Alexander Romanowitsch Lurija 1902 -- 1977
by Clifford MorrisAlexander Romanovich Luria is recognized throughout the world as one of the most eminent or influential psychologists of the 20th century. He was a prominent Soviet psychologist who made advances in many areas, including cognitive psychology, the processes of learning and forgetting and mental retardation. One of his most important studies charted the way in which damage to specific areas of the brain affect human behaviour. Here are some of my favourite sites about him and his accomplishments.
My book review of Michael Cole, Karl Levitin and Alexander Romanovich Luria's The Autobiography of Alexander Luria: A Dialogue with The Making of Mind
The Autobiography of Alexander Luria A Dialogue with The Making of Mind is the title to a recent book dedicated to Alexander Romanovich Luria, one of the most prominent Russian scientists of the 20th century. For some forty years, Luria conducted research with great success on the functions of the brain such as analyzed the changes in function as a result of local brain lesions, attention, learning and forgetting and perception. As his academic life spanned a sizeable section of the last one hundred years, this expanded and revised autobiography gives readers a glimpse on the development of neurology and psychology in Russia. Thus, I feel that this 'new' version will be of great interest to an ever expanding number of Luria followers.
Introduction to The Making of Mind by Michael Cole
Alexander Romanovich Luria began his professional era at a tumultuous moment in human history. The Bolshevik Revolution had interrupted his high-school career, in the provincial Russian commercial center of Kazan. Changes in educational regulations and curricula left him free to accelerate his passage through the accrediting process, and within three years he had completed the formal requirements for a college degree ...
A Site to Accompany
Cole, Michael, Levitin, Karl, & Luria, Alexander (Eds.). (2005). The Autobiography of Alexander Luria: A Dialogue with The Making of Mind with an accompanying DVD Archive. New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers. xvi + 276 pp. BF109.L87C65 2005 ISBN: 0-8058-5499-1 Paperback ~~ This internet web site was constructed to accompany the above book. The site is devoted to preserving the memory of Alexander Romanovich Luria (1902 -- 1977). Visitors will find a variety of materials indexed into categories that include archival film, photographs, oral lectures and written materials by Luria as well as interviews and correspondence with scholars who interacted with him and papers written about him by others and extensive bibliographic sources ...
The Resolution of the Crisis in Psychology
"It is a great personal pleasure for me to address this conference, honoring the life and work of Alexander Romanovich Luria. I am not a Russian and I am acutely aware that I am speaking to you, so to speak, from afar, about a person you know very differently than I do. So, to begin with, I want to give a brief account of how I first encountered Alexander Romanovich and his work. I will then provide my interpretation of his contributions to psychology, in particular, the issue of creating a unified science of psychology."
"From the late 1920s until his death, Luria sought to elaborate this synthetic, cultural-historical psychology in different content areas of psychology. In the early 1930s he led two expeditions to central Asia where he investigated changes in perception, problem solving, and memory associated with historical changes in economic activity and schooling. During this same period, he carried out studies of identical and fraternal twins raised in a large residential school to reveal the dynamic relations between phylogenetic and cultural-historical factors in the development of language and thought."
Luria: The Encyclopedia of Marxism
Alexander Romanovich Luria (1902-1977) was born in Kazan, an old Russian university city east of Moscow. He entered Kazan University at the age of 16 and obtained his degree in 1921 at the age of 19. While still a student, he established the Kazan Psychoanalytic Association and planned on a career in psychology. For forty (40) years, Luria conducted research with great success on the functions of the brain, including the following pssychological constructs: learning and forgetting, attention, and perception. He was most interested in analyzing the changes in function as a result of local brain lesions. His earliest research sought to establish objective methods of assessing Freudian ideas about abnormalities of thought and the effects of fatigue on mental processes.
There is no hope of finding the sources of free action in the lofty realms of the mind or in the depths of the brain. The idealist approach of the phenomenologists is as hopeless as the positive approach of the naturalists. To discover the sources of free action it is necessary to go outside the limits of the organism, not into the intimate sphere of the mind, but into the objective forms of social life; it is necessary to seek the sources of human consciousness and freedom in the social history of humanity. To find the soul it is necessary to lose it". A.R Luria ...
Dedicated to one of the most prominent Russian scientists of the 20th century, this book provides a detailed and careful description of the life and academic career of Alexander Luria. Written by one of his students and colleagues, it unavoidably bears traces of personal admiration characteristic of Luria’s reputation in the Russian academic circles. As Luria’s academic life spans a significant portion of the last century, the book offers a glimpse on the development of neurology and psychology in Russia in general, thus becoming of interest to a wider readership ...
This book’s appearance is extremely timely -- it coincides with the 2002 centennial of Alexander Luria’s birth. The life and scientific heritage of this Russian scholar have been widely celebrated, with several international conferences held to commemorate Luria’s achievements, including one in Moscow organized by his many students and followers, now renowned scholars themselves, working in various institutions in Moscow and around the world ...
I last updated this Luria page on Wednesday, 26 November, 2008