This book examines key ideas related to the Theory of Subjectivity within a cultural-historical approach. It brings together the intellectual contributions made by Professor Fernando González Rey (1949–2019) towards understanding human subjectivity, and emphasizing their unfolding in different fields and contexts. The book addresses the genesis and development of González Rey’s work, articulating this discussion with the author’s biography. González Rey’s main scientific contribution is the Theory of Subjectivity in a cultural-historical perspective, which is inseparable from Qualitative Epistemology and from its constructive-interpretive methodological expression. The book presents and discusses González Rey’s contributions to different contexts and fields, such as psychological research, education, cultural-historical psychology, human development, motivation, human health and psychotherapy. This book brings together examples of how these ideas have been employed and developed in different fields and contexts.

This book examines key ideas related to the Theory of Subjectivity within a cultural-historical approach. It brings together the intellectual contributions made by Professor Fernando González Rey (1949–2019) towards understanding human subjectivity, and emphasizing their unfolding in different fields and contexts. The book addresses the genesis and development of González Rey’s work, articulating this discussion with the author’s biography. González Rey’s main scientific contribution is the Theory of Subjectivity in a cultural-historical perspective, which is inseparable from Qualitative Epistemology and from its constructive-interpretive methodological expression. The book presents and discusses González Rey’s contributions to different contexts and fields, such as psychological research, education, cultural-historical psychology, human development, motivation, human health and psychotherapy. This book brings together examples of how these ideas have been employed and developed in different fields and contexts.

This book draws upon Vygotsky’s idea of perezhivanie, emotions and imagination, and introduces the concepts of subjective sense and subjective configuration. These concepts are crucial for explaining and understanding children’s development from a cultural-historical perspective. A book which theorises the relations between the social and the individual through a study of a child’s perezhivanie, which analyses emotions more holistically, and advances the concepts of subjective sense and subjective configuration, is much needed. This book examines the complexity of human development through a comprehensive elaboration of these concepts, allowing for new insights to be put forward. It doesn’t always follow the chronological order of Vygotsky’s publications, as many of his works remained in the family archives until the 1980s, when his Selected Works were first published in Russian. There has long been a need for a contemporary book on the scholarly treatment of perezhevanie, emotions, and subjectivity, and as such this book revisits dominant representations of these concepts and then puts forward new ways of conceptualising and using them in empirical research. The chapters cover a broad range of case studies where the concepts of perezhivanie, emotions and imagination and subjective sense and subjective configuration are used to give new empirical and theoretical insights into the study of human development.

This book is an exploration of science in the making. It offers readers the opportunity to critically reflect on the process of development of Vygotsky's research program from the perspective of dialectics, focusing on the dramatic process of building and rebuilding cultural historical theory. Vygotsky's creative and dramatic journey is no less important than the concrete results of his research. An epistemological and historical investigation of the formulation of cultural historical theory sheds light on the process of knowledge production and reveals hidden dimensions of creativity in science.

This book offers a theoretical and epistemological-methodological framework as an alternative approach to the instrumental-descriptive methodology that has prevailed in psychology to date. It discusses the differences between the proposed approach and other theoretical and methodological positions, such as discourse analysis, phenomenology and hermeneutics. Further, it puts forward a proposal that allows the demands of studying subjectivity to be addressed from a cultural-historical standpoint. The book mainly highlights case studies that have been conducted in various countries, and which employ or depart from the theoretical, epistemological and methodological proposals that guide this book. The research discussed here introduces readers to new discussions on theoretical and methodological issues in subjectivity that have increasingly attracted interest.

This book opens up a critical dialogue within and across the theoretical traditions of critical psychology and cultural-historical psychology. It explores and addresses fundamental issues and problems within both traditions, with a view to identifying new avenues for productive discussion and cooperation between these two important movements in contemporary psychology. Accordingly, the book gathers contributions from a range of internationally respected researchers from both fields who have demonstrated a willingness to look critically, and self-critically, at their theoretical allegiances and trajectories. This book provides readers with the opportunity to both appreciate and reflect on fundamental differences of perspective across the ‘cultural-historical’/’critical’ psychology divide and, thereby, to consider and debate key issues facing the discipline of psychology more generally.

This is the first book in English to show how the work of Lev Vygotsky gave rise to a prolific and original school of cultural-historical psychology in Latin America. In recent decades, Latin American researchers have expanded Vygotskyan conceptualizations and applied practical theory to psychological and educational research and practice, but until now this production remained virtually unknown for English speaking audiences since it has been mainly published in Spanish and Portuguese. This timely volume contributes to change this situation by presenting a panoramic picture of the state of the art of cultural-historical psychology in Latin America. The book is divided in two parts. The first part shows how Latin American researchers used Vygotsky’s work to develop new theoretical elaborations and empirical advances to deal with different political, social and cultural problems in the region. The second part presents an overview of the current state of cultural-historical psychology in Latin America. Throughout its 15 chapters, the book shows how Latin American researchers contributed to the studies of different aspects of the cultural-historical theoretical conception of the development of higher psychological functions, such as concept formation, inner speech, zone of proximal development and imagination, and how these theoretical elaborations have been applied to research and practice in fields such as sociocultural psychology, developmental psychology, psychotherapy and education in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Mexico, Peru and Puerto Rico. Latin American Advances in Subjectivity and Development - Through the Vygotsky Route will be an invaluable resource to researchers, students and practitioners in the fields of psychology, education and other social sciences interested in discovering or learning more about the original Latin American school of cultural-historical psychology.