I bring lots of questions with me to ISCAR. I really like the ones
Natalia asked about development and the development of the higher
psychological functions. Among others, I have questions that pertain
to social class, and related one about something Ilyenkov called
"collective self-awareness," that ultimately connect to Natalia's questions.
I bring to Sevilla a particular interest in the role of social class
in human development, the role of human development in the
development of social class, and the role of social class in history,
largely influenced by Marxist theory and practice, and my own
experiences as a factory worker for some decades now. (BTW, for
those of you that know I am a machinist at Boeing, yes, we are on
strike!). Culture and activity emerge again and again at these
junctures and transformations. But humans, especially when organized
as politicized social classes, can become not just the objects and
outcomes of historical development, they also can become the subjects
and agents of historical motion. What happens when this happens to
the working and toiling masses, such as in revolutionary upsurges and
in socialist revolutions (Russia, Cuba, etc.)? What happens to the
psychology of working people when they become not just the objects,
but the *subjects* of deepgoing social change? What happens to
working people when, to refer to Natalia's wonderful little
discussion of Vygotsky the other day, society goes into its own
"crisis of development"?
What discoveries and insights and research work of the various
tendencies in the general international Vygotsky school - which
currently calls itself by the initials "iscar", an international
society of cultural and activity researching - contribute to
understanding this kind of process? Can such understandings
contribute to helping working people participate in social "crises of
development" and change history?
I find myself asking the same kind of question from another angle by
touching off from something Ilyenkov spoke of in his essay "The
Concept of the Ideal": "The dialectics of the emergence of the
collective self-awareness of the human race." What are the various
trends within ISCAR (cultural-historical psychology, CHAT,
sociocultural theory etc.) contributing to understanding this
"emergence of collective self-awareness of the human race" that
Ilyenkov spoke of? What role might this "emergence of collective
self-awareness" play in human history?
For me, the above lines of inquiry may also help lay the sociological
and sociocultural theoretical foundations for the kind of dialectical
materialist psychology that Vygotsky envisioned and opened the door
to - a new psychology which would include a (non-linear,
crisis-based) developmental, cultural and historical understanding of
the relationships of the body, emotions and anxieties to the higher
psychological functions, among other things. Who else in the ISCAR
community is thinking along these lines? And who can help me
formulate these complex questions I am asking more precisely and effectively?
For me, this is a very exciting opportunity to be able to participate
in this conference with these kinds of questions and many more - and
I owe much to my xmca friends for making this possible.
~ Steve Gabosch, Seattle
At 08:12 PM 9/11/2005 -0700, Natalia wrote:
>Hi Mike and Dear ALL!
>
>Mike asked:
> > So, what question concerning CHAT is on your mind?
>
>
>My concern is that people from different fields apparently view
>"development" in very different ways, thus creating confusion whenever we
>are discussing development. We have had the same situation with "learning,"
>but at least with learning we admit openly that we have different learning
>theories. Development, what is development?
>
>I am always curious why people don't, for example, discuss the development
>of higher psychological functions versus lower psychological functions? Is
>Vygotsky's concept obsolete, not deserving, or falsified (if so, by whom?)?
>
>Cheers,
>Natalia.
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>xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
>http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
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