vi the text can engender. Of course, translations by scholars of advanced standing are not a novelty in modern scholarship. The Plenum translations ofVygotsky' s texts are appearing at a moment when authentic and authoritative English versions of them are rare-a moment when the frequency of works about Vygotsky threatens to outstrip the availability of work by Vygotsky. Since seminal thinkers make their contributions by provoking further thought, admirers ofVygotsky will, of course, welcome the spate of interpretation, reinterpretation, revision, reconstruction, and deconstruction which Vygotsky's work has invited and will participate with alacrity in the activity. Yet, the translations appearing in these volumes are not offered as interpretations in the sense that they are new analytic works about Vygotsky. They are offered to serve as basic texts for readers of English who may be interested in what Vygotsky himself had to say. They are offered to scholars and students, who will make their own interpretations (in its broader sense) and who will evaluate the interpretations of others. Having taken the view that a good translation is essentially an interpretation, the claim that this volume is an accurate and authentic interpretation of Vygotsky's meanings and intentions-and only of those meanings and intentions-must await hoped-for reassurances from those reviewers and critics who are qualified to make such judgments.

Klappentext

This work is a translation of Volume 5 of Pedagogika's 6 volume series published in Moscow between 1982 and 1984. It includes Vygotsky's works on defectology originally published between 1924 and 1932, as well as posthumous, unpublished material.

Zusammenfassung
The Plenum translations ofVygotsky' s texts are appearing at a moment when authentic and authoritative English versions of them are rare-a moment when the frequency of works about Vygotsky threatens to outstrip the availability of work by Vygotsky.

Inhalt
Vygotsky and Soviet Russian Defectology: An Introduction.- I: General Problems of Defectology.- Introduction: Fundamental Problems of Defectology.- 1: Defect and Compensation.- 2: Principles of Education for Physically Handicapped Children.- 3: The Psychology and Pedagogy of Children's Handicaps.- II: Special Problems of Defectology.- The Blind Child.- Principles of Social Education for the Deaf-Mute Child.- Compensatory Processes in the Development of the Retarded Child.- The Difficult Child.- Moral Insanity.- The Dynamics of Child Character.- Defectology and the Study of the Development and Education of Abnormal Children.- III: Questions at the Forefront of Defectology.- The Study of the Development of the Difficult Child.- Bases for Working with Mentally Retarded and Physically Handicapped Children.- Fundamental Principles in a Plan of Pedological Research in the Field of Difficult Children.- The Collective as a Factor in the Development of the Abnormal Child.- to la. K. Tsveifel's book, Essay on the Behavioral Characteristics and Education of the Deaf-Mute.- to E. K. Gracheva's book, The Education and Instruction of Severely Retarded Children.- The Problem of Mental Retardation.- The Diagnostics of Development and the Pedological Clinic for Difficult Children.- From Addresses, Reports, etc..- Afterword.- Notes to the Russian Edition.- References to Volume1 of This Series.- References to This Volume.- Author Index.