L. S. Vigotski’s studies about disability

developments for psychology and pedagogy today

Abstract

Historical-Cultural Theory makes essential contributions to disability studies, called “defectology”. Lev Semionovitch Vigotski, the main name at the forefront of this science, revolutionized the psychology field and education in this area that concerns the development of people with specific needs. Despite this, several concepts that encompass these studies are poorly understood and/or incorrectly explored. This article aims to present in a critical way the relations between the “normal” and the “pathological” by articulating the following concepts: the role of the “environment” in development; the importance of the “collective” in deve-lopment; the “defect” problem; “biological compensation” versus “social compensation”; and the role of “diagnosis” for human development, in addition to understanding “social education”, addressed in Vigotski’s posthumous work that makes up Tome V - Fundamentos da Defectologia. From a bibliographic review analysis of defectology studies, it was possible to conclude that understanding the author’s ideas in a contextualized and critical way is fundamental, especially tensioning the contradiction among normal and pathological and other concepts when questioning the social construction around deficiency. It was also interesting to contribute to the debate about possible developments of desdobramentos desses estudos na atualidade, especial-mente para a educação e psicologia, além de se afastar dos equívocos conceituais e distorções que instrumentalizam os ideários teóricos que versam sobre essa temática.