Re: [xmca] Vygotsky Circle as a Personal Network of Scholars: Restoring Connections Between People and Ideas (Vygotsky & Luria, 1929))

[mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com>]

Thanks for the summary of hagiography, and your close reading, David. I went
back and re-read page 6. And I gather from your message that both times
planes, hagiography of the 30's and of the post-Stalin era, are somehow
connected in this
discussion.

So the hagiography that sees Leontiev as a direct descendent of Vygotsky
comes from Leontiev, his son, and some younger colleagues. Late dates. But
right in there with with Yaroslavsky and Levitin. Since Karl puts me into
his docudrama, and he was a co-editor in adding materials to Luria's
autobio, I'll pass on commenting on his work or its relationship to the
personages under discussion.

I look forward to the way in which you spell out and fill in your
conclusions. The changing systems of interfunctional relations vs functional
differentiation transformation that you say occurred in 1930-31 is
particularly interesting. So you think that Luria parted company with
Vygotsky that early!? Very surprising to me.


Mike



On Thu, Jun 16, 2011 at 4:59 PM, David Kellogg <vaughndogblack@yahoo.com>wrote:

> Thanks, Anton. I wonder why Thinking and Speech has Leontiev and Levina as
> co-authors? Curiouser and curiouser....
>
> Mike, I think Anton defines the "official, hagiographic" narrative better
> than I can, on p. 6 of his article. Voila:
>
> "...(T)he vast majority of these publications follow the tradition of
> 'Great Men' histories, or, in other words, represent 'hagiographic'
> historiography that is characterized by distinctly celebratory (or,
> otherwise, accusatory and denuciatory) accounts of the history of ideas
> against the background of personal life-stories of a few protagonists,
> typically Vygotsky, Leonitiev, or Luria."
>
> By this definition, BOTH the official and the revisionist accounts are
> really hagiographies or Carlylean "Great Men" accounts. I think I would
> single out THREE points of the "official" hagiography (that is, the one
> perpetrated by historians like Yaroshevsky and Levitin):
>
> a) The Vygotsky school is a single coherent institution with a single,
> coherent research programme.
>
> b) Vygotsky was the unquestioned leader, and his legitimate successors were
> the other members of the troika (Leontiev and Luria) and the pyaterka
> (Zaporzhets, Bozhovich, R. Levina, Morozova, and Slavina).
>
> c) Vygotsky's's genius is a "given", and it does not develop very much.
> Contrary to what Vygotsky says in the preface to Thinking and Speech, there
> are no great changes of approach and method.
>
> The revisionist account (to which I still subscribe) is something like
> this:
>
> a) Vygotsky was for most of his career lonely and misunderstood even by his
> closest collaborators (especially by Leontiev and to a lesser extent by the
> vascillating Luria).
>
> b) Vygotsky in his own lifetime was not the unquestioned leader of
> anything. Although older than Leontiev and Luria, he did not succeed in
> winning either man unreservedly to his pedological research programme, and
> when pedology came under fire neither man were reliable defenders.
>
> c) Vygotsky, like any good Jew, spent a lot of his time doubting, not only
> others but also himself. There are at least three major shifts in his method
> and approach (the rejection of reactology and the idea of the instrumental
> method in 1927-1929, the rejection of stable functions in changing
> "interfunctional relations" and the idea of functional differentiation in
> 1930-1931, the rejection of complexes as stand-alone features of
> development and the zone of proximal development in 1932-1934).
>
> Anton then contrasts his own approach, which is to see Vygotsky's life as a
> confirmation of his own dialogic approach to knowledge construction, a set
> of non-concentric circles which involved a huge range of other persons, but
> no fixed cast of characters. Needless to say, there is a very great deal to
> be said for this approach, but I think Anton is the person to say it.
> Wholeheartedly and unreservedly do I recommend his article--especially the
> refs!
>
> David Kellogg
> Seoul National University of Education
>
>
>
> --- On Thu, 6/16/11, Anton Yasnitsky <the_yasya@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
> From: Anton Yasnitsky <the_yasya@yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: [xmca] Vygotsky Circle as a Personal Network of Scholars:
> Restoring Connections Between People and Ideas (Vygotsky & Luria, 1929))
> To: "lchcmike@gmail.com" <lchcmike@gmail.com>, "eXtended Mind, Culture,
> Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> Date: Thursday, June 16, 2011, 4:06 PM
>
>
> Here is a brief response to the first of David's questions:
>
>
> > a) In the section on Phase Two (1927-1931) you are arguing that the
> > "troika" was essential a "dvoika" (???) with Vygotsky-Mozart and
> > Luria-Beethoven at the end of the 1920s. You do this on the impeccable
> > evidence of co-authorship and co-participation (rather than the MUCH less
> > reliable evidence of correspondance--people write all kinds of stuff in
> > letters and then they kiss and make up). But didn't Leontiev ALSO
> co-author
> > the "Fate and Function"Paper presented in New Haven, along with Luria
> (and
> > Levina)? Thinking and Speech says he did!
>
>
> Yes, I do mean to say that both Vygotsky and Luria were
> (a) administrative superiors in their respective fields: Luria in
> Psychology, whereas Vygotsky was more associated with Defectology (roughly
> equivalent with the mixture of Special Education and Clinical Psychology)
> and Pedology (alias Paedology, an interesting field of studies that covered
> roughly Developmental, Child, and Educational Psychology and
> Psychophysiology)
> (b) quite active socially and fairly well connected nationally and
> internationally and
> (c) prolific authors who published a lot, and also together during the
> period of 1920-1930s.
>
> So, yes, this was a "dvoika" (the two) in the centre with numerous -- and
> increasingly growing! -- connections.
>
> Then, to the second part of the question, formally nobody else but Vygotsky
> and Luria were formally (officially) mentioned as the co-authors of their
> presentation at the IX International Congress of Psychology at Yale in 1929.
> Luria presented, Vygotsky stayed home. Other guys [of the Vygotsky Circle]
> certainly contributed to research behind the presentation, but no -- there
> were only two authors. Just in case, the text in English of the publication
> of Vygotsky & Luria (1929), is available online --
> http://psyhistorik.livejournal.com/59654.html at online group blog on the
> history of Russian psychology http://psyhistorik.livejournal.com/ ; info
> and join here: http://psyhistorik.livejournal.com/profile
>
>
> AY
>
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com>
> To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> Cc:
> Sent: Wednesday, June 15, 2011 11:25:39 PM
> Subject: Re: [xmca] Vygotsky Circle as a Personal Network of Scholars:
> Restoring Connections Between People and Ideas
>
> Could you summarize the official hagiographic account for us and who are
> the
> officials, David? Your comments are meant to span up to 1956 or so? I am
> trying to keep separate the period up to 1934-35 and the later accounts of
> these people as I encountered them in 1962-63 and subsequently. Having all
> those early connections spelled out is very helpful.
>
> For example, I believe the influence of Bernshtein on Luria and a number of
> x-kharkovites and muskovites was profound. Zinchenko's recent writing draws
> out these and other connections in interesting ways. Its a topic worth
> study. It helps when tracing the links between gibsonians and vygotskians,
> for example.
>
> mike
>
> On Wed, Jun 15, 2011 at 6:13 PM, David Kellogg <vaughndogblack@yahoo.com
> >wrote:
>
> > Congratulations, Anton--on delivering what has to be the driest howler I
> > have ever seen in a reference list, namely this one:
> >
> > Feofanov, M.P. (1932) Teoriya kul'turnago razvitiya v pedologii kak
> > electricheskaya (sic) kontseptsiya, imeyushchaya v osnovnom
> idealisticheskie
> > korni (The theory of cultural development in pedology as an electric
> [sic]
> > theory that has mainly idealistic roots). Pedologiya (1-2), 21-34.
> >
> > I admit, though: some of the electricity this produced in my nervous
> system
> > was of a rather tragic sort: this was probably one of the last issues of
> the
> > journal that Vygotsky co-edited for so long.
> >
> > As always, your work prompted three questions, two easy ones (what
> Spinoza
> > would call "existential" questions) and a more difficult essential one
> for
> > discussion.
> >
> > a) In the section on Phase Two (1927-1931) you are arguing that the
> > "troika" was essential a "dvoika" (???) with Vygotsky-Mozart and
> > Luria-Beethoven at the end of the 1920s. You do this on the impeccable
> > evidence of co-authorship and co-participation (rather than the MUCH less
> > reliable evidence of correspondance--people write all kinds of stuff in
> > letters and then they kiss and make up). But didn't Leontiev ALSO
> co-author
> > the "Fate and Function"Paper presented in New Haven, along with Luria
> (and
> > Levina)? Thinking and Speech says he did!
> >
> > b) At the end of the section on Phase Two, right before the section on
> Page
> > Three, you talk about Luria's work on "hypoboulic" processes, which you
> > gloss as "unconscious". But the way I read Luria he's really talking
> about
> > "weak-willed" patients, that is, persons who have trouble controlling
> their
> > own behavior. That is the standard definition of the word (and it's the
> way
> > Vygotsky uses it too)!  The same term appears in your entry on Averbukh
> in
> > the appendix. Was this some special term that psychoanalysts used in
> Russia?
> > That is, did it mean something like "subconscious"?
> >
> > c) My discussion question has to do with your "Presentist Conclusion: Why
> > Bother?"  I think that you are fundamentally right to weight the evidence
> of
> > co-authorship and collaboration over that of the sometimes overwrought
> > correspondance (I notice you don't even mention the 1929 letter to "Five
> > Faced Kuzma Prutkov" where Vygotsky himself suggests that there was a
> troika
> > followed by a pyaterka, or the bitter exchange of letters with Leontiev
> in
> > which the latter hints at suicide).
> >
> > But for me, just as the weight of co-authorship and collaboration is more
> > important than the correspondence and personalism, the issues of
> methodology
> > and approach really outweight even those of co-authorship and
> collaboration.
> >
> > It seems to me that the struggle between the official hagiographic
> account,
> > including the troika and the pyaterka, on the one hand and the
> > "revisionists" (in which I count myself) on the other is really a
> struggle
> > over method and approach and even theory.
> >
> > The obvious analogy is with the authorship of Voloshinov's works
> > ("Freudianism" with its attack on Luria, and the even more influential
> > "Marxism and the Philosophy of Language") . For much of the eighties and
> > nineties, there was a rather poisonous debate over whether his books were
> > authored by Bakhtin or not. Beneath the apparently insoluble historical
> > issues, though, there was an important problem of principle and method:
> is
> > Voloshinov Marxist, or is he just pretending to be?
> >
> > Actually, I think Bakhurst solved the historical problem of Voloshinov's
> > authorship by using a NON-historical method: he simply pointed out that
> > although Bakhtin COULD have written "Marxism and the Philosophy of
> Language"
> > as a joke, it is very hard to imagine that, as a non-Marxist, he would
> have
> > wanted to make a major contribution to Marxist theory in so doing.
> >
> > It seems to me that the issue between the official account and the
> revision
> > is similarly resolvable by non-historical means. The official account
> > considers that Leontiev's critical stance towards Vygotsky's emphasis on
> > semiotic processes rather than "activity" was ultimately correct;
> Vygotsky
> > was wrong to pursue word meaning as the central form of mediation
> involved
> > in all higher psychological processes. That's why Leontiev warns that
> > language is not the demiurge of mind.
> >
> > The revisionist account considers that Leontiev's attitude, whether it
> was
> > in good faith ror not, was incorrect: children do not work, and the idea
> > that play is a form of pre-labor, and that child development occurs
> without
> > crises, and that activity is the molar unit of human consciousness is
> > entirely wrong.
> >
> > Wertsch and Zinchenko on the one hand, and Lindqvist and Kozulin on the
> > other do not phrase it in historical terms (although as you point out
> A.A.
> > Leontiev and Gita Vigodskaya, for understandable reasons, do see it that
> > way). Instead, it's a psychological issue, and even a methodological one
> of
> > the very first rank. But history can certainly EXPLAIN how it got the
> first
> > rank, and what is at stake, and I think your study is a very valuable
> step
> > in doing that.
> >
> > David Kellogg
> > Seoul National University of Education
> >
> >
> > --- On Tue, 6/14/11, Anton Yasnitsky <the_yasya@yahoo.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> > From: Anton Yasnitsky <the_yasya@yahoo.com>
> > Subject: Re: [xmca] Vygotsky Circle as a Personal Network of Scholars:
> > Restoring Connections Between People and Ideas
> > To: lchcmike@gmail.com, "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <
> > xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> > Date: Tuesday, June 14, 2011, 10:21 AM
> >
> >
> > Not only were they socially motivated, Mike, but also, as I argue,
> directed
> > against not Vygotsky, dead by then, but against his socially successful
> > former
> > associates: Luria, Zankov, Elkonin et al.
> >
> > AY
> >
> >
> >
> > ----- Original Message ----
> > From: mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com>
> > To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> > Sent: Tue, June 14, 2011 1:00:15 PM
> > Subject: Re: [xmca] Vygotsky Circle as a Personal Network of Scholars:
> > Restoring
> > Connections Between People and Ideas
> >
> > Yes, Anton, I think it is safe to say that those critiques were socially
> > motivated!
> > Thanks for all the new materials.
> > mike
> >
> > On Tue, Jun 14, 2011 at 6:50 AM, Anton Yasnitsky <the_yasya@yahoo.com
> > >wrote:
> >
> > > P.S. Oh, yes, speaking of Vygotsky's followers and their integrative
> > > theory.
> > >
> > >
> > > I have just been informed that the previously announced paper on
> Vygotsky
> > > Circle
> > > has just been released as an Online First publication, see:
> > >
> > > Yasnitsky, A. (2011). Vygotsky Circle as a Personal Network of
> Scholars:
> > > Restoring Connections Between People and Ideas. Integrative
> Psychological
> > > and
> > > Behavioral Science; DOI: 10.1007/s12124-011-9168-5
> > > http://www.springerlink.com/content/b34101p383588v95/
> > >
> > > The paper is quite long and fairly detailed, but the pictures, all five
> > of
> > > them,
> > > are really good and particularly loveable! Also, the Appendix stands
> out,
> > I
> > > guess... :)
> > >
> > > I believe this is the first ever study of its kind that systematically
> > > investigates the inter- and intra-group dynamics within the entire
> group
> > of
> > > scholars around Vygotsky during his lifetime and after his death. The
> > > rationale
> > > for such study was provided somewhere else: please see discussion of
> the
> > > urgent
> > > need in understanding collaborative and experimental aspects of
> Vygotsky
> > &
> > > Co's
> > > integrative science of cultural and biosocial development of mind,
> brain,
> > > and
> > > behaviour, closer to the end of the paper under the section
> "Programmatic
> > > Conclusion: What Needs to Be Done and How?" in
> > >
> > > van der Veer, R. & Yasnitsky, A. (2011). Vygotsky in English: What
> Still
> > > Needs
> > > to Be Done. Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science; DOI:
> > > 10.1007/s12124-011-9172-9 @
> > > http://www.springerlink.com/content/278j5025767m2263/
> > >
> > >
> > > AY
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > ----- Original Message ----
> > > From: Anton Yasnitsky <the_yasya@yahoo.com>
> > > To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> > > Sent: Tue, June 14, 2011 8:57:56 AM
> > > Subject: Re: [xmca] help-me -- Rudneva, E. I. (1937/2000). Vygotsky's
> > > Pedological Distortions
> > >
> > > No problem.
> > >
> > >
> > > Speaking of Vygotsky "falling out of favor in Moscow", one needs to
> > > understand
> > > that, quite contrary to traditional fairly simplistic accounts,
> 1934-1936
> > > was
> > > truly a "Golden Age" for -- dead by   then -- Vygotsky and his -- still
> > > alive --
> > >
> > > followers: lots of stuff, including Vygotsky's stuff, was published by
> > the
> > > group, for Vygotsky--posthumously. The discussion of this "Golden Age"
> > > first
> > > appears, I believe, in Yasnitsky, A. (2011). Lev Vygotsky: Philologist
> > and
> > > Defectologist, A Socio-intellectual Biography. In Pickren, W.,
> Dewsbury,
> > > D., &
> > > Wertheimer, M. (Eds.). Portraits of Pioneers in Developmental
> Psychology,
> > > vol.
> > > VII, but I am not so sure about that.
> > >
> > > Thus, Rudneva's critique, as well as the critique of several other
> > > individuals
> > > that appears to have been directed at Vygotsky, despite appearance
> quite
> > > likely
> > > targeted not the dead man, but his socially and academically successful
> > > followers. Among others, most often several names were pronounced, such
> > as
> > > Luria, Zankov, Elkonin, Shif, and Leontiev. Thus, in other words, we do
> > not
> > > truly know what motivated these critiques and how they really affected
> > the
> > > carreers and, generally, the course of events back there and then, but
> > > chances
> > > are the critique was originally meant by their authors much more
> socially
> > > than
> > > theoretically. By the way, for other critical publications of that time
> > > please
> > > see a marvelous issue of the Journal of Russian and East European
> > > Psychology
> > > that Rene van der Veer published more than a decade ago (Volume 38,
> > Number
> > > 6 /
> > > November-December 2000 of Journal of Russian and East European
> > Psychology):
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
> http://mesharpe.metapress.com/openurl.asp?genre=issue&issn=1061-0405&volume=38&issue=6
> > >6
> > >
> > > OR      http://mesharpe.metapress.com/link.asp?id=n73424205223 (both
> > links
> > > seem to be good, I just am not sure which one might work this time,
> > > luckily,
> > > both)
> > >
> > > FYI, all materials that came out in this journal have been digitized
> and
> > > from
> > > January 2011 are accessible/downloadable.
> > >
> > > AY
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > ----- Original Message ----
> > > From: Peter Smagorinsky <smago@uga.edu>
> > > To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> > > Sent: Tue, June 14, 2011 6:18:56 AM
> > > Subject: RE: [xmca] help-me -- Rudneva, E. I. (1937/2000). Vygotsky's
> > > Pedological Distortions
> > >
> > > Thanks for sharing this piece. I've read many summaries about why LSV
> > fell
> > > out
> > > of favor in Moscow, but this is the first truly contemporary (published
> > in
> > > 1937
> > > originally, and reproduced here) vituperative attack that lays out the
> > > complaint.
> > >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu]
> > On
> > > Behalf
> > >
> > > Of mike cole
> > > Sent: Tuesday, June 14, 2011 12:06 AM
> > > To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> > > Subject: Re: [xmca] help-me -- Rudneva, E. I. (1937/2000). Vygotsky's
> > > Pedological Distortions
> > >
> > > Thanks Anton--
> > > Bad fellow that LSV. No end of mischief, to this day.
> > > Well, he got his just deserts. He died young of tuberculosis and
> totally
> > > avoided lead poisoning!
> > > mike
> > >
> > > On Mon, Jun 13, 2011 at 6:01 PM, Joao <jbmartin@sercomtel.com.br>
> wrote:
> > >
> > > > Thanks, Anton
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > João Martins
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > -----Original Message-----
> > > > From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu [mailto:
> xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu]
> > > On
> > > > Behalf Of Anton Yasnitsky
> > > > Sent: segunda-feira, 13 de junho de 2011 19:44
> > > > To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> > > > Subject: Re: [xmca] help-me -- Rudneva, E. I. (1937/2000). Vygotsky's
> > > > Pedological Distortions
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > ----- Original Message ----
> > > > From: Joao <jbmartin@sercomtel.com.br>
> > > > To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> > > > Sent: Mon, June 13, 2011 5:34:22 PM
> > > > Subject: [xmca] help-me
> > > >
> > > > People... i need of text
> > > > Rudneva, E. I. - Vygotsky's Pedological Distortions, published at
> > Journal
> > > > of
> > > > Russian and East European Psychology, V. 38, N. 6, P. 75-94 -
> > > > November-December 2000
> > > >
> > > > Can Someone help-me?
> > > >
> > > > Thanks
> > > >
> > > > João Martins
> > > >
> > > > __________________________________________
> > > > _____
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