[Xmca-l] Re: perezhivanie

[Andy Blunden]

I heartily concur with your efforts to gain precision, Marc. 
Leaving aside the generation of new terms willy nilly for no 
scientific purpose, the problem we face (especially in 
appropriating scientific work in the Marxist tradition) is 
this: the object is itself is not fixed. Analytical 
approaches want strictly circumscribed objects, 
differentiated from one another by definable attributes, but 
continuing analysis (e.g. over the history of a science) 
lead to more and more distinctions, leading to the 
disintegration of the original concept or insight. For 
example, the psychology of a child is not like the 
psychology of an adult, and yet the child is a person, just 
as is an adult, and the psychology of a child has to be 
understood *not in itself* but in its fitness to turn, 
eventually, into the psychology of an adult.

Irina Mescheryakov's dictionary definition (circulated by 
Alfredo last week) said:

    "According to the theory of Vygotsky, /perezhivanie/ can
    be approached like any other mental function which in
    ontogenesis is developed from involuntary and direct
    forms to the highest forms, which have status of action
    or activity. This approach offers possibilities for
    distinguishing the different genetic forms
    /perezhivanie/, and also for the search for the
    cultural-historical means of mastery of /perezhivanie./"

So my point is: generating multiple different terms for 
/perezhivanie/ in this or that circumstance places an 
obligation on the writer to show how one transforms into the 
other. Such a transformation process is not *yet another 
form* of /perezhivanie/ but the content of the processes 
undergoing transformation.

Andy

------------------------------------------------------------
Andy Blunden
http://home.mira.net/~andy
http://www.brill.com/products/book/origins-collective-decision-making 

On 10/01/2017 1:19 PM, Marc Clarà wrote:
> Hi, Andy,
> In my opinion, it is important, and especially in this 
> topic, to be precise about the phenomena or the aspects of 
> the phenomena which are under scrutiny; otherwise, 
> scientific discussion and cumulative construction may 
> become quite difficult. In this case, it might happen, I 
> think, that different people interarticulate a formally 
> coherent discourse talking of perezhivanie, and they think 
> they are talking about the same object of study and about 
> analogous observations, but in reality talking about 
> different objects of study, or different aspects, or about 
> observations which can be complementary (instead of in 
> opposition, for example). The problem, in my view, is not 
> that there are different focuses, aspects, etc. under 
> research in relation to a phenomenon or different related 
> phenomena; the problem may arise if observations about 
> different aspects, for example, are counterpoised and 
> discussed as if they were about the same aspect of the 
> phenomenon.
> That's why I think it may be useful to make some 
> distinctions, to gain some precision in the scientific 
> work on perezhivanie. The first distinction, 
> experiencing-as-contemplation and 
> experiencing-as-struggle, is made by Vasilyuk (although 
> with a different name for experiencing-as-struggle, as 
> explained in the paper). He initially distinguishes these 
> as two types of activity, although later suggests that 
> experiencing-as-contemplation could be an initial moment 
> for a subsequent experiencing-as-struggle (but not all 
> experiencing-as-contemplation would necessarily imply 
> experiencing-as-struggle). In experiencing-as-struggle, 
> Vasilyuk also identifies the importance of the cultural 
> meanings that mediate this activity -which he calls 
> schematism,- and especially how these meanings are 
> transformed in experiencing-as-struggle. In my 
> interpretation, when Vygotsky talks of perezhivanie in The 
> Problem of the Environment, he focuses mainly in this type 
> of meaning. This is what in my comment I suggested to call 
> m-perezhivanie.
> I agree with you, Andy, and I think this is also related 
> to part of Alfredo's points, that there is no 
> experiencing-as-struggle without a mediating 
> m-perezhivanie which is transformed in the activity, so 
> that, even analytically, this distinction could seem 
> useless, because studying experiencing-as-struggle is the 
> same as studying the transformation of m-perezhivanija, 
> and viceversa. Still, I think that the distinction may be 
> useful because I work with the hypothesis that this type 
> of holistic meaning is key not only as a mediator in 
> experiencing-as-struggle, but in many other types of 
> activity (as I mentioned also in previous messages and 
> also in the paper). Thus, what we learn about this type of 
> mediating meaning in experiencing-as-struggle may inform 
> also about other types of activities and viceversa. Also, 
> and in the same vein, in my view this distinction helps to 
> connect Vygotsky and Vasilyuk works on perezhivanie. Thus, 
> note that, in The Problem of the Environment, Vygotsky 
> does not consider what in my interpretation is 
> m-perezhivanie as mediating in activities of 
> experiencing-as-struggle, but instead he considers it, 
> basically, as mediating in activities of 
> experiencing-as-contemplation.
> I don't know if the terms I suggested are adequate or not, 
> and I don't consider myself with authority enough to 
> recommend one term over others, but I think that, 
> regardless the terms used, we need to be precise about the 
> phenomenon or aspects of the phenomenon we are addressing.
> Best regards,
> Marc.
>
> 2017-01-10 1:05 GMT+01:00 Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net 
> <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>>:
>
>     Marc, throughout the Special Issue we spelt
>     /perezhivanie/ the same say and put it in italics,
>     indicating a Russian word transliterated into English,
>     and systematically had authors delete "experiencing"
>     and "lived experience" from their articles and even
>     quotations, as part of an effort to create a common
>     meaning for the word. Summing up your position, in the
>     Response, you said:
>
>            In my reading (and I apologize in advance for any
>            misinterpretations), the different papers in this
>            special issue have basically noted four different
>            phenomena that are sometimes referred to as
>            /perezhivanie/. They might be considered four
>            different meanings of the word. To distinguish
>            between these meanings of /perezhivanie/, I will
>            give them four different tentative names:
>            experiencing-as-contemplation;
>            experiencing-as-struggle; fantasy-based
>            experiencing-as-struggle; and m-/perezhivanie/.
>
>     What is your recommendation for future writers? Should
>     they choose one of these four terms? Or use
>     /perezhivanie/ and qualify, or rely on context to
>     specify meaning?
>
>     Andy
>     -- 
>     ------------------------------------------------------------
>     Andy Blunden
>     http://home.mira.net/~andy <http://home.mira.net/%7Eandy>
>     http://www.brill.com/products/book/origins-collective-decision-making
>     <http://www.brill.com/products/book/origins-collective-decision-making>
>
>
>