[Xmca-l] Re: units of analysis? LSV versus ANL

[David Kellogg]

Attached is some small proof that Vygotsky believes in consciousness
before language: a summarizing endnote that I wrote for the lecture
immediately after the Problem of the Environment, which is called "The
General Laws of Psychological Development in the Child". Easily half
the lecture is devoted to consciousness before language.

So ANL is under a lot of pressure. But I find it really hard to
believe that his criticism is some kind of subterfuge, that actually
Leontiev wanted to preserve Vygotsky's ideas in some form and saw that
the only way he could do that is by criticizing them. There are always
ways of handling pressure that do not involve murdering the work of
your dead and dying colleagues and friends.

After the massacres in Beijing and Chengdu in 1989, we were all herded
into little rooms every Wednesday afternoon to "ren-ding fang-geming
bao-luan de zhenxiang", that is, to "correctly characterize the
counter-revolutionary turmoil" in Beijing. One of my graduate
students, a young doctor, would sit in the corner with her face in a
newspaper and her big beautiful deer-like eyes firmly shut. Once,
after repeated demands from our party commissar (who had himself
supported the demonstrations before the shooting started), she opened
her suddenly rather baleful eyes and replied, "Didn't you correctly
characterize it? Counter-revolutionary means counter-revoutionary,
la!"

>From the way she added "la" in Cantonese dialect, we all knew exactly
what she meant. But nobody laughed.

David Kellogg
Hankuk University of Foreign Studies



On 18 October 2014 06:39, Martin John Packer <mpacker@uniandes.edu.co> wrote:
> Eh? No, I mean "necessary."  What isn't what statement?
>
> No more clumsy posting, please, Huw
>
> :)
>
> Martin
>
> On Oct 17, 2014, at 4:29 PM, Huw Lloyd <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>>
>> Do you mean unnecessary, Martin?  This isn't the statement.
>>
>> Best,
>> Huw
>>
>>
>>>
>>> Martin
>>>
>>> On Oct 17, 2014, at 3:09 PM, Huw Lloyd <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Specifically, ANL is pointing to drivers and necessary conditions.  He is
>>>> saying that LSV considers language-ing the driver for consciousness,
>>>> whereas ANL points to activity.  This to my reading and thinking is
>>>> justifiably presented as a decisive difference.  It is the same as
>>> stating
>>>> that the deed precedes the word, and that the genetic precursor is
>>>> different to products derived from it.
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>
>
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