Théories et pratiques de l’apprentissage situé 24/101

janv. 19, 2018 Christian MARTIN Apprendre, Apprentissage, Education, Formation 0 comments

Cognition in practice 8/n

Cognition and practice

Introduction – Psychologie et anthropologie II (suite)

Dans cette section du chapitre “Psychologie et anthropologie II » de son livre « Cognition in Practice » , Jean Lave s’intéresse à ce qui sépare la psychologie et l’anthropologie – y compris les différences méthodologiques – et l’impact (de ces différences) sur la manière de conceptualiser la culture et la cognition. Dans ce billet, nous résumerons la section intitulée « divisions duales ».

« Cognitive studies in psychology and anthropology are mired in other divisions, differences which they defend in ways that are exceptionally difficult to overcome. For example, both disciplines have overlooked their common theoretical views, preferring instead to emphasize their self-styled differences on grounds that psychology has the distinction of being theoretically oriented while anthropology is descriptive. »

Divisions duales

L’anthropologie et la psychologie mettent l’accent sur leurs différences méthodologiques, ce qui, renforce la conceptualisation de la culture et la cognition telles qu’elles étaient formellement définies (encodées) dans deux disciplines séparées au tournant du 20e siècle.

Du point de vue de la psychologie cognitive conventionnelle, pour laquelle la continuité d’une activité d’une situation à une autre est assurée par les connaissances stockées en mémoire, toute notion d’apprentissage situé sera considéré comme a-théorique.

Et si l’on traite la cognition et la culture comme des unités séparées, l’on provoque ces craintes, En effet, les “universaux” cognitifs et les spécificités des contextes organisés par la culture s’impliquent mutuellement.

De même, la définition de la psychologie comme nomothétique (proposant des lois universelles) et de l’anthropologie comme idéographique (descriptive) participent de la même division.

« Treating cognition and culture as isolatable units of analysis leads to such fears: for cognitive « universals » and the specificity of culturally organized contexts imply one another, as we shall see. At another level, the characterization of psychology as a nomothetic discipline and anthropology as ideographic reflects the same division precisely. »

Du point de vue des psychologues, la culture ne peut être que du contenu – un assemblage de connaissances particulières – et/ou contexte – un assemblage de particularités situationnelles. Pour l’anthropologie, en qualité de discipline qui étudie la culture, et l’étude descriptive de ces particularités, depuis cette perspective, une étude théorique de la culture serait considérée au mieux avec méfiance, au pire serait totalement niée.

From the perspective of psychologists, then, many of whom begin with a belief in the universality of cognitive processes, all that culture can be is content – an assembly of particular knowledge, and/or context – an assemblage of situational particularities. Anthropology, as the discipline which studies culture, is the descriptive study of those particularities. Indeed, from this perspective, the notion of the theoretical study of culture is at best regarded suspiciously, at worst denied entirely. »
Jean Lave fait l’historique de ce long débat, pour conclure, provisoirement, et fait porter à cette division du travail (entre psychologie et anthropologie) la responsabilité de l’absence d’un discours sensé, au niveau théorique entre les disciplines. Et que ce sont précisément ces hypothèses (erronées) telle le caractère universel des processus cognitifs, et le rôle déterminant que Jean Lave attribue au positivisme qui expliquerait cet état de fait.

« But it is precisely these divisions of labor and caricatures of disciplines that have led to the absence of meaningful discourse at a theoretical level between disciplines. It is also such assumptions – particularly the universality of cognitive processes – that mistake theory and theoretical discourse sui generis for a metaphysic concerning the nature of cognition and culture. It is also such assumptions – particularly the universality of cognitive processes – that mistake theory and theoretical discourse sui generis for a metaphysic concerning the nature of cognition and culture. That this metaphysic has a hegemonic hold on the study of cognition is intimately related to the role of positivism as the central ideological tenet of the symbolism and epistemology of Western science, an issue to which we shall shortly return. »

Jean Lave évoque ensuite les dimensions méthodologiques qui de manière conventionnelle séparent la psychologie et l’anthropologie. À la première la rigueur scientifique, à la seconde la pertinence. Et de citer un ensemble d’études à l’appui de cette affirmation:

Closely related to the issues discussed so far, and the arenas in which they are played out, is a methodological divide that conventionally separates psychology and anthropology, rigor versus relevance.

[…]

Campbell provides but one of a series of papers in which anthropologists and psychologists have focused explicitly on relations between their disciplines (e.g. Boas 1910; Rivers 1926; Bartlett 1937; Kohler 1937; Nadel 1937; Campbell 1961; Edgerton 1974; LCHC 1978, 1979; and Price Williams 1980).

« He sees psychology as an abstractive, scientific testing approach to the study of human activity, as opposed to the descriptive recording, participant observation methods of the anthropologist. »

Jean Lave, citant Edgerton, recherche une explication à ce chaud débat méthodologique et aux positions chauvines des acteurs, pour finalement regretter que psychologues et anthropologues ne se soient pas plus intéressés à un rapprochement théorique, le débat étant systématiquement situé au niveau méthodologique.

« For, on the whole, discourse about relations between anthropology and psychology has been chauvinistic on both sides, and not productive of synthesis or even communication. Edgerton suggests an explanation for this heated opposition:

I believe that most cross-cultural psychologists are committed to experimental procedures as their ultimate means of veriticatioll … Because the conflICt is at the level of a basic belief about how truth is best ascertained, it is often exacerbated by unspoken assumptions … Anthropologists have always believed that human phenomena can best be understood by procedures that arc primarily sensitive to context, be It situational, social, or cultural. Our methods are primarily unobtrusive, nonreactive ones; we observe, we participate. we learn, hopefully we understand. We rarely experiment, and then only under special conditions. This is our unspoken paradigm and it IS directly at odds with the discovery of truth by experimentation which, at least as many anthropologists see it, ignores context and creates reactions. »

[…]

It is remarkable that papers about relations between anthropology and psychology do not call for theoretical rapprochment: the level of argument is in fact almost uniformly methodological.

La conclusion de Jean Lave

Jean Lave finit par conclure que le conflit entre psychologie et anthropologie est sans issue:

« But this diagnosis insures that the two fields will continue to have irreconcilable disagreements, for as usually couched, one method pitted against another, the debate is, I think, unresolvable. »