Re: Appropriation, Part 2

vera p john-steiner (vygotsky who-is-at unm.edu)
Mon, 27 Jul 1998 10:24:20 -0600 (MDT)

David,
I found your summary of Gal'perin very useful, do you have a reference? Or
did I miss that in catching up with messages. I am still puzzled by
the widespread resistance to internalization . We have so much
neurophysiological evidence that learning, appropriation and I thoibk
internalization produces neural re-organization. To me, denying
internalization is really opposing the notion that we can think both at
the psychological, participatory and the neurological level. But
then this may be a naive stance. (I AM REFERING, AS AN INSTANCE, TO THE
PHONOLOGICAL ACQUISITION STUDIES WE MENTION IN THE FUNCTIONAL SYSTEMS
ARTICLE IN THE LAST mca ISSUE).
vERA

On Thu, 16 Jul 1998 dkirsh who-is-at lsu.edu wrote:

> Lest the summer get too restful, perhaps, I'll
> say a few words about my particular interest in
> appropriation. As I'm reading about the problems
> with the construct of internalization (e.g., Arievitch
> & van der Veer, 1995), I'm trying to decide to what
> extent those problems are the result of trying to
> account for what is sometimes called "scientific
> thinking" or "higher order cognitive functions" in a
> social frame. Gal'perin, for example, struggled
> (explicitly) against Cartesian dualism in his account
> of three levels of activity: "material" (in which the
> activity is carried out in the material world); "ideal
> external" (in which the activity is enacted mentally,
> but only with the support of material props); and
> "ideal internal" (in which no external props are needed).
> For Gal'perin appropriation is a more general term that
> applies to all three of these sorts of actions; but only
> this last one is characteristically human (i.e., higher
> order) activity.
>
> What I'm trying to figure out is if appropriation, which
> seems like a relatively clear solution to the internalization
> problem, achieves its clarity by providing a more general
> (less specifically human) account of learning in the ZPD.
>
> Thanks.
> David Kirshner
>
> Louisiana State University
> dkirsh who-is-at lsu.edu
>
> Arievitch, I., & van der Veer, R. (1995). Furthering
> the internalization debate: Gal'perin's contribution.
> Human Development, 38, 113-126.
>
>
>

---------------------------------
Vera P. John-Steiner
Department of Linguistics
Humanities Bldg. 526
University of New Mexico
Albuquerque, NM 87131
(505) 277-6353 or 277-4324
Internet: vygotsky who-is-at unm.edu
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