Re: [xmca] Soft Power and Collective Sense Making

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

On 13 May 2013 15:46, mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com> wrote:

> Everything is related to everything else, Larry. Still, if we simply engage
> in Vygotskian chaining, it makes more effective concept development a
> little iffy.  :-)
>
> I think your question is related to Martin's regarding power and
> positive/negative
> effects. I found David ES who is cc'ed on this note. Like more than a few
> of us,
> this is a busy time of year for him, but he has been on xmca before and
> hopefully
> will join the conversation. If we are lucky we might get Harry to
> participate as well -- as I said, the discussion of Bernstein is important,
> and, I might add, of Hasan and Halliday as well. But first, Spicer Eddy!
>

Yes, it would be good to get Harry's voice too.  For me, David's article
presents some stepping stones (the "positioning") between the
institutionalised implicit mediation that Harry references (Daniels, 2010)
and the materialised forms of mediation that Wertsch has typically focused
upon.

Regarding the sign-activity divergence.  My interpretation (which the
article does not point to) is of the divergence in conceptualisation of
development according to sociocultural and Activity-Theoretic
orientations.  As I understand it, In the conventional _developmental_
understanding the sign manifests and moves as part of the learning dynamic
(tool & symbol, Luria & Vygotsky) whereas in Activity Theoretic approaches
the "social development" is a more overt designed process.  In this regard,
I interpret the object-oriented and semiotic aspects as being the other way
around... because the Activity-Theoretic (i.e. Engestrom's approach) is not
focused on the object-oriented activity, rather it is focused on social
reflections.  The use of "semiotic" here is rather ambiguous for me, I am
inferring it to mean the symbolic form that is manifest and derived from
the social work or praxis (Ratner, 1997, p. 103; Daniels et al, 2010, p.
106).

Huw

http://www.marxists.org/archive/vygotsky/works/1934/tool-symbol.htm
Daniels, H. (2010). Mediation in the Development of Interagency Work. In H.
Daniels, A. Edwards, Y.
Engestrom, T. Gallagher, & S. R. Ludvigsen (Eds.), Activity Theory in
Practice: Promoting Learning Across Boundaries and Agencies (pp. 105–125).
Routledge.
Ratner, C. (1997). *Cultural Psychology and Qualitative Methodology:
Theoretical and Empirical Considerations* (p. 262). Springer.


> g'day!
> mike
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