On Revisionism in Vygotskian Science. Commentary on «In August of 1941» by Yasnitsky and Lamdan (2017)

Abstract

In this article we analyze the shift in Vygotskian science from “archival revolution” to the revelatory “revisionist revolution”, which Yasnitsky and colleagues proclaimed in 2012. The aim of revisionist revolu¬tion supporters is a critical analysis of the scientific heritage of Vygotsky, Luria and their colleagues, and the demythologization of Vygotsky’s personality as well as the scientific contribution of his school. We ana¬lyze in detail a selected set of the papers within “revisionist” movement and describe their advantages and disadvantages, and further question the soundness of statements of these papers. We justify our disagree¬ment with the exposed by revisionist papers undervaluation of the results of Luria’s Central Asian expedi¬tions. We also refute the assumptions of Yasnitsky and his colleagues about the absence of documentary evidence demonstrating that the heritage and name of Vygotsky were under administrative prohibition during the years of Stalinism, and provide corresponding documents. We conclude that ignorance of one group of facts, tendentious analysis of the other facts, and partiality in the discussion lead the researchers who work on “revisionist revolution” to misrepresent psychological science development.

Keywords

• vygotsky
• luria
• cultural-historical psychology
• vygotskian heritage
• archival revolution
• revisionist revolution
• yasnitsky
• administrative prohibition