This is a direct re-publication of my position statement here on the blog set up by Bruce Ingraham in support of the Sudeley Paradox symposium at ALT-C 2006.
It might seem disingenuous that the technologies chosen to mediate a discussion about theoretical issues in technologically mediated learning were those leading to the production of a printed book. This paradoxical question has hovered just below the surface of the Sudeley discussions since their inception. But, in spite of this seeming paradox, which is ameliorated by the pluralisation of “technologies”, I do fully expect future generations of scholarship will exploit knowledge being gained through the engagement with and creation of electronically-mediated learning activities. This process will go at a ponderous, rate (water deep and still). For me the issues are deeper than the RAE, which can be seen as a superficial manifestation of a more fundamental epistemology of publishing and authority, and the academic community.
Here, I consider the philosophical and political implications of the Sudeley paradox. These have two dimensions: the contextual and the individual. The dimension of context is usefully described and explained in terms of communities of practice, actor networks, and structural theories like the “Third Way” (Giddens 1994: 68) and the “Third Space” (Bhabha 2004: 53). The individual dimension is usefully illuminated by emergent approaches, which position the researcher as learner and draw on theories of distributed cognition (Salomon 1993), social constructivism and identity politics. Over arching these are Freireian ideals of learner-centricism and a macroeconomic view of the organisation of the institutions of society in productive networks of “firms” through which goods and resources flow. Spacial metaphors are often used in respect of identity not only in direct reference to the self (I look up to him, though he is not as tall as I; city on the hill, higher education), but in ways of seeing the world structured hierarchically or concentrically, for example, almost tonally, as, when a person’s base tone is set, the relative differential movement notes semantically significant features. Metaphorical spatial positioning (going deeper into it, for example) can say much about a world view, not only where one “fits” but where everyone and everything else fits too; what is “surfaced” and what remains hidden.
But, first a note on the Sudeley process. While it would have been possible to produce the Sudeley book entirely by paper, photocopy and post, it would have been an even more fearsome job than herding 22 authors, each strong minded in their analyses, using e-mail. And, the result might have been different. The Sudeley group started asking about Wikis when we began drafting, but as a group were just behind that application curve (but we are blogging this). The book took shape through the e-mail circulation of many documents in the MSWord format, probably all originated and edited using Word. I contributed to three chapters with about four authors each. Each chapter went through what could be described as four to six iterations with not every author contributing to each iteration. I was not the lead author on any chapter though I was in at the beginning and the end of all three. Finally the lead author would pull something together and send it back to the team saying that if you object, shout now or it’s going in. Then it was down to the editors and the publisher.
I also need to declare my own position. I have never engaged directly with the RAE. And, this is illustrative of some of the questions raised by the Sudeley paradox. My small contributions to knowledge in my field as well as revenue to the University has, for some circles, been off the radar (but it has netted me a permanent academic contract – smiley). Although I bring in funding, it is JISC and HEA funding and as my publications derive from this funding they have not really been noticed by our internal research support apparatus. Only recently has “Research Services” attended to my applications. Previously it was considered the realm of “Business Development”. As I was not on an academic contract, I would have been ineligible to lead bids for Research Council Funding. But my contract of employment has always charged me with “undertaking research”. All these features reflect an underlying view of what counts on the interfaces of knowledge, authority, wealth and power. So my research is possibly less nuanced by the RAE than that of my colleagues but I suspect it is not too dissimilar from that of many who read this.
In fact a shared sense of being somehow anomalous, being outside the mainstream is a a defining feature of this group. This was always going to attract me. This was the community that gave me a start into research at all. I spoke up in Edinburgh in 2000, and found there was an ALT SIG called Learning Technology Theory. This group provides a useful illustration of rhizovocality (Jackson 2003): epistemologies – knowing what as much as knowing how – propagate in communities of practice. Bakhtinian polyvocality and heteroglossia were seen – and accepted for their explanatory power – in, for example, words exchanged by colleagues about whether learning technology is a community of practice or not. Community of Practice theory proved itself useful in illuminating learning technology practice emerging in the UK. It is now useful to bring actor network theory to communities of practice. Agency is distributed differently and resides in humans, their artefacts and institutions and the natural world.
All the disciplines and orientations I have mentioned align with critical theory, emphasising conflicting interests of social groups and having many approaches and “flavours”: femininst, Marxist, postfoundational. This “engaged” characteristic of critical discourse analysis and actor network theory makes them approaches suited both to understanding people in education and learning technology, as well as means of influencing policy. According to Taylor, such “... rhetorical analysis, ‘helps to point to the politics of discourse that is at play in policy making processes’ and suggests that this is a politics in which researchers need to engage ‘if their own arguments around policy issues are to be persuasive’" (Taylor 2004: 445). Scollon concludes:
... we have to agree that our human discourses do, indeed, work to some extent and, in some cases, in a dialectical relationship with the real world but, on the other hand, that reality puts up rather steady resistance to our discursive constructions of it. ... that is, the world exerts pressure on what we can say about it and at the same time our constructs can bring about changes in reality. (Scollon 2003)
This is not just an epistemological claim. Bringing about changes in reality is a politological question involving the direction of activity, that is: tools and rules, the direction of labour and capital: cultural, social and economic. Polity is the concern with how groups of people organise themselves. As well as exposing the politological orientation and purpose of learning technology theory, I argue that there is a politological thread running through all levels of analysis, personal and domestic to transnational and that this thread is carried as much by abstractions (Learning Technology in general) as by any concrete instances (a particular VLE). Not only is this approach engaged, it is engaged with a declared moral and ethical orientation, “on the side of dominated and oppressed groups.” As Fairclough declares, one aim of Language and Power was, “... to help increase consciousness of how language contributes to the domination of some people by others, because consciousness is the first step towards emancipation” (Fairclough 2001: , p. 1).
Like all structuring devices making polity models like these involves reduction of complexity. When making a representation of a community of practice or an actor network some things are left out. Agency does not recognise many traditional boundaries. In this community, Grainne Conole could address a near stranger and ask, “… are you doing anything for Networked Learning? Would you like to do a symposium with me and Chris Jones? You’ll like his politics.” Sue Clegg was also on that group. The “myth of flexibility” (Clegg and Steele 2002) is still seminally productive, kick starting my thoughts about the “new covert curriculum” (Roberts 2004) also, as it happens, under the influence of another paper published at Networked Learning 2002, Steve Fox’s “…Actor-Network Critique of Ideas on Community…” (Fox 2002). Another important rhizome in this text is “discipline”. The Sudeley book was always concerned with antecedant, parent or cognate feeder disciplines and how they contributed to the new emergent discipline of Learning Technology. The community positioned itself on the cusp of a Khunian revolution, consuming computer science, psychology, physics, engineering, chemistry, business studies, linguistics, sociology, education, philosophy and the rest while bringing forth a new paradigm of knowledge! Well, that was how it seemed after a bottle of red wine around banquet tables in castles in the Lakes and basement restaurants in the centres of Birmingham, Manchester, Amsterdam and Dublin.
So, my first academic piece in a “research” conference appeared at Networked Learning 2002 (Roberts 2002) shortly after my first position statement (ALT Theory SIG). And, here’s the next. As a maturing researcher I am far less certain of anything any more. Books are slowly being chipped open. Larry Lessig blogs that Yale University Press has started allowing authors to re-release books under a By-NC-SA licence (http://www.lessig.org/blog/archives/003483.shtml). I would be interested in petitioning Taylor and Francis to allow this book to be opened up on the web. It is where it belongs.
References
* ALT Theory SIG. "Web site of the Association for Learning Technology Special Interest Group for Theory and Learning Technology." Retrieved 23/08/2006, from http://homepages.north.londonmet.ac.uk/~cookj/alt_lt/index.htm.
* Bhabha, H. (2004). The Location of Culture. Abingdon, Routledge.
* Clegg, S. and J. Steele (2002). Flexibility as Myth? New Technologies and Post-Fordism in Higher Education. Networked Learning 2002: proceedings of the 3rd international conference held at the Univerfsity of Sheffield, 26 - 28 March 2002. D. McConnell, S. Banks, V. Hodgson, M. Asensio and P. Goodyear, Lancaster University and University of Sheffield.
* Fairclough, N. (2001). Language and Power, second edition. Harlow, Pearson.
* Fox, S. (2002). Networks and communities: an actor-network critique of ideas on community and implications for networked learning. Networked Learning 2002, proceedings of the 3rd international conference, Sheffield, 26 - 28 March 2002. D. McConnell, S. Banks, V. Hodgson, M. Asensio and P. Goodyear, Lancaster University and University of Sheffield: 119-127.
* Giddens, A. (1994). Beyond Left and Right: The Future of Radical Politics. Cambridge, Polity.
* Jackson, A. Y. (2003). "Rhizovocality." Qualitative Studies in Education 16(5): 693-710.
* Roberts, G. (2002). Complexity, Uncertainty and Autonomy: the Politics of Networked Learning. Networked Learning, 2002: proceedings of the third international conference, Sheffield University, 26 - 28 March 2002. D. McConnell, S. Banks, V. Hodgson, M. Asensio and P. Goodyear.
* Roberts, G. (2004). The New Covert Curriculum: a Critical, Actor-Network Approach to Learning Technology Policy. Networked Learning 2004: proceedings of the 4th international conference held at the Univerfsity of Lancaster, 5 - 7 April 2004. S. Banks, P. Goodyear, V. Hodgsonet al, University of Sheffield and University of Lancaster.
* Salomon, G. (1993). Distributed cognitions: psychological and educational considerations. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press
* Scollon, R. (2003). "The Dialogist in a Positivist World: Theory in the Social Sciences and the Humanities at the end of the Twentieth Century." Social Semiotics 13(1): 71-88.
* Taylor, S. (2004). "Researching educational policy and change in 'new times': using critical discourse analysis." Journal of Educational Policy 19(4): p433-451.
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