[Xmca-l] Re: Covid as World Perezhivanie?

[Glassman, Michael]

Hi Greg,

So I have been exploring this for a couple of months, including read the MCA special issue. I wrote a post asking a question some weeks back as there seemed to be parallels between Vygotksy’s piece On the problem of the Actor’s Creative Work, which if the dates I have are right (and I am not sure they are) was the first time (after his dissertation) when Vygotsky used the term perezhinavie. I have been reading Jean Benedetti’s translation Stanislavski’s An Actor’s Work on and off for the last month. It is a pretty amazing piece of work. The parallels between Stanislavski’s early chapters and Vygotsky’s use of the concept, not just in the Actor’s creative work but in his other uses of the term in problem of age and problem of the environment, to me at least seem striking. I would go further than that and suggest there are also parallels with Chapter 7 of thinking and speech where Vygotsky’s does not use the specific word, but of course late in the chapter refers directly to Stanislavski and An Actor’s Work (although he does not name it – because I believe, based on translation, the early chapters were just called experience, I am guessing perezhinavie – at that point. So Stanislavski began writing an Actor’s Work in 1926, he had completed drafts of the early chapters in 1929. There is no way I think that Vygotsky could have made the references he does without having seen these drafts. In particular, he takes the idea of motivation for action, words, from Stanislavski’s chapter Bits and tasks where he makes almost exactly this same argument (some people may think Vygotsky misinterpreted Stanislavski, but I don’t think so). I think it is hard to make the argument that Vygotsky had not seen the drafts of these early chapters. Maybe less certain, but I would make the argument, that he was affected by them. Stanislavski’s ideas on perezhinavie dominated these early chapters, and as I said I see a number of parallels.

All that said, I think there are many facets to Stanislavski’s perezhinavie, but I think central is the idea that action is humans primary expression to the audience (world) and that action to be worthwhile must be based in a (relative) truth (this may be because I recently read the chapter belief and the sense of truth which I found to be pretty profound). This action of a combination of the life the actor has lived with the scene that is playing out in the socio-historical time frame. In a theatrical sense, the author’s words combined with the historical moment (I felt like I really understood thins when we took one class to watch the Hamlet Olivier did just after World War II with the Hamlet Zeferelli did just after Reagan). The same words, but the historical moment made the plays completely different. Because you never act alone, the member’s of an ensemble are interdependent in the development of their action. In other words, from my reading, perezhinavie is both an individual and a communal experience, it is based on our individual histories and the historical moment and those that are around us. It is based on the steps we take in the journey of our actions and the motivations we have for moving forward with those actions.

There is one point in the chapter on truth where Stanislavski in the character of the acting teacher Tortosov is asked about the psychology behind actions. Tortosov replies that of course there is psychology behind actions, but we cannot see them, so we can only know psychology through actions. Sort of a watch what they do not what they say moment. Anyway, with all that, I see perezhinavie as building emotional actions when individuals are working together – in a way that moves beyond thought. Tortosov argues that it is when you are no longer thinking about your actions, you are simply doing them along with others.

I don’t want give the impression that perezhinavie is a good. It is simply the truth.

How does this translate into the idea of World perezhinavie, which was you original question Greg. I am not sure. I know Andy in his article did not refer much to Stanislavski’s chapters and was considering a more global definition. But this is my thinking on what I have been able to figure out about the concept as I hypothesize Vygotsky was using it.

Michael

From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> On Behalf Of Greg Thompson
Sent: Friday, April 24, 2020 2:02 PM
To: xmca-l@ucsd.edu
Subject: [Xmca-l] Covid as World Perezhivanie?

I'm wondering about Andy's suggestion that covid-19 is a (or maybe "is creating a"?) world perezhivanie. That seems a really rich suggestion but I'm not sure how many of us on the list really understand what he means by this.

Andy tends to just tell me to go read more and so I'm wondering if someone else might be willing to take a stab at explaining what he might mean.

Also, as a critical intervention, I am wondering whether covid-19 is the "same" for everyone. We have folks in the U.S. who think it is basically just a typical flu that has been turned into a political tool to attack the current president. Or does that not matter for perezhivanie?

(and just to be clear, my question is not whether or not this is true or right or beautiful to think this way; my question is whether or not this is how people are actually experiencing the world since I assume that this is what perezhivanie is supposed to be "getting at". Or am I misunderstanding perezhivanie?)

So is there really a shared perezhivanie here?
(Is The Problem of Age the place to look for answers?)

But if no one wants to take this up (perhaps too much ink has been spilt over perezhivanie?), that's fine too.

Cheers,
greg


--
Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Department of Anthropology
880 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
Brigham Young University
Provo, UT 84602
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