[Xmca-l] Re: Help with Russian translation

[Andy Blunden]

Your "over-literal" translation captures the grammatical 
structure of the excerpt in a way that makes a lot of sense, 
David. Thank you for that. I will definitely borrow from it.
The word otnosheniyi, which I have translated as 
"life-projects" is usually translated as "relations" or 
"life-relationships" but as I understand it, it is the 
bolded word in statements like:
"The Party's *orientation* to improvements in agriculture 
was affirmed." and
"The Central Committee's *priorities* were outlined by the 
Secretary."
I also have in mind that the otnosheniya are *realised as* 
activities, not even "realised by", so in a sense they are 
the inner form of activities. A "life-project" is both inner 
and outer really, but this seems appropriate to all the ways 
otnosheniyi is translated.
Andy
------------------------------------------------------------
*Andy Blunden*
http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/
On 7/08/2015 9:04 AM, David Kellogg wrote:
> Andy:
>
> I think this somewhat over-literal translation might help:
>
> "The real (or the actual, factual--DK) basis of the human personality
> consists of the totality of its social-in-nature relations to the world;
> however, these are relations which are realized, and realized in their
> activeness, or more precisely, in the totality of their multi-formed
> activities.
>
> We have in view the subjective activeness which is the source of the
> "units" for the psychological analysis of the personality: not actions, not
> operations, and not psycho-physiological functions or building-blocks of
> these functions; the latter characterize activity and not directly
> personality."
>
> I'm cheating a little here, both by being over-literal and also by
> distinguishing between subjective activeness and the activities which
> realize it. But I think that is Vygotsky's intention. First of all, to
> identify the basis of human personality in relations with the world taken
> as a whole, and then to distinguish between the personality and the
> specific actions that apparently make it up but which cannot exhaust its
> potential.
>
> David Kellogg
>
>
>
> On Fri, Aug 7, 2015 at 7:01 AM, HENRY SHONERD <hshonerd@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Andy,
>> Sorry, I am absolutely unqualified to translate this! But I am wondering
>> if the “life projects” Vygotsky had in mind were akin to what Vera
>> John-Steiner has called in her book Creative Collaboration “network of
>> enterprises” and what you call “life projects” in your intro the recent
>> book on collaborative projects that you edited and to which Vera has
>> contributed. I doubt this helps with the translation, but I am hoping that
>> I am on the right path to understanding the passage.
>> Henry
>>
>>> On Aug 6, 2015, at 6:28 AM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net> wrote:
>>>
>>> Could some of our wonderful Russophiles criticise my translation of the
>> following excerpt:
>>>        *Р*еальным базисом личности человека является
>>>        совокупность его общественных по своей природе
>>>        отношений к миру, но отношений, которые реализуются,
>>>        а они реализуются его деятельностью, точнее,
>>>        совокупностью его многообразных деятельностей.
>>>
>>>        Имеются в виду именно деятельности субъекта, которые
>>>        и являются исходными "единицами" психологического
>>>        анализа личности, а не действия, не операции, не
>>>        психофизиологические функции или блоки этих функций;
>>>        последние характеризуют деятельность, а не
>>>        непосредственно личность.
>>>
>>> which I have translated as:
>>>
>>>        The real basis of a person’s personality is the
>>>        totality of their life-projects, which are social by
>>>        nature, but life-projects which are realised, and
>>>        they are realised by their activity, or more
>>>        precisely, by the totality of their various
>>>        activities.Here we have in mind in particular the
>>>        activities of the subject that are initial “units”
>>>        of the psychological analysis of personality ‒ not
>>>        actions, not operations, not psychophysiological
>>>        functions or the blocks of these functions, which
>>>        characterise activity, but not directly personality.
>>>
>>> But there are parts of this which are really unclear to me, and perhaps
>> a better translation would clear it up. The standard English translation
>> does not help.
>>> Andy
>>> --
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> *Andy Blunden*
>>> http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/
>>
>>