I am unsure of the answer to your question, Barbara. I can help more with
Russian than with German. I expect that
either Yrjo, who was an advisor to Kirsten's thesis or Wolf-Michael Roth can
provide a better answer than I could.
And thanks for asking! I do not understand if, ask Yrjo has written. "the
activity is the context" one can make a distinction
between " object, and object embedded in activity."
Lets hope we can get some help!
mike
On 7/11/05, Barbara Crossouard <bcrossouard@macdream.net> wrote:
>
> Mike
>
> As one of the silent readers so far, I'm encouraged by your appeal below
> for questions.. In trying to engage wtih activity theory, I discovered
> recently the distinction between object, and object embedded in activity,
> which I understand is related to the German concept of Gegenstand. Not being
> a German speaker however, I am trying to work out if I have any handle on
> the distinction. I should say that although I came across gegenstand in
> Leont'ev, it didn't mean anything to me in his text, and it's only by
> reading Kirsten Foot (2002) Pursuing the Evolving Object, in MCA vol 9 issue
> 2, that I picked up on the distinction to any extent.
>
> To check my understanding, I am wondering if what Ruqaiya raised in
> general terms below about developing an academic identity, if this can be
> related to gegenstand for example, where an academic progressively develops
> both within a conceptual framework at the same time as contributing to it in
> a dialectic way, and if for me at the moment, as a doctoral student lurking
> at the edge of this, and looking for a way of conceptualising what I'm
> researching, if that might be an instance of an evolving object. Is that the
> way this distinction might be applied - would appreciate any comments.
>
> It seems this distinction is important in the formation of activity
> systems, but I don't often see it raised, as Kirsten also points out in her
> article.
>
> Barbara
>
>
>
> At 14:27 06/07/2005, you wrote:
>
> Phillip-- Seems to me that it is simply axiomatic that we cannot fully
> understand a system we are inside of.
> Yesterday several of us at LCHC discussed the need, once we are through
> all the papers, to double back
> and try to summarize the major points that have emerged with general
> agreement and to identify (potential)
> points of disagreement. Given our different languages of description
> (passim Ruqaiya via Bernstein) finding
> REAL disagreements is likely to be difficult because we will constantly be
> confusing concepts that are derived
> from somewhat different theoretical approaches and will not catch the
> differences. But it is worth a try.
>
> Ruqaiya-- We do not disagree about the restrictions of Luria's central
> asian work so far as I can tell. You have
> made the point convincingly that the interpersonal uses of language/mind
> are underplayed in the Russian
> cultural-historical tradition as represented in the readings we have
> discussed and that is certainly true of
> Luria's central asian work.
>
> By coincidence. I was thinking of all of Luria's work on neurolinguistics
> and the followups of that work by
> Akhutina and others when, our of the great byte bucket in the sky, I
> received a note from Tanya Akhutina
> this mornig about another matter. Given that many of those most
> knowledgeable about SFL are more or
> less unavailable in the next couple of weeks it seems impossible to
> consider adding to the readings for
> now. We need to get a more comprehensive overview of what we have
> collectively learned, or produced (at
> least that would be my priority). But we WILL return to this topic, in
> January if not before, when we have
> another course on mediational theories of mind, and when we do, we need to
> open up the issue of how to advance
> the idea of developing the ideas of complementarity that have been in this
> discussion. (I am still made uneasy
> by the slippage in AALeontiev's work regarding language and activity, but
> that may be my shortcoming. Perhaps
> an effort at summarizing will reveal a fuller picture; perhaps a more
> extensive discussion of Landolf and Thorne will
> help, I am unsure).
>
> Anyway, at LCHC there will be some efforts in this direction and help from
> ALL would be appreciated. What questions
> do those who have been silent have? Questions are so helpful in revealing
> areas of understanding and differences in
> interpretation or simply holes in what we are talking about.
>
> Off to other matters for a while.
> mike
>
>
> On 7/5/05, *ruqaiya hasan* < Ruqaiya.Hasan@ling.mq.edu.au> wrote:
> yes Mike, you are right, but there is a slippage here. Most of the
> experiments in Luria concerned concept formation, classification, and/or
> (syl)logical reasoning; these are often also cited as the prime examples
> of
> higher mental function -- which is what might explain the slippage, though
> not quite excuse it! I will certainly be more careful with my formulation
> next time.
>
> Yes, I like this listserve precisely for the reason that it opens up
> different orientations to the same problem -- that's great and I certainly
> hope that I am learning from it. One thing that might perhaps be already
> available somewhere information about which might help is a Readings
> Advice
> section (preferably for people like me a graded list!) which might guide
> one
> into understanding the vocabulary (what Bernstein used to call "the
> language
> od description"). Something of that kind would help me immensely with the
> concept of activity.
>
> I use "politics of academia" as another expression referring to roughly
> what
> Bourdieu called "appropriation of intellectual capital". There is also
> what
> Bernstein's phrase"formation of pedagogic identity"; we learn through one
> theory and may be 'the least effort principle' persuades us to stay within
> those safe boundaries.
>
> Ruqaiya
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Mike Cole" < lchcmike@gmail.com>
> To: "ruqaiya hasan" < Ruqaiya.Hasan@ling.mq.edu.au>
> Cc: "eXtended Media, Culture, Activity" < xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> Sent: Wednesday, July 06, 2005 9:10 AM
> Subject: Re: [xmca] LCA:Complementarity
>
>
> Hi Ruqaiya-
>
> It is only late in the day that I have time to get to xmca. Perhaps in
> time
> for your morning cofee?
> Anyway, the passage about Luria I was referring to is the following: With
> regard to his Uzbek subjects Luria suggested that the absence of higher
> mental functions was due to
> the lack of schooling in his subjects, as if the lack of schooling, ie
> failure to 'benefit' from official
> pedagogy.
>
> Yes, Ochs at least (I only have a couple of the books here) references
> Halliday. But he does not appear
> to be a key figure in her fermament. Nor, desipte Gordon's gentle urging,
> has he been one in mine. A number of
> the criticisms fairly levelled at Vygotsky could easily be sent my way as
> well, I am sure.
>
> It seems to me that one important function of an enterprise such as this
> (eXtended mind, culture and activity)
> sort of discussion group is the cross-polination of ideas that it affords.
> And the acdemic politics are greatly
> muted by the highly distributed nature of the discussion -- very few of us
>
> have, or care to have, control over the
> academic fates of those with whom we are conversing. But we know we don't
> know, even if it is that we don't
> know what it is that we don't know that we should know. And to those who
> are
> in it as a matter of politics, good luck
> to them. They would almost certainly be better of at the moment studying
> how
> to do research on education that
> wins the approval of our education bureaucracies or learning how to
> conduct
> fmri studies of undergraduates solving
> math problems.
>
> I think that the set of article laid before us provide a lot of
> opportunities for learning. Whether we avail ourselves of
> the opportunity or not is pretty much up to the participants.
>
> On to the rest of the days xmca thoughts.
> mike
>
>
>
> On 7/4/05, ruqaiya hasan < Ruqaiya.Hasan@ling.mq.edu.au> wrote:
> >
> > Hello Mike
> > yes I am in total agreement with you. If something I wrote gives the
> > impression that Luria thought his Uzbek subjects did not have 'higher
> > mental
> > functions' then that is a bad piece of writing by me, for which
> apologies.
> > In fact I can't quite recall but somewhere I have expressly quoted Luria
> > as
> > attributing the results to the educational experience of the subjects
> (may
> > be in Reading picture reading: a study in ideology and inference in
> Foley
> > (ed) Language, Education and Discourse. London: Continuum 2004). And I
> > also
> > share your "scepticism about the enthusiasm for schooling that Luria
> > espoused". I guess I was arguing more that knowing the careful thinking
> of
> > both Vygotsky and Luria, it is to be doubted that they would have
> > attributed
> > the Uzbek results to absence of higher mental function; I was
> particularly
> > keen to bring into the debate that the "symbolic" function of language
> as
> > envisaged by Vygotsky is a function that every normal human has; if that
> > is
> > the quality of language essential to semiotic mediation then all of us
> > have
> > this experience; if there are distinct orders of semiotic mediation
> (shall
> > we say Bernstein's codes) then it is only reasonable to ask that they
> and
> > their etiology be identified nonambiguously. Has this been done?
> >
> > On Ochs and Schiefflin, I guess their work post-dates Halliday's. Are
> > their
> > many references to Halliday in their work? SFL linguists typically like
> to
> > have an explicit analysis of language along with statements relating
> > language to culture, cognition etc. So that maybe one reason for the
> > absence
> > of reference to Ochs and Schiefflin's work. On another tack, I have
> often
> > thought it would be great to have someone doing their doctoral research
> on
> > "the politics of academic referencing"!
> >
> > Ruqaiya
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "Mike Cole" <lchcmike@gmail.com>
> > To: "eXtended Media, Culture, Activity" < xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> > Sent: Tuesday, July 05, 2005 3:18 AM
> > Subject: [xmca] LCA:Complementarity
> >
> >
> > Bruce tells me that my problems with receiving xmca messages has been
> > fixed.
> > We'll see.
> >
> > Based on my readings of Wells, Halliday, and Hasan, I find the proposal
> > for
> > the complementarity
> > of LSV, Halliday, and Bernstein compelling. This past winter I conducted
> a
> > graduate class where
> > we read Jim wertsch's 1985 book on Vygotsky and the Social Formation of
> > Mind
> > which Ruquaiya
> > refers to in her first article in the readings. Jim focuses there on
> > discourse and propositional referentiality
> > and his commentary seems important background for actually working out a
> > unified cultural historical
> > approach that incorporates contemporary work on lexiocgrammar. But I do
> > not
> > know how to bring that
> > into a discussion that is already packed with things to read.
> >
> > I also believe that the work of Ochs and Schiefflin, who make a strong
> > case
> > for the idea that the acquisition
> > of language is simultaneously acquisition of the sociocultural order
> into
> > which children are born needs to be
> > brought into the discussion. It seems to fit very well with Halliday's
> > emphases but does not seem to been
> > into the discussion by SFL folks, or at least, not in my limited
> reading.
> > Does anyone else think this work
> > relevant?
> >
> > There is one point on which I think Ruqaiya errs in her discussion of
> > Luria's Central Asian work (if I understand her
> > characterization correctly) and it is important to get straight in
> seeking
> > to deal with issues of cultural historical variation
> > in thought. It is not the case that Luria claimed that Uzbeki peasants
> > lack
> > higher psycholgical functions. All humans
> > are said to have higher psychological functions by virtue of the fact
> that
> > their thought and action is mediated by
> > culture. Rather, as Wertsch discusses, LSV and ARL believed that one
> must
> > include an analysis of evolution/development
> > of cultural means as a cultural historical process. They use the term
> > "rudimentary" mediational means, for example, in
> > connection with what they referred to as "primitive peoples."
> > Specifically,
> > Luria believed that traditional central asian
> > peasants used functional graphic modes of mediation which were
> superceded
> > by
> > taxonomic logical modes of mediation
> > associated with literacy, schooling, and involvement in industrial modes
>
> > of
> > life.
> >
> > I have my quarrels with Luria's conclusion and share scepticism about
> the
> > enthusiasm for schooling that Luria espoused. But
> > it is not correct, in my view, to believe that he attributed only
> > elementary
> > (not culturally mediated) forms of mental life
> > to Uzbeki peasants.
> >
> > This issue may not be central to the question of the complementarity of
> > the
> > views of Halliday and Vygotsky, but it certainly
> > touches directly on questions of Bernstein/Luria/LSV connections, so I
> > wanted to raise it here. I still have Ruqaiya's second paper to get
> > through and look forward to others comments on this work.
> > mike
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
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>
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