This article traces the historical and conceptual development of what is known as activity theory, from Vygotsky and Luria, to A. N. Leont’ev, to Engeström, in order to illustrate what I see as two problems with the activity theoretic approach, especially as manifest in the work of Leont’ev and Engeström: what I call the boundary and/or focus problem and the unit-of-analysis problem. In the second half of the article, I explore the social semiotic of an everyday artifact, the “speed bump,” and introduce a discovery heuristic for examining how this artifact functions mediationally in human activity. In so doing, I have tried to discover activity through principled analysis, rather than assuming activity or activity system a priori.
Akrich, M. (1992). The description of technical objects. In W. E. Bijker & L. Law (Eds.), Shaping technology/building society: Studies in sociotechnical change (pp. 205-224). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
2.
Akrich, M., & Latour, B. (1992). A summary of a convenient vocabulary for the semiotics of human and nonhuman assemblies. In W. E. Bijker & L. Law (Eds.), Shaping technology/building society: Studies in sociotechnical change (pp. 259-264). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
3.
Applebee, A. N. (1978). The child’s concept of story: Ages two to seventeen. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
4.
Bijker, W. E. (1995). Of bicycles, bakelites, and bulbs: Toward a theory of sociotechnical change. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
5.
Bijker, W. E., Hughes, T. P., & Pinch, T. (Eds.). (1987). The social construction of technological systems: New directions in the sociology and history of technology. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
6.
Bijker, W. E., & Law, J. (Eds.). (1992). Shaping technology/building society: Studies in sociotechnical change. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
7.
Bødker, S. (1990). Through the interface: A human activity approach to user interface design. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
8.
Bracewell, R. J. & Witte, S. P. (1997, April). Implications of activity, practice, and semiotic theory for cognitive constructs of writing. Paper presented during the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, Chicago.
9.
Bracewell, R. J., & Witte, S. P. (2003). Tasks, ensembles, and activity: Linkages between text production and situation of use in the workplace. Written Communication, 20(4), 478-510.
10.
Britton, J. N. (1970). Language and learning. London: Allen Lane.
11.
Britton, J. N., Burgess, T., Martin, N., McLeod, A., & Rosen, H. (1975). The development of writing abilities, 11 to 18. London: Macmillan Educational.
12.
Chaiklin, S., & Lave, J. (Eds.). (1993). Understanding practice: Perspectives on activity and context. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
13.
Chin, E., & Witte, S. P. (1995, April). Activity, practice, and semiotics: Intersecting theories in the study of situated writing. Paper presented during the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Francisco, CA.
14.
Cole, M. (1985). The zone of proximal development: Where culture and cognition create each other. In J. V. Wertsch (Ed.), Culture, communication, and cognition: Vygotskian perspectives (pp. 146-161). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
15.
Cole, M., & Engeström, Y. (1993). A cultural-historical approach to distributed cognition. In G. Salomon (Ed.), Distributed cognitions: Psychological and educational considerations (pp. 1-46). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
16.
Cole, M., Engeström, Y., & Vasquez, O. (Eds.). (1997). Mind, culture, and activity: Seminal papers from the Laboratory of Comparative Human Cognition. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
17.
Cole, M., & Maltzman, I. (Eds.). (1969). A handbook of contemporary Soviet psychology. New York: Basic Books.
18.
Daniels, H. (Ed.). (1993). Charting the agenda: Educational activity after Vygotsky. London: Routledge.
19.
Drier, O. (1993). Researching psychotherapeutic practice. In S. Chaiklin & J. Lave (Eds.), Understanding practice: Perspectives on activity and context (pp. 104-124). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
20.
Engeström, Y. (1987). Learning by expanding: An activity-theoretical approach to developmental research. Helsinki, Finland: Orienta-Konsultit.
21.
Engeström, Y. (1990). Learning, working, and imagining: Twelve studies in activity theory. Helsinki, Finland: Orienta-Konsultit.
22.
Engeström, Y. (1993). Developmental studies of work as a testbench of activity theory: The case of primary care medical practice. In S. Chaiklin & J. Lave (Eds.), Understanding practice: Perspectives on activity and context (pp. 64-103). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
23.
Engeström, Y. (1995). Innovative organizational learning in medical and legal settings. In L. Martin, K. Nelson, & E. Tobach (Eds.), Sociocultural psychology: Theory and practice in knowing and doing (pp. 326-356). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
24.
Engeström, Y. (1999a). Activity theory and individual and social transformation. In Y. Engeström, R. Miettinen, & R.-L. Punamäki (Eds.), Perspectives on activity theory (pp. 19-38). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
25.
Engeström, Y. (1999b). Innovative learning in work teams: Analyzing cycles of knowledge creation in practice. In Y. Engeström, R. Miettinen, & R.-L. Punamäki (Eds.), Perspectives on activity theory (pp. 377-404). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
26.
Engeström, Y., & Middleton, D. (Eds.). (1996). Cognition and communication at work. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
27.
Engeström, Y., Miettinen, R., & Punamäki, R.-L. (Eds.). (1999). Perspectives on activity theory. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
28.
Englehart, H. T., Jr., & Caplan, A. L. (Eds.). (1987). Scientific controversies: Case studies in the resolution and closure of disputes in science and technology. Cambridge. UK: Cambridge University Press.
29.
Elliott, B. (Ed.). (1988). Technology and change. Edinburgh, Scotland: Edinburgh University Press.
30.
Foucault, M. (1977). Discipline and punish: The birth of the prison (A. Sheridan, Trans.). New York: Pantheon Books.
31.
Frawley, W. (1997). Vygotsky and cognitive science: Language and the unification of the social and computational mind. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
32.
Geertz, C. (1983). Local knowledge: Fact and law in comparative perspective. In Local knowledge: Further essays on interpretive anthropology (pp. 167-234). New York: Basic Books.
33.
Giddens, A. (1993). New rules of sociological method (2nd ed.). Stanford, CA:Stanford University Press.
34.
Glaser, B. G., & Strauss, A. L. (1967). The discovery of grounded theory: Strategies for qualitative research. New York: Aldine de Gruyter.
35.
Haas, C. (1989a). Does the medium make a difference? Two studies of writing with pen and paper and with computers. Human-Computer Interaction, 4(2), 149-169.
36.
Haas, C. (1989b). How the writing medium shapes the writing process: Effects of word processing on planning. Research in the Teaching of English, 23(2), 181-206.
37.
Haas, C. (1989c). Seeing it on the screen isn’t really seeing it: Computer writers’ reading problems. In G. Hawisher & C. Selfe (Eds.), Critical perspectives on computers and composition instruction (pp. 16-29). New York: Teachers College Press.
38.
Haas, C. (1996). Writing technology: Studies on the materiality of literacy. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
39.
Haas, C. (1997, May). Public and private spaces: An analysis of the spatial delineation of discourse in an urban abortion clinic. Invited paper presented during the Cultures of Writing Conference, Society for Critical Exchange, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH.
40.
Haas, C. (1999a). Materializing public and private: The spatialization of conceptual categories in discourses on abortion. In J. Selzer & S. Crowley (Eds.), Material rhetorics (pp. 218-238). Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.
41.
Haas, C. (1999b). On the relationship of old and new technologies. Computers and Composition, 16(2), 209-228.
42.
Haas, C., & Hayes, J. R. (1986). What did I just say? Reading problems in writing with the machine. Research in the Teaching of English, 20(1), 22-35.
43.
Haas, C., & Neuwirth, C. M. (1994). Writing the technology that writes us. In S. Hilligoss & C. Selfe (Eds.), Literacy and computers (pp. 319-335). New York: Modern Language Association.
44.
Halliday, M. A. K. (1978). Language as social semiotic: The social interpretation of language and meaning. Baltimore: University Park Press.
45.
Harris, R. (1995). Signs of writing. London: Routledge.
46.
Heath, S. B. (1983). Ways with words: Language, life, and work in communities and classrooms. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
47.
Hildebrand-Nilshon, M., & Ruckriem, G. (Eds.). (1988). Proceedings of the 1st International Congress on Activity Theory (1/1986, Berlin/West): State of the art lectures. Berlin, Germany: Druck und Verlag System Druck.
48.
Hildebrand-Nilshon, M., & Ruckriem, G. (Eds.). (1988-1989). Proceedings of the 1st International Congress on Activity Theory (Vols. 1-4). Berlin, Germany: Druck und Verlag System Druck.
49.
Hutchins, E. (1995). Cognition in the wild. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
50.
Knorr-Cetina, K., & Cicourel, A. (Eds.). (1981). Advances in social theory and methodology: Toward an integration of micro and macro sociologies. London:Routledge & Kegan Paul.
51.
Lave, J. (1988). Cognition in practice: Mind, mathematics, and culture in everyday life. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
52.
Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral participation. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
53.
Law, J. (Ed.). (1991). Power, technology, and the modern world. London: Routledge.
54.
Latour, B. (1987). Science in action: How to follow scientists and engineers through society. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
55.
Latour, B. (1992). Where are the missing masses? The sociology of a few mundane artifacts. In W. E. Bijker & L. Law (Eds.), Shaping technology/building society: Studies in sociotechnical change (pp. 225-258). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
56.
Latour, B. (1996). Aramis or the love of technology (C. Porter, Trans.). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. (French original published in 1993 as Aramis, ou l’amour des techniques)
57.
Lektorsky, V. A. (1984). Subject, object, cognition (S. Syrovatkin, Trans.). Moscow: Progress Publishers. (Russian original published in 1980)
58.
Lektorsky, V. A., & Engeström, Y. (Eds.). (1990). Activity: Theories, methodology, and problems (A. Mikheyev, S. Mikheyev, & Y. Fillipov, Trans.). Orlando, FL: Paul M. Deutsch.
59.
Leont’ev, A. A. (1984). The productive career of Aleksei Niklolaevich Leont’ev (M. Vale, Trans.). Soviet Psychology, 23(1), 6-56. (Russian original published 1983)
60.
Leont’ev, A. N. (1964). Problems of mental development (No Trans. given). Washington, DC: U.S. Joint Publications Research Service.
61.
Leont’ev, A. N. (1978). Activity, consciousness, and personality (M.J. Hall, Trans.). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall. (Russian original published in 1975)
62.
Leont’ev, A. N. (1997). On Vygotsky’s creative development (R. van der Veer, Trans.). In R. W. Rieber & J. Wollock (Eds.), The collected works of L. S. Vygotsky, Vol. 3: Problems of the theory and history of psychology (pp. 9-32). New York: Plenum. (Russian original dates from the late 1970s and was written for the Russian edition of Vygotsky’s Collected Works)
63.
Leont’ev, A. N., & Luria, A. R. (1968). The psychological ideas of L. S. Vygotsky. In B. B. Wolman (Ed.), Historical roots of contemporary psychology. New York: Harper & Row.
64.
Leont’ev, A. N., Smirnov, A. A., & Luria, A. R. (1969). Foreword. In M. Cole & I. Maltzman (Eds.), A handbook of contemporary Soviet psychology (pp. v-vii). New York: Basic Books.
65.
Luria, A. R. (1928). The problem of the cultural development of the child. Journal of Genetic Psychology, 35, 493-506.
66.
Luria, A. R. (1976). Cognitive development: Its cultural and social foundations (M. Lopez-Morillas & L. Solotaroff, Trans.; M. Cole, Ed.). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
67.
Luria, A. R. (1979). The making of mind: A personal account of Soviet psychology (M. Cole & S. Cole, Eds.). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
68.
Lynch, M., & Woolgar, S. (Eds.). (1990). Representation in scientific practice. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
69.
Martin, L. M. W., Nelson, K., & Tobach, E. (Eds.). (1995). Sociocultural psychology: Theory and practice of doing and knowing. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
70.
Marx, K. (1978). Theses on Fuerbach. In R. C. Tucker (Ed.), The Marx-Engels reader (2nd ed., pp. 143-145). New York: W. W. Norton. (German original published in 1888)
71.
Mayntz, R., & Hughes, T. P. (Eds.). (1988). The development of large technical systems. Frankfurt, Germany: Campus Verlag.
72.
McDermott, R. P. (1993). The acquisition of a child by a learning disability. In S. Chaiklin & J. Lave (Eds.), Understanding practice: Perspectives on activity and context (pp. 269-305). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
73.
Mehan, H. (1993). Beneath the skin and between the ears: A case study in the politics of representation. In S. Chaiklin & J. Lave (Eds.), Understanding practice: Perspectives on activity and context (pp. 241-268). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
74.
Moll, L. C. (Ed.). (1990). Vygotsky and education: Instructional implications and applications of sociohistorical psychology. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
75.
Myers, G. (1996). Out of the laboratory and down to the bay: Writing in science and technology studies. Written Communication, 13(1), 5-43.
76.
Nardi, B. A. (Ed.). (1996). Context and consciousness: Activity theory and human-computer interaction. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
77.
Newman, D., Griffin, P., & Cole, M. (1989). The construction zone: Working for cognitive change in schools. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
78.
Peirce, C. S. (1931-1958). The collected papers of Charles Sanders Peirce (Vols. 1-6, C. Hartshorn & P. Weiss, Eds.; Vols. 7-8, A. W. Burks, Ed.). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
79.
Petrovsky, A. V. (1985). Studies in psychology: The collective and the individual (F. Longman, Trans.). Moscow: Progress Publishers.
80.
Rogoff, B., & Lave, J. (Eds.). (1984). Everyday cognition: Its development in social context. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
81.
Salomon, G. (Ed.). (1993). Distributed cognitions: Psychological and educational considerations. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
82.
Saussure, F. de. (1959). Course in general linguistics (W. Baskin, Trans.) (Based on 3rd French ed.; C. Bally, A. Sechehaye, & A. Reidlinger, Eds.). New York: Philosophical Library. (French original published in 1915)
83.
Scribner, S. (1985). Vygotsky’s uses of history. In J. V. Wertsch (Ed.), Culture, communication, and cognition: Vygotskian perspectives (pp. 119-145). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
84.
Scribner, S. (1997a). Mind and social practice: Selected writing of Sylvia Scribner (E. Tobach, R. Falmagne, M. Parlee, L. Martin, & A. Kapelman, Eds.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
85.
Scribner, S. (1997b). Three developmental paradigms. In E. Tobach, R. Falmagne, M. Parlee, L. Martin, & A. Kapelman (Eds.), Mind and social practice: Selected writing of Sylvia Scribner (pp. 281-288). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. (Essay originally published in 1985)
86.
Scribner, S., & Cole, M. (1981a). The psychology of literacy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
87.
Scribner, S., & Cole, M. (1981b). Unpackaging literacy. In M. F. Whiteman (Ed.), Writing: The nature, development, and teaching of written communication, Vol. 1: Variation in writing: Functional and linguistic-cultural differences (pp. 71-87). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
88.
Spradley, J. P. (1972). Foundations of cultural knowledge. In J. P. Spradley (Ed.), Culture and cognition: Rules, maps, and plans (pp. 3-38). Prospect Heights, IL: Wavel and Press.
89.
Star, S. L. (1991). Power, technology, and the phenomenology of conventions: On being allergic to onions. In J. Law (Ed.), A sociology of monsters: Essays on power, technology, and domination (pp. 16-26). London: Routledge.
90.
Strauss, A. L. (1987). Qualitative analysis for social scientists. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
91.
Steiner, E. (1991). A functional perspective on language, action, and interpretation: An initial approach with a view to computational modeling. Berlin, Germany:Mouton de Gruyter.
92.
Volosinov, V. N. (1986). Marxism and the philosophy of language (L. Ladislav& I. R. Titunik, Trans.). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. (Russian original published in 1929)
93.
Vygotsky, L. S. (1962). Thought and language (E. Hanfmann & G. Vakar, Trans.). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. (Russian original published in 1934)
94.
Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes (A. R. Luria, M. Lopez-Morillas, & M. Cole, Trans.; M. Cole, V. John-Steiner, S. Scribner, & E. Souberman, Eds.). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. (Russian originals date from the 1920s and 1930s)
95.
Vygotsky, L. A. (1981a). The development of higher forms of attention in childhood. In J. V. Wertsch (Ed. & Trans.), The concept of activity in Soviet psychology (pp. 189-240). Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe. (Russian original published in 1956)
96.
Vygotsky, L. A. (1981b). The genesis of higher mental functions. In J. V. Wertsch (Ed. & Trans.), The concept of activity in Soviet psychology (pp. 144-188). Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe. (Russian original published in 1960)
97.
Vygotsky, L. A. (1981c). The instrumental method in psychology. In J. V. Wertsch (Ed. & Trans.), The concept of activity in Soviet psychology (pp. 134-143). Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe. (Russian original published in 1960)
98.
Vygotsky, L. S. (1986). Thought and language (A. Kozulin, Trans. & Ed.). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. (Russian original published in 1934)
99.
Vygotsky, L. S. (1997). The historical meaning of the crisis in psychology (R. van der Veer, Trans.). In R. W. Rieber & J. Wollock (Eds.), The collected works of L. S. Vygotsky, Volume 3: Problems of the theory and history of psychology (pp. 233-343). New York: Plenum. (Russian original written in 1927)
100.
Vygotsky, L. S., & Luria, A. R. (1993). Studies on the history of behavior: Ape, primitive, and child (V. I. Golod & J. E. Knox, Eds. & Trans.). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. (Russian original published in 1930)
101.
Vygotsky, L. S., & Luria, A. R. (1994). Tool and symbol in child development. In R. van der Veer & J. Valsiner (Eds.), The Vygotsky reader (pp. 99-174). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. (Original written in English in 1930)
102.
Wertsch, J. V. (Ed.). (1981a). The concept of activity in Soviet psychology. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe.
103.
Wertsch, J. V. (1981b). The concept of activity in Soviet psychology: An introduction. In J. V. Wertsch (Ed.), The concept of activity in Soviet psychology (pp. 3-36). Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe.
104.
Wertsch, J. V. (Ed.). (1985a). Culture, communication, and cognition: Vygotskian perspectives. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
105.
Wertsch, J. V. (1985b). Vygotsky and the social formation of mind. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
106.
Wertsch, J. V. (1991). Voices of the mind: A sociocultural approach to mediated action. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
107.
Wertsch, J. V. (1998). Mind as action. New York: Oxford University Press.
108.
Wertsch, J. V., del Río, P., & Alvarez, A. (Eds.). (1995). Sociocultural studies of mind. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
109.
White, L. (1969). The science of culture. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.
110.
Witte, S. P. (1992). Content, text, intertext: Toward a constructivist semiotic of writing. Written Communication, 9(2), 237-308.
111.
Witte, S. P. (1995, March). Agency, literate practices, and semiosis. Paper presented during the Annual Convention of the Conference on College Composition and Communication, Washington, D.C.
112.
Witte, S. P. (1996a, October). Between some rocks and some soft places: Practice, activity, semiotic. Invited paper presented during the Thomas R. Watson Conference on Rhetoric and Composition, University of Louisville, Louisville, KY.
113.
Witte, S. P. (1996b, April). Situated writing, individual history: Notes toward a synthesis of semiotic, activity, and practice theory. Paper presented during the Annual Meeting of American Educational Research Association, New York.
114.
Witte, S. P. (1997, May). Literacy as socially embedded practice: A theoretical framework for investigating literacy in workplace contexts. Invited paper presented during the Annual Convention of the International Reading Association, Atlanta, GA.
115.
Witte, S. P., & Chin, E. (1995, July). Integrating theories of semiotics, activity, and practice in a study of situated writing. Paper presented during the Penn State Conference on Rhetoric and Composition, State College, PA.
116.
Woolgar, S. (Ed.). (1988). Knowledge and reflexivity: New frontiers in the sociology of knowledge. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.
