58 JOURNAL OF RUSSIAN AND EAST EUROPEAN PSYCHOLOGY

Journal of Russian and East European Psychology, vol. 43, no. 4,

JulyAugust 2005, pp. 5871.
2005 M.E. Sharpe, Inc. All rights reserved.
ISSN 10610405/2005 $9.50 + 0.00.
58
A.N. LEONTIEV
The Genesis of Activity
English translation 2005 M.E. Sharpe, Inc., from the Russian text 2003 A.A.
Leontiev, D.A. Leontiev, and Smysl. Genezis deiatelnosti, in Stanovlenie psikhologii
deiatelnosti: rannie raboty, ed. A.A. Leontiev, D.A. Leontiev, and E.E. Sokolova (Mos-
cow: Smysl, 2003), pp. 37385.
Stenographic transcript of an untitled lecture dated March 11, 1940. First pub-
lished as Analiz deiatelnosti, Vestnik Moskovskogo universiteta, Seriia 14, Psy-
chology, 1983, no. 2, pp. 517; as Genezis deiatelnosti, in Leontev A.N. Filosofiia
psikhologii (Moscow: Moscow University Press, 1994), pp. 5166.
Translated by Nora Favorov.
The reasons for the qualitative change in and the appearance of a new, higher
form of psychehuman consciousnessare, as I have previously stated, the
emergence of labor and the formation of human society. The transition from
animal to human is also the transition from the immediately biological, char-
acteristics of animals, from a relationship with nature, to a new social relation-
ship to nature that finds expression in the emergence and development of the
process of labor.
Labor is not only that which appears together with man; it is not only that
new relationship to nature that we observe as the result of the humanizing of
animals. Labor is also, and primarily, what transforms the animal-like fore-
runner of man into man. Again we see that the transition to a higher stage of
development both in the sense of more complex and developed organization
of the very subject of activity, in this case, man, and from the perspective of
the emergence of a new, higher form of the reflection of reality, is realized
primarily in the form of a change in life itself, the appearance of a new form of
life, a new relationship to reality, and a new form of connection with nature.
First labor, as Engels expresses it, and then, together with it, articulate
JULYAUGUST 2005 59
speech, are the two primary stimuli under the influence of which the brain of
the ape gradually changed into that of man, which, despite all its similarity to
the monkey brain, is far superior to it in size and efficiency.
1
Of course, the emergence of labor was prepared by the course of develop-
ment that came before it: walking upright and the development of the hands as
a very efficient organ, which were integral to the lifestyle led by mans hu-
manoid ancestorall this created the physical possibility of the appearance of
the complex process of labor. The process of labor was also prepared in an-
other way. It arises not, of course, in an animal living alone, but in animals in
the humanoid ancestors of man who lived in groups, in whom it is possible to
see the beginning stages of a certain life together, although these beginnings
were still, of course, not at all like the beginnings of true social life in their
internal characteristics. Later we see that the development of the psyche
reaches quite a high relative level in the most advanced members of the
animal world. In this way, the prerequisites were created that could lead, and
indeed did lead, to the possibility of the emergence of labor and human
society, founded on labor.
What is it that makes labor a specifically human activity? Labor, as you
know, is what we call the process of influencing nature. Labor is also a pro-
cess of activity that connects man with nature. This is a process that Marx
actually calls a process between man and nature. But at the same time, not
every process of influencing nature, of course, can and should be called a
process of labor. There are two essential features that characterize labor, spe-
cifically the form of impact on nature. One of these features is the use of tools.
The process of influencing nature that we call labor is a process of influencing
nature using tools. Second, the process of labor is always carried out in the
combined, in the literal sense of the word, activity of people in such a way that
man enters into a defined relationship not only with nature but also with other
people, with members of a given society. It is specifically through these rela-
tionships toward other people that man relates to nature. Therefore, labor
emerges from the start as a social process. I have already stated that labor is a
specifically human activity. And truly, no matter how many externally similar
processes we may have studied in the animal world, in none of them can we
discover features that by nature are those of the specifically human social
activity that we call labor.
In my opinion, there is one more feature that is quite essential, and I would
like to especially point out and emphasize it before moving on to examine the
significance of the appearance and development of labor from the perspective
of the development and change of specifically human activity and psyche.
This last feature is as follows: the very development of man is determined now
by the development of labor, and, acting with labor with the help of labor
60 JOURNAL OF RUSSIAN AND EAST EUROPEAN PSYCHOLOGY
relationships on the external side of nature and changing it, man, at the same
time, changes his own nature. He develops, according to Marx, abilities latent
in his nature and subjects the interplay of these forces to his own power.
2
So, what kind of change in the specific processes of human activity and
what kind of change in the form of reflection of human reality does this fea-
ture bringemerging labor, creating man himself?
Labor is a process, as we have seen, that is realized not by a lone being, in
ways peculiar to himself alone, but under conditions of peoples joint activity,
under conditions of a human collective, and, as I will try to especially empha-
size, in a social, that is, collectively expressed way. Through this process,
people enter into communication with one another. It is not so much a matter
of communication that is primarily verbal, of course, but of communication in
the sense of participation in a joint action, in the sense of participation in the
process of labor, first and foremost.
Let us look at how, in practical terms, human activitythe activity of a
member of a human society at a certain stage of development of labor, al-
though a relatively low onemight take shape. Let us look at the activity of
an individual human under conditions of joint labor, under conditions of the
joint and productive activity of people.
It is known that even very early in history what is called the technical divi-
sion of labor began to be seen rather clearly. The technical division of labor is
expressed in the fact that overall, the complex process is divided between
separate agents. One takes upon himself a part or an aspect, one link in the
entire, complex, unified process. Other participants take on other links. In
particular, it is suggested, that at a certain stage in the development of human
society one can observe such a division of functions: the maintenance of fire,
the work of preserving the hearth fire is given to women. Men hunt animals.
What is the fire needed for? Maintaining a fire in a warm climate is essential
for cooking food. Providing food unites both of these processesthe actual
finding of the animal and the maintenance of the fire.
Let us now analyze just what the activity of a person maintaining a fire is.
What is the focus of this persons activity? Is the object of this activity some-
thing that can in and of itself or in association with some other properties, ob-
jects, and so on, satisfy human need? If we assume a situation under the conditions
of a warm climate, then in and of itself fire is not an object of activity that can
stimulate this activity. How, then, can we explain the fact that this activity none-
theless takes place? It is not hard to find the answer to this question. Evidently,
the point is that maintaining the fire is associated with the capability to cook
food. So it leads to satisfying an essential and important needthe need for
nourishment. But how is the first tied to the secondmaintaining the fire, on
JULYAUGUST 2005 61
the one hand, and satisfying the need for food, on the other? Perhaps the con-
nection here is the connection of constant, simultaneous effect, and as soon as
the effect of the fire takes place, then the possibility of satisfying the need for
food is satisfied? Perhaps fire, the object stimulating the activity toward which
the activity maintaining this fire is directed, is connected to food in the same
way that the sound produced by an insect is connected to its landing in the
grass, allowing the animal-hunter, moving in the direction of the sound, in the
end to almost inevitably attain the possibility of satisfying its need for food by
catching the rustling insect? Noevidently the connection here is of an en-
tirely different sort.
What do we see that is special in this connection? What is special is that
this connection is not a connection based on similarity, not a connection based
on coexistence. This connection has a special nature. The activity of other
peoplethat is what unites the first and the second. For the maintenance of
the fire to lead to the satisfaction of a vital need, it is essential that another part
of the activity is carried out by other peoplethe catching of the animal, whose
meat can be prepared on this fire. If this second process did not exist, then the
first would not be able to lead to the satisfaction of any sort of need and loses
its purpose.
We do not and cannot find the sort of activity that I just described anywhere
in the animal world. It can arise, as you yourself understand, under only one
set of conditionswhere there is joint activity. Only where there is social life,
under conditions of the life of a person in the society of other people.
How should one now denote this new process, which is characterized by
these special features? We have seenand the last time I especially empha-
sized this, that any time we observe some process in an animal, the thing at
which the process is directedthe object at which it is directedis simulta-
neously what stimulates the activity, that is, what we have agreed to call by the
term motive. The animal follows a line of sound waves. Toward what is the
animals activity directed? Toward the source of the sound. And what brings,
activates, stimulates this process? It is the sound-emitting body itself, it is the
source of sound. They coincide. What are the features of the structure of this
new process that appears on the basis of the emergence of labor activity? What
is special in this process is that now the object toward which the process is
directed is not what in and of itself stimulates the action. It is not fire that is
needed, it is not actual heat that is needed. Fire is maintained because it is
essential for something else, because it is in relation to something else, in this
case, to nutritional matter, or it would be more precise and correct to say: the
fire generates activity in relation to itself, the activity of maintaining it in this
case, because another person is ensuring the possibility of using it as a way to
62 JOURNAL OF RUSSIAN AND EAST EUROPEAN PSYCHOLOGY
cook food. Thus, what is new here is that what stimulatesthe motiveand
the object toward which the activity is directed, are now not the same thing.
What is it in our example that could be viewed as the motive behind the entire
process, what motivates it? It is food. It is something that answers an essential
need. But are food and fire the same thing? No, they are connected through a
certain relationship, but they are not the same. What is this relationship? How
is it specifically expressed? We have already stated: they are particularly ex-
pressed in the activity of another person, in the relationship of the subject of
this activity to the subject of some other activity, to the activity, in this ex-
ample, of the hunter. What is this relationship? A natural connection or is this
a social connection? This is a social connection. What form does it take? The
form of the activity of other people.
Finally, let us ask the final question that arises in connection with the pro-
cess we are examining. How is activity possible in relation to an object that, in
and of itself, is not the thing that can stimulate my activity? It is clear, of
course, that such activity is possible only if somehow the relationship, the
connection that exists between the object of my activity and the thing that can
stimulate my activity, is somehow reflected, is somehow perceived. So it must
be presumed that such activity necessarily presumes a reflection of relation-
ships that connect the object of activity and its motive. It is necessary that the
object toward which my activity is directed be encompassed, be reflected in
its relationships and connections with what is capable of stimulating me to
action, with the motive.
To put it more simply and concisely: it is necessary that there be awareness
of the object of activity, that is, that it be reflected in its particular objective
relationshipin this case, a social relationship to the object of my need. It
would be correct to call the object of such activity the goal, emphasizing through
this word that we are dealing not with an instinctive object, but with a con-
sciously realized object, that is, with a goal. One is forced, evidently, to sig-
nify in some other way the entire process directed at the conscious goal. In
essence, activity, that is, what leads to the satisfaction of a need, has grown.
Now, as is evident from the example we have analyzed, it presumes not just
the action of a single given person, but his action under conditions of the
activity of other people, that is, it presumes a certain joint activity. A name
must be found for the unit that has been separated out in the course of the
process that satisfies the need, and to signify this separated unit. It is what we
call action. How do we define what action is? Action, which we truly encoun-
ter for the first time only in man, is a process that is directed at a conscious
goal. The special feature of this process is that the conscious goal, at which the
process is directed, may not be the same thing, and is not the same thing that
JULYAUGUST 2005 63
satisfies the need that has motivated the action overall. Allow me to give an
example, putting our historical material to the side, an example that is from
the activity of man, in this case contemporary man, in order to illustrate the
difference between activity and action. We observe a person reading a book.
We know that it is a textbook, a book that must be read to prepare for an exam.
What is this process that we are observing directed toward? His object is the
contents of the book. The result of this process is the mastery of the content of
the book. The question arises: so, is this process stimulated specifically by the
content of the book? This is unknown. We have to take a closer look. It may be
that the thing forcing him to read the book is not its content. Let us perform
the following experiment: let us say to this person that the examination for
which he is preparing is canceled and that he will never have to take the exam
in his whole life. What could happen? There are two different cases. In one
case, the person closes the book and starts doing something else. What was
the reading of the book in this case? Was it an activity? No, it was not, evi-
dently, an activity. Because the sign of an activity is that the object and the
motive coincide. Evidently, as soon as we took away the motive, the object of
action ceased to exist, the action collapsed.
But we can imagine another case: you are telling a person that it is not
necessary to read this book in order to fulfill the intention of passing the exam.
Goodit is very nice to hear this, your reader will say, and will continue to
read. We ask him why he continues to read. Because the book itself is interest-
ing to him. The object of his action coincides with the thing that motivates his
activity. What is thisaction or activity? Activity. I have brought up this ex-
ample, which is a bit artificial, because it clearly demonstrates that when we
psychologically analyze a process, it is never possible to judge based on exter-
nal appearances and the objective result. It is always necessary to view this
process earlier from the perspective of psychology. From the outside, the reading
of the book in both cases appears to be the same process, but you see the
difference between them when you pose the question of the motivation behind
the process, about what stimulates the person to act, about the reflection of the
corresponding connections and relations in the consciousness of the person
in other words, how this process is consciously realized.
Allow me to summarize. With the appearance of labor, we see the separat-
ing out of special units within activityaction, directed toward realizing a
goal. Such a separation is possible specifically because the transition toward a
process of labor signifies at the same time a mans move toward joint activity,
to collective activity. To this must be addedemphasizing this although it
must be the subject of special examination and we actually will examine it
separatelythat over the course of development and growth in complexity of
64 JOURNAL OF RUSSIAN AND EAST EUROPEAN PSYCHOLOGY
the process, the thing that stimulates man to act, which is not the same thing as
the object toward which the specific action is directed, is absolutely not the
thing that meets his natural vital needs, as, for instance, the need for food. This
type of connection with nature, this social way of living life, the social life of
man, in its development leads to the following noteworthy phenomenon: it
turns out that what can emerge initially and initially historically, it seems,
emerges as the goal of action, that to which action is directed but is not able to
stimulate activity in and of itself is transformed into a new, human type of
motive. A new kind of need emerges, since now what increasingly stimulates
the activity of man are factors that do not meet primitive, biological, vital
needs, but that meet certain new, specifically human needs that are social in
nature. Itself, the social way of satisfying elementary needs arises over the
course of development, makes it essential that over the course of development
new, higher human needs appear. A process occurs that can be expressed thus:
the motive, separate from the goal, comes at a certain stage in the develop-
ment of the given process toward the goal itself.
The example that I gave about reading a book, a naive and rather simple
example, can be used to show this transition, to describe it. You undertake
something because you are moved by some extraneous motive that lies out-
side of the given action, but you realize this action, and it may and does hap-
pen that in the course of the action itself you notice that you are beginning to
act not because the external motive stimulates you to do so, but because now
the object itself, toward which the action is directed, turns out to be interesting
or attractive to you. You started to read a book because it was necessary. You
continue to read because it is interesting. This is the simplest way to describe
this change.
Thus, the necessity, to which not only separate actions but also the activity
of man are subject, is transformed from a merely biological necessity into a
necessity that could be called a social necessity. So it is a social and not a
biological necessity that becomes the law to which the activity of man is sub-
ject. And if, talking about animals, we say that the top law of animal activity is
that it falls within the realm of instinct, that is, that it meets biological needs,
then in relation to man we can say that the top law is that activity is subject to
social necessity, and not biological necessity, although, of course, under no
circumstances can the life of man continue without the meeting of his biologi-
cal needs.
First of all, what we see that is new in the activity of man and that appears
in connection with the transition to labor is the uniquely human unit of activ-
ity that we have designated with the word action and that is a process subject
to a goal. In connection with the appearance of action, as I stated briefly, the
JULYAUGUST 2005 65
nature of activity itself changes as a whole as it further develops. It is now
directed not only in relation to objects that immediately satisfy instinctive
biological needs, but it takes on a social nature itself. Motives that are social in
character become predominant. Needs that are human, social in character,
emerge. Other processes also change, processes that we find in complex, de-
veloped activity. First and foremost, the content of activity changes, that is,
the content of the process that relates to the conditions under which the pro-
cess takes place change. What does this change of conditions consist of? It
primarily consists in the fact that tools appear. The manner of human action is
characterized by the fact that the action is carried out with the help of tools.
What is a tool? According to Marx, the means or tools of labor are the objects
or set of objects that the worker places between himself and the object of labor
and that are used as a guide to his effect on this object.
3
Tools are inexorably tied to labor. Labor is an activity that uses tools, an
activity carried out by means of tools. This is the reason that we see the first
genuine tools only with man. As far as animals are concerned, we can speak
only of rudimentary tools, but here it is always important to remember that
these rudimentary tools differ qualitatively from developed forms of tools,
that is, from true tools. A stick that a monkey might use and a stick that a
human might use to perform a labor action are by their nature completely
different things. In what way is a true tool different from a stick or some other
object used by an animal? How, essentially, does an object we call a tool ap-
pear? It always appears as a vehicle of a certain manner of actions. A hammer
is something with the help of which certain operations can be performed. Within
the tool itself some manner of action, some manner of usage of this object is
always materially formulated. And that is what makes a tool a tool. The ques-
tion arises: does this rule apply equally to a stick, which is used by hominoid
apes to reach a banana, and to tools that a person uses in the process of his
productive labor actions? In the most general sense, if we do not look at the
question in more detail, in both cases we find a method. What is a stick used
by a monkey? It is primarily a method of getting fruit, a banana. Just as I have
already said that any human tool also comprises a certain method, in its mate-
rial form it represents a certain method of action. But in addition to the gener-
ality that unites the monkeys stick and a human tool, there is a qualitative
difference between them, a difference that is quite essential. And here is what
the difference consists of: it is not a method of usage randomly determined by
a given set of circumstances that is carried out by a human tool, but it is a
socially developed method, a socially developed approach. When an animal
finds itself in a situation that suggests the use of a stick, the animal is capable,
as we have seen, of using a stick as a means of obtaining the fruit. But let us
66 JOURNAL OF RUSSIAN AND EAST EUROPEAN PSYCHOLOGY
take a different situation. The fruit is in the hands of the monkey, or it has been
completely taken out of the field of action of the animal by man, or there has
been some other change in the circumstances of action. Will the stick continue
to represent a certain method of action for the animal, will that random method
of using it as a given object be reinforced? Observation shows that this never
happens. Only at the moment when the animal finds itself in a situation that
demands the use of a stick does the stick begin to fill the role of the objectof
a method of action. As soon as the situation changes, the stick is again trans-
formed into an object that is indifferent. It is not attributed with any method of
action. The stick does not become a vehicle of that method of action. For
this reason it does not become a true tool. Therefore, the animal does not
make tools, and because of this the animal does not keep tools. In man, we
see something else. The human tool is something that is made, it is some-
thing that is preserved and a method of action is retained by this tool. There-
fore, it would make a strange impression on all of us, for instance, to see a
monkey walking around with a stick, but no one would be surprised if an
artist, envisioning a primitive human, portrayed him walking and holding a
primitive tool in his hands.
In a human tool, that is, a true tool, we can see, first and foremost, that it is
the vehicle of a certain method of action, and, moreover, a social method of
action, that is, developed in the joint activity of people. Specifically because it
was not developed individually or by chance in one situation or another, this
method is at the same time a conscious method, that is, reflected in the psyche
of man, and therefore associated by man with this object. Only under this
condition is it possible to see what we indeed see, specifically, the storage of
tools, the making of tools, that is, it is possible that in the making of a tool, the
vehicle of a method of action is the goal toward which human action is di-
rected. There is awareness of the tool in its connection with action, as a method
of action. This is how a tool can become a goal toward which action is di-
rected; a tool can be made, produced. But when we talk about awareness of a
tool, about the reflection of a tool in its connection with an action, at the same
time, we are talking about any method of use of this thing, any method by
which an action is carried out, which is materially reflected in the tool, and
which is also an object of reflection, an object of consciousness. In other words,
awareness of a method of action emerges, that is, something unknown to ani-
mals emerges, something never seen in the animal world.
How is this reflected? It is reflected in the fact we see first in man the
possibility of truly preparing his actions. The division of the preparation phase
and the realization phase that is seen even in monkeys, in higher-order animals
in general, that which gives their behavior the characteristic of intellectual
JULYAUGUST 2005 67
behaviorthis notable division of phases is first realized in man. Man can act,
preparing his action. Again, the simplest example of such an action is the
action of making a tool. The actual making of the tool is nothing but the first
preparatory phase of an action that has taken on the character of an indepen-
dent, separate action, representing a certain goal. It is this split, this breaking
apart, separation of phases that had been tied to one anotherthe phases of
preparation and realizationthat comprises the special feature that character-
izes human intellectual action and that is the beginning, the initial point of the
development of the human beingin the exact sense of this wordthought.
The use of tools, the making of tools not only leads to an awareness of
ones own, that is, social, action. At the same time, the use of tools is a prereq-
uisite, a precondition for the awareness of the object being impacted with the
help of this tool. The tool is adapted to the object of action. The hammer
represents not only a method by which the action of hammering or smashing,
and so on, can be realized. Its objective properties must reflect the properties
of the object toward which the action is directed. Can a tool, adapted for ac-
tions toward small objects be big? No, because it must correspond to the ob-
jective characteristics of this object; its own properties reflect the objective
properties of the object on which this particular tool used. In a tool, in a visual,
sensual, I would say palpable form, not only the method of my action appears,
but the properties of the object toward which my action is directed. Finally,
last of all: a tool impacts not just one single object. We use tools in dealing
with many objects in the world around us. One and the same tool is directed at
different objects at different times. It is as if it subjects the property of an
object to a test and unites its objects, generalizes, associates them, and associ-
ates them according to purely objective propertiestested by the very action
of the toolnot dependent on our attitude toward a given object. A hammer
may be able to smash apart one object, a second, a third time, but turn out to be
ineffective the fourth time. By virtue of is properties of resilience and sturdi-
ness, the fourth try is put into a different category from all those objects that
were submitted to the action of this tool of mine. This is why Marx calls hu-
man tools the first true generalization, the first true abstraction, that is, the first
true taking of separate properties and being aware of them in objects.
4
As you
see, this again, is the material, the sensually perceived form in which the ob-
jective properties of the objective world around man is represented in his psyche.
In the new type of activity of man that corresponds to the new type of life
of man, you see his social and work life, all of the prerequisites are created
for changing the type of reflection of reality. You see that the conditions
created by these new processes are such that they make possible and neces-
sary a reflection of the reality in which man lives, not in the form we see
68 JOURNAL OF RUSSIAN AND EAST EUROPEAN PSYCHOLOGY
with animalsinseparable from the actions of animals, from the attitude of
the animal to these objects, inseparable from the instincts of these animals
but rather a form that offers a reflection of the objective world surrounding
man in its objective properties, independent of the needs of man and of his
instincts. A tool is the object that appears to the consciousness of man in its
enduring property. A tool remains a tool for man even when no immediate
need of the tool is felt by him. Food, which is attained now by man not for
himself, not by a solitary, or isolated person and not by a herd of people,
where everyone acts to satisfy his own need, but food that appears as an object
of joint, social action of people, now also appears independent of concern for
the changing needs of each individual person. A social method for getting
food is established. This method is conscious. Being aware of this method,
people are also aware of the object that they obtain with this method. There is
awareness of food in its enduring nutritional properties. Man does not waste-
fully destroy food that he finds in nature, but is able to gather it, preserve it,
relate to food as food whether or not he feels hunger at the moment. His atti-
tude toward a given object is separated from the object itself.
Conditions are created that necessitate the sort of reflection of reality that
allows for the identification of the enduring, objective properties and qualities
of this reality. But there must be something that allows this form of reflection
to truly be born. There must be conditions that not only necessitate such a
reflection but also allow this reflection to be truly realized. Because a sensual,
sensory reflection, a reflection that completely exhausts itself, that fits com-
pletely in sensual experience, in feelings, in a sensual image, and so on, is
insufficient here. Corresponding to the change in the activity there must be a
change in the form of reflection. What we call human consciousness must
emerge. For the emergence of human consciousness, sensuality, sensory forms
of reflection, are insufficient. For the emergence of consciousness, it is essen-
tial that a special form of reflection emerge, a form of reflection tied to the
appearance of language and speech.
Language, says Marx, is as old as consciousness; language is practical,
real consciousness that exists for other people as well, and therefore exists for
me; and like consciousness, language arises only out of need, out of the insis-
tent necessity of communication with other people.
5
In these words, Marx clearly emphasizes two essential thoughts. First, that
consciousness emerges together with language, and that consciousness begins
to exist when and where language begins to exist. That language is, to put it
another way, the real form of human consciousness, is the true consciousness
of man. Second, that language, like consciousness itself, emerges because man
enters into relations with other people. The emergence of language and human
JULYAUGUST 2005 69
consciousness is again tied to the transition to labor, with the emergence and
development of labor that, as I already said, is characterized not only by the
fact that many enter into a relationship with nature, influencing it with the
help of tools of labor, but also by the fact that man enters into relations with
other people and this becomes a determining factor in his relationship to
nature.
Before us there is now a new, special task, a new special subject. The ques-
tion is about the emergence and nature of human speech and the meaning of
speech, about the connection between speech and the consciousness and thought
of man. Speech, together with labor, is an essential condition for the emer-
gence of human consciousness. Labor and speechsuch are the main condi-
tions that Engels emphasizes, speaking about the process of the transition from
animal to human. Speech arises out of the need for mans communication with
man, out of the need, as Engels puts it, to say something to someone else.
Does this mean, however, that in examining the question of human speech and
its emergence, about its essence, it is enough for us to start only from the fact
that in the process of labor, people develop a need? Can we reason that labor
gives rise to the need for communication, the need for speech? This need calls
to life the appearance of speech with the help of language; does language,
speech allow human consciousness to take shape? No, evidently, we cannot
reason thus. This would surely be a simplification of the essence of the matter.
In explaining the origin of speech and language, taken from the process of
labor and together with it, Engels further states that this is the only true expla-
nation. Communication is the aspect of labor that makes speech essential, but
speech itself emerges in direct connection with labor itself, and therefore speech
itself becomes possible only in the process of labor.
6
One must not think that people enter into communication with one another
only in the form of speech, in the form of special actions that are directed at
conveying something to another person, to indicate something to another per-
son, to motivate him to an action, and so forth. Then, the speech that emerges
would have to be viewed as invented speech. That is always a bad way to look
at something, because invention, and the possibility of invention, are always a
result and not a cause. The theory that represents the emergence of speech as
the result of mans invention of this manner of communication with other
people is naive and untrue in its essence. The emergence of speech must be
understood as the product of the division of a process that has been unified,
connecting man with man. And, this is the process of labor; it is the joint labor
action of people. The development of these joint labor actions by people
leading to their specialization, to a divisionleads to the emergence of spe-
cial actions that are related neither to labor nor to the practical actions of man,
70 JOURNAL OF RUSSIAN AND EAST EUROPEAN PSYCHOLOGY
and those unique actions that we call verbal actions. In this way, speech itself
gradually separates from the process of labor.
How does this separation take place? Is the specialization of some actions,
which are no longer labor actions but special actions carrying out only one
function, to influence another person, that is, are they speech actions? The
modern history of the development of language, especially represented in the
works of academician N.Ia. Marr and his school, indicates that the most ancient
form of speech was so-called complex speech, that is, inarticulate, kinetic speech.
This was speech using sounds, but with the help of movements. Furthermore,
these movementsat the dawn of the emergence of this speechrepresent
movements that correspond very closely to the actual movements of a person
performing labor.
Initially, a work movement and a movement serving to influence another
person under conditions of a joint activity among people coincided. Here,
indeed, was a complex, not only in the sense that this speech could not be
divided into separate parts of speech, separate units of a sentence, but it was
complex and united also in that such an action directly reveals its connection
with a productive action, with a labor action. When a person puts effort toward
some action that must be produced in the process of social labor; when, for
instance, a person exerts an effort toward moving some obstacle out of the
way or out of the path of his action, then with the joint activity of people, as is
easy to understand, the action directed at the objectthe labor actioncan
serve simultaneously to indicate to another person participating in this pro-
cess the necessity of performing this action and can stimulate another person
to appropriate participation in the action.
What are the two functions of a labor action by me under the conditions of
joint human activity? One function is the influencing of an objectthis is a
direct labor function. The other function is the influencing of other people. In
acting on an object of labor, I indirectly influence other people. But, imagine
now that my action, a separate influence, is impossible, and experience indi-
cates that it is unrealizable, but experience also tells me that, in attempting to
act, I will attract to this action other participants in the labor process who
together with me will carry out the given action. What would then happen
naturally? The following would naturally happen: I will not make every pos-
sible effort in making my movement into a work movement, but will limit
myself only to preserving the part of it, the content of it, that is perceived by
other people. I preserve all of my movements, but I do not produce an action.
It turns out that my movement is separate from an action. And what is move-
ment separate from an action? It is a gesture. How can we define a gesture? A
gesture cannot, of course, be defined in any way but as a movement that is
JULYAUGUST 2005 71
separated from a real action that effects an actual change on an object. A ges-
ture is a separate movement, alienated from action. When I perform this action
with a glass, I am not actually performing an action, but a gesture, that is, I am
organizing my action in such a way that it takes on a certain content of the
action of throwing a glass on the floor; but, in fact, that glass is not thrown, the
action is not produced. I produced only a gesture. When I do not know the
language you are speaking but I want to show you that you have to throw the
glass, I would act in this way; I am depicting an action, but not producing it. A
threatening gesture, a gesture indicating someone should come to mein a
word, the entire system of such natural, not symbolic, not technically devel-
oped gestures, represents movement even now, some actions, separated from
the action itself. Therefore, the first step in the development of actual human
speech, first in separation from real productive labor actions, is nothing but
kinetic speech, or, as it is still sometimes called, linear speech, that is, it is
speech with the aid of gesture. It is true that, evidently (such a presumption
can be made from a contemporary scientific perspective), this speech is con-
nected with a certain sound accompaniment. But what plays the decisive role
in the first steps of speech development? Gesture, movement. What character-
izes consciousness at this stage of complex kinetic speech? What is it that
takes shape in a gesture and appears to our consciousness as objective, not tied
to our own subjective state? What stands out, first and foremost, is nature,
where only some primary properties and objects satisfying the needs of man
for food and the like are prevalent. On the one hand, it is nature that stands out,
and on the other hand, what actually stands out? The subject here is not man,
but human society. Wepeople who act, the human collective, and itnature.
This is the first division in the consciousness of man that is tied to the origin of
labor and speech.
Notes
1. K. Marx [Marks] and F. Engels [Engels], Works [Soch.] vol. 20, p. 490.
2. Ibid., vol. 23, pp. 18889.
3. Ibid., p. 190.
4. Ibid., pp. 18997.
5. Ibid., vol. 3, p. 29.
6. Ibid., vol. 20, pp. 48699.
To order reprints, call 1-800-352-2210; outside the United States, call 717-632-3535.