Re: [xmca] B.V. Belyayev

To whom it may concern, fyi re --

--- Mike Cole <lchcmike@gmail.com> wrote:
> I will try to get Russian copy of Belyaev.
> Doing seminar with grad students
> at Moscow State U tomorrow and will ask for
> help. --

Incidentally, I have just got the copy of the
original Belyaev's 1959 Uchpedgiz edition. Anyone
 interested, please, let me know what we should
be looking for in it and I would be happy to
compare the original with the English
translation.

> Vygotsky was for sure in Central Asia, but not
> when Luria was there. Before.

As a matter of fact, there were not so many
Koreans at that time there. The majority of the
Koreans of the Soviet Union were deported to the
Central Asia in 1937, well after either Vygotsky
(Tashkent, 1929) or Luria (Fergana, Samarkand,
1931 & 1932) went there (see, e.g.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deportation_of_Koreans_in_the_Soviet_Union
) .

> The syllogism experiments were motivated by
> prior research
> on rural russian by a woman whose name i do not
> recall. Perhaps Anton can
> recover the ref from memory.

No, unfortunately, I can not; no clue at all.
Furthermore, I am rather intrigued to learn
anything more about this research and syllogism
exeriments. There were several Russian female
researchers working with the Gestaltists in
Germany, as well as some people working in the
context of pedological research with Zalkind and
others, but is is unlikely that the woman
mentioned here is one of those...

>
> On 4/12/07, David Kellogg
> <vaughndogblack@yahoo.com> wrote:
> >
> > Frankly, Belyayev is not very good when he
> tries to describe exactly how
> > children "fold away" the mediating link of
> native language word meanings and
> > move from treating a foreign language as a
> set of "second order symbols" to
> > the stage of what he calls "thinking in a
> foreign language".
> >
> > It's not really his fault. He's trying to
> make an emulsion of two sets
> > of ideas that really don't mix, and like
> salad dressing they keep settling
> > out. On the one hand, he STRONGLY believes in
> the distinction between smysl
> > and znachenie:
> >
> > p. 87: "A word has sense in so far as it
> expresses a concept present in
> > one's consciousness at the moment when one
> uses this word. A word also has a
> > definite meaning, which is conditioned by the
> way in which the word can be
> > related to the object which it denotes."
> >
> > In fact, he takes it even FARTHER--he
> distinguishes, as very few
> > linguists were and are able to do, between
> discourse (that is, process) and
> > text (that is, product). Linguists are ALWAYS
> getting these two mixed up
> > (Henry Widdowson is the only other person
> besides Vygotsky who could ever
> > get them straight):
> >
> > p. 70: "The problem of the interrelations
> of speech and langauge are
> > also cmoplicated by the fact that the actual
> word "speech" is ususally used
> > in two different senses. In some cases, we
> use speech to describe a specific
> > human activity, the actual process of
> communication as realized by
> > linguistic means. In other cases we use
> "speech" to describe what is the
> > result of this process--that which is created
> by man when communicating with
> > otehrs and which to some extent becomes
> remote, as it were, from the actual
> > person."
> >
> > This is really the key to Carol's remark
> about scientific concepts and
> > foreign language concepts. Carol takes us
> RIGHT back to Chapters Five and
> > Six of "Thinking and Speech".
> >
> > Children's experience of their native
> language is simple. A given
> > situation automatically gives rise to
> discourse. When they actually go to
> > school they accept, rather reluctantly, that
> this discourse may be written
> > down and realized in texts.
> >
> > But in science class (and in foreign
> language class) we are asking them
> > to do something that seems pragmatically
> pointless. We are asking them to
> > take a text, pretend that it is a discourse,
> and then create, on the basis
> > of this made-up discourse, a purely imaginary
> situation.
> >
> > For example, in the world of the science
> classroom, we may pretend that
> > we are doing "experiments" and discovering
> scientific laws. But if the
> > experment goes wrong, they will have to do it
> again, because what they are
> > really doing is not discovering scientific
> laws at all but taking texts and
> > re-enacting them to re-create the underlying
> discourse, and demonstrate the
> > abstract laws that were given to them a
> priori in the text.
> >
> > Similarly, in the world of the foreign
> language classroom, they find the
> > world they are used to completely turned
> upside down. In the real world,
> > discourse roles (mom, dad, even teacher) are
> fairly clear cut and grammar
> > rules are very abstract and word meanings
> tend to be negotiable. But in this
> > weird corner of their world, things go the
> other way around: we've got
> > explict rules about what words mean and how
> they go together, but who is
> > Jinho and who is the teacher and who is Mrs.
> Smith all seem to be
> > negotiable.
> >
> > I think if Belyayev were true to his
> vision, which is Vygotsky's and
> > Volosinov's, he wouldn't have any problems.
> Kids make the transition to
> > "thinking in a foreign language" as soon as
> they can figure out the
> > pragmatic point of all this. They are
> "thinking in a foreign language" when
> > they realize a discourse from a situation in
> that language, or as soon as
> > they can realize a discourse and a situation
> from a text in that language.
> >
> > They apprise the context without
> translating, whether that involves
> > confronting an actual real life situation or
> re-enacting a discourse from a
> > text. They are thinking in a foreign language
> when the situation represented
> > by that language arises in their minds
> without recourse to the mediational
> > link of the mother tongue.
> >
> > This is at first true of material
> situations. But in the classroom it
> > often has to be true of imaginary situations,
> in which we can include all
> > theoretical knowledge. It's a long row to
> hoe! Fortunately, the child's not
> > alone.
> >
> > Do these words sound familiar to anybody?
> >
> > p. 103: "The word 'soznaniye' consists of
> the root-word 'znaniye' and
> > the prefix 'so', which indicates the joint
> nature of that which is denoted
> > by the root-word. Thus 'sochuvstviye' is
> understood as common feeling,
> > soavtorstvo as common authorship, etc.
> Similarly, from a psychological point
> > of view, human consciousness represents the
> combination of common knowledge
> > possessed by people in virute of the fact
> that they carry out labour in
> > common, and when doing so communicateby means
> of language. This is why
> > consciousness is closely linked with langauge
> and why 'to be conscious of'
> > and 'to call' are almost the same thing."
>
=== message truncated ===

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Received on Mon Apr 23 21:16 PDT 2007