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Re: Fw: Re: [xmca] Double Stimulation?



Antti, I was directing my question to you and your remarks.

In Engestrom's highlky regarded, now out of print, 1987 text "Learning by Expanding", the famous triangle logo is given as Figure 2.6, and after a long consideration of "candidates" for "unit of analysis" he says the following about this triangle: "The model of Figure 2.6 may now be compared with the four criteria of a root model of human activity, set forth earlier in this chapter." and goes on to list and consider the criteria which are commonly associated in this current with the notion of "unit of analysis." (numerous citations are not required). But he never said that the triangle is a unit of analaysis, and it is not, and cannot be. He said it is a root model and it is. The root model is a system concept, not a unit of analysis.

Do you think it possible that this has been the source of some confusion?

Andy

Antti Rajala wrote:

Thanks Andy for sharing the wikipedia text, and your thoughts about the issue! The thoughts about unit of analysis were my own interpretation of the study, and I am not sure if the issue you raised concerns the original study.

Warm wishes, Antti



On Mon, Jun 10, 2013 at 9:20 AM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>> wrote:

    Antti, here is a link to th eWikipedia on "System concept"
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System
    Why do Activity Theorists in Engstrom's current of thinking mix up
    the idea of a system concept with a unit of analysis?

    Andy


    Antti Rajala wrote:

        Greg,

        You asked:
        ”My question is getting at where we locate "agency". In
        individuals alone?
        Or as possibly being distributed among multiple people and
        perhaps in
        amanner that isn't recognizable to the individual. But maybe
        there is
        aconcept for that that is different from "double stimulation.”

        I think that double stimulation can be analyzed not only at
        the individual
        level but at the collective level as well. Actually, the study
        of Engeström
        and Sannino (2013) that I referred to in my earlier email
        gives a nice
        example. The study also involves in some respects a similar
        situation as
        the one that you described having taken place with the workers
        in Malaysia.

        According to my reading, the study describes a change laboratory
        intervention taking place in a university library. The library
        as invited
        researchers to help them find new forms of work with research
        groups. A
        first stimulus emerges in the course of the change laboratory
        intervention,
        as a member of one of the research groups that the university
        library is
        delivering services says that they can find these services in
        the internet
        without the help of the library. Thus a problem emerges for
        the librarians
        to collectively produce a service that would be genuinely
        helpful for the
        research groups.

        In solving this problem, they organize their collective action
        with the
        help of a second stimulus, namely the concept of knotworking
        (Engeström,
        Engeström & Vähäaho, 1999) that the researchers have
        introduced in the
        beginning of the change laboratory. In particular, a new
        working group, a
        knot, is formed that starts to work with the emergent problem
        of inventing
        a useful service.

        What is in my opinion very innovative, Engeström and Sannino
        also provide
        an example of this second stimulus, the concept of
        knotworking, becoming an
        initial theoretical generalization that is reworked and
        enriched through a
        process of ascending from abstract to concrete as the
        intervention evolves.
        Specifically, in the end of the intervention, the concept of
        knotworking
        gives rise to many concrete, practical applications of the
        librarians' work
        at multiple levels of hierarchy.

        As for the unit of analysis, I think that the unit of analysis
        in the study
        is the intersection of several activity systems, the
        university libarary
        and the research groups, In terms of agency, one can maybe
        talk about
        shared transformative agency in which the subject is not an
        individual but
        a collective. (More about shared transformative agency, see
        Virkkunen’s
        paper in http://www.activites.org/v3n1/v3n1.book.pdf#page=43)

        Best wishes, Antti


        On Thu, Jun 6, 2013 at 6:57 PM, <ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org
        <mailto:ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org>> wrote:

            forgot to send this to XMCA

            -----Forwarded by ERIC RAMBERG/spps on 06/06/2013 10:56AM
            -----
            To: ablunden@mira.net <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>
            From: ERIC RAMBERG/spps
            Date: 06/06/2013 09:05AM

            Subject: Re: [xmca] Double Stimulation?

            True true, the history of philosophy does lead there Andy.
             But that leads
            to my trepidations regarding ideology lacking in practice.

            What substance within conscious formation is measurable?

            I believe that answer has yet to be found
            perhaps?

            eric

            -----xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu
            <mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu> wrote: -----
             To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity"
            <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu <mailto:xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>>
            From: Andy Blunden
            Sent by: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu
            <mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu>
            Date: 06/05/2013 08:42PM
            Subject: Re: [xmca] Double Stimulation?

            Eric,
            By posiing the problem as that of the Kantian dilemma, of
            unifying two
            disparate abstractions, you determine the answer as from
            the history of
            philosophy and the answer is Hegel's answer: "a formation of
            consciousness" or Gestalt des Bewusstsein.

            Andy

            ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org <mailto:ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org> wrote:
                I believe that this discussion needs to involve "unit
                of analysis" for
                what it is that provides the mediational method.
                What unit of study can properly encapsulate that which
                is being observed?
                Activity? Concept? Word? Mirror Neuron?
                Oh my what a great temptest LSV did let out of the teapot
                eric

                -----xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu
                <mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu> wrote: -----
                To: "xmca@weber.ucsd.edu <mailto:xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>"
                <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu <mailto:xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>>
                From: Achilles Delari Junior
                Sent by: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu
                <mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu>
                Date: 06/05/2013 07:04AM
                Subject: RE: [xmca] Double Stimulation?

                Sure, Greg,
                Well, seems to me that "draw analogies between
                different domains of
                their worlds" is closer to "meaning construction" than
                to choice a
                "stimulus medium" to help memory tasks, for instance.
                The "double
                stimulation" is fine because introduces a kind of
                mediation between a
                stimulus and our response to the stimulus. But,
                following Vygotsky's
                formulations at that time this new series of
                "stimulus" (a nude, a
                word, etc) act also as a stimulus, a conditioned one.
                If you change
                you paradigm to the proposition that all sign implies
                any kind of
                "generalization process" (meaning) that differs in
                their structure and
                has a genetic construction (see the studies about
                concepts, for
                instance), a sign could not be only a second series of
                stimuli ruled
                by the same laws that a conditional reflex... As in
                "Instrumental
                method": S-------X-------R. Where the relation
                S---------R is a direct
                stimulus response relationship, but when you introduce
                a second series
                of stimulus "X" (double stimulation) you have an
                indirect stimulus
                response relationship, but the relation between S and
                X, and X and R
                remain a conditioned reflex relationship... "Draw
                analogies between
                different domains of our worlds" seem to mean that we
                are in transit
                between different words of signification, and culture
                is a human
                production that involves the "generalization" from a
                world to another,
                broader, maybe not exactly more precise, but
                "broader", in my opinion.
                I don't know...


                "In natural memory a direct associative (conditional
                reflex)
                connection A?B is established between two stimuli A
                and B. In
                artificial, mnemotechnic memory of the same
                impression, by means of a
                psychological tool X (a knot in a handkerchief, a
                mnemonic scheme)
                instead of the direct connection A?B two new ones are
                established: A?X
                and X?B Just like the connection A?B each of them is a
                natural
                conditional reflex process, determined, by the
                properties of the brain
                tissue. What is new, artificial, and instrumental is
                the fact of the
                replacement of one connection A?B by two connections:
                A?X and X?B They
                lead to the same result, but by a different path. What
                is new is the
                artificial direction which the instrument gives to the
                natural process
                of establishing a conditional connection, i.e., the
                active utilization
                of the natural properties of brain tissue." Vygotsky
                "The Instumental
                Method" (this is 1930)
                http://www.marxists.org/archive/vygotsky/works/1930/instrumental.htm

                But already in 1928:

                "Let us now compare the natural and cultural mnemonics
                of a child. The
                relation between the two forms can be graphically
                expressed by means
                of a triangle: in case of natural memorization a
                direct associative or
                conditional reflexive connection is set up between two
                points, A and
                B. In case of mnemotechnical memorization, utilizing
                some sign,
                instead of one associative connection AB, the others
                are set up AX and
                BX, which bring us to the same result, but in a
                roundabout way. Each
                of these connections AX and BX is the same kind of
                conditional-reflexive process of connection as AB."
                Vygotsky (1928)

            http://www.marxists.org/archive/vygotsky/works/1929/cultural_development.htm
                See: "AX and BX is the same kind of
                conditional-reflexive process of
                connection as AB." --> The same kind... This paradigm
                will not be the
                same in 1933-34...

                "(Introduction: the importance of the sign; its social
                meaning). In
                older works we ignored that the sign has meaning. <
                But there is “a
                time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones
                together”
                (Ecclesiastes). > We proceeded from the principle of
                the constancy of
                meaning, we discounted meaning. But the problem of
                meaning was already
                present in the older investigations. Whereas before
                our task was to
                demonstrate what “the knot” and logical memory have in
                common, now our
                task is to demonstrate the difference that exists
                between them.From
                our works it follows that the sign changes the
                interfunctional
                relationships." (Vygotsky, 1933-34)

            http://www.marxists.org/archive/vygotsky/works/1934/problem-consciousness.htm
                And now?


                Thank you.

                Achilles.

                    Date: Tue, 4 Jun 2013 18:31:23 -0600
                    Subject: Re: [xmca] Double Stimulation?
                    From: greg.a.thompson@gmail.com
                    <mailto:greg.a.thompson@gmail.com>
                    To: xmca@weber.ucsd.edu <mailto:xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>

                    Achilles,

                    Sounded interesting, but I'm not sure I followed
                    you completely. You
            say
                    that Strathern's quote seems like it has a broader
                    application that
                "double
                    stimulation", but I could use some help with the
                    rest of your message.

                    If you have a few minutes, maybe you could try
                    rephrasing?

                    -greg


                    On Tue, Jun 4, 2013 at 4:11 PM, Achilles Delari
                    Junior <
                    achilles_delari@hotmail.com
                    <mailto:achilles_delari@hotmail.com>> wrote:

                        In my undertanding, this is very broader and
                        more powerful than
            double
                        stimulation... Double stimulation could be
                        overcoming with another
                way for
                        think signs than "medium stimulus" - See "The
                        problem of
                consciousness"
                        (1933-34), for instance. The more important
                        will be not the
            similarity
                        between a nude and a word, but their
                        difference, "before was
                forgotten that
                        sign had a meaning" and "now" the meaning must
                        be take in account.
                Double
                        stimulation, in my understanding, do not
                        resists to this new point
                of view.
                        Achilles.

                            Date: Mon, 3 Jun 2013 06:19:04 -0600
                            From: greg.a.thompson@gmail.com
                            <mailto:greg.a.thompson@gmail.com>
                            To: xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
                            <mailto:xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>;
                            lchcmike@gmail.com
                            <mailto:lchcmike@gmail.com>;
                antti.rajala@helsinki.fi <mailto:antti.rajala@helsinki.fi>
                            CC:
                            Subject: [xmca] Double Stimulation?

                            I wonder if this quote by Marilyn
                            Strathern can be productively
                connected
                            (not necessarily geneaologically, but
                            ideologically) to the
                notion of
                            "double stimulation" (which I am just now
                            trying to figure out):
                            "Culture consists in the way people draw
                            analogies between
            different
                            domains of their worlds" (1992: 47).

                            -greg

                            --
                            Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
                            Visiting Assistant Professor
                            Department of Anthropology
                            883 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
                            Brigham Young University
                            Provo, UT 84602
                            http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson
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                    --
                    Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
                    Visiting Assistant Professor
                    Department of Anthropology
                    883 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
                    Brigham Young University
                    Provo, UT 84602
                    http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson
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            <http://home.mira.net/%7Eandy/>
            Book: http://www.brill.nl/concepts
            http://marxists.academia.edu/AndyBlunden

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    Book: http://www.brill.nl/concepts
    http://marxists.academia.edu/AndyBlunden

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