Can we have the whole article?
-----Original Message-----
From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu on behalf of Andy Blunden
Sent: Thu 11/15/2012 6:24 PM
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: [xmca] Abstract to Concrete
Taylor & Francis allows xmca only discuss one article per issue, but I
see no reason why we couldn't discuss this excerpt from Engestrom's
paper. It concerns "rising from the abstract to the concrete," which we
were recently discussing, but without resolution.
--------------------------
Ascending from the abstract to the concrete is achieved through specific
epistemic or learning actions. Together these actions form an expansive
cycle or spiral. An ideal-typical sequence of epistemic actions in
ascending from the abstract to the concrete may be described as follows:
. The first action is that of questioning, criticizing, or
rejecting some aspects of the accepted practice and existing wisdom. For
the sake of simplicity, we will call this action questioning.
. The second action is that of analyzing the situation. Analysis
involves mental, discursive or practical transformation of the situation
in order to find out origins and explanatory mechanisms.
. The third action is that of modeling a new explanatory
relationship in some publicly observable and transmittable medium. This
means constructing an explicit, simplified model of the new idea, a germ
cell, that explains the problematic situation and offers a perspective
for resolving and transforming it.
. The fourth action is that of examining the model, running,
operating, and experimenting on it in order to fully grasp its dynamics,
potentials, and limitations.
. The fifth action is that of implementing the model,
concretizing it by means of practical applications, enrichments, and
conceptual extensions.
. The sixth and seventh actions are those of reflecting on and
evaluating the process and consolidating its outcomes into a new stable
form of practice.
--------------------
MCA 19(1) pp. 288-289.
Andy
mike cole wrote:
> Dear Colleagues--
>
> I have been reminded of an issue that has been nagging at me for
some time,
> that we have not had a discussion of any of the articles in the special
> issue of MCA called "concepts in the wild." The article selected by
a plurality of
> voters was by Chuck Bazerman on concepts in the process of writing.
But no one has
> commented on the article. That seems to me a shame. In fact, the entire
> issue, with its stellar set of authors and papers is worth
discussing, and I
> figure there will be more articles on this general theme in the
time to come, spanning as it does, the story of all those practice in
which we acquire and deploy concepts in organizing our social life and
experience the world.
>
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