Abstract
How do ideas come into being? Our contribution takes its starting point in an observation we made in empirical data from a prior study. The data center around an instant of an academic writer’s thinking during the revision of a scientific paper. Through a detailed discourse-oriented micro-analysis, we zoom in on the writer’s thinking activity and uncover the genesis of a complex idea through a sequence of interrelated moments. These moments feature different degrees of “crystallization” of the idea; from gestures, a sketch, a short written note, oral explanations to a final spelled-out written argument. For this contribution, we re-analyze the material, asking how the idea gets formed during the thinking process and how it reaches a tangible form, which is understandable both for the thinker and for other persons. We root our analysis in a notion of language as social, embodied, and dialogical activity, drawing on concepts from Humboldt, Jakubinskij, and Vygotsky. We focus our analysis on three conceptual nodes. The first node is the ebbing and advancing of language in idea formation – observable as a trajectory through linguistically more condensed or more expanded utterance forms. The second node is the degree of objectification that the idea reaches when it is performed differently in a variety of addressivity constellations, i.e., whether and how it becomes understandable to the thinker and to others in the social sphere. Finally, the third node is the saturation of the idea through what we call intrapersonal intertextuality, i.e., its complex and dialogically related re-articulations in a sequence of formative moments. With these considerations, we articulate a clear consequence for theorizing thinking. We hold that thinking is social, embodied, and dialogically organized because it is entangled with language. Ideas come into being and become understandable and communicable to other persons only by and within their different, yet, intertextually related formations.
Highlights
This contribution addresses the intriguing question of how ideas “come into being.” That is, we ask how ideas get formed in thinking processes and how they reach a tangible form, which is communicable to others in the social sphere
We derive that intrapersonal intertextuality, i.e., the movement of interrelated language forms through a series of moments and addressivity constellations while staying always tied back to the speakerthinker, is crucial for idea formation
We have argued in previous publications that Martin reflected and re-presented his “inner” dialogues during writing in the subsequent interview setting, and this was marked by a differing basic addressivity constellation with the researcher as a co-present person and Martin’s main addressee (Karsten, 2014a,b; Bertau and Karsten, 2018)
Summary
This contribution addresses the intriguing question of how ideas “come into being.” That is, we ask how ideas get formed in thinking processes and how they reach a tangible form, which is communicable to others in the social sphere. Observing empirical data from a prior study (Karsten, 2014a,b), we noticed different degrees in the crystallization of an idea within the thinking and articulating process of an expert academic writer revising a scientific article These degrees are coupled with various forms of tangible (re)presentations, reaching from just body movements to pencil drawings on paper with handwriting, and to computer writing. Our last analytical step highlights the intertextual relations between the various forms we observe and discuss (section “Intrapersonal Intertextuality: A Crucial Process in Idea Formation”) From these observations, we derive that intrapersonal intertextuality, i.e., the movement of interrelated language forms through a series of moments and addressivity constellations while staying always tied back to the speakerthinker, is crucial for idea formation. Our interpretation of Vygotsky’s framework of semiotic mediation and the role of inner speech for thinking is at the core of this argument
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