[Xmca-l] Re: LSV versus ANL

Tue Oct 21 15:31:25 PDT 2014

Thanks Henry-- You are illustrating exactly the point I was making to
Annalisa when your message popped up.
mike

On Tue, Oct 21, 2014 at 3:23 PM, Henry G. Shonerd III <hshonerd@gmail.com>
wrote:

> All,
> Like Annalisa, I consider myself a neophyte regarding Vygotsky and Marx,
> and only slightly more informed about Vygotsky "pure and simple". Ha! I
> found the following article through LCHC website a little while ago (thanks
> to Mike's encouragement to use the google tool on the website). A fairly
> short read, it confirmed things that I had suspected about Vygotsky in a
> Stalinist environment, though very little about Marx, especially
> dialectical materialism. Those in the XMCA chat that are steeped in the
> dialectic will probably find the article falls short, but does it look like
> a fair and accurate account of the context of Vygotsky's work and
> collaborations?
> Henry
>
>
>
>
>
> On Oct 21, 2014, at 4:01 PM, Huw Lloyd <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Ah, quite true.
> >
> > http://lmgtfy.com/?q=site:lchc.ucsd.edu/mca/mail+Marx+and+Vygotsky
> >
> > I am showing you this way so that you see how to write "site:" in the
> > search, which you can then apply to many sites.  If I sent you the google
> > link it wouldn't be so clear.
> >
> > Best,
> > Huw
> >
> > On 21 October 2014 21:59, Annalisa Aguilar <annalisa@unm.edu> wrote:
> >
> >>
> >> ________________________________________
> >> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> >> on behalf of Huw Lloyd <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com>
> >> Sent: Tuesday, October 21, 2014 12:43 PM
> >> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> >> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: LSV versus ANL
> >>
> >> This is one way to search, Annalisa: http://bit.ly/1pxNClw
> >>
> >> Best,
> >> Huw
> >>
> >> Hi Huw,
> >>
> >> What is the link? I see it is a bit.ly link but that doesn't tell me
> >> anything, and I like to know somewhat where I'm going before I click. :)
> >>
> >> Thanks,
> >>
> >> Annalisa
> >>
> >>
> >>> Best,
> >>>
> >>> Annalisa
> >>> ________________________________________
> >>> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu
> >
> >>> on behalf of Martin John Packer <mpacker@uniandes.edu.co>
> >>> Sent: Tuesday, October 21, 2014 9:57 AM
> >>> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> >>> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: LSV versus ANL
> >>>
> >>> Hi Juan, Annalisa,
> >>>
> >>> The relationship between LSV and Marx is certainly something that we
> have
> >>> discussed here on xmca.  My own contribution includes a paper
> published a
> >>> few years ago, which I would be happy to send to you:
> >>>
> >>> Packer, M. J. (2008). Is Vygotsky relevant? Vygotsky’s Marxist
> >> psychology.
> >>> Mind, Culture, and Activity, 15(1), 8-31.
> >>>
> >>> Martin
> >>>
> >>> On Oct 21, 2014, at 10:27 AM, Annalisa Aguilar <annalisa@unm.edu>
> wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> Hello Juan,
> >>>>
> >>>> I agree with you that one must understand Marxism to understand
> >> Vygotsky
> >>> clearly. Darwin's theory too. My grasp upon these topics is tenuous
> and I
> >>> would benefit to know more.
> >>>>
> >>>> In my past, it has been difficult to enjoy dispassionate conversations
> >>> about Marxism in my circles without the distractions of how much I
> don't
> >>> know about Marxism, or how much Marx didn't know about capitalism;
> >> neither
> >>> position is helpful. Perhaps Marxism is a hot potato still.
> >>>>
> >>>> Certainly there are claims that even the Soviets did not understood
> >>> Marxism properly and that that may be why Vygotsky had such a hard
> time.
> >> If
> >>> Marxism has been so difficult a topic, why should it be different for
> us
> >>> who have come late to the table? We do have the power of hindsight, but
> >> has
> >>> this helped?
> >>>>
> >>>> For any thinker's work, it is highly relevant to understand the
> >>> contemporary milieu in which that person worked. That is why I look to
> >>> historical context to unlock Vygotsky's work, not just his texts.
> >> However,
> >>> I find a political specter rises from the grave when discussing Marxism
> >> and
> >>> kills all prospects before understanding can begin. It is perplexing. I
> >>> wonder if it is why Vygotsky will remain elusive to us post-moderns.
> >>>>
> >>>> I wish I could read the Castorina & Baquero paper, but I cannot read
> >>> Spanish very well. Would it be asking too much of you to list the
> >> relevant
> >>> points made in that paper? I would very much be interested!
> >>>>
> >>>> Regards,
> >>>>
> >>>> Annalisa
> >>>> ________________________________________
> >>>> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <
> xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu
> >>>
> >>> on behalf of Juan Duarte <juanma.duarte@gmail.com>
> >>>> Sent: Tuesday, October 21, 2014 5:39 AM
> >>>> To: ablunden@mira.net; eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> >>>> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: LSV versus ANL
> >>>>
> >>>> I´m sorry for couldn´t answer -neither red all the messages-
> >> previously.
> >>>> But what i was reffering was precisely the fact that the "unit of
> >>> analysis"
> >>>> in Vigotsky is not understandable without taking Marx and Engels
> >> method,
> >>> as
> >>>> Vygotsky himself writes, for example, in his manuscript The historical
> >>>> meaning of the chrisis in psychology.
> >>>> There´s is the need of psychology´s own Das Kapital. And the units of
> >>>> analisis in LV are built in a dialectical way. So, it´s -for me, at
> >>> least-
> >>>> surprising to read so much about the marxist psychologist, and
> >> preciselly
> >>>> about method, and very few comments about the fact he was marxist. To
> >>>> understand the concept of "unit of analysis" is to know, for example,
> >> the
> >>>> method of Das Kapital, where Marx takes the value as a cell, unit of
> >>>> diverse and opposits, change value and use value, wich cannot be
> >>> separated
> >>>> without loosing the whole. So is the use of Meaning (unit of though
> and
> >>>> language), for example.
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> Well, that´s my point. And know that there are many that thake this
> >> point
> >>>> of view. Andy, for example.
> >>>>
> >>>> Thanks a lot for the fruitful interchange.
> >>>> I send you, if anyone is interested, an article about the marxism in
> LV
> >>> (in
> >>>> spanish). Here, in Argentina, Jose Castorina and Ricardo Baquero have
> >>>> worked through this line, in a very interesting work.
> >>>> Juan Duarte (Argentina).
> >>>>
> >>>> 2014-10-20 21:08 GMT-03:00 Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net>:
> >>>>
> >>>>> Returning to Leontyev's critique of Vygotsky, ANL claimed that
> >>>>> perezhivanie, as a manifestation of the whole personality, cannot be
> >> the
> >>>>> determinant of personality, because that would be a logical circle.
> >> But
> >>> it
> >>>>> seems to me that ANL failed to understand how Vygotsky’s analysis by
> >>> units
> >>>>> allows him to avoid the reductionism into which ANL then ventures. If
> >> a
> >>>>> complex process is to be explained by something _else_, then its
> >>> analysis
> >>>>> is _reduced_  to the analysis of that something else. Analysis by
> >> units
> >>>>> allows Vygotsky to avoid reductionism because the analysis begins
> >> from a
> >>>>> concept of the whole complex process represented in a unit, not the
> >>> whole,
> >>>>> but a small fragment of the whole, such that the whole can be seen as
> >>> being
> >>>>> made up of very many such fragments only. Absent Vygotsky's method of
> >>>>> analysis by units, and Leontyev's Activity Theory is in danger of
> >>>>> collapsing to a reductionism that actually explains nothing.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Andy
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>>>> *Andy Blunden*
> >>>>> http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> >>
>
>
>

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