Agency
Graham Nuthall (G.Nuthall who-is-at educ.canterbury.ac.nz)
Thu, 26 Oct 1995 08:55:17 +1300
Re:Agency discussion
I am currently working on self-talk among students in elementary school
classrooms. We have extensive recordings made from individual broadcast
microphones worn by 10-11 year old students during the course of their days
in school. From the audio recordings and accompanying viderecordings it
seems that children drift in and out of self-talk and social talk as they
go about their activities. There are, of course, apparent startings and
endings to the sequences of comments, commentaries, self-instructions,
chatter, and so on, but on the whole the sequences are fluid. Topics are
interwoven with each other. This suggests a transactional relationship
between the social and the individual, between talking to self and to an
outer audience, a kind of feed-back loop, in which neither the individual
or the social is the beginning or the end.
This assumes, I think, that both the individual and the social are
continuous processes, constantly interacting with each other. This
continuous flow is interrupted from time to time with pauses, silences, but
not beginnings and endings. That at least is the impression I get from
studying this kind of data. Does that help suggest an alternative view of
agency?
Cheers, Graham
Graham Nuthall
Education Department
University of Canterbury
Private Bag 4800
Christchurch, New Zealand
Phone 64 03 3642255
Fax 64 03 3642418