Jaan Valsiner’s Cultural Psychology. Part I. In the Discourse of Global Science

Abstract

We introduce a variant of international cultural psychology, insufficiently known to the Russian reader, the leader of which is Jaan Valsiner. It differs significantly in its methodological principles and orientations from most related to cultural psychology, both international and Russian. In a certain sense, the methodology of the school of dynamic semiosis seems to be an alternative to the modern development of the discourse of cultural psychology in Russia. Russian cultural psychological discourse primarily moves towards a general humanitarian synthesis, with a focus on the intersection of the humanitarian subject area of psychology with the humanities, while cultural psychology of Jaan Valsiner represents a movement of trans-subject synthesis, embrasing not only the humanities, but the entire scientific sphere, including the exact and natural sciences, along with the humanities. Thus, the task of “vertical” integration of psychological knowledge, that is, the integration of natural science and humanitarian psychology, appears the main target, which should become the mission of cultural psychology in the development of psychological science.