[Xmca-l] Re: how to broaden/enliven the xmca discussion

Sun Oct 12 03:47:56 PDT 2014

I like Holli's plan to commit some time to reading the two articles. But, as usual, I don't know that I'll have much to contribute in posts. I usually get deep in thinking about the posts and don't follow that through to write something. The writing is much harder, and I am usually just trying to keep up with reading!

For me, the thread has been fascinating, probably because I'm interested in different units of analysis, what they might be used for, and how they fit together with theory and conducting research. What are people doing with units of analysis and why? Or why aren't units of analysis being used? If anyone wants to write more in that direction, I'd be very interested to read, and I'll try to respond, although the questions might be as basic as these.

Lastly, Andy has basically been articulating my thoughts (in a much more eloquent way than I would) about action as a unit of analysis. In Mike's example about driving and thinking and writing, I'd add that the action is mediated. Together with sociocultural and historical factors that influenced those actions (and which, as has been said here before, are often difficult to get a look at), the actions create a picture of much more than just Mike's behavior. 

Katie

Katie Wester-Neal
University of Georgia

On Oct 12, 2014, at 2:59 AM, "Tonyan, Holli A" <Holli.Tonyan@csun.edu> wrote:

Hi Mike,

I really appreciated what you said in your previous post and I really appreciate that you are trying to start a thread focused on two specific articles that we could read together.  The discussion has moved so fast (your comment about whether we can stop a moving train) that it's become hard for me to even find where you posted the original articles.

I found it helpful that David Kellogg just started a new thread to continue a discussion that seems to be of interest to some readers.

Perhaps, Mike, you could start a new thread for a discussion of the two articles you mentioned?  I don't know that I can actually read those two articles right now (even two is a struggle these days of reports due and exams to grade), but I'd sure like to be able to try and to follow that thread.  Like Vera, I was excited to see the subject line for this thread, and disappointed when the discussion quickly turned to so many articles and thinkers with whom I am not familiar.  If it were it's own post and other people respected the goal of only posting in response to those specific articles, then we might be able to spark a different discussion?

I can't speak for others, but I am with you - I have far too difficult a time understanding much less responding to articles that make references to concepts with which I am not familiar and don't have time to read.  I would guess that others, like me, are interested, but just couldn't reply fast enough to keep up with the pace of new posts in that thread.  I think others, like me, would be well served by specific references to parts of those articles rather than general references to the concepts and ideas.

Any other takers for a new thread dedicated to comparing the Problem of the Environment and the article by Leontiev?

Thanks!
Holli Tonyan

On Oct 10, 2014, at 4:59 PM, mike cole <mcole@ucsd.edu<mailto:mcole@ucsd.edu>> wrote:

<html>
I had never thought of the meaning/value connection, David. Thank Mr
Hicheol for me!
I need to read more about tema which is not a term I am familiar with being
used in this context before.

I gather that the idea of reading the two articles on the problem of the
environment proved uninteresting. As a sign of my decriptude I had totally
forgotten that Andy had written a whole essay about the contrast because I
had it compartmentalized as part of a discussion among Russians that we
have been poking our noses in to. I would not recommend starting with
Andy's essay because it might discourage reading the two articles
themselves. I have read the Vygotsky over a couple of times with special
focus on question of units of analysis arising from one of David's earlier
notes.

Perhaps its only me, but when our conversations quickly spiral into three
more heavy tomes to read just to get near what the note writer is
suggesting, and when it involves Husserl, Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty
(whose work, at least, i know a little about!), I get to feeling
overwhelmed. I was hoping that maybe a sharp contrast and a discussion that
focused right on it, might be useful.

No stopping the racing train, i guess.
mike

On Fri, Oct 10, 2014 at 2:40 PM, David Kellogg <dkellogg60@gmail.com<mailto:dkellogg60@gmail.com>> wrote:

When we were translating "Thinking and Speech", one of our old
Marxists, Mr. Bae Hicheol, pointed out that "znachenie" can also be
translated as "value", and that "sense" and "signification" can easily
be understood along the lines of Marx's analysis of the commodity into
a use value and an exchange value. I think this is precisely
Volosinov's model for "tema" and "znachenie": "tema" is the use value
of a word in a concrete act of thinking and speech, while "znachenie"
is an abstraction (thus more stable than "tema") created by the
process of exchange itself. There are limits to the analogy, of
course, but it is certainly not the case that use value is "private"
while exchange value is "public".

David Kellogg
Hankuk University of Foreign Studies

On 10 October 2014 23:01, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net<mailto:ablunden@mira.net>> wrote:
On the contrary. It was quite explicit.
The first slide showed two columns. On the left were the were the Russian
and German words for "personal meaning" and the inadequate English word,
sense, on the right the Russian and German words for objective or public
meaning and the inadequate English word, meaning.
The next slide illustrated this dualism graphically with public and
private
domains represented.
The whole point was the Cartesian problem of the relation between the
two.
It seems that the word "dualism" is not a "dirty word" where he comes
from,
and the idea of theorising social change, which was a theme of 2 of the 4
keynote speeches, was also not a priority for him.

His Oral presentation (immediately after mine on the Thursday) was
devoted
to representation of the autoregulation processes of social and
psychological systems.

Andy
------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Andy Blunden*
https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__home.pacific.net.au_-7Eandy_&d=AAIBaQ&c=Oo8bPJf7k7r_cPTz1JF7vEiFxvFRfQtp-j14fFwh71U&r=nc0IzcQ7AJuG1zNoaB3azX4jLwOThkgntuk4nvTAto4&m=XRDgxyMqJBwZ8A1nCnjij72JOYIYEq3FYAx_EhNc238&s=2heitYYyTq6QcHUXLa8wb020-IFUSed8lid9NRW98Lk&e=

Martin John Packer wrote:

Did Dmitry simply not recognize the dualism in the theory he was
presenting, Andy?

Martin

On Oct 10, 2014, at 7:26 AM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net<mailto:ablunden@mira.net>> wrote:

You are quite right Martin, that it was my report of Dmitry's speech
that
was being referred to and also correct to chide me for irony. Irony is
really out of place in discussing such complex questions. However,
Dmitry
was not criticising his grandfather's theory; he was continuing it.
When I
said that I didn't think that such a stark dualism was a fruitful
place from
which to begin a discussion of meaning, he didn't really see the point
of my
remark, simply agreeing that there could be local or regional meanings
which
departed from the norm. So the irony, I admit, was all mine, and I
apologise
for inappropriate use of irony in this instance.
Andy

------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Andy Blunden*
https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__home.pacific.net.au_-7Eandy_&d=AAIBaQ&c=Oo8bPJf7k7r_cPTz1JF7vEiFxvFRfQtp-j14fFwh71U&r=nc0IzcQ7AJuG1zNoaB3azX4jLwOThkgntuk4nvTAto4&m=XRDgxyMqJBwZ8A1nCnjij72JOYIYEq3FYAx_EhNc238&s=2heitYYyTq6QcHUXLa8wb020-IFUSed8lid9NRW98Lk&e=

Martin John Packer wrote:

Just to reduce confusion, I want to point out that it was Andy who
provided this account of  Dmitry Leontiev's presentation at ISCAR,
not me.
And I think Andy was rejecting the argument. In fact, if I understood
correctly (there was a lot of irony in Andy's message!), D. Leontiev
was
both summarizing and criticizing a position that his father (A. N.
Leontiev)
had made. Martin

On Oct 10, 2014, at 3:35 AM, Rod Parker-Rees
<R.Parker-Rees@plymouth.ac.uk<mailto:R.Parker-Rees@plymouth.ac.uk>> wrote:

I would challenge Martin's  account of Dmitry Leontiev's  argument
that
meaning is objectively fixed to 'what is' -  'irrespective of one's
personal
relation to it' - yes, znachenie - common sense or agreed meaning is
more
'objective' than smysl but it is still socially constructed -
meanings are
agreed by dint of their common use (what people do 'as a rule')
rather than
because they reflect an absolute objectivity.

--
It is the dilemma of psychology to deal with a natural science with an
object that creates history. Ernst Boesch.

Holli A. Tonyan, Ph.D.
------------
Associate Professor | Department of Psychology | California State University, Northridge
Postal Address: 18111 Nordhoff Street | Northridge, CA 91330-8255

Tel: (818) 677-4970 | Fax: (818) 677-2829
Office: ST322

http://www.csun.edu/~htonyan
http://csun.academia.edu/HolliTonyan
http://www.csun.edu/~ata20315/GE/general_experimental_psychology2.html

**check out**

Tonyan, H. A. (in press).  Everyday routines: A window into the cultural organization of family child care.  Journal of Early Childhood Research.  http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1476718X14523748

Tonyan, H. A., Nuttall, J. (2014).  Connecting cultural models of home-based care and childminders’ career paths: An Eco-cultural analysis.  International Journal of Early Years Education, 22, 117-138, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09669760.2013.809654

Tonyan, H. A., Mamikonian, A., & Chien, D. (2013).  Do they practice what they preach?  An Ecocultural, multidimensional, group-based examination of the relationship between beliefs and behaviours among child care providers.  Early Child Development and Care, 183:12, 1853-1877.   http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03004430.2012.759949

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