Kelleen wrote,
> But what I was wondering is if this notion of decentralization might help
> me understand why Lave and Wenger argue that it is a misunderstanding to
> oppose the separate terms in legitimate peripheral participation. If
> social groups are not characterized by centralization, then everything and
> everyone is peripheral or partial? Maybe this goes some way to
> understanding the resolution of the antinomies problem too?
>
> I'm interested in what others made of this decentralization notion and if
> there are other authors writing about social action in these ways, I'd
> really appreciate some references.
Several months ago Colleen Loomis, a student of Robert Serpell, and I had an
interesting discussion on "peripheral" and "full" participation. Colleen
made a very interesting and, I think, promising point by saying that the
notion of "full participation" should be applied to different level of
analysis. Here what she said specifically,
"I agree with you that "full-participation" is most likely not part of
situated learning, at least not in the way L & W portray it. One take
on this is that "full-participation" (FP) would occur when all members
are working together; i.e., have created synergy. From this revised
definition, FP would only possible at the community level of analysis,
and not at the individual level."
According to this notion, all individual participation is peripheral. Full
participation belongs to a community not individual. I think this may be
interesting to consider.
What do you think?
Eugene
----------------------
Eugene Matusov
School of Education
University of Delaware
Newark, DE 19716
Office (302) 831-1266
Fax (302) 831-4445
email ematusov who-is-at udel.edu
Website http://ematusov.eds.udel.edu/
-------------------------