Re: cultural rituals and social change

Charles Bazerman (bazerman who-is-at humanitas.ucsb.edu)
Sun, 10 Dec 1995 15:39:31 -0800 (PST)

Some threads from activity theory that seem relevant to Angel's and
Judy's discussion :

1. the different objects people have in pursuing an activity--other
children may have been praying, but the bateson boys were not even
reciting the alphabet, they were getting by without notice. That latter
object is something frequently noted in classroom ethnographies, but
often given a different evaluation than the Batesons' passing among the
apparently pious.

2. the flow and unfolding of events from the differently positioned
participation of the various actors, who make individual sense of these
unfolding events and constantly adjust their behaviors from their
developing sense of the events.

3. the momentum of the events as unfolding to overtake prior objects or
senses of any of the participants.

4. the role of typified forms of interactions to orient, overtake,
provide sense-ible means of getting by, getting through, being
intelligible within unfolding situations.

5. the issue of influence, which too often is perceived as simply passing
from the adult or more skilled participant in a ZPD kind of
interaction--also implying the learning and influence is of a
pre-existing kind of practice or knowledge. A more fundamenbtal way is
to consider which interactions prompt which kinds of challenges for which
participants and how meeting those challenges are developmental or
modifying for each of those participants--again in an unfolding set of
interactions.

The success of modifying the flow of the stream or being washed
downstream in it hangs on such issues.

Chuck Bazerman