[Xmca-l] Re: RES: Re: Child Development: Understanding a Cultural Perpsective

Fri May 19 15:39:09 PDT 2017

Thanks, Martin. I'm reading Vygotsky's lecture on "Negative Phases of the
Transitional Age", i.e. adolescence. Its' a late lecture, a little under a
year before he died. But in it he does argue that the central neoformation
of adolescence isn't sexuality or teenage rebellion or any of the other
behavioural symptoms that his colleagues were focused on. He wants
something that can generalize to every other crisis as well, and he chooses
what he calls "schizoticism" which is probably what we would call today
"schizotypal personality disorder", except that for him it's not a disorder
at all, an in fact he argues that it is the children who show only feeble
schizotic symptoms or who refuse to show them who are seriously disordered.
And he suggests that what generalizes to every other crisis is the notion
of a house divided against itself, what he calls "понятие о расщеплении",
or the concept of the differentiation, the division, the split, just as you
say.

Weirdly, I think that your stable periods don't link together so well.
That's not just the lack of grammatical parallelism in the nomenclature
("infancy", "toddler[hood]", "early/middle childhood" "teenager[hood]"--I
can see that you are trying to stay away from a nomenclature that implies
schooling on the one hand and use common-sense folk categories on the
other. I think it's because you are using a model of stable periods based
on world-building rather than on language, and the worlds of "Greatwe",
"irresistible invitations", "appearances", etc don't really seem linked the
way that physical-biological-psychological differentiation are linked.

Your stable periods work well for your project (yes, culture, but  within
that getting your students to rediscover both the strengths and weakness of
Piaget). But I think they won't work so well for mine (yes, language, and
within language and the "world-building" function of
language, distinguishing what Halliday would call the Experiential rather
than the Logical metafunction--the feeling/thought of what's happening
rather than the whole question of how it all fits together.)

I didn't really mean to inflict my book chapter on poor Henry--publishers
are now trying to get authors to shoulder almost ALL of the sales as well
as the editing work, and one of the things they do is provide all these
neat links that you stick in your signature when you take part in a
discussion list; my book sales have been, like two or three copies a year,
so I thought I'd try it. I notice that (for all that real, unfeigned
modesty and humility), Henry knows onewhole hell of a lot more about
Langacker on the one hand and Wundt on the other than I do (I have read
bits of both but I don't have anything like his understanding of either).

But there really is something I really do share with Henry that I think
explains right away how he responded to my book chapter. It's this:
Vygotsky talks about "communication" and "generalization" (or "sharing" and
"about that shared"); Halliday about "dialogue" and "narrative". It seems
to me that by whatever name we give them, this linguistic woofing and
warping are the weft that join the stable periods and the crises together.

The difference is that during stable periods, the
communication/sharing/dialogue threads are in front and the
generalization/about-that-shared/narrative
threads go in back. But during the crises, the child is trying to "turn the
tables" on the environment, so that the child is source of development and
the environment is site. During the crisis, we see all those loose threads,
all those knots and breaks--and yet also, there is the same pattern, albeit
like a photographic negative--in the back of the carpet.
-- 
David Kellogg
Macquarie University

"The Great Globe and All Who It Inherit:
Narrative and Dialogue in Story-telling with
Vygotsky, Halliday, and Shakespeare"

Free Chapters Downloadable at:

https://www.sensepublishers.com/media/2096-the-great-
globe-and-all-who-it-inherit.pdf

Recent Article: Thinking of feeling: Hasan, Vygotsky, and Some Ruminations
on the Development of Narrative in Korean Children

Free E-print Downloadable at:

http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/8Vaq4HpJMi55DzsAyFCf/full
On Sat, May 20, 2017 at 7:51 AM, Martin John Packer <mpacker@uniandes.edu.co
> wrote:

> Diagram attached, I hope.
>
> Martin
>
>
> > On May 19, 2017, at 4:34 PM, HENRY SHONERD <hshonerd@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > Martin,
> > I’m sorry, but I don’t think that diagram came through. Also I too am
> interested in what you think of Shpet.
> > HJenry
> >
> >
> >> On May 19, 2017, at 9:45 AM, Martin John Packer <
> mpacker@uniandes.edu.co> wrote:
> >>
> >> Hi David,
> >>
> >> Here’s how I handled the matter of the age periods: the stages and
> crises; tell me what you think.
> >>
> >> Infancy - A Practical Understanding of the World
> >> Infancy - Towards Biological Differentiation
> >> Toddlerhood - A World of Irresistible Invitations
> >> Toddlerhood - Towards Psychological Differentiation
> >> Early Childhood  - How Things Appear, And How They Are
> >> Early Childhood  - Towards Inner and Outer
> >> Middle Childhood - Understanding Institutional Reality
> >> Middle Childhood - Towards the Actual and the Possible
> >> The Teenage Years - Adolescent, or Adult?
> >> The Teenage Years - Towards Adulthood
> >>
> >> The “Towards” in these chapter titles reflects the fact that I needed
> to treat each stage in two chapters, and there was usually less to say
> about each crisis than about each stage, so I couldn’t dedicate a whole
> chapter to each crisis. Here’s how I described the notions of ‘stage’ and
> ‘transition’:
> >>
> >> "Stages are qualitatively distinct from one another, not only in the
> form of intelligence that the child employs (as Piaget noted), but also in
> the child’s way of being in the world. Each stage involves a specific way
> of relating to the world and relating to self, and as a result of this a
> new way of experiencing and understanding.
> >>
> >> "Transitions are those times when new properties rapidly emerge. A
> transition is a point of inflection, a crisis. In a transition there is a
> dramatic change in the child’s way of being in the world, so that she
> discovers new possibilities in that world and gains a new sense of herself:
> of her abilities, her capacities. During the stage that follows, the child
> progressively masters this new way of living in the world. These
> transitions are truly changes not only in the child but in the whole
> child-caregiver-niche system of which she is a component.”
> >>
> >> And the diagram below (if it comes through) illustrates the sequence (I
> think the third should read Appearance & Reality).
> >>
> >> Martin
> >>
> >>
> >> [cid:FAACC3A0-B984-4539-B8E7-05391373CD7F]
> >>
> >> On May 18, 2017, at 7:27 PM, David Kellogg <dkellogg60@gmail.com
> <mailto:dkellogg60@gmail.com>> wrote:
> >>
> >> Martin, I think if I'd written something like that I'd be pretty
> shameless
> >> too. (A propos--or by the bye--do you have a publisher for the Shpet
> >> schtick you are up to...?)
> >>
> >> Here's something for the revised edition. The way Vygotsky explains
> "Great
> >> We" in the Pedological Lectures is a little different and a lot
> wittier. He
> >> says it is a "Grandwe" in the sense of your Grandpa--that is, the "we"
> was
> >> there before you were even a gleam in your Daddy's eye. (Vygotsky likes
> to
> >> address the students with "You and we").
> >>
> >> I have been thinking how to "popularize" the age periods without
> >> vulgarizing them (you know, what Bruner says about being able to teach
> >> anything to anybody in some honest way).
> >>
> >> You and we (our little Grandwe) know perfectly well that Vygotsky
> measured
> >> that zone of proximal development in years (it's a "next" zone of
> >> development, so it doesn't make any sense to talk about it unless:
> >>
> >> a) you have the age periods and
> >>
> >> b) you have some set of problems--not the Binet problems!--that will
> >> correlate in some non-arbitrary way to the next age period.
> >>
> >> That means that the "next zone of development" for Vygotsky studies is
> not
> >> to try to turn him into a failed Gestaltist (pace Yasnitsky and van der
> >> Veer) but rather to try to figure out some way to get people to take the
> >> age periods seriously no matter how busy and how impatient with
> Vygotsky's
> >> discursive and apparently indecisive formulations they are.
> >>
> >> What do you think of this?
> >>
> >> Birth--Social Situation of Development: Instinct confronted by
> >> intersubjectivity. Central Neoformation: "Pre-we"
> >> Infancy--SSD: Physiologically independent but biologically dependent:
> >> CNF: "Grandwe"
> >> One--SSD: Proto-speech confronted by proper speech. CNF: "Pre-speech"
> >> Early Childhood--SSD: Biologically independent but interpersonally
> >> (interactionally) dependent. CNF: "Grandspeech"
> >> Three--SSD: Affect confronted by the 'antipode' of will.  CNF:
> "Pre-will"
> >> Preschool--SSD: Interpersonally independent but psychologically
> dependent
> >> ('reactive' learning). CNF: "Grandwill"
> >> Seven--SSD: Inner personality confronted by outer persona. CNF: "Pre-me"
> >> School Age: Psychologically independent but intellectually
> >> (academically) dependent. CNF: "Grandme"
> >> Thirteen: Original thinking confronted by imitation. CNF: "Pre-concepts"
> >> Adolescence: Intellectually independent but socioeconomically dependent.
> >> CNF: "Grandconcepts" (nontheoretical concepts, tinged with concrete
> >> thinking)
> >> Seventeen SSD: In the USSR, school leaving. CNF: "Pre-Life"
> >>
> >> You could write the Crises on your palm and the Stable Periods along
> each
> >> finger. (Hard to read it, though....)
> >>
> >> --
> >> David Kellogg
> >> Macquarie University
> >>
> >> "The Great Globe and All Who It Inherit:
> >> Narrative and Dialogue in Story-telling with
> >> Vygotsky, Halliday, and Shakespeare"
> >>
> >> Free Chapters Downloadable at:
> >>
> >> https://www.sensepublishers.com/media/2096-the-great-globe-
> and-all-who-it-inherit.pdf
> >>
> >> Recent Article: Thinking of feeling: Hasan, Vygotsky, and Some
> Ruminations
> >> on the Development of Narrative in Korean Children
> >>
> >> Free E-print Downloadable at:
> >>
> >> http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/8Vaq4HpJMi55DzsAyFCf/full
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> On Thu, May 18, 2017 at 9:10 AM, Maria Judith Sucupira Costa Lins <
> >> mariasucupiralins@terra.com.br> wrote:
> >>
> >> Martin
> >> Thank you for the chapter. Maria
> >>
> >> -----Mensagem original-----
> >> De: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-l-bounces@
> >> mailman.ucsd.edu]
> >> Em nome de Martin John Packer
> >> Enviada em: quarta-feira, 17 de maio de 2017 20:05
> >> Para: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> >> Assunto: [Xmca-l] Re: Child Development: Understanding a Cultural
> >> Perpsective
> >>
> >> Thanks Alfredo. It was fun to write, and it would not have been possible
> >> except for what I have learned over the years from some very smart
> people,
> >> a
> >> number of whom hang out on this very discussion group.
> >>
> >> Martin
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> On May 17, 2017, at 5:48 PM, Alfredo Jornet Gil
> >> <a.j.gil@iped.uio.no<mailto:a.j.gil@iped.uio.no>> wrote:
> >>
> >> Thanks for shamelessly sharing your work, Martin. The chapter looks
> great.
> >> I
> >> like the way it draws connections throughout diverse theories,
> emphasising
> >> common ground across dual systems theory, dynamic field theory, and
> >> cultural
> >> psychology.
> >>
> >> Alfredo
> >> ________________________________________
> >> From:
> >> xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> >> <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu
> >>
> >> on
> >> behalf of Martin John Packer
> >> <mpacker@uniandes.edu.co<mailto:mpacker@uniandes.edu.co>>
> >> Sent: 18 May 2017 00:10
> >> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> >> Subject: [Xmca-l]  Child Development: Understanding a Cultural
> Perpsective
> >>
> >> A few months ago I shamelessly promoted my new textbook, Child
> Development:
> >> Understanding a Cultural Perspective, published by Sage at only $46 for
> the
> >> paperback edition, $33 or less for the various electronic editions.
> >>
> >> There is now a sample chapter available online: Chapter 5, one of the
> two
> >> chapters on infancy:
> >>
> >> <https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/child-development/book2535
> 43%20#preview>
> >>
> >>
> >> Martin
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >
> >
>
>