Re: Gibson's affordances and sociocultural theory

Eva Ekeblad (eva.ekeblad who-is-at ped.gu.se)
Wed, 29 Jul 1998 10:49:32 +0200

At 15.15 -0500 98-07-28, Jeong Suk Pang wrote:
>I have received one off-channel response to my previous request (below)
>regarding references to Gibson's theory of affordances by sociocultural
>theorists.
and
>Does anyone have any other leads --or reason to suspect that there are none=
?

Well, there were recurring discussions of Gibson and scocio-cultural,
cultural-historical, activity theory approaches on the old xlchc and xact
lists -- back in the late 80s and early 90s -- where Arne Raeithel was one
of the active parties in fitting them together. He does so in published
form in:

Arne Raeithel
Semiotic Self-Regulation and Work: An activity theoretical foundation for
design

=46loyd, C., Z=FCllighoven, H., Budde, R. & Keil-Slawik, R. (Eds)
Software Development and Reality Construction,
Berlin: Springer 1992
ISBN 3-540-54349-X

Then in March -96 Mike Cole asked:
>Date: Mon, 4 Mar 1996 10:19:40 -0800 (PST)
>Subject: CHAT and Gibson
>Dear Xmca-ites-- Has anyone out there done work bringing together the
>ideas of cultural-historical activity theorists and Gibsonian psychology?
>We published a neat article by Arthur Still and Alan Costall on
>"Mutual elimination of dualism in Vygotsky and Gibson." I believe these
>authors have done further work that I am tracking down. But beyond
>citations, what is known collectively in xmca about this topic?
>mike
>cole

and got a bunch of answers:

>For a discussion of Vygotksy and Gibson see Rogoff, B. (1982). Integrating
>context and cognitive development. In M. Lamb and A. Brown (Eds.)
>Advances in developmental psychology, Vol 2. Hillsdale, N.J. Erlbaum.
>Regards, Artin Goncu

>I know that Andrew Cohen, currently a McDonnell Fellow at Vanderbilt, has
>examined the relation between sociocultural theory and Gibson. His
>dissertation at OISE looked at the relations between classroom participatio=
n
>and the affordances of collaboratively-designed software use by teachers an=
d
>students. He's now expanding on this research by examining how teachers a=
nd
>students can use collaborative technology in mathematics classrooms here in
>Nashville.
>
>Bill Penuel

and from Joe Polman:
>Maybe a lot of the people on XMCA are already familiar with his work
>(especially the ones at UCSD), but Don Norman really unpacked some
>interesting and amusing examples of Gibson's affordances as they relate to
>the design of artifacts and tools in his book _The Psychology of Everyday
>Things_ (1988, New York: Basic Books).

there was also some discussion, and Mike posted the following snapshot of
local academic history at UCSD:

>Date: Sat, 30 Mar 1996 12:54:50 -0800 (PST)
>From: Mike Cole <mcole who-is-at weber.ucsd.edu>
>Subject: affordances/functional systems/Ed H
>To: xmca who-is-at weber.ucsd.edu
>
>
>Sorry to be slow in responding to your note on Ed Hutchins and affordances,
>Paul Prior.
>
>There are not many references in Ed's book. Over a period of years here
>in the "pre-cog sci" days when the Center For Human Information Processing
>was the leading venue for such discussions, the CHIP folks beat heavily
>on Gibsonian ideas. But over time, in part because of the influence of
>Ed and perhaps of me, Don Norman started to take a more congenial view
>toward artifact mediation. Gerry Balzano, who has worked on event perceptio=
n,
>was also a participant in these discussions.
>
>A little later, Ed bumped into the functional systems ideas in conjunction
>with AR Luria's writings, and perhaps Anokhin/Leontiev, perhaps in
>discussions with Yrjo Engestrom.
>
>In any event, for quite a while these apparently-connected ways of thinking
>have rattled around parts of the UCSD world, where Ed has put them together
>in his own, very exciting, ways.
>
>That's my 3cent history-- certainly incomplete but hopefully not misleading=
=2E
>mike

Note the link between Gibsonian and CHAT psychologies provided by
functional systems -- Luria, Anokhin, Leontiev.

just compiling some x-communal knowledge
Eva Ekeblad