Citation

Matusov E. Cult. Psychol. 2011; 17(1): 99-119.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2011, SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.1177/1354067X10388840

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

In Western psychology and education, up until very recently, Bakhtin has often been introduced as a scholar whose approach was compatible with and an extension of Vygotsky's cultural-historical approach. I argue that this continuity is problematic. Vygotsky's approach to the social was heavily influenced by Hegel's universalist, mono-logic, mono-logical, developmental (diachronic), activity-based philosophy. Bakhtin developed a pluralistic, essentially synchronic, dialogic, discourse- and genre-based approach to the social, involving the hybridity of co-existing competing and conflicting varieties of logic. Extrapolating Bakhtin's approach in education and psychology, I argue that from Bakhtin's dialogic framework, when a child (or any other person) is a subject of development -- as in developmental psychology, or a subject of learning -- as in education, development, its goals, and developmental values defining the teleology of the development, become (again) unknown for the participant (e.g., a developmental psychologist or parent).