Re: [xmca] Streamed Discussion of Development in CHAT Theory

It was not coincidently that I used the term, atmosphere, Paul. But I am
glad that it evoked such resonance with you. If one does not awaken, no
issue of measuring the
air..... But having awakened, by what do we perceive and measure the air we
breath, except when it is carrying things to which, as we say, we are
alergic?

The Quechua have it about as well figured out as anyone, and even they must
experience something akin to foggy days.
mike

On Nov 21, 2007 6:55 PM, Paul Dillon <phd_crit_think@yahoo.com> wrote:

> mike,
>
> It is quite coincidental that you used the term "atmosphere" to signify
> the dimension in which we signifying monkeys dwell. Just before reading your
> message I read a passage in a new and quite good book about linguistic
> ideologies, Rosaleen Howard. in which she provides the transcript of a
> conversation she had with a primary quechua bilingual (Spanish the other
> language). She asked the man whether he thought Quechua would survive. He
> responded in the afirmative and further added "Es nuestra clima, y como va a
> ser, pues" which is more or less like saying "it's the air in which we
> breathe, how could it be otherwise" . . . Another interviewee stated, "we
> awaken in Quechua".
>
> How does one measure the air of awakening?
>
> Paul
>
> *Mike Cole <lchcmike@gmail.com>* wrote:
>
> Your fuller description of what you consider related to etymology helped
> clarify what you were trying to say, David. Thanks.
> I am always rethinking the idea of development and its relations to terms
> like learning and emotion and context and.....
> So I am using the LSV chapter to think about the process in the abstract
> and
> in the concrete as well. Twice a week I
> spend time with kids in different multigenerational settings where all
> these
> things are constituitive of the "atmosphere"
> (aka culture). (Interesting, now we can thing of atmosphere more
> dynamically
> since we all reject static, essentialist,
> ideas of culture)!
>
> I believe that if we could be detailed enough we could benefit from some
> computer modelling of systems with the same constituents
> but a different "dynamics of development." I am always suscpicious of
> binaries even when they are obviously useful. -- central|peripheral
> for example, so I want to dig into the heterogeneity (related, I think, to
> the idea of an activity system/ an event/ a....performance//////).
>
> Sets of examples from seemingly different domains for which it was
> possible
> to find a formal metric of comparison ought to prove
> really challenging. And we need challenges.
> mike
>
> On Nov 21, 2007 3:22 PM, David Kellogg wrote:
>
> > Em--
> >
> > I think what I said was that "apfel" and "carrus" DID have a traceable
> > etymology (Germanic and Latin). But words like "this" and "that" and
> "the"
> > and "there" and "then" and "these" and "those" are clearly related, but
> do
> > not have any traceable etymology that I know of. Instead, they are all
> > linked to the pointing gesture (and in fact some linguists speculate
> that
> > they evolved from pointing with the tongue, but this is of course an
> > imaginary tradition).
> >
> > To tell you the truth, I think all language is imaginary tradition. We
> > have an incredibly powerful system of abstract symbolism, but it is
> based on
> > a slightly reworked, exapted system of animal communication, gesture and
> > grunting. We intellectuals imagine that the central part of this
> > communication system is abstract symbolification and the gestures and
> grunts
> > are peripheral, but if you listen, really listen, to the way that MOST
> > meaning-makinglanguage goes on in the real world, you will see that it
> is
> > highly local and there isn't really such a thing as "a language". I
> think
> > that's WHY people find the San Diego-Helsinki videos so satisfying (and
> also
> > why they find them hard to discuss on the e-mail).
> >
> > Your suggestion for a dynamic testing klatsch (clash?) in San Diego is
> > highly tempting, but I'm afraid I'm way over my travel budget for the
> next
> > five years or so. We'll have to stick to e-mail and video!
> >
> > eric--
> >
> > I don't understand why the idea that development is non-observeable is
> > behaviorist. For the behaviorists, if it's non-observeable it simply
> doesn't
> > exist.
> >
> > Mike--
> >
> > I was re-reading the chapter on the The Problem of Age in Volume Five on
> > the subway last night, and I realized that I have always completely
> > misunderstood this chapter. I assumed that Vygotsky used "development"
> in
> > two different ways; one was to describe evolutionary development within
> > periods, and the other to describe revolutionary reconstruction that
> happens
> > during the crises.
> >
> > Of course this is entirely wrong. They are linked but distinct
> processes.
> > I use the formula "linked but distinct" as longhand for "dialectic", a
> word
> > that has not only Marxist but also Confucian and even Daoist etymology
> over
> > here...to me, the word "although" expresses causality even better than
> the
> > word "because". They are linked because each cannot exist without the
> other.
> > They are distinct because in a very important sense, they are opposed
> > to each other and each is the mirror image of the other, like the two
> halves
> > of the central motif of the Korean flag.
> >
> > Of course you are right (and so is eric), what we really need is
> > observeable data on this stuff instead of more handwaving. My idea is to
> > present FOUR studies from three different crisis periods. Each one by
> itself
> > cannot really describe development (because we cannot really be sure
> that
> > learning is going on, much less development). But together they may give
> us
> > some idea of the shape of the beast.
> >
> > David Kellogg
> > Seoul National University of Education
> >
> > ------------------------------
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> > it now.
> >
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Received on Wed Nov 21 19:51 PST 2007