The "answerability dimension of dialogue" which Debora Hicks discusses in
the early Bakhtin, has its counterpart in his later insistence on
"ideological dimension" in the very core of every meaning construction.
"Dialogue, as depicted by Bakhtin,
entails a form of answerability that is morally responsive to unique
others and particular relationships. Considered outside of such moral
ends, social actions and discourses lose a crucial part of their
concreteness -- their embeddedness in relationships constituted by
thoughts, feelings, and histories between unique individuals"
This "ideological" dimension for Bakhtin is both the narrowly interpreted
"ideological position", but also a much wider aspect of meaning - namely
that aspect, by which it is impossible to create a "sign" without creating
a particular relationship with a part of the "reality" in which this part
of the reality is reflected from a particular angle.
Meanings are never impartial and neutral: they reflect every possible
aspect of the THREE way relationship between: the "reality", the one who
uses a sign to signify it and the one to whom this sign is sent.
Bakhtin claimed that:
"The logic of consciousness is the logic of ideological communications, of
the semiotic interaction of the social group" .
The similarity of Bakhtin's and Vygotsky's thinking is obvious. Individual
consciousness arises as a social-ideological fact. The main mediator in the
development of the individual cognition is communication materialized in
meaningful signs. It is hard to believe that they did not know each other
or at least of each other...
Vygotsky never stopped pointing out the importance of personal
relationships and their affective meanings for the development. An ability
to construct a shared topic - a precursor of any meaningful communication -
depends on a closeness of the participants in a dialogue.
One should also not forget the influence of Stanislavsky on Vygotsky.
Personal experiences of communication (i.e. signs used in communication)
are multidimensional and rich with intonations, body language, winks and
frowns, amplitude and the rhythm of the voice ...
Just like Bakhtin's "early philosophical
essays argue that discourse and action outside of morally imbued
relationships might be true of angels and spirits, but not of persons
engaged in historical moments of living." (Hicks), so later Bakhtin talks
of "ideology" as a form of "cultural morality" that permeates any system
of signs.
Ana
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