Andy,
I
think I am following your argument here, but I am wondering if you
could clarify your use of *coextensive* in “And when in
a given circumstance we have practical activity (making bars) and
discourse (expert talk, issuing advice) going on together, then these
different strands weave together as extended projects/concepts that
lock into the overall social fabric by not being coextensive.
I.e., a particular discourse is not excluively located within a certain
"activity."” And as
in your last sentence: “…because these threads are not
coextensive.”
It is the relationality in both Activity and
Discourse that is difficult to define and translate into research
because of the necessity for a *unit* of analysis. The confusion
about *discourse* comes from its ambiguous meaning, often used
(or limited to use), as interchangeable with *unit* of study, a
singular object (or molecular). This usage is reflected in monological
approaches to language study versus dialogical approaches (Linell,
2009).
It strikes me: if we are using construction as a
metaphor for knowledge building and mind making, maybe it is this
metaphor that keeps us going back to the individual parts that are
required for construction. Same with discourse: ...a discourse is
constructed…And then we are inspired by the opposing direction of
sequential processing (deconstruction). This tendency towards seriality
is maybe the difficulty in defining instructional methods in both math
and language. I am not saying the components and sequences are
unnecessary (Pedagogical knowledge often being dichotomized as content
and process), but beyond the parts, we are pulled back to the
understanding of the elements in context, integrated, all happening
simultaneously as important to both Activity and Discourse and I would
say to borrow from the study David K cited before, the enactment of
understanding in math or language arts.
Just thinking out loud,
Monica
Thanks for that Mike. for resurrecting my
original question (which may could not be clarified through
difficulties in learning maths as I'd hoped) and for the Engestrom
paper. As Engstrom says: "a theoretical integration of these two
[talking and acting] has not yet been accomplished."
Engestrom is discussing exactly the problem of the relation of
Discourse Analysis and Activity Theory, in the context of the relation
between a Discourse and an Activity. In the fine detail of the
performance of Activity and Discourse, the two are of course
inextricable. The hope of some Discourse analysts to make conversation
an object of analysis, while abstracting the conversation from what the
talkers were trying to do (or talking about) is clearly (to
Activity Theorists and the participants, if not the analysts) vacuous.
But also, it is obvious that if we try to make some kind of dichotomy
between practical activity (as in making metal bars and operating
machines) and discursive activity (talking about it, issuing commands,
etc.) then we can't make any sense of Activity either. Even a dichotomy
of Actions is problematic, but maybe has some sense. It is self-evident
and obvious the distinction between words and practical actions, but
speaking is also an action and all practical actions also have a
symbolic effect.
To this end, the question of unit of analysis is raised. Engstrom wants
to make a "situated activity system as the basic unit of analysis." But
this defeats the purpose. It is actually taking the analytical road,
not the road of Goethe and Hegel and Vygotsky, in my view. If we break
the whole down into situated units which contain systems of activity,
inclusive of the talk going on and the surrounding artefacts (machinery
etc), then try to assemble the whole again, we find on the one hand the
"long duration" concept of the specific industry producing metal
components, and on the other, the "historically distinctive social
languages at work, namely the social language of the machinists and the
social language of the expert engineers." That is, there are discourses
(plural) sustained of course, by practical activity (visiting
workshops, attending conferences, writing papers, having conversations)
and mathematics is one of them. And when in a given circumstance we
have practical activity (making bars) and discourse (expert talk,
issuing advice) going on together, then these different strands weave
together as extended projects/concepts that lock into the overall
social fabric by not being coextensive. I.e., a particular
discourse is not excluively located within a certain "activity."
So I don't think it works to take a molecule of talk-and-labour as a
"unit of analysis" unless we just want to be analytical sociologists,
and nor can we take (I believe) Discourses to be a particular variety
of Activities (because the Actions entailed, meanings, are always
inextricably connected with practical Actions, as per Bakhtin's
Utterances). You can't have an Activity that doesn't include talk or a
Discourse that doesn't include or imply practical actions as well as
meanings.
So, for example, mathematics is a Discourse. There we have a unit of
analysis. I believe Anna is in agreement here. Doing mathematics
involves talking and all sorts of practical actions. It also has the
structure and movement of a concept: a system of judgments - acts of
thinking - of long duration, which has an internal unity thanks to the
word. So the Activities (units of Activity) are long threads which are
overlapping and interacting in the concrete situation, which gains its
tensions, contradictions, its nature as a predicament, because these
threads are not coextensive.
I think we have to merge the concepts of an Activity and a Discourse.
They are inextricable.
Andy
mike cole wrote:
Dear Colleagues--
I am poking along at the question of activity and discourse.
While poking around, it occurred to me that Yrjo had written a paper on the
topic. The context is different-- a special issue of a journal on
organizational communication, but it
seems as if it might be relevant to Andy's question and Anna's answers.
mike
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