Peter wrote
>2. The creation of settings has as one of its major variables the
>phenomenology of power.
I think there is an interesting and complex relation between power and
settings. Observing classroom settings, how the teachers and parent
volunteers organize the classroom space (children do it as well but rarely),
I came to a conclusion that settings can facilitate some power relationships
(e.g., authoritarian) but rarely (if it all) impose them across all the
participants. For example, I noticed that collaborative parent volunteers
and teachers can still promote collaborative and respectful relationships
with the kids even in exteremly unwelcome and authoritative settings (e.g.,
bolted desks organized in raws). However, on some other ocassions adults
who otherwise can be collaborative become more authoritative in
authoritative settings (and visa versa).
>3. The planning of settings rarely foresees disruptions--all those pot
>holes that doom the creation of settings, large or small. Settings
>inevitably become other than what their planners envision. Planners rarely
>adopt the "what if" stance--they rarely seriously and systematically list
>and think through the predicatoable problems that might arise.
>
>I've worked in school facilities where all came into play (one Chicago-area
>h.s. hired a California architect to design an expansion, which included
>open-air walkways that required kids to walk outdoors during brutal winter
>weather--these were eventually enclosed in a later redesign).
I more agree with Diane who said
>Power never negotiates.I
>wonder, too, what kinds of health & education benefits accompany this,
>like, whose health
>standards, whose education, and so on...
I think successful design of new settings involves open negotiation and
respectful relations rather than ability to forsee distructive consequences.
Or, putting it in another way, I think that respect to participating
communities will guide both the process of negotiating and the process of
forseeing. what do you think?
Eugene
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Eugene Matusov
Willard Hall#206G
Department of Educational Studies
University of Delaware
Newark, DE 19716, USA
phone: (302) 831-1266
fax: (302) 831-4445
email: ematusov who-is-at UDel.edu
web: http://www.ematusov.com
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