[Xmca-l] MCA Issue 3 article for discussion Re-started

[Alfredo Jornet Gil]

Dear all, 

last week I announced MCA's 3rd Issue article for discussion:

"Hollowed Out: Meaning and Authoring of High School Math and Science Identities in the Context of Neoliberal Reform," by Margaret Eisenhart and Carrie Allen.

The article is open access and will continue to be so during the discussion time at this link. 

Thanks to everyone who begun the discussion early after I shared the link last week, and sorry that we sort of brought the discussion to a halt until the authors were ready to discuss. I have now sent Margaret and Carrie the posts that were produced then so that they could catch up, but I also invited them to feel free to move on an introduce themselves as soon as they ​​wanted. 

It is not without some doubts that one introduces a discussion of an article in a moment that some US media have called as "An American Tragedy" and other international editorials are describing as "a dark day for the world." But I believe that the paper may indeed offer some grounds for discuss important issues that are at stake in everyone's home now, as Mike recently describes in a touching post on the "local state of mind" and that have to do with identity and its connection to a neoliberal organisation of the economy. It is not difficult to link neoliberalism to Trump's phenomenon and how it pervades very intimate aspects of everyday life. 

If this was not enough, I think the authors' background on women's scholar and professional careers in science is totally relevant to the discussions on gendered discourse we've been having. Now without halts, I hope this thread gives joys and wisdom to all.

Alfredo 
________________________________________
From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> on behalf of Alfredo Jornet Gil <a.j.gil@iped.uio.no>
Sent: 02 November 2016 01:48
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: MCA Issue 3 article for discussion

Thanks Mike and everyone! I am sure Margaret (and many of those still reading) will be happy to be able to catch up when she joins us next week!
Alfredo
________________________________________
From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> on behalf of mike cole <mcole@ucsd.edu>
Sent: 02 November 2016 01:32
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: MCA Issue 3 article for discussion

Gentlemen -- I believe Fernando told us that Margaret would be
able to join this discussion next week. Just a quick glance at the
discussion so far indicates that there is a lot there to wade into
before she has had a word.

I am only part way through the article, expecting to have until next week
to think about it.

May I suggest your forbearance while this slow-poke tries to catch up!

mike

On Tue, Nov 1, 2016 at 3:38 PM, White, Phillip <Phillip.White@ucdenver.edu>
wrote:

> David & Larry, everyone else ...
>
> by way of introduction, Margaret and Carrie point out that the data in
> this paper emerged through a three year study - which was the processes of
> how students of color, interested in STEM, responded to the externally
> imposed neoliberal requirements. they framed their study using theories of
> social practices on how identity developed in context.
>
>
> David, you reject the theories.  or so i understand your position. as you
> write: It's that the theory
>
> contradicts my own personal theories.
>
> are you also rejecting the data as well?  it seems as if you are
> suggesting this when you write: The authors find this point (in the case of
> Lorena) somewhere between the
> beginning of the tenth and the end of the eleventh grade, but I think
> that's just because it's where they are looking.
>
> you reject the narrative of Lorena on the grounds that it could be traced
> back to infancy.
>
> do you also reject the identical narrative found in the adult
> practitioners within the context of the high schools?  that this narrative
> is not one of a contemporary neoliberal practice but rather could be traced
> back to, say, the mid 1600's new england colonies, in particular
> massachusettes, where the practices of public american education began?
>
> to explain the data that emerged from the Eisenhart/Allen study, what
> theories would you have used?
>
> phillip
>
> ________________________________
> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> on behalf of lpscholar2@gmail.com <lpscholar2@gmail.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, November 1, 2016 7:03 AM
> To: David Kellogg; eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: MCA Issue 3 article for discussion
>
> Margaret and Carrie,
> Thank you for this wonderful paper that explains the shallow
> *hollowed-out* way of forming identity as a form of meaning and sense. I
> will add the French word *sens* which always includes *direction* within
> meaning and sense.
>
> David, your response that what our theory makes sens of depends on where
> we are looking makes sens to me.
> You put in question the moment when the interpersonal (you and me) way of
> authoring sens *shifts* or turns to cultural and historical ways of being
> immersed in sens. The article refers to the *historical-in-person*.
>
> My further comment, where I am looking) is in the description of the
> sociocultural as a response to *externally changing circumstances*  as the
> process of *learning as becoming* (see page 190).
>
> The article says:
>
> This process is what Lave and Wenger (1991) and other Sociocultural
> researchers have referred to as *learning as becoming,* that is, learning
> that occurs as one becomes a certain kind of person in a particular
> context.  Identities conceived in this way are not stable or fixed. As
> *external circumstances* affecting a person change, so too may the
> identities that are produced *in response*. (Holland & Skinner, 1997).
>
> In this version of *history-in-person* the identity processes that start
> the process moving in a neoliberal *direction* are *external*
> circumstances. I am not questioning this version of the importance of the
> external but do question if looking primarily or primordially to the
> external circumstances as central if we are not leaving a gap in our
> notions of *sens*.
>
> If by looking or highlighting or illuminating the *external* and highly
> visible acts of the actual we are leaving a gap in actual*ity.
> A gap in *sens*.
>
> To be continued by others...
>
> Sent from my Windows 10 phone
>
> From: David Kellogg
> Sent: October 31, 2016 2:15 PM
> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: MCA Issue 3 article for discussion
>
> I was turning Mike's request--for a short explanation of the
> Halliday/Vygotsky interface--over in my mind for a few days, unsure where
> to start. I usually decide these difficult "where to start" questions in
> the easiest possible way, with whatever I happen to be working on. In this
> case it's the origins of language in a one year old, a moment which is
> almost as mysterious to me as the origins of life or the Big Bang. But
> perhaps for that very reason it's not a good place to start (the Big Bang
> always seemed to me to jump the gun a bit, not to mention the origins of
> life).
>
> Let me start with the "Hollowed Out" paper Alfredo just thoughtfully sent
> around instead. My first impression is that this paper leaves a really big
> gap between the data and the conclusions, and that this gap is largely
> filled by theory. Here are some examples of what I mean:
>
> a)    "Whereas 'subject position' is given by society, 'identity' is
> self-authored, although it must be recognized by others to be sustained."
> (p. 189)
>
> b)  "It is notable that this construction of a good student, though
> familiar, does not make any reference to personal interest, excitement, or
> engagement in the topics or content-related activities." (193)
>
> c)  "When students' statements such as 'I get it', 'I'm confident', 'I'm
> good at this', and  'I can pull this off' are interpreted in the context of
> the figured world of math or science at the two schools, their statements
> index more than a grade. They reference a meaning system for being good in
> math or science that includes the actor identity characteristics of being
> able to grasp the subject matter easily, do the work quickly, do it without
> help from others, do it faster than others, and get an A." (193)
>
> In each case, we are told to believe in a theory: "given by society",
> "self-authored", "does not make any reference", "the context of the figured
> world". It's not just that in each case the theory seems to go against the
> data (although it certainly does in places, such as Lowena's views as a
> tenth grader). I can always live with a theory that contradicts my data:
> that's what being a rationalist is all about. It's that the theory
> contradicts my own personal theories.
>
> I don't believe that identity is self authored, and I also don't believe
> that subject position is given by society as a whole, I think the word
> "good" does include personal interest, excitement, and engagement as much
> as it includes being able to grasp the subject matter easily, do the work
> quickly, do it without help from others, do it faster than others and get
> an A. To me anyway, the key word in the data given in c) is actually "I"
> and not "it" or "this": the students think they are talking about, and
> therefore probably are actually talking about, a relation between their
> inner states and the activity at hand  or between the activity at hand and
> the result they get; they are not invoking the figured world of neoliberal
> results and prospects.
>
> But never mind my own theories. Any gap is, after all, a good opportunity
> for theory building. The authors are raising a key issue in both Vygotsky
> and Halliday: when does an interpersonal relation become a
> historico-cultural one? That is, when does that 'me" and "you" relationship
> in which I really do have the power to author my identity (I can make up
> any name I want and, within limits, invent my own history, particularly if
> I am a backpacker) give way to a job, an address, a number and a class over
> which I have very little power at all? When does the interpersonal somehow
> become an alien ideational "identity" that confronts me like a strange
> ghost when I look in the mirror?
>
> The authors find this point (in the case of Lorena) somewhere between the
> beginning of the tenth and the end of the eleventh grade, but I think
> that's just because it's where they are looking. We can probably find the
> roots of this distinction (between the interpersonal and the
> historico-cultural) as far back as we like, right back to (Vygotsky) the
> moment when the child gives up the "self-authored" language at one and
> takes on the language recognized by others and (Halliday) the moment when
> the child distinguishes between Attributive identifying clauses ("I'm
> confident", "I'm good at this"), material processes ("I can pull this off")
> and mental ones ("I get it").
>
> (To be continued...but not necessarily by me!)
>
> David Kellogg
> Macquarie University
>
>
>
> On Mon, Oct 31, 2016 at 4:50 PM, Alfredo Jornet Gil <a.j.gil@iped.uio.no>
> wrote:
>
> > Dear xmca'ers,
> >
> >
> > I am excited to announce the next article for discussion, which is now
> > available open access at the T&F MCA pages<http://www.tandfonline.
> > com/doi/full/10.1080/10749039.2016.1188962>.
> >
> >
> > After a really interesting discussion on Zaza's colourful paper (which
> > still goes on developed into a discussion on micro- and ontogenesis), we
> > will from next week be looking at an article by Margaret Eisenhart and
> > Carrie Allen from the special issue on "Reimagining Science Education in
> > the Neoliberal Global Context". I think the article, as the whole issue,
> > offers a very neat example of research trying to tie together
> > cultural/economical? and developmental aspects (of identity in this
> case).
> >
> >
> > Margaret has kindly accepted to join the discussion ?after US elections
> > (which will surely keep the attention of many of us busy). Meanwhile, I
> > share the link<http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10749039.
> > 2016.1188962>  to the article (see above), and also attach it as PDF.
> > ??Good read!
> >
> >
> > Alfredo
> >
> >
>
>