Eugene forwarded me a long note in response to a message from Robert
Serpell that contains at least a start on the issue of the interpretation
of the meaning of cultural-historical in Russia and the US. The most
relevant segment is the following:
First, in my view, there is different understanding of the notion of culture
by Russian scholars in general and Vygotsky in specific than by modern
American use (both in popular and in academic contexts). In Russian, the
word "culture" ("kul'tura") highly connotes with the "high quality" and
"education" (in broad sense) and "art" (like in "Ministry of Culture" as a
part of Russian government). For example, in Russian you can say
"cultureless behavior" ("bezkul'turnoe povedenie") which can be translated
as "ignorant behavior" or even as "barbaric behavior." In Russian, "culture
of service" ("kul'tura obsluzhinvaniya") means "quality of service." Many
English wordings like "culture of a group" are not easy to translate in
Russian. What is similar between Russian and English use of the word
"culture" is that they are both applied to "ethnicity." I'm sure that this
is just a tip of an iceberg of differences and similarities.
Second, in Russian culture in general and in Vygotsky in specific, there is
much more focus on history then culture. It may be not overgeneralization,
that in many contexts Vygotsky viewed culture as a specific historical stage
of the development of a society. Culture is viewed as history.
-----
Elsewhere I have talked about the same contrast in terms of culture(s) versus
Kultur, which I trace back to German romanticism and earlier.
Both in English and Russian we are using a word that comes from latin (and
in German too, of course).
So, here we see at least one place where misunderstandings could arise
in interpretation even when issues of translation, narrowly conceived,
are minimized.
the linking of history with Kultur rather than culture(s) is, I believe,
a major reason why some (jim wertsch, perhaps babara rogoff-- I have never
asked her about it) and maybe Eugene prefer to talk about sociocultural
rather than cultural historical. In so far as the Kultur interpretation
reigns, history is progress and cultures can be ranked high to low. And
by this same token, those who adopt the more typical anglo-american
view are ahistorical relativists.
Two half truths do not make a whole truth unless they are very carefully
alligned!
and even then.....
mike
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Tue May 23 2000 - 09:20:37 PDT