Americans are famous for being "folk action theorists," and it's manifest
not just in psychology: witness rational choice theory in economics. I'm
sure many of the participants in this list have had the frustrating
experience of trying to teach social theory texts (e.g. Durkheim, Marx)
which try to find answers in something other than individual intention
and agency; undergraduates usually have real trouble "getting it." I
just came from a class where I assigned both Ellen Winner (psychology and
the arts) and Howard Becker (Art Worlds, a sociologist) and Becker's
sociological/institutional perspective didn't really register.
Could anyone recommend a book which discusses the history/institution of
Soviet psychology, and how politics and ideology
affected/constrained/inspired it? For example, was Vygotsky suppressed
because his ideas didn't correspond to ideology?
Keith Sawyer
Department of Psychology
University of California, Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz, CA 95064