RE: [xmca] Re: One more example: errors in translation/interpretation

I am currently reading Levi-Strauss's "The Savage Mind" (1962), which
directly contradicts much of the view of the topic amongst the Vygotsky
School (e.g. that the language of tribal people was poor in abstractions,
or that their concepts are like complexes). I will raise this topic again
when I have finished the book, but I'd be interested to know if there has
been a previous discussion in print by CHAT theorists about Levi-Strauss's
conception of "The Savage Mind".

Andy
At 06:26 AM 30/03/2008 +0400, you wrote:
>Hi, Martin,
>
>you are touching upon the very interesting issue - the Vygotsky's position
>concerning the problem of interrelation between phylogenesis and
>ontogenesis. Incidentally that is one of alternative formula of the problem
>of historicism, and thus one of the most evident demonstration of the lack
>of genuine historicism in Vygotsky's theorizing.
>Vygotsky openly rejects Stanly Hall's recapitulation principle as something
>obviously naïve. We agree with him, it is utterly naïve to try to explain
>child's play with bow and arrows as a recapitulation of hunters stage in
>human history or a play with sand pie as a recapitulation of agricultural
>stage. But he throws the baby out with the bathwater rejecting not only
>naïve realization of the principle, but the principle as it is. In other
>words rejecting the principle of recapitulation Vygotsky rejects the
>historicism in understanding of humans consciousness. And the issue with
>interrelation of thinking and speech is an obvious demonstration of it.
>Let’s call a spade a spade. Vygotsky realized the very first steps in
>critical overcoming of old metaphysical psychology so that we can compare
>his role in the history of psychology with the role of Emmanuel Kant in the
>history of philosophy. You surely know that overcoming of the old
>philosophical metaphysics needed in additional theoretic work, in insights
>of such great figures as Fichte, Shelling, Hegel and Marx. The same
>situation we meet in psychology. To approach to dialectical psychology we
>need not to stick in Vygotsky’s “cultural-historical theory” (BTW
>Vygotsky
>never claimed that he elaborated something that can be estimated as a
>“theory” and never used the notion “cultural-historic” as the
>original name
>of his theoretic approach), but to follow the real history of
>cultural-historic ideas in psychology after Vygotsky. I mean the ideas of
>A.N.Leont’ev and E.Il’enkov.
>But not to sound proofless let’s return to our sheep.
>It is obvious that prior to try to find a dialectical interrelation between
>thinking and speech researcher needs to have dialectical notion of both
>sides of interrelation. Otherwise he risks to face insoluble contradictions
>later.
>What Vygotsky understood as thinking?
>It’s absolutely evident that he shared the sensualistic interpretation of
>thinking well-known in formal logic as a process of bringing of sensually
>perceived single instance under general concept. From this point of view a
>dull schoolchild who thoughtlessly acquire the skill of formal operations
>with words and can easily make formal group from words like “aryk”
>(irrigation ditch in Central Asia), “water”, “hoe” and “melon”
>has a more
>developed thinking, a thinking approaching the “scientific concepts”,
>whereas an illiterate peasant stands “on more primitive” stage so that his
>thinking can be estimated as only “thinking in complexes”.
>The same situation from dialectical perspective looks quite oppositely. The
>peasant who has a real skill of farming melons beyond all doubt has genuine,
>albeit practical, not theoretical concept (pon’atie) of all listed objects
>whereas our scholarlike schoolchild has only general notion (obschee
>predstavlenie), understands only common meaning of words and there is every
>likelihood that he/she has only one real idea (pon’atie): how to eat melons.
>Thus the understanding of thinking in Vygotsky’s theorizing is far from
>dialectic not only materialistic dialectic of Marx, but idealistic one of
>Hegel as well.
>Now let’s consider Vygotsky’s understanding of speech.
>In his “ Tool and sign in child’s development” Vygotsky tells us highly
>interesting experiment in which psychologist “plays” with a little
>child in
>renaming of objects.
>Thus a child easily agrees to rename say a pencil into a spoon and acts with
>the pencil as with a spoon “feeding” a doll.
>But the same child positively rejects a proposal to rename a knife into a
>chair. He/she looks at the experimenter with suspicion and “explains” him
>that it is quite impossible to rename a knife into a chair because it is
>foolish to sit on the knife.
>The key is Vygotsky’s interpretation of this fact.
>Vygotsky explains us that a child displays in this experiment the
>undeveloped character of his/her thinking, that “a child doesn’t discovers
>the relation between a sign and its meaning in the beginnings of speech and
>long after doesn’t come to awareness of this connection” (Nel'zya yasnee
>vyrazit' tot fakt, chto rebenok ne otkryvaet svyazi mezhdu znakom i
>znacheniem v samom nachale vozniknoveniya rechi i dolgoe vremya ne prihodit
>k osoznaniyu etoi svyazi).
>Paying attention to this issue Vygotsky displays a brilliant researchers
>intuition as well as complete misunderstanding of this interesting fact from
>dialectical perspective. From our point of view the child from the very
>beginning of his/her life demonstrates the object oriented character of
>his/her thinking. From this perspective the naming is an inalienable,
>integral part of practical attitude to the object. For a child words are
>means or tools of collaborative (with another human) object oriented
>activity and not a mean for formal senseless operations or renaming. Thus
>his/her “naivety” is much more wise than “sophisticated” position
>of an
>adult, playing with conventional meanings of words. Out of the mouth of
>babes and sucklings... To rename a knife into a chair is a lie, and baby
>protests against this falsification of reality. (Alas, lately most of us
>lose this initial wise position and reconcile us to all forms of social lie,
>forfeiting thus the ability to objective thinking.)
>In opposition to Vygotsky we insist that (after the age of approximately two
>months when occurs the complex of animation (kompleks ozhivleniya)) there is
>no stage during which human thinking is not mediated with another person.
>The only distinction is that in the early age such mediation exists in the
>form of “real life language” (Marx), while later it supplements with the
>verbal one. In other words there is no human thinking (acting) without human
>language as well as there is no human language in abstraction from real
>object oriented activity = thinking. Thus the idea about separate roots of
>thinking and speech proves to be quite false, as well as an idea of their
>encounter and mutual fertilization.
>Generally the dialectic never deals with “unities” of two different
>things,
>but only with identities of oppositions. An alive single whole splitting to
>opposite contradictory sides is inevitable basis of dialectical movement,
>its condition sine qua non.
>And finally I don’t really think that we can find the answers to our
>questions in Vygotsky’s texts. I do think that we can acquire it in real
>process of investigation of urgent psychological and educational problems.
>Vygotsky sincerely declared his intention to elaborate new materialistic as
>well as dialectical psychology, which will be based on ideas of Spinoza and
>Marx and made the first steps in this direction. Our task is to continue his
>work.
>Anyhow we, I mean Moscow group of Il’enkov’s disciples philosophers and
>psychologists, find both your articles utterly interesting as a fundamental
>attempt to settle very urgent problems. Now I am translating both of your
>articles into Russian (most of my friends knows only German ;-( ). We are
>planning to discuss them in detail.
>
>Sasha
>
>
>
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu] On
>Behalf Of Martin Packer
>Sent: Saturday, March 29, 2008 8:36 PM
>To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
>Subject: Re: [xmca] Re: One more example: errors in
>translation/interpretation
>
>Alexander,
>
>Can't we say that thinking and speech have independent roots within
>individual ontogenesis, but that in the longer view of cultural evolution
>both have their origins in human biology? I don't have the texts in front of
>me, but this seems to me to be the line of Vygotsky's reasoning.
>
>Martin
>
>
>On 3/24/08 10:59 PM, "Alexander Surmava" <monada@netvox.ru> wrote:
>
> > The first
> > idea that thinking and speech have different and independent roots is
> > basically incompatible with the next one concerning their "dialectical"
> > interaction. Those which are mutually alien are doomed to fruitful
> > superficial relation and any genuine dialectical relation in this case is
> > totally impossible.
>
>
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  Andy Blunden : http://home.mira.net/~andy/ tel (H) +61 3 9380 9435,
mobile 0409 358 651

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Received on Sat Mar 29 20:02 PDT 2008