Luria in Uzbekistan: The Vicissitudes of Cross-Cultural Neuropsychology |
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Authors: | Nell Victor |
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Affiliation: | (1) Institute for Social and Health Sciences, University of South Africa, Pretoria, South Africa |
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Abstract: | If the material conditions of culture shape cognitive structures, as Luria and Vygotsky argued, the extraordinarily deep and rapid restructuring of historical forms (Luria, 1971, 265) in the Soviet Republics that followed the Bolshevik revolution of 1917 provided a natural laboratory to determine whether processes of modernization changed traditional ways of thinking. This was the purpose of Luria's 1931 expedition to the Soviet Republic of Uzbekistan in central Asia. Luria's initial reports attracted vitriolic criticism because he had allegedly belittled primitive Uzbeki culture. The lasting importance of the Uzbek expedition is its emphasis on culture as a determinant of cognitive processes that remains valid to the present: in 1984, Gilbert replicated Luria's field studies in South Africa with near-identical results. Yet current neuropsychology has been slow to recognize the need for culturally sensitive assessment. |
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Keywords: | Luria Vygotsky cross-cultural neuropsychology South Africa |
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