Re: [xmca] LCA- & bersein?

From: Mike Cole (lchcmike@gmail.com)
Date: Sun Aug 28 2005 - 08:53:42 PDT


Phil--- My note was intended to extend Lars' noticing of a different way of
thinking about horizontal/vertical dimensions
of change/development/human experience/etc. I had not been able to
assimilate the comments about Latour at the time
they were made, and since Latour is not a shared reading, was unsure of how
to respond. I am still unclear about the idea
of Latour being a-theoretical, but figure its my fault for not doing the
appropriate reading.

Now there is something in your message that I did not understand-- the idea
of exotropic and endotropic theories and the possibility that there is an
unrecognized fault line running between those who favor one over the other.

According to OED:

 *e[image: {sm}]xophora* *n.* *Gram.*, a mode of reference in which the
significance of a substitutional element or pro-form is determined by
situational knowledge on the part of the reader or listener; opp. *endophora
* n. s.v. *ENDO-</cgi/crossref?query_type=word&queryword=exotropic&first=1&max_to_show=10&single=1&sort_type=alpha&xrefword=endo->.

*1976* HALLIDAY <http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-h.html#halliday> &
HASAN *Cohesion in Eng.* ii. 33 We shall find it useful..to have a special
term for situational reference. This we are referring to as **exophora*, or
*exophoric* reference. *1984* *Discourse Processes* VII. I. 58 The register
characteristic of speakers sharing many common assumptions conveys meaning
contextually and is characterized by a greater incidence of exophora; for
example, Hand *it* over, where the meaning of *it* is conveyed by a gesture

 *endotropic*.

Chiefly of Mycorrhiza: nourished from within; growing within the cells of
plant roots. Opp.
ECTOTROPHIC</cgi/crossref?query_type=misspelling&queryword=endotropic&first=1&max_to_show=10&sort_type=alpha&search_id=rqK1-rPxAyS-1105&control_no=null&result_place=1&xrefword=ectotrophic&ps=a.>
*a.*

*1899* *Ann. Bot.* XIII. 7 The presence of an endotropic mycorhiza in the
roots of the *Aplectrum* would lessen the tendency to the formation of an
ectotropic layer with a second fungus
 
With those definitions in hand, even using Halliday and Hasan as source,
might you explain how it relates to cultural historical theories? Don't they
look to the social orgins of higher
psychological function (exotrpic explanation?). Isn't development seen as
transformations over time that are not based on single individuals?
 
Color me confused here.
Note, interestingly, that Yrjo is beginning to use Mycorrhiza as a way of
conceiving of systems change. Unusual confluence.
 
Harry Daniels' empirical work has provided what to my mind are very useful
contributions to understanding Bernstein AND relations of
the different scholars whose ideas we have been batting around.
mike
 

On 8/28/05, Phil Chappell <philchappell@mac.com> wrote:
>
> Dear Lars and Mike,
>
> Please see this link
> http://communication.ucsd.edu/MCA/Mail/xmcamail.2005_07.dir/0174.html
> for Lars' original post re: Basil Bernstein's paper on knowledge
> structures. The reply you talk about, I think, was mine, and it was
> less a reply than a personal response to the paper. I was hoping that
> others more tuned into Bernstein's work would field Lars' responses,
> since we are pushing the discipline boundaries here. Indeed as we have
> seen from Ruqaiya Hasan's papers and posts here over the past few
> weeks, she favours theories of an exotropic kind, which have a systemic
> and dynamic nature to them. I just wonder whether some here may be a
> little sensitive to this topic due to an orientation to more endotropic
> theories, which are centred on more isolated objects of study? I don't
> know, but I feel that mention of Bernstein here draws blanks, yawns or
> even contemptuous stares.
>
> Quoting Frances Christie 1999 ("Pedagogy and the Shaping of
> Consciousness"), "...how rarely social theories have usefully brought
> together insights from sociology and linguistic studies, though
> Bernstein, Cicourel and Grimshaw are theorists who have used actual
> speech data to develop their theories". And of course, Halliday is
> another.
>
> For me, I am challenged by the precision with which Bernstein locates
> knowledge structures, and the potential of Halliday's linguistic system
> to articulate the differences.
>
> I don't have the artistic ability, however, to represent my thinking
> through triangles!
>
> Now, back to Lars' point
>
> Lars wrote:
> My question is - when the paper conclusively points towards focusing on
> a
> problem instead of a theory as a solution to the issues of too many
> specified languages, is there not a discrepancy between the use of
> Latours
> notion of a theory-free approach and the notion of the sketched
> horizontal-vertical dichotomy?
>
> Lars Rossen
>
>
>
> On 27/08/2005, at 10:45 PM, Mike Cole wrote:
>
> > Dear Xmca-O-filoites.
> >
> > Yesterday a too and from plan trip afford me plenty of undisturbed
> > reading
> > time and I did what lars asked to do. Think about him.
> > In Lar's case (see July messages in the archive), here is what he had
> > to say
> > about reading Bernstein. He got a reply I have not
> > found, so this may be passe, but here is what Lars said and it
> > intersected
> > the thoughts I had had while reading.
> >
> > Lars wrote
> > :*******************************************
> >
> > When reading the Bernstein paper I had the feeling that the
> > descriptions of
> > vertical discourses would link to Latour's analysis of institutional
> > life
> > and their localized, emerging discourses – and the connection is
> > indeed made
> >
> > in the end. However from my (somewhat fragmented and far from
> > qualified)
> > reading of both the researchers in focus, a question comes to mind: I
> > am
> > under the impression that Latour would claim that any and all
> > discourses,
> > theoretically specialized or not, would be horizontal, situated and
> > take the
> >
> > shape of enclaves – and these enclaves will, through their research and
> > science production contribute to the language of science, reshaping the
> > general scientific language tools by participation and localized
> > negation
> > that spreads into the larger network of science workers.
> > Even though the language might be structured around established
> > cannons (as
> > science) it will quickly reshape under the influence of the language
> > users
> > (as research). As far as I understand the Latourian mindset, it can
> > not be a
> >
> > question of vertical vs. horizontal discourses, or putting one over the
> > other, since this would be in opposition to the idea of the network (or
> > work-net) where the discourse of everyday life and science and research
> > float back and forth within the enclave and between the nodes in the
> > net as
> > a larger set of enclaves.
> > Where the dichotomy of the two axis seems to imply that one has to
> > develop
> > from a lover state to a higher – rise from the profane to the academic
> > - in
> > order to participate in the scientific discourse and that the
> > acquisition of
> >
> > the vertical languages equals a adaptation to a pre-set structure and
> > growth
> >
> > towards a given set of behaviors by learning the hind lying theoretic
> > frame
> > work, Latour seems to bring emphasis to the fact that knowledge
> > distribution
> >
> > and social development is a matter of circulated and indeed
> > non-hierarchical
> >
> > negotiations and refrains from giving any heed to theoretical
> > frameworks or
> > power structures that might be governing the network in question –
> > meaning
> > specialized language becomes a tool among many others that can be
> > analyzed
> > alongside any other tool in play – very much in line with the activity
> > theoretical understanding.
> >
> > My question is - when the paper conclusively points towards focusing
> > on a
> > problem instead of a theory as a solution to the issues of too many
> > specified languages, is there not a discrepancy between the use of
> > Latours
> > notion of a theory-free approach and the notion of the sketched
> > horizontal-vertical dichotomy?
> >
> > Lars Rossen wrote:
> >
> > Latour seems to bring emphasis to the fact that knowledge distribution
> > and social development is a matter of circulated and indeed
> > non-hierarchical
> >
> > negotiations and refrains from giving any heed to theoretical
> > frameworks or
> > power structures that might be governing the network in question –
> > meaning
> > specialized language becomes a tool among many others that can be
> > analyzed
> > alongside any other tool in play – very much in line with the activity
> > theoretical understanding.
> > ******************************************************************
> > This description of Latour vs Bernstein is a fascinating replay, in
> > post-modern
> > terms what Sylvia Scriner and I wrote about one of Bernstein's earlier
> > influential
> > volumes. But before reading the note, I was coming at it in terms of
> > the
> > Expanded
> > Triangle that serves as a germ cell for CHAT in relation to Bernstein.
> >
> > 1988 I wrote a paper about the historical convergence of
> > American-style,
> > context/activity
> > focused in anthrhopology, sociology, and psychology by scholars for
> > whom
> > fieldwork,
> > discourse analaysis, institutional analysis were the great and butter,
> > with
> > the German-Russian
> > approach which emphasized not-synchronic heterogeneity, but historical
> > (genetic) transformation.
> >
> > CHAT, although I had no name for it at the time, is analogous to the
> > historical and phylogenetic lines
> > converging in the language and al the semiotic means that are our
> > enviroment.
> >
> > In Seville I am going to talk about important points of uncertainty,
> > imprecision, and confusions of thinking
> > (I am thinking about myself here) accompahy the CHAT discourse along a
> > number of different important
> > dimensinos. Hierarchy is one of them. I found it interesting that
> > Bernstein,
> > whose sociological focus is
> > has often been about class, repersented the "hierachical knowledge
> > structure" as a triangle. Burke a
> > pentad, Yrjo the expanded triangle.
> >
> > In an article somewhere 30 years ago, Zaparozhets wrote about
> > development as
> > an increase in the range of
> > cutlural contexts/events/practices/etc a child could participate in.
> > The
> > idea is not absent from the cutlural-
> > historical theorists, rather, it has different ideological
> > significance.
> >
> > Adding Latour seems appropriate to me.Bernstein uses Bourdieu, a name
> > we
> > hear often in discussions that
> > link chat ideas to family members.
> >
> > I gather from Kris G with whom I shared a cab yesterday that an issue
> > perhaps not fully explored in this group concerns
> > the privileging of language over other cultural/semiotic means.For
> > another
> > discussion.
> >
> > Anyway, a good topic to consider on a list about current
> > accomplishments and
> > inadequcies of CHAT as a mode of
> > (scientific?) inquiry?
> > mike
> > _______________________________________________
> > xmca mailing list
> > xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
> > http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
> >
>
>
>
>
>
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