The Practical Essence of Man: The 'Activity Approach' in Late Soviet Philosophy (Historical Materialism Book Series, 108)

Book info: The Practical Essence of Man: The 'Activity Approach' in Late Soviet Philosophy (Historical Materialism Book Series, 108) (Hardcover, 210 pages) – Brill, 2015. Language: English.

For the first time, this book presents to Western readers a current in the late Soviet philosophy of the 1960s and 1970s known as the ‘activity approach’. It had to some degree a counterpart in so-called cultural-historical psychology, but whilst the work of Vygotsky and Leontyev was received in the West decades ago, its sibling in philosophy has remained virtually unnoticed. Started by Evald Ilyenkov and other young Moscow philosophers in the early 1960s, the activity approach soon became an intellectual mode, leading to several different interpretations of human activity and challenging Marxist-Leninist orthodoxy. The book depicts in detail the rise and fall of this remarkable phenomenon in Soviet Marxism. Contributors are: David Bakhurst, Aleksandr Khamidov, Vladislav Lektorsky, Alex Levant, Pentti Määttänen, Andrey Maidansky, Sergei Mareyev, Elena Mareyeva, Vesa Oittinen, Edward Swiderski, and Inna Titarenko. Editorial Reviews About the Author Vesa Oittinen, Ph.D. (1994), University of Helsinki, is Research Chief at the Aleksanteri Institute. He published monographs and articles on Nordic and Russian philosophy, Spinoza, and Hegel.Last publication with Brill is the co-edited volume with Alex Levant, Dialectics of the Ideal (2014).
Andrey Maidansky, Ph.D. (1993), Professor, Belgorod State University, Russia, published monographs and articles on Spinoza, Marx, and Soviet philosophy, and the anthology Spinoza: Pro et contra (St Petersburg: RHGA, 2012).