[Xmca-l] Re: "sociocultural psychology" ?

Fri May 15 08:48:41 PDT 2020

Mike,
Just wondering if you ever heard of Pitirim Alexandrovich Sorokin's
(Sociology, Harvard) use of "sociocultural" pre-WWII?
Any recollections?
-greg
(and in case anyone is interested in this Russian-born interdisciplinary
sociologist who became the first head of the Sociology Department at
Harvard (and used the term "sociocultural" in 1937):
https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://www.suz.uzh.ch/dam/jcr:00000000-36d7-41d4-0000-000064b51e55/simpson_sorokin.pdf__;!!Mih3wA!U61xaS5eaEzj6VgLnz4h-ztQI9N-VIYPZ07rO-sJS8EAcChzCPy4ZTOn5wFGL0Q_oG9nrg$ 
)

On Thu, May 14, 2020 at 10:20 PM Andy Blunden <andyb@marxists.org> wrote:

> Mike tells me that my account is indeed "pretty muddled," so please do not
> quote anything from that email, and do not ascribe any of it to Mike. The
> chapter Mike sent around, and Jim Wertsch's book, are the places to go for
> reliable information.
>
> Sorry.
>
> Andy
> ------------------------------
> *Andy Blunden*
> Hegel for Social Movements
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://brill.com/view/title/54574__;!!Mih3wA!X76L88p--8UMlV02Wb3KV9TVvGaD7LEj24rX0Qq1zB0uuQEaLXYnED9Mv1bScCcfdgL_Vg$>
> Home Page
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> On 15/05/2020 11:24 am, Andy Blunden wrote:
>
> In response to requests, I will elaborate. Apologies to Mike if I have
> garbled the long and complex story he told. I have done my best.
>
> Jim Wertsch said:
>
> Various people undoubtedly have various accounts of this, but I
> consciously started to use this in order to bring in cultural anthropology
> and also to avoid the unexamined social evolutionism in some approaches
> that I was building from.  I believe I started highlighting it in my 1985
> book on Vygotsky, and by 1991 it was part of the subtitle of my book Voices
> of the Mind.  It is not a term used by Soviet scholars when talking about
> the Vygotsky tradition.  Instead, the terms there were “socio-historical”
> or “cultural-historical.”
>
> Mike Cole told me:
>
> In addition to what has been said on line ... initially, the term
> "sociocultural" was used as a term of abuse by the opponents of Vygotsky's
> ideas in the Soviet bureaucracy, so it was not a term which his Russian
> followers ever embraced. The Soviet hostility to Vygotsky came to a head,
> apparently, in 1986 when ISCRAT had a conference in Berlin and the Soviets
> prevented Russian delegates form attending. Jim Wertsch, who had been on a
> sabbatical year, and had been in the Soviet Union, and was angry about what
> he saw, was at the congress too and went from there to a conference in
> Spain where a group of Spanish Vygotskyists were arguing that Vygotskyists
> had ignored the needs, etc., of the "global South" and they used the term
> "sociocultural" for their approach, meaning something like
> Vygotsky+postcolonialism. Wertsch embraced this idea and henceforth adopted
> to term, meaning to distinguish himself from the Soviet-influence. CHAT
> emerged as a term a little later in an effort to unite the followers of the
> various brands of "Activity Theory" with those who did not embrace the
> Activity Theory of Vygotsky's Russian followers and stuck with Vygotsky.
> CHAT includes the H for History, because in all the various terms being
> used at that time, there was no attention to the important place of History
> in theory, and it was Mike who insisted on its inclusion.
>
> Andy
> ------------------------------
> *Andy Blunden*
> Hegel for Social Movements
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://brill.com/view/title/54574__;!!Mih3wA!RTGbCZZ1yCkr4jCqSe4SB3e7KrPD-Ptq8Hhz2_7jDT2OtWnRBco2e9D6yKW2qUv1JKsaYg$>
> Home Page
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm__;!!Mih3wA!RTGbCZZ1yCkr4jCqSe4SB3e7KrPD-Ptq8Hhz2_7jDT2OtWnRBco2e9D6yKW2qUuwMTbXLQ$>
> On 14/05/2020 11:55 am, Andy Blunden wrote:
>
> I should have reported progress with my question.
>
> Jim Wertsch responded to me on email and Mike Cole Skyped me and between
> these two I have a very rich history of the usage of this term and the
> various nuances it acquired and shed, and Mike has put the article Martin
> referred to on his academia.edu page for us all to read.
>
> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.academia.edu/43037735/Sociocul_tural_studies_of_rnind_Edited_by__;!!Mih3wA!U61xaS5eaEzj6VgLnz4h-ztQI9N-VIYPZ07rO-sJS8EAcChzCPy4ZTOn5wFGL0SfusWTOQ$ 
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.academia.edu/43037735/Sociocul_tural_studies_of_rnind_Edited_by__;!!Mih3wA!R2PQRv7SmtSpShBHHVPDEjIG1-ol_VEYh22ETbbkrOTaZbmV95HyZtHr1MBppGr6Y2oI9g$>
>
> As ever, XMCA has proved to be a bottomless mine of wisdom. Thank you.
>
> Andy
> ------------------------------
> *Andy Blunden*
> Hegel for Social Movements
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://brill.com/view/title/54574__;!!Mih3wA!R2PQRv7SmtSpShBHHVPDEjIG1-ol_VEYh22ETbbkrOTaZbmV95HyZtHr1MBppGqUcVpkyg$>
> Home Page
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> On 14/05/2020 1:38 am, Charles Bazerman wrote:
>
> Thank you Anthony for the interesting question and link. The way I see
> this issue is that Vygotskian work attempts to understand human activity
> multi-dimensionally (or even better holistically, trying to reunite what
> the emergence of various parochial disciplines have pulled apart for
> analysis of the separate dimensions).  The different terms that Veresov
> points out as contending are simply foregrounding those sets of components
> that are most salient to the particular analyst at that moment.  To those
> we might add other elements that Vygotsky was interested in such as
> consciousness and language and experience and mediation (and even economics
> and human knowledge and education lurk in the background, as well as human
> neurodiversity as well as materialities of the experienced world).  That is
> the wonder of Vygotsky, even though he may have developed some of the
> components more than others and he was acting nominally as a
> psychologist--yet his approach allows the integration of all these
> components.
>
> I therefore use different conjunctions of terms depending on what I am
> talking about, and I see activity as the overarching term--though this does
> not necessarily mean triangles all the time.  Rather activity is humans in
> motion, mobilizing multiple internal and external resources in situations.
>
> While I would like some stability in terms, right now our different
> concerns and issues leave salience mutable. And I am not yet comfortable in
> being terminally enlisted into another scholar's transient saliencies.
>
> BTW, I see another related, parallel attempt at reintegrating the social
> sciences in the pragmatist project which has at times been in communication
> with the activity theory project (see my paper "Practically Human").  This
> project also never settled on a coherent set of terms and stable concepts.
>
> Chuck
> ----
> די פאַרייניקטע שטאַטן איז אַ פאָלק פון ימאַגראַנץ
> الولايات المتحدة هي أمة من المهاجرين
> Los Estados Unidos es una nación de inmigrantes.
> The U.S. is a nation of immigrants.
> History will judge.
> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://bazerman.education.ucsb.edu/__;!!Mih3wA!U61xaS5eaEzj6VgLnz4h-ztQI9N-VIYPZ07rO-sJS8EAcChzCPy4ZTOn5wFGL0TDK9Pzlw$ 
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://bazerman.education.ucsb.edu/__;!!Mih3wA!UhKa4f0rCaFbK573eepABBebep9QDP87JqQVUnd9uIfxETz6hRUnOR46PYaTgoSDGY6tLw$>
> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Charles_Bazerman__;!!Mih3wA!U61xaS5eaEzj6VgLnz4h-ztQI9N-VIYPZ07rO-sJS8EAcChzCPy4ZTOn5wFGL0S9AR-iNA$ 
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Charles_Bazerman__;!!Mih3wA!UhKa4f0rCaFbK573eepABBebep9QDP87JqQVUnd9uIfxETz6hRUnOR46PYaTgoSePA_SrQ$>
> https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://www.isawr.org__;!!Mih3wA!U61xaS5eaEzj6VgLnz4h-ztQI9N-VIYPZ07rO-sJS8EAcChzCPy4ZTOn5wFGL0R8liM8SQ$ 
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://www.isawr.org__;!!Mih3wA!UhKa4f0rCaFbK573eepABBebep9QDP87JqQVUnd9uIfxETz6hRUnOR46PYaTgoRwwTwk4Q$>
>
>
> On Wed, May 13, 2020 at 8:08 AM Anthony Barra <anthonymbarra@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Interesting question (and follow-ups) here.  Thanks, Andy.
>>
>> While not 100% related, I wonder if this brief, 2-minute excerpt adds any
>> value: https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sT4uktowa-M__;!!Mih3wA!U61xaS5eaEzj6VgLnz4h-ztQI9N-VIYPZ07rO-sJS8EAcChzCPy4ZTOn5wFGL0RgNRRmjw$ 
>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sT4uktowa-M__;!!Mih3wA!WLyceskZQL4AGQL-pVuwd-RH-yfvzQvsIVerMU367Nw8BZjwVLHdZ94SZfyfIX_sfjyW7w$> "Pros
>> and Cons of (terminological) Diversity"
>>
>> As a non-expert, I can empathize with Nikolai's main point, but I'm not
>> so sure the cons outweigh the pros here.
>>
>> But what WOULD happen if a terminological consensus was formed -- could
>> Vygotsky's theory (and methodology), in fact, be definitively defined?  If
>> so, would the benefits of doing so outweigh the constraints?
>> I'm guessing this is an old conversation, and maybe even stale, but I'm
>> more outsider than insider and don't really know.
>>
>> Thank you for any insight.
>>
>> Anthony
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, May 13, 2020 at 10:19 AM Martin Packer <mpacker@cantab.net>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> I had assumed you were looking for uses earlier than Jim Wertsch’s,
>>> Andy.
>>>
>>> Jim used the term in titles in 1989 too. And in the introduction to this
>>> book he, along with Pablo del Rio and Amelia Alvarez, explain why in their
>>> view it’s the best term:
>>>
>>> Wertsch, J. V., del Río, P., & Alvarez, A. (Eds.). (1995). *Sociocultural
>>> studies of mind.* Cambridge University Press.
>>>
>>>
>>> Martin
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On May 12, 2020, at 11:13 PM, Andy Blunden <andyb@marxists.org> wrote:
>>>
>>> Thanks to everyone for their help. It all went into the mix. Indeed, the
>>> term seems to have migrated from Spanish to English and the word
>>> "sociocultural" became popular in 1990, and it seems that Jim Wertsch is
>>> the fellow who triggered the explosion in "sociocultural psychology" with "Voices
>>> of the mind : a sociocultural approach to mediated action
>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.worldcat.org/title/voices-of-the-mind-a-sociocultural-approach-to-mediated-action/oclc/797855062&referer=brief_results__;!!Mih3wA!WsWX2sD5ZfUnBEp3uLEVG7T0NliMnbPpuJl6VOoxtiFfKP5msJWjbZPFaCQ6jDWDMZtFSg$>"
>>> published by Harvard University Press in 1991.
>>>
>>> Although "sociocultural" seems to be most widely associated with
>>> "context dependence," Wertsch's reference to "mediated action" in the title
>>> of this book makes it clear that for him "context" referred to the signs
>>> and artefacts mediating action.
>>>
>>> Thanks again to all
>>>
>>> Andy
>>> ------------------------------
>>> *Andy Blunden*
>>> Hegel for Social Movements
>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://brill.com/view/title/54574__;!!Mih3wA!WsWX2sD5ZfUnBEp3uLEVG7T0NliMnbPpuJl6VOoxtiFfKP5msJWjbZPFaCQ6jDWcr53a1g$>
>>> Home Page
>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm__;!!Mih3wA!WsWX2sD5ZfUnBEp3uLEVG7T0NliMnbPpuJl6VOoxtiFfKP5msJWjbZPFaCQ6jDW3ivveVA$>
>>> On 13/05/2020 12:26 pm, David Kellogg wrote:
>>>
>>> Andy--
>>>
>>> Go to to the Google N-gram site itself.
>>> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://books.google.com/ngrams__;!!Mih3wA!U61xaS5eaEzj6VgLnz4h-ztQI9N-VIYPZ07rO-sJS8EAcChzCPy4ZTOn5wFGL0QLtr34Tw$ 
>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://books.google.com/ngrams__;!!Mih3wA!Wt7qmS7sdvLo3anWG71NQFUJMvyFBqEy-mStjfAI_HEUpY8D8dQt5zHkl12Ld90MDkv2Mw$>
>>> Then do your own n-gram for "sociocultural psychology". If you set the
>>> years you'll get better granularity in the document search.
>>> On the bottom of the n-gram, there are some dates in blue--when you
>>> click on them, you should get a list of all the books used in the search.
>>>
>>> dk
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> David Kellogg
>>> Sangmyung University
>>>
>>> New Article: Ruqaiya Hasan, in memoriam: A manual and a manifesto.
>>> Outlines, Spring 2020
>>> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://tidsskrift.dk/outlines/article/view/116238/167607__;!!Mih3wA!U61xaS5eaEzj6VgLnz4h-ztQI9N-VIYPZ07rO-sJS8EAcChzCPy4ZTOn5wFGL0SZA_pZSw$ 
>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://tidsskrift.dk/outlines/article/view/116238/167607__;!!Mih3wA!Wt7qmS7sdvLo3anWG71NQFUJMvyFBqEy-mStjfAI_HEUpY8D8dQt5zHkl12Ld92Vl0flPg$>
>>>
>>> New Translation with Nikolai Veresov: *L.S. Vygotsky's Pedological
>>> Works* *Volume One: Foundations of Pedology*"
>>>  https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9789811505270__;!!Mih3wA!U61xaS5eaEzj6VgLnz4h-ztQI9N-VIYPZ07rO-sJS8EAcChzCPy4ZTOn5wFGL0R5MA8yvw$ 
>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9789811505270__;!!Mih3wA!Wt7qmS7sdvLo3anWG71NQFUJMvyFBqEy-mStjfAI_HEUpY8D8dQt5zHkl12Ld92EeQenpA$>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, May 13, 2020 at 11:17 AM Martin Packer <mpacker@cantab.net>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> The earliest use of the term ‘sociocultural’ I’ve been able to find in
>>>> English is this:
>>>>
>>>> A sociocultural psychology, by Rogelio Diaz-Guerrero
>>>>
>>>> In "Chicano psychology", 1977 - Academic Press
>>>>
>>>> Diaz-Guerrero was Mexican psychologists whose publications in Spanish
>>>> use the term ‘sociocultural’ frequently.
>>>>
>>>> The 2nd edition of Chicano Psychology is available in Google books,
>>>> and Diaz-Guerrero has a chapter in it, but titled The psychological study
>>>> of the Mexican.
>>>>
>>>> Martin
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On May 12, 2020, at 8:47 PM, Andy Blunden <andyb@marxists.org> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> That graph from Google shows that usage of the term took off in 1988.
>>>> How do we find out who wrote what in 1988?
>>>>
>>>> And Google also tell us that "Sociocultural theory grew from the work
>>>> of seminal psychologist Lev Vygotsky, who believed that parents,
>>>> caregivers, peers, and the culture at large were responsible for developing
>>>> higher-order functions. According to Vygotsky, learning has its basis in
>>>> interacting with other people," together with a reference. So that is nice.
>>>>
>>>> Andy
>>>> ------------------------------
>>>> *Andy Blunden*
>>>> Hegel for Social Movements
>>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://brill.com/view/title/54574__;!!Mih3wA!XAtiPQXEOK3tz8RHCURqNz0psvv8Js3PxWmYUmHtZyY5j_IK-RqcFDVph7-NJ5i1rCBdtQ$>
>>>> Home Page
>>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm__;!!Mih3wA!XAtiPQXEOK3tz8RHCURqNz0psvv8Js3PxWmYUmHtZyY5j_IK-RqcFDVph7-NJ5gDytDZfw$>
>>>> On 13/05/2020 11:30 am, David Kellogg wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Andy:
>>>>
>>>> I did a Google N-gram on it. You probably thought of doing this too,
>>>> but here's what I got.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://books.google.com/ngrams/interactive_chart?content=sociocultural*psychology&year_start=1800&year_end=2008&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1*3B*2Csociocultural*20psychology*3B*2Cc0__;KyUlJSUl!!Mih3wA!U61xaS5eaEzj6VgLnz4h-ztQI9N-VIYPZ07rO-sJS8EAcChzCPy4ZTOn5wFGL0S9O2l8pA$ 
>>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://books.google.com/ngrams/interactive_chart?content=sociocultural*psychology&year_start=1800&year_end=2008&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1*3B*2Csociocultural*20psychology*3B*2Cc0__;KyUlJSUl!!Mih3wA!T9TXqTQDd-8tvv5PfuxbPkx6Drdw0VlIrRNfcypZApQv2jnziHRkeAppccOVAZEmjetMCg$>"
>>>> width=900 height=500 marginwidth=0 marginheight=0 hspace=0 vspace=0
>>>> frameborder=0 scrolling=no
>>>>
>>>> So it all starts around 1960. At first I thought this probably referred
>>>> to the Hanfmann and Vakar "Thought and Language", but when I looked the
>>>> only books that used the term were sports psychology books. The big uptick
>>>> after 1992 is Vygotsky though.
>>>>
>>>> Of course, this is all English only. I am sure you will find very
>>>> different results in German, where "cultural historical psychology" is the
>>>> trend identified with Dilthey, Spranger, and neo-Kantianism generally.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> David Kellogg
>>>> Sangmyung University
>>>>
>>>> New Article: Ruqaiya Hasan, in memoriam: A manual and a manifesto.
>>>> Outlines, Spring 2020
>>>> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://tidsskrift.dk/outlines/article/view/116238/167607__;!!Mih3wA!U61xaS5eaEzj6VgLnz4h-ztQI9N-VIYPZ07rO-sJS8EAcChzCPy4ZTOn5wFGL0SZA_pZSw$ 
>>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://tidsskrift.dk/outlines/article/view/116238/167607__;!!Mih3wA!T9TXqTQDd-8tvv5PfuxbPkx6Drdw0VlIrRNfcypZApQv2jnziHRkeAppccOVAZFjmWjmLg$>
>>>>
>>>> New Translation with Nikolai Veresov: *L.S. Vygotsky's Pedological
>>>> Works* *Volume One: Foundations of Pedology*"
>>>>  https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9789811505270__;!!Mih3wA!U61xaS5eaEzj6VgLnz4h-ztQI9N-VIYPZ07rO-sJS8EAcChzCPy4ZTOn5wFGL0R5MA8yvw$ 
>>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9789811505270__;!!Mih3wA!T9TXqTQDd-8tvv5PfuxbPkx6Drdw0VlIrRNfcypZApQv2jnziHRkeAppccOVAZGMmypSYw$>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Tue, May 12, 2020 at 10:43 PM Andy Blunden <andyb@marxists.org>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Can anyone tell me when and with whom the term "sociocultural
>>>>> psychology" originated?
>>>>>
>>>>> Andy
>>>>> --
>>>>> ------------------------------
>>>>> *Andy Blunden*
>>>>> Hegel for Social Movements
>>>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://brill.com/view/title/54574__;!!Mih3wA!WBIr3_zzidcxaloVcp2qUX4U6WR3f7enQ2z2gvamcdo3Ihy82L4ZkR-PgfCDASisbYxsxw$>
>>>>> Home Page
>>>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm__;!!Mih3wA!WBIr3_zzidcxaloVcp2qUX4U6WR3f7enQ2z2gvamcdo3Ihy82L4ZkR-PgfCDASiXKr5OJw$>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>

-- 
Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Department of Anthropology
880 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
Brigham Young University
Provo, UT 84602
WEBSITE: https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://anthropology.byu.edu/greg-thompson__;!!Mih3wA!U61xaS5eaEzj6VgLnz4h-ztQI9N-VIYPZ07rO-sJS8EAcChzCPy4ZTOn5wFGL0TXoqYp6Q$ 
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