Re: [xmca] Taking culture into account/Doing harm?

[Huw Lloyd <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com>]

On 25 July 2012 16:50, White, Phillip <Phillip.White@ucdenver.edu> wrote:

> Andy - thanks for the Scribner article - much appreciated.
>
> i had no intention of suggesting a cause and effect description of CHAT as
> you've described below.  nor am i suggesting that all problems anyone faces
> in life are to be ascribed to a teacher, or tyrants.
>
>
My reading of colonization in this context was of an enforced mediation,
e.g. railroads, television, computing, money & consumerism, of which the
only defence is conscious organization, e.g. intracultural agreement to
sustain the means of production in which values are education/practice are
inherent.

Were the "2 hours of schooling" the crucible by means of which the native
pupil would accommodate a central pervasive orientation (to help them swim
better in the wider invasive culture), it's not so hard to imagine why it
might be the target of vitriol.  If a railroad is undermining your local
culture, why should you care if the cargo only ships for a few hours a day?

Anyway I've other distractions keeping me reading Lave/Richardson, so
you'll have to tell me whether I'm way off here.

Huw

thanks,
>
> p
>
> ________________________________________
> From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu [xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu] On Behalf
> Of Andy Blunden [ablunden@mira.net]
> Sent: Wednesday, July 25, 2012 12:23 AM
> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Subject: Re: [xmca] Taking culture into account/Doing harm?
>
> I do think we have to stop totalising in this way.
>
> Teacher trained in CHAT = Vygotsky = Soviet Union = Stalinist
> colonisation of Baltic States, therefore if a teacher has been taught
> Vygotsky in their teacher training, they are continuing the colonising
> practices of Stalin's USSR. Meanwhile, because an indigneous child
> attends school for a few hours a week for several years of their life,
> all the problems facing an indigenous person living in a settler nation
> are put down to their teacher, and thereby Stalin's colonising policies.
>
> I have attached a scan of Sylvia Scribner's "Vygotsky's Uses of History"
> which is worth reading.
>
> Andy
>
>
>
> White, Phillip wrote:
> > good morning, Mike, and everyone else who've read both the Lave article
> and the Richardson article -
> >
> > from my perspective, the Richardson article is a good example of Lave's
> call to be will to take a political stance in one's work.
> >
> > i understand Richardson's critique as being both intercultural as well
> as intracultural - intercultural as his cultural heritage is one that has
> been oppressed to a near point of extinction by we european-rooted
> colonizers, and he is calling attention to the historical and present day
> fact that our european based epistemologies marginalize at best, while
> usually attempting to erase Indigenous epistemologies.  furthermore,
> ironically, the very tools of multicultural education result more in
> enclosure of Indigenous epistemologies rather than inclusion.
> >
> > on the other-hand, Richardson's critique is also intracultural so far as
> he is a fellow academic using multiple academic cultural tools of
> argumentative discourse to press his point.
> >
> > what strikes me thus far is that it appears that rather than engaging in
> his critique, we've veered off (my perception) into the morality of
> inter-intra-cultural critique.
> >
> > i think that Richardson is putting forth epistemologies that i can
> barely wrap my head around: "sharing a spirit"; "shadow memories and
> imagination are foundational to rational thinking"; "shimmers of
> imagination are reason"; "shadow relations in visionary narratives", etc.
>  part of my mind rebels against what i think of as - i can't find the right
> word at this moment.  but it's akin to transubstantiation.
> >
> > at the same time, Richardson's work calls into question the genealogy of
> CHAT is that part of its roots are in marxist communism, a theory that
> assumes that communism is the way, truth and light for the organization of
> human activities.  Wertsch demonstrates this quite clearly in his research
> in Estonia, in which Estonians being educated within the russian hegemony
> of soviet history, learned the language structures to be repeated as a kind
> of catechism in order to do well at school, all the while learning cultural
> "truths" at home about Estonian history.  (it is of the greatest irony that
> within the three baltic nations that now russians are utilizing the
> language structure of victimhood, all the while denying the history of
> russian oppression.  but, american history as understood by most americans
> has little understanding of american oppression.)
> >
> > i think that one of our shared cultural practices as academics is that
> we want to demonstrate what we do know, and become deeply hesitant to
> discuss areas in which we're pretty ignorant.  this is my take on why from
> my point of view it's been so difficult to tackle Richardson's primary
> argument - which is that historically, our practices as americans has been
> the eradication of Indigenous epistemologies, though we're perfectly happy
> to display their cultural artifacts in our museums.
> >
> > i would think that those of you from any part of the world that's been
> colonized even if your roots are those of the colonizers should be able to
> recognize.
> >
> > and, in the immortal words of Eugene, "What do you think?"
> >
> > phillip
> >
> > Phillip White, PhD
> > Urban Community Teacher Education Program
> > School of Education & Human Development
> > University of Colorado Denver
> > phillip.white@ucdenver.edu
> > ________________________________________
> > From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu [xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu] On
> Behalf Of mike cole [lchcmike@gmail.com]
> > Sent: Sunday, July 22, 2012 10:15 AM
> > To: eXtended Mind, Culture,Activity
> > Subject: [xmca] Taking culture into account/Doing harm?
> >
> > The attached article has been hanging around my desktop for some time
> now.
> > It
> > is critical of people like myself who had sought ways in ways to assist
> > kids from
> > non-mainstream cultural communities when they encounter standard
> schooling.
> >
> > At least one of the shoes provided seems to fit. Seems worth reflecting
> on
> > the critique
> > as a whole.
> >
> > Anyone interested?
> >
> > mike
> > __________________________________________
> > _____
> > xmca mailing list
> > xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
> > http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
> >
> >
>
> --
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> *Andy Blunden*
> Joint Editor MCA: http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/hmca20/18/1
> Home Page: http://home.mira.net/~andy/
> Book: http://www.brill.nl/concepts
> __________________________________________
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