt is a German term which unfortunately has no exact English equivalent. Several
terms have been proposed, such as form, configuration and shape; however,, essence and manner are also
acceptable translations.
By large, the term itself, rather than any inadequate translation, has moved over into English and is now
often spelled without the initial capital. The primary focus of the term is that it is used to refer to unified
wholes, complete structures, totalities, the nature of which is not revealed by simply analyzing the several
parts that make them up. An aphorism spawned by this idea is "The whole [i.e. the Gestalt] is different
from the sum of its part." This principle forms the core of the Gestalt Psychology movement.