[Xmca-l] Re: Vygotsky,Marx, & summer reading

Sat Aug 19 16:39:09 PDT 2017

I wonder if the term (germ) is related to germinate as indicating  developing?

That is, approaching a *genetic* model indicating cells that are germinating?

This is my guess as I was reading and following Andy’s article on unit & Unity.

Greg, 
On the first page of Andy’s article, in the first section titled (Origins of “cell” as METHOD of Analysis) Andy is outlining the germinating development of the notion of the “cell” that is “as though light of a particular hue were cast upon everything, tingling all other colors and MODIFYING their specific features”.

This image seems significant as a genetic origin.

Sent from my Windows 10 phone

From: Greg Thompson
Sent: August 19, 2017 2:22 PM
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Vygotsky,Marx, & summer reading

Backing up a bit, I have an ignorant question here:

what does the "germ" of "germ cell" refer to?

I'm caught up in English germs and can't think of what else the term might
imply (e.g., in Germ-an...). Sorry, this is a CHAT 101 question but perhaps
some others on the list might appreciate getting a better sense of what is
meant by "germ".

-greg

On Sat, Aug 19, 2017 at 3:01 PM, David Kellogg <dkellogg60@gmail.com> wrote:

> I would like to propose the following tests for a unit of analysis. They
> are all based on things Vygotsky wrote in the pedology.The examples, from
> biology, political economy, and music, are my own.
>
> a) It must be maximally simple. That is, it must be small enough to be
> manageable in experiments, clinical settings, and observable using
> "objectivizing" methods of research such as the functional method of dual
> stimulation or the Zoped. For example, cells can be managed in a petri
> dish, drawn from patients during examinations, and their genesis may be
> provoked and observed with a microscope: the commodity can be abstracted
> from an exchange for analysis, observed as it arises in production and
> exchange, and elicited through barter and markets. The four note "theme" of
> that opens Beethoven's fifth symphony is simple enough to play on a timpani
> as well as a piano.
>
> b) It must be minimally complex. That is, it must contain functioning
> analogues of all the properties which are the object of investigation. For
> example, cells have functioning analogues for metabolism, reproduction, and
> equilibrium with the environment.Commodities contain, in a coded,
> potential, or "embryonic" form, all the social relations of labor and
> capital we find in a mature capitalist economy. Beethoven's "theme" is
> complex enough to describe the structure of the symphony as a whole, and to
> form its coda.
>
> c) These analogues cannot be simple, miniaturized "recapitulations" of the
> properties which are the object of investigation. The mechanisms of cell
> metabolism, reproduction, homeostasis are not the same as the metabolism of
> the human organism. A commodity cannot produce or exchange or invest
> itself; it does not contain productive labour or finance capital in
> anything but a coded form; these must be unfolded through the historical
> process and that historical process is not infallibly predictable.
> Beethoven's "theme" did not create its variations and permutations:
> Beethoven did.
>
> Applying these tests to the units that Andy proposes (with one exception,
> number three below, they are also based on Vygotsky!) we find:
>
> 1. Word meaning is maximally simple but not minimally complex. It doesn't
> contain analogues of interpersonal meanings, e.g. questions, commands,
> statements, requests. It doesn’t contain analogues of textual meanings,
> e.g. hypotaxis and parataxis, Theme and Rheme, Given and New information.
>
> 2. The social situation of development is minimally complex but not
> maximally simple: it does construe the ensemble of relations between the
> child and the environment at a given age stage, including the whole of
> actual and potential language, but these cannot be managed in an
> experimental or clinical setting, or elicited in complete form using the
> functional method of dual stimulation or the Zoped.
>
> 3. Mediated actions are maximally simple and minimally complex, but not, as
> far as I can see, structurally, functionally or genetically different from
> the phenomena of activity they purport to explain.
>
> David Kellogg
> Macquarie University
>
> Recent Article: Vygotsky, Halliday, and Hasan: Towards Conceptual
> Complementarity
>
> Free E-print Downloadable at:
>
> http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/W7EDsmNSEwnpIKFRG8Up/full
>
> On Sat, Aug 19, 2017 at 10:37 PM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net> wrote:
>
> > Word meanings for the study of (verbal) intellect
> > Artefact-mediated actions for the more general study of the development
> of
> > activity
> > Perezhivaniya for the study of personality development
> > (Defect-Compensation) for the study of disability or whatever
> > Social Situations of Development for the study of child development
> >
> > See page 9 on https://www.academia.edu/11387923/
> >
> > Andy
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > Andy Blunden
> > http://home.mira.net/~andy
> > http://www.brill.com/products/book/origins-collective-decision-making
> > On 19/08/2017 10:47 PM, Martin John Packer wrote:
> >
> >> What are the five, Andy?
> >>
> >> Martin
> >>
> >> On Aug 18, 2017, at 9:07 PM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> Amazon have it for $38.21: https://www.amazon.com/Vygotsk
> >>> y-Marx-Toward-Marxist-Psychology/dp/1138244813 which is not too bad.
> >>>
> >>> My chapter is available at https://www.academia.edu/11387923/ but so
> >>> far as I can see other authors have not posted theirs on academia.edu
> -
> >>> maybe elsewhere?
> >>>
> >>> Thank you, Alfredo, for highlighting how I have pointed to 5 different
> >>> domains in which Vygotsky demonstrated the "method of analysis by
> units."
> >>> To me, it seems useless to identify a writer's methodological
> innovations
> >>> unless you can transport that methodology to a different context, and
> >>> pointing to five applications by Vygotsky himself seemed a good way of
> >>> showing how portable the method is. More recently, I used this method
> in an
> >>> approach to political science, taking a group of people in the room
> trying
> >>> to decide on what they are going to do together as a unit of analysis.
> >>> Personally, I think this method has proved very fruitful and original.
> How
> >>> lucky we are to be inheritors of Vygotsky's brilliant insights, still
> >>> generally so unknown to the general scientific audience. What a gift
> LSV
> >>> has given us!
> >>>
> >>> But legacies are always problematic. Alfredo, I think you would be a
> >>> very good candidate to review this book. Beth?
> >>>
> >>> Andy
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >>> Andy Blunden
> >>> http://home.mira.net/~andy
> >>> http://www.brill.com/products/book/origins-collective-decision-making
> >>> On 18/08/2017 10:16 PM, mike cole wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> Peter, Alfredo Et al -
> >>>>
> >>>> It seems that the readers of MCA would appreciate a good overview
> >>>> review of
> >>>> the LSV and Marx book, but so far as I know, no one has proposed the
> >>>> idea
> >>>> to Beth, the book review editor. (You seem to have a jump on the task,
> >>>> Alfredo!).
> >>>>
> >>>> Also, given the cost of the book, it would be nice if authors could
> >>>> follow
> >>>> Andy's lead and make a draft available. Andy's article on units of
> >>>> analysis
> >>>> is on Academia, a click away. That way the many readers of XMCA around
> >>>> the
> >>>> world would not be excluded from the discussion.
> >>>>
> >>>> Mike
> >>>> Happy travels summer readers.  :-)
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >
>

-- 
Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Department of Anthropology
880 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
Brigham Young University
Provo, UT 84602
WEBSITE: greg.a.thompson.byu.edu
http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson