Re: [xmca] Universalism, Relativism, and Developmentalism

[Carol Macdonald <carolmacdon@gmail.com>]

David
Just a gratuitous comment.  Does anybody have a picture of Shweder?  I will
then draw a turtle on his head, and send it to him as a well-deserved award.


Seriously, for me Shweder's real help for my students is his description of
a Central Processing Mechanism (CPM) for dealing with all aspects of
(individualistic) psychology, versus Cultural Psychology.  My students who
had come in from a background on mainstream psychology went goggle-eyed at
the difference and were sure they would never understand the course. So I
had to reassure them that we would understand the comparison (I had made a
chart with UoI etc.) by the *end *of the course.

Now I will stop with my narratives.
Carol


On 15 July 2010 23:28, David Kellogg <vaughndogblack@yahoo.com> wrote:

> Congratulations to Mike and Carol for being to make any sense at all out of
> my last screed. Last semester I tried to write a book for a class on the
> theory of English language teaching for the poor undergrads.
>
> Trying to write a book on the theory of ELT by listening to what
> methodologists actually say is (with all due respect to the method of
> immanent critique) rather like trying to write a history of the automobile
> on the basis of what used car salesmen tell their customers. I decided the
> best way to proceed was to think of sets of problems.
>
> Some of these problems never get solved ("Can we learn a second language
> the same way we learnt the first one?"), others are too widespread for the
> very local solutions that are used to solve them ("How do you replace a
> native language concept based on ages of first handl experience with a
> foreign language concept which has no empirical content at all?") and still
> others appear to be solveable at first glance but later lead to more
> interesting and difficult problems ("How do you teach the difference between
> "apples", "an apple" and "the apple" to children who speak a language where
> the difference between the universal, the particular, and the individual is
> realized in a completely different way?")
>
> At this point I re-read Marshall Brown's wonderful (but rather obscure)
> essay on how Hegel's "Logic" (the full blown Science of Logic, and not the
> Shorter Logic which Andy has made so readable and readily understandable)
> applies to the development of 19th Century Realism in novels (e.g.
> "Middlemarch"). Brown begins by noting that the existence of a hundred
> schools of thought on what "realism" might be suggests, to a basically
> complaisant intellectual frame of mind, not a bitter struggle for domination
> of one truth over others but rather a set of partial truths awaiting
> synthesis.
>
> He does this by dividing the development of realism into three coexisting
> and interpenetrating moments:
>
> a) the realism of the stock type (e.g. Moll Flanders, Richardson's Pamela
> or Clarissa) where who you are is pretty much determined by the set
> character you are playing, and these set characters are very often
> identifiable by their professions (tinker, tailor, sailor, spy)
>
> b) the realism of the freak, the grotesque, the inimitable individual (e.g.
> the whole of Dickens, Gothic texts like Frankenstein, almost anything by
> Charlotte Bronte or by Balzac and everything by Victor Hugo). Brown points
> out that these individuals are really produced by simply applying the same
> method of differentiating social types to the various features of a single
> individual--they are all set against each other, and the result is a freak.
> (Think of how children learn to differentiate the features of Vygotsky's
> blocks and for a moment become transfixed by the singularity of every
> block).
>
> c) the realism of the particular, the nuanced repetition, the meaningful
> variation of a recognizeable pattern (e.g. the whole of Jane Austen, my own
> favorite Elizabeth Gaskell, and of course the great George Eliot). This is,
> of couse, a sublation of the previous two types: the pattern is brought back
> but individuals in it are allowed to interact and to define themselves
> relationally; here for the first time we have not simply dialect vs.
> idiolect but idiolects WITHIN dialects.
>
> Now, on the face of it, this is nothing more than yet another rather dreary
> sorting exercise, and not a particularly original one either. Think of the
> old syllogism:
>
> a) All men are mortal (universalism).
> b) Socrates is a man. (relativism)
> c) Therefore, Socrates is mortal. (particularism).
>
> There are other less obvious connections. You may remember that we had a
> paper by Strawson on Bruner's universalistic narrative theories a few years
> ago, where Strawson made a strong argument for relativism (which he called
> the "episodic" form of conscoiusness) as opposed to narrativism.
>
> The one which occurred to me was that the first period of English teaching,
> largely concerned with very practical problems of trade and immigration, is
> a realism of types, the second period focuses on inimitable texts, and the
> third, which I really do believe we are smack in the middle of, somewhere
> between the gradual transformation of classical structuralism-behaviorism
> into a more baroque form misleadingly called "communicative teaching", is an
> attempt to situate every unique communicative act in some kind of speech
> genre.
>
> But of course there is interpenetration as well as differentiation: every
> period has to solve all of the problems, and so although one set of problems
> may dominate, the others are nevertheless there. I think Mike has provided a
> very helpful insight in bringing in the phylogenetic universal, the
> sociogenetic relativist, and the ontogenetic developmentalist.
>
> Of course the universal is, in the final analysis, the sum total of the
> particular. But it's not really deriveable from it any more than the
> particular can be logically determined entirely by the universal. Market
> demand is, in the final analysis, the sum total of individual biological
> needs, but it's not really deriveable from it any more than ethics can be
> logically determined entirely by politics. Phylo-socio-onto-microgenesis is
> all, in the final analysis, nothing more or less than the changes wrought by
> the vicissitudes of time. But the time scales are SO different that the
> changes must be qualitatively different and never reducible to each other.
>
> David Kellogg
> Seoul National University of Education
>
> Oh, Shweder! I brough him in as a counterweight to eric's idea that Mike is
> a cross-cultural psychologist; Shweder makes an important distinction
> between cultural psych, which for him is relativist, and cross-cultural
> psychology, which is always universalist.
>
> But I do like his essays, Carol. At University of Chicago, when I was there
> as a humble and ultimately unsuccessful undergrad during the seventies,
> there was a craze for what Mike correctly calls the reduction of cultural
> psychology to a province of social psychology (it took the particularly
> annoying form of inoculating bourgeois economic history with homeopathic
> doses of anthropology). Shweder was the lone standout. It was
> anthropologists all the way down, and at the bottom of the stack of turtles,
> if there was one, stood a psychologist and not a historian.
>
> dk
>
>
> --- On Wed, 7/14/10, mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> From: mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [xmca] Universalism, Relativism, and Developmentalism
> To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> Date: Wednesday, July 14, 2010, 4:56 PM
>
>
> David--  Have read as far as your nice laying out of the three
> perspectives,
> universal, relativistic, developmental. That was rich enough for the time
> being.
>
> It occurred to me as I read your summary of each position that they map
> rather nicely on to phylogenetic, cultural historical, and ontogenetic time
> scales. Is that fair? If so, seems like a really aligning of discourses.
> mike
>
> On Wed, Jul 14, 2010 at 2:12 AM, Carol Macdonald <carolmacdon@gmail.com
> >wrote:
>
> > Dear David
> >
> > Thank you for your extremely enlightening series of examples, especially
> > since they are also relevant to my other work--English language. I am
> > constantly astonished at how diligent my colleagues/comrades are in
> making
> > an extended point/reply.  I will reply off-line.
> > Carol
> >
> > PS Andy also sent me a helpful comment off-line.  I owe you guys.
> >
> > On 14 July 2010 10:37, David Kellogg <vaughndogblack@yahoo.com> wrote:
> >
> > > Dear Carol:
> > >
> > > I don't think what I said was illogical, just historical. History
> appears
> > > to contradict itself not infrequently. But the mere fact that something
> > > appears completely impossible on paper does remarkably little to
> prevent
> > it
> > > from actually occuring. And even less to render it comprehensible.
> > >
> > > For example, one might, with some exaggeration, divide the last five
> > > hundred years of English language teaching into three very rough two
> > hundred
> > > year periods:
> > >
> > > a) a first, very basic, transactional-interpersonal period which mostly
> > > dealt with cross-channel trade and the influx of Huguenot refuges,
> > lasting
> > > from roughly the invention of printed language learning materials by
> > William
> > > Caxton around 1480 to the death of Comenius in 1670.
> > >
> > > b) a second, much more textually based period which dealt with the
> > creation
> > > of an English canon as a secular equivalent to the Greek and Latin
> > classics,
> > > lasting from roughly the revocation of the edict of Nantes by Louis the
> > > XIVth in 1685 until the birth of the Reform Movement around 1870 with
> the
> > > work of Sweet and later Palmer, West, and Hornby.
> > >
> > > c) the current period, which has seen the rise of a more meaning-based
> > > method, first in the rather predictable forms of
> > structuralism-behaviorism
> > > (which although it had different names in the US and the UK had much
> the
> > > same audiolingual-oral-situational content) and then in the more
> > > unpredictable form of "communicative methodology" (which although it
> has
> > the
> > > same name in the US and the UK has completely different and in some
> ways
> > > completely opposite content, because the Yanks kept structuralism and
> > > ditched behaviorism while the Brits kept behaviorism and ditched
> > > structuralism).
> > >
> > > Now, the reason I raise all this ancient history is not simply to deny
> > that
> > > we are at the beginning of a new epoch (although I DO deny it, as I
> deny
> > > that the Communicative Method represented anywhere a complete break
> with
> > > structuralism-behaviorism). I raise it to point out that there are
> > moments
> > > of this ancient history which are:
> > >
> > > 1) Universal. That is, the same kinds of questions keep coming up again
> > and
> > > again, viz. How do we know, when we translate, that children understand
> > the
> > > English word and not the translation? How do we "present" and
> "practice"
> > > something like meaning, as opposed to mere sound? Do we learn grammar
> the
> > > subconsciously, unconscioiusly, or deliberately and volitionally? etc.
> > >
> > > 2) Relativistic. That is, there are very different answers to all of
> > these
> > > questions, and not one of them appears to be always right at any given
> > time.
> > > Children sometimes understand and retain the English word and
> > > sometimes forget it instantly and only retain the translation or retain
> > the
> > > English word but go on using the mother tongue concept as its meaning.
> > There
> > > appear to be very different kinds of meaning, some of which are
> > repeatable
> > > and others of which are not, and this is not in any direct way
> relatable
> > to
> > > their learnability, contrary to what we might suppose. Some grammar is
> > > subconscious, some of it is unconscious, and a very great deal of it
> is,
> > > like murder and other crimes, completely premeditated.
> > >
> > > 3) Developmental. That is, some aspects of language teaching appear to
> > > change cumulatively, and others merely proliferate, producing variation
> > > without any obvious progress. There is no real sense, that I can see,
> in
> > > which English teaching today is "better" than the teaching of Latin or
> > Greek
> > > in Comenius's time (and there is also no real sense in which English is
> > more
> > > of a "global" language than Latin or Greek or French was). But there is
> > > certainly a very real sense in which our understanding of how language
> > works
> > > (for example, what kinds of meaning there are, and what kinds of
> grammar
> > > there are) has managed to sum up the past, complexify our present
> > > understanding, and go forward to new applications of that
> > > richer understanding.
> > >
> > > It's really not the case, as I once thought, that teaching practice
> just
> > > produces variations without any real evolution, while educational
> > research
> > > produces the very opposite, by "theory culling". Theory and practice
> seem
> > > much more mutually interpenetrated, so that there are theories which
> > > proliferate without any real refinement or even differentiation (I
> think
> > the
> > > theory of "comprehensible input" is a good example of this) and there
> are
> > > practices which are very clearly and demonstrably more efficient than
> > others
> > > (e.g. the keyword method of vocabulary learning, or the practice of
> > teaching
> > > grammar by using examples before rules).
> > >
> > > But it really is the case, I now think, that in English teaching (and I
> > > suspect also in cultural psychology, or cultural historical activity
> > theory,
> > > or socioculturalism, or phylo-socio-onto-microgenetic epistomology)
> that
> > > there are some areas of what we do where universalism is the underlying
> > > basis, others where relativism is an observeable fact, and still others
> > > where progress is not only possible but palpable. Do I contradict
> myself?
> > > Well then, I contradict myself; I am large, and like any other
> > > language-using animal, I contain worlds.
> > >
> > > Sorry, I meant "words".
> > >
> > > David Kellogg
> > > Seoul National University of Education
> > >
> > >
> > > --- On Tue, 7/13/10, Carol Macdonald <carolmacdon@gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > > From: Carol Macdonald <carolmacdon@gmail.com>
> > > Subject: Re: [xmca] The Missing Part
> > > To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> > > Date: Tuesday, July 13, 2010, 6:34 AM
> > >
> > >
> > > Eric
> > >
> > > What does this mean?  Am I dense or is there a word missing:
> > >
> > > but I have turned the corner and *believe we are who were
> > > and wherever you go there you are. *
> > >
> > > I loved D's illogicality:
> > > *
> > > But it's also why there can be, at one and the same moment,
> universalism
> > > ("We're all the same"), relativism ("We're all different, but equal")
> and
> > > developmentalism ("We're all different, and the differences matter") at
> > > one and the same time.*
> > >
> > > But, for me relativism is a farce--e.g. the witchdoctor having the same
> > > power as a nuclear physicist? USAID and DFiD don't believe this, and
> > > neither
> > > do I.
> > >
> > > And on what grounds do we see Shweder as having Mike's stature? (David)
> >  My
> > > students hated him (Shweder, by the way, they thought he was a sellout,
> > too
> > > close to mainstream psychology.)
> > >
> > > Carol
> > >
> > > PS Sorry for spoiling the line of argument: I have missed a part.
> > >
> > > On 13 July 2010 15:15, <ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org> wrote:
> > >
> > > > How very idealistic of you David.  I don't share in your optimistic
> > view
> > > > of bringing about a kumbaya utopia.  This veil of tears we share has
> > been
> > > > shared by our ancestors and shall continue to be shared in all its
> > > > brilliance and hair covered moles.
> > > >
> > > > At one time I did possibly believe that humans were developing
> > > > phylogenetically but I have turned the corner and believe we are who
> > were
> > > > and wherever you go there you are.  It is what it is or as the WWII
> > vets
> > > > say  "comme ci comme ca"
> > > >
> > > > eric
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > From:   David Kellogg <vaughndogblack@yahoo.com>
> > > > To:     Culture ActivityeXtended Mind <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> > > > Date:   07/12/2010 06:53 PM
> > > > Subject:        Re: [xmca] The Missing Part
> > > > Sent by:        xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > eric:
> > > >
> > > > No, as usual, you have my point pretty much exactly, only without the
> > > > silly flourishes I sometimes add. Remember, though, that Mike's
> magnum
> > > > opus was entitled "A Once and Future Discipline" .
> > > >
> > > > Mike says this was an accident; Bradd Shore dibsed the title he
> really
> > > > wanted, ("Culture in Mind") so he went and stole this one from
> Mallory
> > > > ("The Once and Future King", i.e. Arthur).
> > > >
> > > > It's not as catchy, but "The Once and Future Discipline" is a better
> > > title
> > > > than "Culture in Mind" for three reasons:
> > > >
> > > > a) it suggests, correctly, that the key cross cultural insights are
> not
> > > > actually Mike's, but date from a much earlier period, when
> ethnography
> > > was
> > > > actually a pretty dirty business. (This is not just true of
> > ethnography,
> > > > by the way, Yerkes, who provides a fair amount of the monkey business
> > in
> > > > Chapter Four of Thinking and Speech, was involved in army
> > "intelligence"
> > > > research dedicated to finding which soldiers were dumb enough to be
> > used
> > > > to clear minefields, and his interest in teaching apes to talk is
> > partly
> > > > motivated by his theories that some of us are more closely related to
> > > apes
> > > > than others.)
> > > >
> > > > b) it suggests, correctly, that in order to use this stuff we need to
> > > > think a little more about where it came from in the light of where we
> > > want
> > > > to go with it, to purge it of its geographical, social and cultural
> > > > specificity and to harness it for a future where insights made in one
> > > > corner of the globe become the common property of all its corners and
> > all
> > > > the bits in between as well.
> > > >
> > > > c) it suggests that cultural psych is transdisciplinary rather than
> > > > interdisiciplinary, that it's a discipline in the process of
> > transcending
> > > > its historical self rather than one which is merely exchanging
> > > ambassadors
> > > > with bordering disciplines. That is actually what accounts for its
> > > > temporary eclipse, and it is equally what will account for its future
> > > > resurgence.
> > > >
> > > > Shweder, for example, from whom I stole the idea of universalism vs.
> > > > relativism vs. developmentalism, is still embroiled in a controversy
> > > about
> > > > whether anthropologists in Afghanistan can and should collaborate
> with
> > > the
> > > > US Army in the occupation of remote provinces. Shweder's position is
> > that
> > > > they can and should, because their presence will help troops
> understand
> > > > local customs (e.g. the custom of "Loving Thursdays" whereby village
> > > > elders undertake the sexual initiation of young boys).
> > > >
> > > > Whatever you may think of Shweder's view, it certainly corroborates
> the
> > > > idea that cultural psychology (of which Shweder is probably the
> leading
> > > > advocate after Mike himself) has feet of clay, that it has not yet
> > > > entirely freed itself from its roots as an adjunct of imperialist
> > > > occupation, and that we have a ways to go before we can really say it
> > has
> > > > something to offer every human being it purports to study.
> > > >
> > > > Take English as a global language (PLEASE! Take it away before it
> hurts
> > > > somebody!). English even in its benign forms is a lousy language for
> > > world
> > > > communication precisely because it is a perfect language for world
> > > > domination, a perfect exclusive language for the global community of
> > > > airport hopping rich folks.
> > > >
> > > > English is a nightmare choice for a world language. It is
> > phonologically
> > > > bizarre, grammatically opaque, and pragmatically obscurantist. It has
> a
> > > > dark past, rooted in a dominance born of genocide and slavery. But it
> > > also
> > > > has a certain promise, a certain future, a certain freedom which we
> see
> > > > whenever we teach it in a country like Korea, and we see that the
> more
> > we
> > > > teach it, the less English it becomes.
> > > >
> > > > I think these problems with English are roughly the same problems
> that
> > > > cultural psychology had in Vygotsky's time. Bleuler, who was Piaget's
> > > > teacher and certainly knew Levy-Bruhl's work extremely well, broke
> with
> > > > both Piaget and Levy-Bruhl precisely over the theorized from of these
> > > > problems, the developmental issue of whether "autistic" thinking was
> > > > developmentally primary, ontogenetically or sociogenetically.
> > > >
> > > > Bleuler, and Vygotsky too, turned the Europocentric view right
> > > > upside-down; they believed tha autism, far from being developmentally
> > > > atavistic, required a certain stage of development to achieve: you
> had
> > to
> > > > be able to remember first and only then could you really think about
> > your
> > > > wishes, dreams, desires. They also believed that thinking
> > > "irrealisically"
> > > > about wishes and desires led in a fairly direct way to more
> > > > realistic hopes and plans.
> > > >
> > > > For that very reason it was wrong to consider "autism" as an
> > > > underdeveloped stage; autism, or as he liked to call it, "irrealism"
> > was
> > > > simply that part of human thinking that was genuinely relativistic,
> > where
> > > > neither an adult nor a man "at the pinnacle of civilization" (Bleuler
> > is
> > > > certainly being ironic here since he is writing at the outset of
> World
> > > War
> > > > One) may claim superiority. There may be other areas where one form
> of
> > > > thinking includes, subsumes, and sublates earlier forms (e.g.
> > mathematics
> > > > and science generally) but in the humanities we find variation
> without
> > > > development, at least without development in the sense of the
> emergence
> > > of
> > > > superior forms which asymmetrically include earlier ones.
> > > >
> > > > That Vygotsky took this on board is very clear from his writings on
> > > > creativity and imagination. That Vygotsky went even further than
> > Bleuler
> > > > is clear from his argument that irrealist thinking and realist
> thinking
> > > do
> > > > not turn in parallel, like the wheels of a desk, only in response to
> > the
> > > > external environment, but have an internal connection, an axle, or
> > rather
> > > > a differential, which allow them to influence each other, so that in
> > > > science too we shall find variation without development and in art
> and
> > > the
> > > > humanities some genuine, common, universally valuable (because
> > > universally
> > > > shareable) developments alongside the dazzling and dizzying
> variations
> > > > which for the most part are hard to share.
> > > >
> > > > Nevertheless I think Vygotsky shares Bleuler's basic insight,which we
> > see
> > > > here in the chapter which begins with the Missing Part. By putting
> the
> > > > "autistic" function at the beginning of development, and by lumping
> > > > selfishness, stupidity, schizophrenia, and perfectly normal cultural
> > > > variation into a single syncretic heap, Freud, Levy-Bruhl and Blondel
> > are
> > > > behaving more like idealist savages than intellectual scientists.
> > > >
> > > > So it goes. From Bleuler to Vygotsky, and from Vygotsky to Mike, and
> > from
> > > > Mike to me, and then from me to you, with each of us forgetting
> > something
> > > > and each of us adding on at every step of the way. This is why
> Vygotsky
> > > > comes up with the confusing image of a chain that has a "central"
> link.
> > > > But it's also why there can be, at one and the same moment,
> > universalism
> > > > ("We're all the same"), relativism ("We're all different, but equal")
> > and
> > > > developmentalism ("We're all different, and the differences matter")
> at
> > > > one and the same time.
> > > >
> > > > David Kellogg
> > > > Seoul National University of Education
> > > >
> > > > --- On Mon, 7/12/10, ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org <ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org>
> > > wrote:
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > From: ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org <ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org>
> > > > Subject: Re: [xmca] The Missing Part
> > > > To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> > > > Date: Monday, July 12, 2010, 6:24 AM
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > David:
> > > >
> > > > This indeed is an important passage in understanding LSV's
> > developmental
> > > > theories.  But I believe cross-cultural research speerheaded by Cole
> > and
> > > > others has discounted 'primitive' cultures as being less developed in
> > > > thought and practice when compared to 'western' culture.  Or am I
> > > > misunderstanding your point?
> > > >
> > > > eric
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > From:   David Kellogg <vaughndogblack@yahoo.com>
> > > > To:     xmca <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> > > > Date:   07/12/2010 02:38 AM
> > > > Subject:        [xmca] The Missing Part
> > > > Sent by:        xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > This is the beginning of Chapter Two of Thinking and Speech that was
> > not
> > > > translated into English. I posted it once several years ago, and
> Anton
> > > > thought it didn't add very much.
> > > >
> > > > I think it does: it structures the whole chapter, because it makes it
> > > > clear that Freud, Levy-Bruhl, and Blondel share a common idealist
> basis
> > > as
> > > >
> > > > well as a common canonical stature.
> > > >
> > > > &Lt;Мы полагаем, . говорит он, . что настанет день, когда мысль
> ребенка
> > > по
> > > >
> > > > отношению к мысли нормального цивилизованного взрослого будет
> помещена
> > в
> > > > ту же плоскость, в какой находится &Lt;примитивное мышление&Gt;,
> > > > охарактеризованное Леви-Брюлем, или аутистическая и символическая
> > мысль,
> > > > описанная Фрейдом и его учениками, или &Lt;болезненное сознание&Gt;,
> > если
> > > > только это понятие, введенное Блонделем, не сольется в один
> прекрасный
> > > > день с предыдущим понятием&Gt; (1, с.408).1 Действительно, появление
> > его
> > > > первых работ по историческому значению
> > > > этого факта для дальнейшего развития психологической мысли должно
> быть
> > по
> > > > справедливости сопоставлено и сравнено с датами выхода в свет &Lt;Les
> > > > fonctions mentales dans les societes inferieures&Gt; Леви-Брюля,
> &Lt;Т
> > > > олкования сновидений&Gt; Фрейда или &Lt;La conscience morbide&Gt;
> > > > Блонделя.
> > > > Больше того, между этими явлениями в различнейших областях научной
> > > > психологии есть не только внешнее сходство, определяемое уровнем их
> > > > исторического значения, но глубокое, кровное, внутреннее родство .
> > связь
> > > > по самой сути заключенных и воплощенных в них философских и
> > > > психологических тенденций. Недаром сам Пиаже в огромной мере опирался
> в
> > > > своих исследованиях и построениях на эти три
> > > > работы и на их авторов.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > “It is therefore our belief", says (Piaget), "that the day will come
> > when
> > > > child thought will be placed on the same level in relation to adult,
> > > > normal, and civilized thought as ‘primitive mentality’, as defined by
> > > > Lévy-Bruhl, as autistic and symbolical thought as described by Freud
> > and
> > > > his disciples and as ‘morbid consciousness,’ assuming that this last
> > > > concept, which we owe to M. Ch. Blondel, is not simply fused with the
> > > > former.” (p. 201-202). In reality, the appearance of this first
> works,
> > in
> > > > regard to the historic importance as a fact for future reference in
> the
> > > > development of psychological thought must be on the compared with the
> > > > appearance of “Les fonctions mentales dans les societes inferieures”
> of
> > > > Levi- Bruhl, Freud’s “The interpretation of dreams’, or Blondel’s “La
> > > > conscience morbide”. It is not simply that between these phenomena in
> > the
> > > > development of the field of scientific psychology there is a formal
> > > > resemblance, determined by their level of historic importance, but
> that
> > > > there is a deep, internal kinship, a connection in essence which is
> > > > visible in their philosophical and psychological tendencies. Not
> > without
> > > > reason does Piaget himself base in enormous measure his own studies
> and
> > > > constructions on these three works and on their authors.
> > > >
> > > > Last night I was re-reading Bleuler's criticisms of Freud in
> "Autistic
> > > > Thinking" and I also came upon these words, which Vygotsky quotes
> > > > approvingly.
> > > >
> > > > "Examining the more grown-up child, I also do not much observe that
> he
> > > > would prefer the imaginary apple to the real. The imbecile and the
> > savage
> > > > are alike practitioners of Realpolitik and the latter, (exactly like
> > us,
> > > > who stand at the apex of cognitive ability) makes his autistic
> > > stupidities
> > > >
> > > > only in such cases when reason and experience prove insufficient: in
> > his
> > > > ideas about the universe, about the phenomena of nature, in his
> > > > understanding of diseases and other blows of destiny, in adopting
> > > measures
> > > >
> > > > to shield himself from them, and in other relationships which are too
> > > > complex for him.”
> > > >
> > > > It seems to me that here and elsewhere in this chapter Bleuler is
> > arguing
> > > > for, and Vygotsky is agreeing with, a position that is simultaneously
> > > > universalist, relativist, and developmentalist. It is universalist in
> > the
> > > > sense that it argues for a universal human autistic response to areas
> > of
> > > > experience of which we are ignorant. It is relativist in the sense
> that
> > > it
> > > >
> > > > argues for the independence of an "autistic" response from
> rationality
> > > and
> > > >
> > > > an autonomous art and autonomous humanities based on that
> independence
> > > > that is in no way subordinate to rationality. It is developmentalist
> in
> > > > the sense that it argues for an autistic response which develops out
> of
> > a
> > > > narrow, immediately realistic (perception based?) reality function
> > rather
> > > > than vice versa (as in Freud, Janet, and Levy-Bruhl).
> > > >
> > > > David Kellogg
> > > > Seoul National University of Education
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
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