[Xmca-l] Re: Question on Imagination

Thu Sep 26 08:27:25 PDT 2019

This is interesting to me as I am wondering if there is a differentiation between imagination and being open to new possibilities and what relationship this has to how we education. Last week we were reading Vygotsky’s writings on early human thinking is a seminar. He said something that really struck me. It was about the difference in how we might treat teaching to track a bear. For early man it might be teaching all the details so you could recreate the hunt of the bear using the tracks. For more modern thinking it might be more about using the track to tell the story of a hunt for a bear opening up a new possibility for things that might happen. Both have their advantages. For the former you have a more detailed and direct instruction of what you are supposed to do. For the latter you are open to new possibilities as new circumstances might make the hunt more complex in ways you are not anticipating so you are open to learning new tools in sign operation or more likely in sign co-operation. A student actually asked, is this the same thing as imagination, actually bringing up the idea of having an imaginary friend. I did not know how to answer. Is being able to think about things in an open manner and able to co-operate in  creating new tools and symbols the same thing as imagination. When a write sits down to write or a director stages a play or an artist creates a painting is it the same thing as working towards a new tool and symbol? I mean that may also be a goal of the artist but is it the same thing? And we often treat imagination as a force to be unleashed, but does it have to do more with the way we education?

Questions running around my head.

Michael

From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> On Behalf Of Laure Kloetzer
Sent: Thursday, September 26, 2019 7:54 AM
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Question on Imagination

Hi Shannon and all,

I am also very interested if you can share all feedbacks you get on this topic, Shannon.
Recently, we began organizing science fiction workshops with students to "extricate the future" - betting that imagination, exploring alternative possible worlds, is a necessary path to free the future from its ready-made, unavoidable clothes massively sold by multinationals and goverments. On going work, with quite interesting insights, esp. on how difficult it is to link imagination and political change.
Also here in Neuchâtel, one of Tania Zittoun's doctoral student is working on close topics (imagination and political utopia).
Finally, I think that Manolis Dafermos, or some of his colleagues and friends, made a movie with young people in Greece on overcoming the crisis, but I can not find it now, sorry...
Best regards,
LK

Le jeu. 26 sept. 2019 à 13:05, Jaakko Hilppö <jaakko.hilppo@helsinki.fi<mailto:jaakko.hilppo@helsinki.fi>> a écrit :
Hi Shannon,

You might find Tania Zittoun's and Alex Gillespie’s work relevant.

https://libra.unine.ch/Publications/Tania_Zittoun_Mazourek/30289

The book was recently reviewed in MCA by Paul Harris.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10749039.2018.1433213

Hope this helps
Jake :)
****************************
Jaakko Hilppö
jaakko.hilppo@helsinki.fi<mailto:jaakko.hilppo@helsinki.fi>
Post-doctoral Researcher
ORCID: 0000-0003-0236-9517
Faculty of Education
P.O. Box 9, 00014 University of Helsinki
+358 40 533 4643

CURRENT PROJECTS:

Compassionate Projects: New Forms of Children’s Civic Engagement
http://bit.ly/CompassionateProjects

Constituting Cultures of Compassion
bit.ly/CoCuCo<http://bit.ly/CoCuCo>
FUSE
https://www.fusestudio.net
****************************

Alfredo Jornet Gil <a.j.gil@ils.uio.no<mailto:a.j.gil@ils.uio.no>> kirjoitti 26.9.2019 kello 10.15:

Really interesting topic, Shannon; just recently Beth Ferholt and I were talking about the relevance of fantasy and imagination in the current context. My sense is that there is more to explore than actually done when it comes to bridging the issue with politics, though I also suspect I may be deeply ignorant in terms of what the actual intellectual landscape is, so I’ll be very interested to follow if you share more of what you are learning about the topic and doing. Ferholt’s work herself may be interesting for you? Also from Sweeden, the work of Gunilla Lindqvist is obviously relevant. Marilyn Fleer just published on Lindqvist’s work in Mind, Culture, and Activity:https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10749039.2019.1663215

Alfredo

From: <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>> on behalf of Leif Strandberg <leifstrandberg.ab@telia.com<mailto:leifstrandberg.ab@telia.com>>
Reply to: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>>
Date: Thursday, 26 September 2019 at 08:45
To: Shannon Brincat <shannonbrincat@yahoo.com.au<mailto:shannonbrincat@yahoo.com.au>>, "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>>
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Question on Imagination

Hi

In Sweden we have translated Vygotsky’s Voobrazenie i tvorcestvo v detskom vozraste - with the Swedish title Fantasi och kreativitet I bandomen. (≈ Fantasy and Creativity in Childhood)
It is a great book.

Greetings from
Leif Strandberg

Från: <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>> on behalf of Shannon Brincat <shannonbrincat@yahoo.com.au<mailto:shannonbrincat@yahoo.com.au>>
Svara till: Shannon Brincat <shannonbrincat@yahoo.com.au<mailto:shannonbrincat@yahoo.com.au>>, "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>>
Datum: onsdag 25 september 2019 23:16
Till: Culture Activity EXtended Mind <xmca@potpourri.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca@potpourri.ucsd.edu>>
Ämne: [Xmca-l] Question on Imagination

Dear all,

I am trying to complete an article on imagination and world politics that brings in Vygotsky.

I was hoping that some of you could point me in the direction of where Vygotsky addresses imagination (both as developmental process in humans AND as life-activity with its political implications). Further, do any of you know of any studies or publications on this theme that may be useful?

Many thanks for your time.

Sincerely,

Shannon

Dr. Shannon K. Brincat
Senior Lecturer, University of the Sunshine Coast
Room T2..09 | School of Social Sciences | University of the Sunshine Coast | 91 Sippy Downs Dr | Sippy Downs | Queensland | 4556 | Australia
+61 7 5430 1193

https://www.shannonbrincat.com/

Global Discourse, Co-Editor
http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rgld20

New Book available:
From International Relations to World Civilizations: The contributions of Robert W. Cox, London: Routledge, 2017.

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.ucsd.edu/pipermail/xmca-l/attachments/20190926/13931f8a/attachment.html 