Re: [xmca] activity (was concepts)

[Huw Lloyd <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com>]

Dear Nikolai, Anna,

We would welcome your thoughts in this interesting and lively discussion
thread.

On 21 April 2011 07:52, mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com> wrote:

> I second the recourse to articles published in MCA and if you could entice
> Anna back into the discussion that would be great. The examples you provided
> are far more appropriate than the Frolov I pulled out!
>
> We may be at the point where, as we once did a long time ago, we select a
> series of articles that constitute a kind of "MCA reader" of key articles.
>
> Arne Raiethel's article on hominization, Hutchins, Latour......
> if pulled together and sequenced could help us at times such as the present
> discussion.
>

That seems like a good way forward.  Personally, I am also keenly aware of
the delicacy of some of these theories and approaches.  To paraphrase
Nikolai Veresov, we shouldn't be picking and choosing from Vygotsky if we
wish to remain 'Vygotskian'.

(I'm also "looking forward" to the immersive studies -- *gulp* )

Huw


> mike
>
>
> On Wed, Apr 20, 2011 at 10:31 AM, Huw Lloyd <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com>wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> On 20 April 2011 10:43, mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> I appreciate all the thoughtful good will going into the attempts to find
>>> common grounding and explore one's own thinking in this/these
>>> thread/threads.
>>>
>>> I fear i violated Tony's reasonable 2 cents rule because I, too, have had
>>> too little time to write and the intermixing of pieces of threads and
>>> thus
>>> added to the difficulties.
>>>
>>> I believe that Andy identified one problem when he pointed out that Huw,
>>> coming from a somewhat different (and relevant!) tradition(s) introduced
>>> concepts such as activity as he understood them from, say, Maturana or
>>> Bateson. So, for example, he pointed to Jim Wertsch's *Mind as Action* as
>>> a
>>> source for explication of the concept of activity using the pole vaulting
>>> example.
>>
>>
>> Kind of.  I'm saying mediation and activity go together.  In, for example,
>> the scheme Wertsch provides (p204, VATSFOM):
>>
>> Activity -- Motive
>> Action -- Goal
>> Operation -- Conditions.
>>
>> A good place, it seems, to locate the use of concepts (i.e. those things
>> gained during dual stimulation experiments) is in the regulation of Action.
>>
>> However, I'd say that the concept used influences the dynamics, as it can
>> change the situation.
>>
>> Consider this simplified account.  A man is queuing at a supermarket.  He
>> only has 10 dollars (or some other currency), yet he needs the food to feed
>> his family.  He's got a number of items, all of which he needs, though they
>> might tally up to more than 10 dollars.  Let's say they add up to 9.99.  If
>> he can confidently do the math and has done so, his whole experience will be
>> different to the circumstances he'd be in if he found those kind of
>> conceptual operations difficult.  He wields these concepts in the act of
>> doing the math (the concepts mediate this act).  But these circumstances
>> will also mediate his activity as a whole as they influence his
>> understanding.
>>
>> Huw
>>
>>
>>
>>> But, Jim uses this example to talk about mediated action in
>>> context, his preferred unit of analysis at the time (at the end of
>>> *Vygotsky
>>> and the Social Formation of mind-*- which you can find whole on the
>>> internet
>>> but not download- he DOES discuss notions of activity following LSV).
>>>
>>
>
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