Re: ZPD (people/interaction)

Susan Leigh Star (s-star1 who-is-at uiuc.edu)
Mon, 20 Oct 1997 16:46:59 -0600

Hi Francoise, Yes, slightly belated. I have noted too the contrast between
my own "magpie" (american?) way of thinking, which I was explicitly taught,
and the importance of learning "from the master" in France. One concrete
way this is reflected is in citation and footnoting practices, btw. L*

>Hi all, I am so glad that the ZPD discussion is resisting
>[snips-ing]! And this morning tend to agree with both Leigh and
>Diana (minus the nausea!). With Leigh because to me it is
>precisely a unit that deals exclusively with human interaction and
>with Diana because what I find missing in it is precisely a
>formulation of all the fine points of human interaction. What
>people bring into in the interaction, what the mirroring is like,
>the gazes, the backgrounds, the feelings etc... and that is why
>perhaps Eugene's suggestion that we move from ZPD to the
>transformation of participation in sociocultural activity is just
>as problematic. In abstraction of all the fine points of
>interaction, the same important snips-ing is going on. As for the
>death of the concept under too much discussion and reformulation
>pressure, I think that it is rather the death of of intellectual
>life that is at stake, when one stops to "appropriate" a great
>notion. And finally, to contradict, just about everthing
>concerning the inclusion of human interaction, I think that
>formulation that extends the ZPD to subject
>-non-human subject as in reading for example, are quite valid. (
>Don't know about radiotors!) but "befriending" the object of
>activity in transforamtion of both subject and object rings like
>Leonteiv and sounds fine to me. Just another dimension and
>plausable interpretation. For a personal story, when I came to
>the US to study at SFSU and Stanford (but less so at Stanford as I
>had already "enculturated?") I found that this multiple view
>points on a concept or theory quite amazing- at least compared to
>the French university scene where one learns "from the master" so
>to speak. One way, or one trajectory of thinking from A to Z, for
>example one teacher's doctoral work and conception.
>
>Voila for now. My new keyboard is actually a used one... it is
>clonky and noisy as I am typing.
>
>Francoise Francoise Herrmann fhermann who-is-at igc.apc.org
>http://www.wenet.net/~herrmann