Re: Genesis/Meaning/Chat/Lewin
Peter Smagorinsky (psmagorinsky who-is-at uoknor.edu)
Fri, 9 Aug 96 10:06:54 -0500
I've been working through this question about what it means to mean. In a
study of the ways in which a case study writer finds meaning in and through
writing (to be published in Written Communication this fall), I look at this
writer's construction of meaning in two ways: (1) in the artifactual sense
that Mike talks about (that is, in the meaning he attributes to the signs of
written texts that both he and other writers produce), and (2) in the
instrumental use of the process of writing as the mediational means through
which he transforms inner speech to public speech (that is, in the way he
uses writing as an exploratory tool for discovering new meaning). The
framework I borrow comes from the paper Jim Wertsch gave at last February's
Vygotsky conference in which he talked about Vygotsky's reliance on both the
*designative* philosophical tradition (chapters 5 and 6 of Thinking and
Speech) and the *expressive* tradition (chapter 7 of TS). For my analysis I
shift the terms to the designative and expressive *functions* of writing,
arguing that, while they are often miscast as mutually exclusive focuses of
product and process, they are instead complementary parts of a semiotic view
of writing--both necessary, neither sufficient. I have found the work from
the 60's and 70's of Douglas Barnes to be very helpful in thinking about
these senses of meaning. I also recommend Wells and Chang-Wells's
Constructing Meaning Together, which goes into great detail on these two
senses of meaning construction (although with different terminology).
Peter
At 08:12 PM 8/8/96 +0100, you wrote:
>At 08.38 96-08-08, Mike Cole wrote:
>>Meaning is the residue of prior human activity embodied in artifacts,
>>among which tools as conventionally understood and the words of languages
>>are prominent kinds of artifacts. Human mind grows and expresses itself
>>through the artifact-saturated medium of culture, through making meaning and
>>human life.
>
>I think I see what you mean Mike, but doesn't the formulation externalize
>the observer-(human mind)- from the embodied-meaning: defining meaning as
>in the residue of prior human activity embodied in artifacts etc. is true
>BECAUSE there is still-always human activity thriving in and upon those
>residues: meanings are in the system of humans&artifacts -- recyclings of
>residues... WE are IN the compost heap of meaning, so to speak.
>
>Eva
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Peter Smagorinsky
University of Oklahoma
College of Education
Department of Instructional Leadership and Academic Curriculum
820 Van Vleet Oval
Norman, OK 73019-0260
office phone: (405)325-3533
fax: (405)325-4061
psmagorinsky who-is-at uoknor.edu