Further pursuing contrasts between whole schools of thought may just lead
me further into the mire. So can I return to the reasons for my enquiry.
My specific target is Axel Honneth's use of G H Mead's conception of the
formation of identity as set out in Mead's "The Social Self":
http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/us/mead3.htm
In this article, Mead contrasts "I" - the subject of action, to the "me",
which the subject gets to know by the sum of responses to the I's actions
by those around her. And this "me" is known sensuously in much the same way
as any other person. Mead, I think, develops this theme in a somewhat
pragmatic-behaviourist or even individualist way (speaking very loosely),
with little recourse to ideas of social mediation.
Honneth's book is "The Struggle for Recognition". I think Honneth is a very
important figure, but I think he is open to critique by his use of Mead.
His objective is to find social-psychological backing for a critique of the
Kojevean notion of Recognition, as an alternative to Habermas's use of
Piaget. My reading of Kojeve and Hegel is that Kojeve reduces Hegel to
intersubjectivity, whereas the young Hegel developed his original notion of
Recognition by means of further developing his conception of mediation.
Honneth thinks that Hegel lost his way when he abandoned the
intersubjective notion of recognition in favour of ideas of mediation in
the forms of abstract right, culture and history. Honneth thinks that the
earlier writings give an appropriately strong role to the individual in
making culture. Doubtless Hegel did lose something when he took this turn,
but he also gained very much.
The reason for my initial question is that I wanted to know how Vygotsky
would deal with this notion of recognition and identity and how this would
differ from Mead's I and Me. After all, Vygotsky does provide a lot more
"empirical backing" than I think Mead could. I think that mediation is more
than instrumental. "Using" something (such as a word) still takes for
granted the subject who uses. Mead does conjecture about how learning about
the "me" enables a person to learn how to control their internal functions,
in a way which is very reminiscent of Vygotsky.
Andy
At 07:48 AM 19/10/2003 +0200, you wrote:
>Horkheimer, "Materialism and Metaphysics" and "The Latest Attack on
>Metaphysics" (chapters 3 and 6 respectively of the 1972 translation of
>Kritisch Theorie '68 titled Critical Theory: Selected Essays) is relevant
>here.
>Victor
>----- Original Message -----
>From: <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>Andy Blunden
>To: <mailto:xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
>Sent: Sunday, October 19, 2003 2:14 AM
>Subject: Re: Mead and Vygotsky from a teacher
>
>Again Steve, I seem to be guilty of exaggeration. It is a few years since
>I read Novack on pragmatism, and I got this impression that he thought
>that pragmatism was the antechamber to Marxism. I have just one chapter of
>the book scanned here, but it is the relevant chapter, and I now see that
>your excerpts fairly well characterise his view. He sums up on Dewey:
>"The modifications introduced by pragmatism did not succeed in eradicating
>the inherent and insuperable defects of empiricism but rather reaffirmed
>them in its own way. The dualism between materialism and idealism
>discernible in Locke flowered into eclecticism with Dewey. As an
>illustration, take his treatment of, the relations between the social
>system and the philosopher himself.
>"Dewey did not hesitate to apply the principle of historical materialism
>that a thinker's views are fundamentally shaped by his social situation
>and class outlook to explain the special features and errors of
>Aristotle's metaphysics and politics. Yet he claimed that his own
>philosophy was totally exempt from class conditioning and that he spoke
>for the general interests of all men. The coexistence of two such
>incompatible types of interpretation did not disconcert him; he used
>either one as he pleased.
>"Dewey was the most radical consummator of the pragmatic tendency. He did
>for pragmatism what pragmatism helped to do for the empirical tradition.
>His instrumentalism pressed its ideas to the farthest limits and thereby
>disclosed their basic insufficiency. Empiricism cannot go beyond Deweyism
>without annulling its basic premises and either passing over into
>materialism to its left or towards logical positivism or linguistic
>analysis to its right." [George Novack, Empiricism and Its Evolution - A
>Marxist View: Chapter IX]
>But on the other hand, Novack's own understanding of Marxism is hardly
>definitive!
>
>Andy
>At 11:46 AM 18/10/2003 -0700, you wrote:
>>Hi Andy,
>>
>>Andy says:
>>"Certainly, my reading of Novack on pragmatism could be summarised as
>>"pragmatism is only an inch short of Marxism." While I think Pragmatism a
>>la Peirce or Dewey or Bridgman was certainly a great achievement, I have
>>always regarded both Marx and Vygotsky as qualitatively different from
>>Pragmatism."
>>
>>I completely agree with you, Andy, that Marxism and Pragmatism are
>>qualitatively different. Is the metaphor of one being "an inch short" of
>>the other from Novack? Novack seemed to assess Dewey himself as on
>>occasion coming within an inch of materialism - Novack was careful to
>>attribute to Dewey his many scientific insights - but I am not so sure
>>Novack said Pragmatism as a philosophy was that close to dialectical
>>materialism. Perhaps my reading is off?
>>
>>
>>Speaking of George Novack, in Pragmatism Vs Marxism: An Appraisal of John
>>Dewey's philosophy, he quotes an amusing story and commentary on Mead
>>told by T.V. Smith in his 1962 book A Non-Existent Man: An
>>Autobiography. In the chapter The Instrumentalist Theory of Knowledge,
>>Novack critiques Dewey's approach to epistemology, the "all-important"
>>question of "what is the basis of knowledge," as one that "wobbled all
>>over the lot, unable to stay permanently in a single place." He says
>>about Mead:
>>
>>"Mead, Dewey's cothinker at Chicago, was no less equivocal on this prime
>>question. T.V. Smith writes: "Long after I had become a colleague
>>of Mead, I asked him one day at lunch, for instance, whether he thought
>>that there was anything existing before life came upon the scene. This
>>seemed to me to be a question to be answered plainly Yes or No, depending
>>upon one's drift toward Realism of Idealism. Mead answered the question
>>at great length. Or at least he seemed to think he did. I repeated the
>>question for a Yes-or-No answer. He answered it at greater length. I
>>then asked him plaintively to answer it so that I could understand his
>>answer. He seemed as puzzled at my perturbation as I at his
>>'equivocation.' I never did understand; and naturally enough, I came to
>>doubt whether he did.
>>
>>[Novack is still quoting from Smith] "I took it that he was confused,
>>having left Idealism (Hegelianism) and not having arrived firmly at
>>anything else. This type of confusion, between the knower, or the
>>knowing, and the known, seemed so to dog the steps of the Pragmatists
>>that I decided they were all what I came to call 'basement-Idealists'
>>rather than, with Hegel, the 'attic' kind. They all seemed to me doubt -
>>what I could not doubt - that anything existed apart from some
>>experience, and yet they seemed unwilling to face the consequences of
>>such a position. They wanted to be Idealists without giving up the
>>fruits of Realism. It made them unhappy to be thus accused, but so they
>>seemed to me" (A Non-Existent Man, p48)."
>>
>>Best,
>>- Steve
>>
>>
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