Towards a Generous* Discussion of Interplay between Natural Descriptive and Hidden Machinery Approaches in Knowledge and Interaction Analysis

This chapter explores diff erent orientations to research practices that are present in both Knowledge and Interaction Analysis. Rather than rehearsing the familiar controversy between individual and sociocultural theories of knowing and learning, we analyze diff erences associated with what we call “natural descriptive” (ND) and “hidden machineries” (HM) orientations. The writing was undertaken as a conversation among the authors, following a series of lively (and sometimes diffi cult) conversations with others in the KAIA community. The text came in pieces, with many gaps and alternate paths taken that are not refl ected here. We have tried to smooth the remaining pieces together in a way that refl ects some of our discoveries along the way, starting by characterizing the work of hidden machineries and natural description in scientifi c practices, and then illustrating the latter in two historical cases. Next, we pose a series of generous* 1 questions for exploring diff erences and possible interplay between these two orientations, using cases from previous studies in the learning sciences. We end with an invitation to think diff erently – in generous* ways – about these diff erences, in eff orts to integrate Knowledge and Interaction Analysis in studies of learning and teaching. Hidden machineries approaches postulate a domain operating either above the phenomena of interest – such as cultural scripts in anthropology, generative rules of universal grammar in linguistics, or relations of production in Marxist history, or beneath the phenomena of interest – such as interactions between atoms and light producing color patterns or mental structures in cognitive psychology. The