[iDC] learning ecologies

Mon Apr 12 07:22:02 UTC 2010

hi all

some footnotes in a literal sense. 

1. I am not totally sure about the replacement of "the book", maybe more
a dis-placement, its site or territory has certainly shifted.

2. In a recent talk by Gustav Metzger
http://www.avfestival.co.uk/programme/10/events/gustav-metzger,
following the symposium Planetary Breakdown: Autonomous Infrastructures
for a Sustainable Future Symposium
http://www.avfestival.co.uk/programme/10/events/autonomous-infrastructure (both
events were part of AV festival 2010 on "Energy"), Gustav put forward
the idea of young people's 'energy' in relation to language. In there
use of re-inventing it they introduce a certain undermining of it. 
Language as such is at the heart of the future, becoming more important
than ever, but there is a need of cleansing language, to find new meanings. 
Claiming a need to cleanse has to do with a hope to work against the
commercial, with a reference to the Frankfurt School, critique right in
the mainstream. 

I wonder if language has to be situated right in modes of speech, in
this sense, not through so-called social tools, but by literal, or
actual inter-action. - which is missing in telecommunication. 

3. Referring to Elana's comment on the limit of the interactive, there
is another concept that might come into play, a definition of
interactivity as something always already reduced to the extent of being
in-active. - One can refer to Laclau’s and Mouffe’s (2001) understanding
of the social as a discursive field in which subject positions emerge,
rather than a subject appear. In the relation with the other, I cannot
be myself: the social arises from the impossibility of myself as a
totality (Laclau & Mouffe, 2001). Antagonism, understood as a positive,
generative concept, describes an absence of a closure needed to
constitute a functioning society. 
In this 'discomfort' is a certain opposition to the interpersonal,
interactive experience of a common interest, as in interactive
experience (with/on the computer). At stake is the activity of a work,
or text, that manifests this experience of diversity, discomfort and
tensions, and echoes the boundaries of communities. 

4. Might be interesting to read in relation to language, speech, written
word. 
Deleuze (1997), "He Stuttered", pp.107-114, in: Essays critical and
clinical, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis. 

best
Verina

www.crumbweb.org

----- Original Message -----
From: Andreas Schiffler <aschiffler at ferzkopp.net>
Date: Sunday, April 11, 2010 5:09 am
Subject: Re: [iDC] learning ecologies

> 
> I am half way through reading Mark Bauerlein's alarmist "The 
> Dumbest 
> Generation" (Backcover catchphrase: ... reveals the disturbing and 
> ultimately, incontrovertible truth, cyberculture is turning us into 
> a 
> society of know-nothings". If the truth it portrays - mostly 
> substantiated by quoting study after survey after anecdotal 
> evidence - 
> holds up, then at least the average under-30 American has indeed 
> less of 
> the more traditional literacy and common knowledge as compared to 
> the 
> over 30-year-old's. There abilities have been replaced with a form 
> of 
> e-literacy and e-behaviors, which do not seem to be an equal 
> substitute 
> to what is lost.
> 
> I see no reason to disagree with this assessment. The fallacy of 
> technology-cheerleaders seems to be a belief, that IT and the 
> Internet 
> have a built-in benefit to lower the bar needed to attain 
> knowledge. We 
> think Wikipedia makes us smarter and helps kids with learning, when 
> in 
> fact it actually raises the bar. While anyone would agree that 
> access to 
> content is not equals understanding of content, with access to 
> digital 
> content, learners have to manage larger and larger volumes of 
> information (most of it autogenerated or trivial junk), spend time 
> with 
> more complex messages (AFAIK WYSIAYG), shift from one technology to 
> the 
> next, and other "complications", And all this is happening on 
> systems 
> and platforms which are consistently getting sucked into the muck 
> of 
> commercialization and entertainment over time (iMac, iBook, iPod, 
> iPhone, iPad = delivery platform for iAds).
> 
> I wish us all luck with the research. We are at best at the 
> beginning of 
> understanding how to constructively handle the shift caused by the 
> replacement of "the book" (tm) with commercialized networks, 
> immense 
> data silos, infantilization of discourse and an avalanche of 
> simplistic 
> "smart" devices. It probably has to be lived to be understood.
> 
> --Andreas
> 
> On 4/9/10 12:57 PM, elana langer wrote:
> > Television, a medium that was once declared the most powerful
> > contribution to the learning environment, provided a perfect analogy
> > for the tension in
> > the current educational paradigm. From the medium’s inception
> > Educational Television (ETV) faced the insurmountable
> > challenge of trying to compete within the economic structures of
> > commercial television. Even when a show like Sesame Street was 
> able to
> > achieve commercial
> > success, the medium itself fell prey to the critique of theorists 
> like> Postman and Winn, claiming that television had a limited 
> learning> potential. In fact the enthusiasm for computers today is
> > indistinguishable from the pamphlets encouraging the use of 
> television> from the 1950’s. Yet as technologies like computers 
> continue to gain
> > support within the educational arena, the context for learning often
> > remains the same.
> >
> > Critics of technologies that range from radio to computers focus on
> > analyzing the educational potential and uses of emerging 
> technologies> and not enough time focusing on the educational 
> processes into which
> > these technologies are embedded. As a result, the media produced 
> be it
> > filmstrip or CD-ROM reflect the limits of the educational 
> philosophies> rather than the limitations of the technology itself.
> >
> > Julian Daily and Michael F C Moreland are both using opportunities
> > afforded through new technologies to expand the learning process and
> > create collaborative learning environments - But can the system 
> expand> and accommodate their efforts? Julian, through his company 
> g8four is
> > creating new models of constructivist learning environments enabled
> > through personal computing. His team have worked both in and outside
> > the classroom has experience both in and outside of the classroom
> > innovating uses for the XO laptop.
> >
> > Michael F C Moreland created seedr l3c, a company designing tools 
> and> strategies for global development that make communities around 
> the> world safer and more prosperous. He uses technology and a
> > collaborative design methodology that includes end users and
> > stakeholders from different disciplines and sectors to make the
> > solutions more informed and relevant.
> >
> > What systems of bureaucracy need to be in place to make each company
> > and effort possible? Do those systems hinder the growth of the model
> > being proposed? Have we totally outgrown our system? If so- what's
> > next?
> >
> > Could an acceptance and subsequent reexamination of our inherent
> > assumptions about learning transform the way in which we use our
> > technology? Are we leveraging the 'trojan horse' opportunity of a 
> new> technology to introduce foundational learning approaches and
> > techniques successfully? What resistances do practitioners creating
> > businesses around new types of learning experience, and where does
> > that tension come from? Is there a way to systematically change the
> > very system (and institutions) of learning we try to cram our
> > technology- or is there a way we can outgrow our system healthily?
> >
> >
> >
> > Elana
> > _______________________________________________
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