Re: [xmca] Six key points on sociocultural models of development

[Larry Purss <lpscholar2@gmail.com>]

Hi Martin,

I wanted to explore the possible distinctions between mediation through
others AND mediation through artifacts.  You never have made this
assumption.  It is something I have pondered as I read in the tradition of
"recognition" AND in the tradition of CHAT.  I am not clear on the
"conceptual" differences, if there are any.  What I did get from your
article was a perspective that of the 6 key themes you articulate as a
possible analytical framework for understanding sociocultural theory 3 of
the themes  which explore recognition, are less articulated.  Those 3 themes
are
desire & recognition
leads to becoming split
which leads to a search for identity.

As you articulate 6 KEY themes and half of those themes are exploring themes
of recognition, I assumed you were wanting your readers to pay more
attention [become conscious] of the centrality recognitin to sociocultural
accounts.

I have often felt split in trying to bridge alternative discourses on
meaning
(A) as dialogically FORMED in differences of perspectives [and calling forth
metaphors of "third spaces", "opening to meaning as developing BETWEEN
persons", "binocular vision of perspectives" etc. {mediation through opening
spaces of self/other I-thou relations} and
(B) meaning as FORMED within artifactually  constructed worlds mediated by
our tool use. [in biocultural niches]

Martin, I framed this as a distinction in order to draw out the centrality
of "desire & recognition" as maybe an "ontological" theme of
being/becoming.  If the theme of recognition, as splitting, leading to a
search for identity is ontological it would follow that how recognition
plays out in our current psychological ways of experiencing the world are
particular FORMS of recognition.

The splitting up of mediation as dialogical and mediation as tool use I
would agree in fact is an artifact of my analysis and is derivative as a
particular type of conceptual splitting.  I took this stance to highlight
the possible foundational (ontological??) centrality of recognition to
sociocultural perspectives.

PS on a very particular example of this larger theme.  You sent out 2
articles on "intentionality in primates"  A detail I found fascinating was
that grasping the intention of others visually through motor gestures was
clearly indicating intentional actions and calling forth responses from the
other, BUT

primate voices as material sounds were not seen as intentional.  From
Bahktin's notion of voices as dialogical and needing to respond and
anticipate the voice of the other [as the space of meaning], the difference
between observing motor gestures and hearing vocal gestures seems to be a
different level of development.  May this difference be at the root of the
human capacity to FORM meaning BETWEEN perspectives.
Just wondering.

Larry

n Wed, Jun 22, 2011 at 10:30 AM, Martin Packer <packer@duq.edu> wrote:

> Larry,
>
> Your question deserves a thoughtful answer, and to provide this I will need
> to read the article again; it's over a decade ago that we wrote it. I won't
> have time to do this, unfortunately, until next week at the earliest.
>
> Meanwhile, is it something I wrote that leads you to distinguish between
> "mediation through other
> persons AND mediation through artifacts"? On the face of it I would agree
> with Andy, that the two go hand in hand, or even that they are not separate:
> we continually relate to others, in a way that is necessarily mediated by
> artifacts. If I wrote something in 2001 that contradicts what I've just
> said, please let me know!
>
> Martin
>
> On Jun 22, 2011, at 12:38 AM, Larry Purss wrote:
>
> > My question to Martin was my attempt to understand our fundamental need
> for
> > recognition, [self/other], and how this fundamental need is transformed
> by
> > cultural-historical institutional arrangements
>
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