I've been re-reading that stuff, too, but with a focus on pulling out
Arne's contributions into an intelligible whole. And as far as I remember,
there had been quite a lot of back-and-forth when Arne came in strong, so I
may have missed something.
What I read as Arne's main objection to Jim's contributions was, I suppose,
a quite foundational objection against Jim's model being a theory of
ACTION, not a theory of ACTIVITY (although then Arne goes on, very
hermeneutically, to understand this in terms of Jim's chosen field of
research). I think this is one of the differences signalled by the labeling
differences between CHAT and Jim's 'socio-cultural approach'. The presence/
/absence of "historical" also signals something -- in Jim's case avoidance
of the "bad karma" of Marxist history writing (has he written about that in
published form anywhere? -- too much of what I learn comes from from the
archives)... judging from *Mind as action* he DOES take account of history,
but he also sticks to an action model.
The historical part of the CHAT acronym I see as corresponding to an
integration of history in the work of Mike and Yrjo. For example, the way
Mike presents his theoretical position in *Cultural Psychology* is very
much a genetic, historical method.
I'll append the entire posting of Mike and Jim discussing names, back in
1989, when labeling matters were more in flux.
cheers
Eva
************************************************
Date: Mon, 24 Apr 89 07:14:00 pdt
=46rom: mcole who-is-at weber (Mike Cole)
Subject: What shall a thing be called?
To: xlchc who-is-at ucsd.edu
=46or some time, Jim Wertsch and I have been discussing the pros and cons of
various names for the general approach to the study of mind initiated in
the USSR by Vygotsky, Luria, and Leontiev. Those worthy gentlepeople, as
you know, used various names for their enterprise, including
cultural-historical, instrumental, and later the concept of activity came
to be highlighted.
In the following note, Jim is reacting to a paper I prepared for a
symposium on cross-cultural contributions to psychology which I entitled,
"Cultural psychology: a once and future discipline?" In the note that
follows his, I respond briefly. The two of us thought that the issue might
be worth further discussion, so I am posting them on XLCHC.
I think that the issue of labels is non-trivial. The notion of cultural
psychology is "in" among some social scientists these days; Jim Stigler and
Rick Shweder, who are participants in this network, are editing a book with
that title and hosting a discussion at SRCD on this topic later this week.
Jerry Bruner is writing a book that may have this label in its title and I
have been working on a manuscript that will, unless this discussion changes
my mind, also bear the label, cultural psychology.
The question is, what "voices" are evoked by various labels, and which most
suit various purposes? I would be very interested in what ghosts spring to
life for various XLCHC participants when they hear socio-cultural approach
to psychology vs. cultural psychology vs cultural-historical psychology,
and what what alternatives seem most reasonable.
mike c
=46rom: <JWERTSCH who-is-at CLARKU>
Subject: cultural psychology
To: mcole who-is-at ucsd
Mike-
Your Nebraska paper is terrific. I had a few minor comments, but I want to
respond about the major issue that it raised for me. This issue has to do
with whether we should be talking about "cultural psychology,"
"sociocultural approach," or "cultural-historical psychology." I opt for
the second term, and I think it's an important issue.
The problem with talking about cultural psychology is that the term
"cultural" is tied to particular disciplines and ideas in our discourse.
In Bakhtin's terms, it has a particular history, and its use invokes
particular others' voices. I believe that cultural phenomena are
absolutely crucial to what you and I want to examine, but I think without
some term such as "social" issues of social class, reproduction of social
institutions, and so forth get overlooked. That is, cultural tends to
focus on what anthropologists tend to examine, whereas some notion of
social or social structural looks at institutional factors in modern,
large-scale societies.
The place where this shows up concretely in your paper has to do with what
we both see as the linchpin of the whole argument--mediation. By focusing
on analysts who study culture, mediation tends to be viewed as something
that individuals consciously dream up for particular purposes. If
mediational means are viewed from a more social theoretic perspective, they
tend to be understood in terms of phenomena that are there for reasons that
have to do with the creation and reproduction of economic and cultural
capital, i.e., for the reproduction of social structure. In this view,
mediational means are often organized around principles that may actually
run against the grain of what would be best for the mediation of mental
functioning. This idea that mediational means are often created for
reasons other than to mediate mental functioning is crucial for many of the
arguments about oppression and dissimilarity of access to mediational means
that I see you making.
This is cryptic for now, but I've got to run. Let me know if it makes sense=
=2E
Jim
>From mcole Tue Apr 18 14:33 PDT 1989
To: JWERTSCH who-is-at CLARKU.BITNET
Subject: Quickly in return
The politics of representation in this discussion are a crucial issue at
several levels.
1) That paper was written for VERY conservative PSYCHOLOGIISTS, and for
a cross-cultural conf as that is ordinarily understood. berry's view was
dominant. So, my paper was a compromise. No--she is never going to be a
rugby player [reference here is to ongoing discussion of key example of
social/cultural relationship] -- did not fit into the discussion. I am
acutely aware of this shortcoming.
2) I fully intend, IN THE CONTEXT OF DISCOURSE CALLED PSYCHOLOGY to
adhere to the canons of the discipline. It is related to practice and
institutionalized in a "modern" way. I will argue, with Luria and Vygotsky,
that WITHIN THE PROBLEMATIC OF MID-19TH CENTURY EUROPEAN (AND AMERICAN)
society, the "crisis" in psychology was real and that the socio-historical
school provides a systematic way to overcome that crisis.
I expect to lose this argument, but I will make it as strongly as I
can, both as critique and as positive argument based in practice.
THEN, friend, I come at the issue from the discipline of communication
where, instead of the mediational view being anti-paradigmatic it IS the
paradigm, and it needs constant criticism through interaction with practice.
So, for my project, I want to use socio-historical. Why, since I agrue
that culture is history in the present? Because of their different
affordances. Culture a la D'Andrade is a-temporal, a- developmental,
a-historical, but is understood as cultural. For me, culture without
development is a contradiction in terms. Cultures are for growing things
(cf. William's), and whenever the "multiple genetic domains" aspect is left
out--caput. Socio-cultural affords leaving out the NECESSITY of
developmental analysis.
Now, in the discipline of communication, one might think that it would
be possible for socio-cultural to be a better term. Mike Shudson would be
more comfortable with it. And he is historical. But he is also a cultural
idealist, and darned if idealism doesn't somehow afford too weak a theory
of the forces and relations of production in shaping the conditions where
cultural artifacts evolve. Geertz says some great things in those 1973
essays, but he leaves the material world out of things and goes
hermeneutic. I go materialist. He does not engage in the practice of
development. I do. Am I "righter" than him? In my theory/practice
methodology I am. For text analysis, he may be the best we can get.
My current project on growing activity systems to promote new
institutional arrangements while testing theories of learning/development
microgenetically ought to be a good way to get a firmer grip on these
issues.
Does this make sense?
mike