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Re: [xmca] Double Stimulation?



Dear Yro and Andy,

It would benefit a lot this list if you actually engage in a serious
dialogue rather than pretend that you have foreign and incomprehensible
languages, which is not of course true or you wouldn't be here.

If we go back to Marx for example committed as he was to study Capitalism
we already have a good demonstration of a system (capitalism) and he found
of course a unit of analysis from which to proceed, the commodity. Does it
make any sense to start from here?

Ivo




On Wed, Jun 12, 2013 at 11:17 AM, Antti Rajala <ajrajala@gmail.com> wrote:

> Sorry about this earlier empty email. My phone seems to have written
> something on its own.
> Best, Antti
>
> Antti Rajala wrote:
>
> AaSAA
>
>
> On Wed, Jun 12, 2013 at 8:41 AM, Antti Rajala <ajrajala@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > AaSAA
> >
> > keskiviikko 12. kesäkuuta 2013 Greg Thompson kirjoitti:
> >
> > Antti,
> >> And not to overwhelm you Antti, (and first thanks for sharing your notes
> >> with me offline), but I have a follow-up question about how the concept
> of
> >> "knots" and "knotworking" is being used by Engestrom and Sannino (I
> recall
> >> some fondness for knots and knotworking by folks at LCHC - Jay, Mike,
> Ivan,
> >> Camille, and Robert preeminent among them, but most literally embodied
> by
> >> the work of Rachel Pfister who is studying Ravelry - an online knitting
> >> community - knots indeed!).
> >>
> >> With regard to the concept of knots and the librarians, I see at least
> >> two uses: one in which knots are positive, as in knots intentionally
> tied,
> >> and in which you imbricate the interests of others with your own
> interests
> >> (and it seems that this would be wise for librarians to do...), and the
> >> other in which knots are negative, as in knots that are caused by
> >> unfortunate circumstances, and in which the aim is to "work" out the
> knots
> >> that others are experiencing in their lives (something that would also
> be
> >> wise for librarians to do and which will de facto result in the first
> kind
> >> of intended knots!).
> >>
> >> In the end I'm just wondering what work the concept of "knots" and
> >> "knotworking" are doing for the librarians?
> >>
> >> Any chance you could provide some insight into this knotty problem? And
> >> perhaps unravel the knot that my words have caught me up in (or,
> perhaps,
> >> which I have tied...)?
> >> -greg
> >>
> >>
> >> On Tue, Jun 11, 2013 at 8:57 PM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net>
> wrote:
> >>
> >> 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<
> 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 e
> >>
> >>
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