Re: RE: [xmca] Hello Other Brain, how are you?

[Larry Purss <lpurss@shaw.ca>]

Hi Mabel

Thanks for your reply.
I mentioned the "Boston Change Process Study Group" as a quick way to explore this topic online.  However if you want the best source which elaborates this perspective I'm discussing  I would recommend you get Daniel Stern's book written recently which is called "The Present Moment in Psychotherapy and Everyday Life".  He builds his case point by point and references all the latest research in this area.  I"m glad to meet another person on chat who works in school settings, not in a teacher role but in a counselling role.  I also want to engage in school settings to promote the "social turn" in emerging perspectives in our culture and how they translate to school settings. Vygotsky has already been introduced to school settings through explorations of "developmental psychology" and learning (scaffolding and ZPD) and therefore is the best entry into schools to promote the "social turn" in relational cultural psychology.  I, like Andy, Mike and others also am interested in pragmatism, especially G.H. Mead as another stream of thought on the "social turn".  For this reason I am interested in the chat on Dewey and his perspective on "experience" as a term which can no longer carry his meaning and  his preference for the term "cultural".  I believe Dewey can be another way to amplify the "social turn" in school settings because he already is seen as part of the historical narrative of school culture.
My interest in relational psychoanalysis is my curiosity on how they are embracing the "social turn" especially in the area of infant research.  What they can add to the conversation is the recognition that development in the first years of life (at the sensorimotor level and the affective level) continues to develop and be elaborated and is not superceded by the "linquistic turn".  As D. Stern emphasizes, all the conversation and theorizing elaborating a new framework which embraces the "linquistic turn" is vital and critical to "open new spaces" in which to be human and move away with our fixation on the "encapsulated" individual of the Cartesian Paradigm. However, Stern's 30 years of studying mother-infant intersubjective relational patterns and others who share his sensibility (The Boston Change Study Group for example) believe we must also elaborate our understanding of "implicit relational knowing".  Andy's articles discuss Winnicot and his model of developmental psychology as adding to G.H. Mead's and other perspectives on the origins of the social "self". The perspective of Stern is elaborating this line of inquiry in the moment to moment PRACTICAL activity as we interact with others.
Mabel, like you I feel I'm bridging two worlds of experience and language games in the public school system. At times its overwhelming and disorienting as I try to elaborate a moral and ethical stance to guide how I ought to act in settings which expect me to act within an intrapsychic model. Vygotsky and CHAT  help refocus and revision how I ought to act..
I hope this helps.

Larry

----- Original Message -----
From: Mabel Encinas <liliamabel@hotmail.com>
Date: Sunday, November 15, 2009 9:03 am
Subject: RE: [xmca] Hello Other Brain, how are you?
To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>

> 
> Hi, Larry.
>  
> Thank you very much for the reference.
>  
> Actually, I have been studying 'affect attunement' (although I 
> do not call it in this way) in junior high school. I also 
> discuss the implicitness in the communitation, although I call 
> that unconscious, because it is not necessary that something has 
> to have been 'conscious' to become 'unconscious' (in 
> psychotherapy I am not a psychoanalist, but a Gestalt 
> psychotherapist, but my research is founded on Vygotsky). I will 
> check this as well!
>  
> Thank you again.
>  
> Mabel
> 
> 
> 
>  
> 
> > Date: Sat, 14 Nov 2009 19:50:05 -0800
> > From: lpurss@shaw.ca
> > Subject: Re: [xmca] Hello Other Brain, how are you?
> > To: xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
> > 
> > The discussion of the place of emotion in the developmental 
> process is a central question.
> > I want to once again recommend googling "Boston Change Process 
> Study Group" to read articles by a group of scholars engaging in 
> exploring the interface BETWEEN emotions (implicit knowing) and 
> consciousness (explicit understanding). Daniel Stern, a member 
> of this group, is a seminal thinker in this area of study.
> > They have studied the intersubjective processes of "affect 
> attunement" within the infant/caretaker relationship. They 
> differentiate intersubjective processes (psychological 
> processes) from "attachment" processes. HOWEVER what I believe 
> is their major focus is the recognition that the processes of 
> "implicit knowing" or "communication" that happen during infancy 
> (implicit affective knowing) do NOT become superceded when 
> language and symbolization is acquired. Their perspective is 
> that this level of implicit knowing continues to develop and 
> become more complex in the same way as cognition develops and 
> becomes elaborated. They take the position that relating at the 
> implicit level may become symbolically elaborated in language in 
> an intersubjective context and thereby become explixit 
> understanding. However it is their position that most implicit 
> ways of relating remain imlicit or unformulated (NOT UNCONSCIOUS 
> because they were never conscious before. The process is 
> relational and NOT an intrapsychic phenomena. However one can 
> take a phenomenological standpoint and make validity claims. 
> However one could just as well choose to take an intersubjective 
> communicative stance to "interpret" the processes. Or one could 
> take a third person stance to "construct" an explanation. Each 
> position taken allows one to make a validity claim one each 
> claim is only an interpretation.
> > However it is at the implicit level of intersubjective 
> contexts that " the person in "moments of meeting" experiences 
> feeling engaged and vital. 
> > I believe the construct of "learning" as mediated can benefit 
> from incorporating this level of analysis.
> > 
> > Andy this speaks to your statement that the "unit of analysis" 
> should be the "subject" as elaborated by Hegel.
> > 
> > Larry
> > 
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: Wolff-Michael Roth <mroth@uvic.ca>
> > Date: Saturday, November 14, 2009 8:17 am
> > Subject: Re: [xmca] Hello Other Brain, how are you?
> > To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> > 
> > > In the following piece, we show how emotion (as evidenced in 
> > > prosody) 
> > > is a resource for the coordination of social action. Michael
> > > 
> > > Cult Stud of Sci Educ
> > > DOI 10.1007/s11422-009-9203-8
> > > Solidarity and conflict: aligned and misaligned prosody
> > > as a transactional resource in intra- and intercultural
> > > communication involving power differences
> > > Wolff-Michael Roth Æ Kenneth Tobin
> > > 
> > > 
> > > On 2009-11-14, at 6:55 AM, Martin Packer wrote:
> > > 
> > > I'm going to ignore Andy's request to ignore his message to 
> > > Mabel, 
> > > because I'm sure Mabel is not the only person being told 
> this 
> > > sort of 
> > > thing. The claim, I suppose, is that emotion is a 
> > > subjective 
> > > experience, and therefore something mental, internal, 
> > > personal, 
> > > private and so inaccessible to other people, including the 
> > > researcher, 
> > > who has access only to the external 'expression' of that 
> > > emotion, on 
> > > the face, in movements, etc.
> > > 
> > > Nonsense. How to argue against that view? Take a look at Joe 
> > > de 
> > > Rivera's work on emotions as interpersonal movements, 
> towards or 
> > > away 
> > > from people on three interpersonal dimensions of intimacy, 
> > > openness, 
> > > and status. Read Hall and Cobey (1976) on emotion as 
> > > transformation of 
> > > the world. Read Mead's Mind, Self and Society where he 
> > > challenges 
> > > Darwin, insisting that "we cannot approach them [emotions] 
> from 
> > > the 
> > > point of view of expressing a content in the mind of the 
> > > individual" (p. 17) because to do so presumes a dualism 
> > > between 
> > > consciousness and the biological organism.
> > > 
> > > These are some resources that come immediately to my mind. 
> What 
> > > can 
> > > others out there recommend?
> > > 
> > > Martin
> > > 
> > > 
> > > On Nov 14, 2009, at 4:42 AM, Andy Blunden wrote:
> > > 
> > > > You have good muses Mabel (Vygotsky and Marx), pity you
> > > > don't have better supervisors. Your approach, studying
> > > > microsituations as social, is Vygotsky's approach too, I
> > > > think, and excellent one, that is often, I fear, not well
> > > > understood. I am probably the last person to ask about that
> > > > kind of problem as I have a devil of a problem making myself
> > > > understood. Others will know the answers to your questions
> > > > better than me, too. But I will mention a few suggestions.
> > > >
> > > > Mabel Encinas wrote:
> > > >> My supervisors are questioning now, that I do not study 
> > > emotions, 
> > > >> but "the expression of emotions". I know how to solidify 
> > > my 
> > > >> argument in this bit, but could you please give me some 
> > > references 
> > > >> of where should I read about the difference-relation 
> > > between 
> > > >> ontological and methodological dualism?
> > > >
> > > > I guess you have already read Vygotsky's comments on
> > > > ontological vs methodological/epistemological dualism:
> > > > http://marx.org/archive/vygotsky/works/crisis/psycri13.htm#p1367
> > > >
> > > > If you use Google on this one, you will probably find a page
> > > > where I am being attacked by someone called Neville for
> > > > failing to make this distinction. I am far from sure of the
> > > > value of that exchange but you are welcome to read it. I
> > > > would not attempt a short summary of this issue.
> > > >
> > > > I am not sure what you are being accused of about emotions.
> > > > Martha Nussbaum is a Critical Theorist who writes good stuff
> > > > about emotions. And of course everyone reads Antonio
> > > > Damassio, with his distinction between feelings and
> > > > emotions. Certainly, emotions are only present in
> > > > consciousness thanks to their "interpretation" by culturally
> > > > acquired concepts.
> > > >
> > > > ""the expression of emotions" is a strange expression to me.
> > > > Are they using "emotions" to refer to forms of consciousness
> > > > which are "expressed" in high blood pressure, etc? Or are
> > > > they using "emotions" to refer to physiological conditions,
> > > > which are "expressed" in the character of behavior. I don't
> > > > understand. I am sure others will know. Sounds like a
> > > > template accusation.
> > > >
> > > > Andy
> > > >
> > > > _______________________________________________
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