Re: [xmca] Perezhivanie and Dewey's concept of experience

[Larry Purss <lpscholar2@gmail.com>]

Andy,
I have a similar question. It is this notion of experience being worked
OVER or rising above after being recalled and reworked for the *nth* time.
This notion of *rising above* while the troubling experience experienced as
a crisis is now  looked down upon as if *overcome*. It seems to me this
type of moving above the felt experience explained in notions of
*catharsis* and *transcendence* and *getting free* from the experience as a
process of reworking of the recollected experiences is one metaphor
emphasizing overcoming of intense experience.

An alternative understanding of felt experiences as  moving *through* or of
seeing *through* felt experiences which transforms the energy and the
psychic pain of the crisis may be another metaphor. Buddhist approaches to
developing *awareness* of the source of the suffering as *suchness* rather
than the alternative notion of *overcoming* recognizes that the
intense experiences may continue to be *recollected* and *reworked* but
over time  the person MAY develop a different quality of relationship to
this felt movement as the person at times continues to be carried along or
UNDERGOES the reworked experience.
I'm questioning if trauma or other intense experiences are ever *overcome*
or if we *rise above* the intensity of the recollections. Is it possible we
learn to live within the intense experiences which  sometimes suddenly pass
*through* us and we develop an ability to trust ourselves that when we are
undergoing and returning to these intense experiences we will survive and
that trust in our ability is a type of knowledge which means we have
developed in our relational capacity  to live *through* the intense
experience.
The reason I ask, is I have met a few psychotherapists who I believe
continued reworking experiences as personal *themes* One particular person
was Carl Whitaker  who in his 80's when talking about his dad had tears
well up and his voice cracked. His reflective comment when this experience
overcame him once again was to comment, "We don't ever transcend or get
over our deepest wounds."

Just wondering. Your question triggered this reflection.

Larry




On Mon, Feb 25, 2013 at 3:08 PM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net> wrote:

> Before moving on to Wundt, and Aristotle I wonder if any xmca
> correspondents could help me with this question?
>
> In my collection of quotes at http://www.ethicalpolitics.**
> org/seminars/perezhivanie.htm<http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/seminars/perezhivanie.htm>I was able to line up Dewey's concept of "an experience" with Vygotsky's
> concept of "perezhivanie" on 5 different "dimensions". But there is one
> aspect of perezehivanie which I can line up with Freud and Stanislavsky and
> several contemporary commentators such as Ferholt, Kravtsov, Vasilyuk, ...,
> but I can't find it in Dewey and I don't know where to find it in Vygotsky,
> and that is:
>
> * in order to function in development, perezhivanie must be "recalled" and
> "worked over" in "catharsis" which is related to what Mike Cole calls
> "prolepsis" or "temporality". Where do I find a clear expression for this
> idea in Vygotsky and is it to be found in Dewey?
>
> Andy
>
>
> Larry Purss wrote:
>
>> Mike, Andy, Martin
>>
>> Mike has summarized the thread to this point in the conversation with the
>> comment:
>>
>>  I was also delighted to see the connection to Dilthey. To me
>> he stands for the "understanding" side of Wundt's duality between
>> volkpsychology and experimental psychology. Two sides of the crisis.
>> Add it to your list of quotations about perezhivanie, Andy, and lets link
>> it somehow to xmca.
>>
>> Mike, as we link up Dilthey, Dewey, and Vygotsky we seem to be linking up
>> *lived experience* which emphasizes the SUBJECTIVE emotional, visceral
>> significance of lived experience.
>>
>> Another central concept is the understanding of *recollection* when the
>> impact of the situation on the person summons up the entire lived
>> experience of development.
>>
>> Does Aristotle's notion of *phronesis* as the relationship BETWEEN
>> *character* and *application* also offer another source for linking to
>> perezhivanie?? My reason for asking is that Gadamer has *recollected*
>> lived
>> experience as *flourishing* by returning to Aristotle. Aristotle also was
>> exploring notions of the *moral good* and I want to link this to page 3 of
>> Andy's notes on perezhivanie. On page 3 Vygotsky uses the metaphor of
>> *prism* and *refraction* on the environments role and influence on the
>> course of development. Vygotsky is suggesting the discipline of pedology
>> as
>> a genre OUGHT to always be capable of finding the particular *prism*
>> THROUGH WHICH the influence of the environment of the environment on the
>> child is REFRACTED. In Vygotsky's own words pedology:
>>
>> "OUGHT to be able to find the relationship which exists between the child
>> and its environment, the child's emotional experience [perezhivanie], in
>> other words how a child BECOMES AWARE of, INTERPRETS, [and] EMOTIONALLY
>> RELATES to a certain event. This is such a prism which DETERMINES the role
>> and influence of the environment on the development of, say, the child's
>> CHARACTER, his psychological development, etc.
>>
>> Andy the way you chose to present the multiple shades of meaning of
>> perezhivanie [TRANSlated as "lived experience"] through gathering together
>> multiple authors each presenting their particular understanding of "lived
>> experience" I found helpful in offering a deepening clarity of
>> perezhivanie. In conjunction with Dewey's understanding of aesthetic
>> experience as a deepening *intensification* of lived experience and
>> Dilthey's exploration of lived experience as *undergoing*, possible new
>> linkings or avenues of conversation open up.
>>
>> Fascinating thread which brings to center stage questions of subjectivity,
>> intra-subjectivity, inter-subjectivity, trans-subjectivity and how these
>> various understandings of subjectivity [and character development] link to
>> perezhivanie. I appreciate how XMCA is contributing to my personal
>> development.
>>
>> Larry
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Feb 24, 2013 at 6:25 PM, mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>> I expect Ivo just sat that dangling issue there on purpose and I was also
>>> delighted to see the connection to Dilthey.  To me
>>> he stands for the "understanding" side of Wundt's duality between
>>> volkpsychology and experimental psychology. Two sides of the crisis.
>>>
>>> Add it to your list of quotations about perezhivanie, Andy, and lets link
>>> it somehow to xmca.
>>>
>>> mike
>>>
>>> On Sun, Feb 24, 2013 at 6:05 PM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> Marvellous quote, Martin. None of these issues were discovered
>>>> yesterday,
>>>> it seems.
>>>> I had forgotten that a couple of years ago I made up a collection of
>>>> quotes from various writers on "Perezhivanie" here:
>>>> http://www.ethicalpolitics.****org/seminars/perezhivanie.htm<
>>>>
>>>>
>>> http://www.ethicalpolitics.**org/seminars/perezhivanie.htm<http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/seminars/perezhivanie.htm>
>>> >
>>>
>>>
>>>> Andy
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Martin Packer wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> On Feb 19, 2013, at 7:13 PM, Ivo Banaco <ibanaco@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Sorry, I've just realized I've mistaken Dewey with Dilthey, I wonder
>>>>>>> why...
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>> Perhaps because all of this was in Dilthey too.
>>>>>
>>>>> Dilthey (1833–1911) considered human experience (erlebnis, usually
>>>>> translated 'lived experience') to be concrete and historical, always
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>> shaped
>>>
>>>
>>>> by the context of the past and by the horizon of the future, and he
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>> argued
>>>
>>>
>>>> that lived experience is the basis for all understanding. Lived
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>> experience
>>>
>>>
>>>> is a direct, immediate, pre-reflective contact with life, an act of
>>>>> perceiving in which the person is unified with the object of their
>>>>> understanding. It is made up not of static cognitive categories but of
>>>>> meaningful unities which are prior to the separation between emotion,
>>>>> willing,  with knowing. Lived experience contains within it the
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>> temporality
>>>
>>>
>>>> of living, and of life itself.
>>>>> “That which in the stream of time forms a unity in the present because
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>> it
>>>
>>>
>>>> has a unitary meaning is the smallest entity which we can designate as
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>> an
>>>
>>>
>>>> experience” (Dilthey, Collected Works 7, 194)
>>>>>
>>>>> “The experience does not stand like an object over against its
>>>>> experiencer, but rather its very existence for me is undifferentiated
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>> from
>>>
>>>
>>>> the whatness which is present for me in it” (Collected Works 7, 139)
>>>>>
>>>>> Martin
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
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>>>>>
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>>>> --
>>>> ------------------------------****----------------------------**--**
>>>> ------------
>>>> *Andy Blunden*
>>>> Home Page: http://home.mira.net/~andy/
>>>> Book: http://www.brill.nl/concepts
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>>>>
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> --
> ------------------------------**------------------------------**
> ------------
>
> *Andy Blunden*
> Home Page: http://home.mira.net/~andy/
> Book: http://www.brill.nl/concepts
> http://ucsd.academia.edu/**AndyBlunden<http://ucsd.academia.edu/AndyBlunden>
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