Shucks Vera. Thanks. I'm a grand-stander at heart, so any opportunity to
"elaborate" is a welcomed one. Ha ha.
Interaction - this get tossed around so much these days, what with all
"our" "interactive" technologies; and having explored a lot of these, I've
found, as I say, they are mostly gaming devices which allow users to
manipulate certain tools-in-place, but
not really "change" anything about the interaction, or manipulate any of
the tools to the extent that you can invent an entirely Other condition or
outcome for the interactions...
the same thing happens, a LOT, in academic conversations, where
language-practices are thrown forward (these are like the tools) and folks
play with these as though they might actually change something, when really
all that can happen is that the tools, like gaming devices,
constrain the interaction instead of opening up Other possibilities for the
conditions of the interaction, manipulation to the extent that something
new and unpredictable is invented...
like school-based "interactions" - no matter WHAT they are, tech-based,
cooperative-learning, seating arrangements, whatever, the condition of the
interaction is still taking place with school, which organizes the
interactions historically, structurally - let's face it, SCHOOL rules start
in kindergarten. By the time we get to higher ed, we're trained. We know
the rules. We are well-equipped to use the tools. If someone rearranges the
chairs in a room, it doesn't mean the conditions
for interactions have changed, it just means the tools have been
re-arranged. The game has been shifted, but it's the same game. Same rules.
In tech-based education, the same things take place. It's pretty much a
CLICK and
watch-what-happens sort of interaction. Sure, you can choose this goblin to
negotiate "that" maze, find "this" key and open "that" door, but everything
is pre-programmed,
and programming is about predicting outcomes. So no matter what you do, there
can be no opportunities to re-program and invent alternative outcomes. Just
like in discourse interactions, if you step outside of the language and say
something like, "Well, compulsory schooling should be abolished", [shriek!]
the game is over. You didn't use the "right" tools.
{A story - this actually happened during a discussion about teacher
education, where I said teachers should be given a liberal arts education
instead of Curriculum and Classroom Management; they should be studying
sociology/philosophy, literature, history, feminism...which led one
particularly red-faced conservative chap to shriek at me, literally, "oh
and I suppose you think we should just shut down all the schools?????" and
I said, "That's another good place to start..." which gave him cause to
sputter...I shouldn't laugh, but it was funny. I've digressed.}
I'm interested in finding alternative tools and giving them to folks who
don't ordinarily get a shot at inventing their own "games";
the unpredictable; chaos; freedom; all those dangerous radical notions
that are so antithetical to education and traditionalist concepts of
"interaction"... these are what interest me about interactions; giving
over any presumptive control of the interaction so that some sort of
autonomous action can take place; give the back-and-forth of interactions a
wider berth, so to speak, so that not only are the outcomes unpredictable,
but so that sometimes you might have to actually run to catch up, or you
might have to react spontaneously to something
unexpected - what a concept!
Education, being a control-thing, obviously, needs to theorize
"interactions" with an outcome in mind.
UBC - beautiful campus. Beautiful. Conservative. Scary conservative.
Uptight. The Women's Studies and Gender Relations faculty are housed in a
re-vamped plywood trailer, fer krissake. UBC=Uptight Boys' Club. Not very
vital at all.
diane
"Every tool is a weapon if you hold it right"
(Ani Difranco)
*********************************************
diane celia hodges
faculty of graduate studies
(604) 253-4807 centre for the study of curriculum and
instruction
university of british columbia,
vancouver, british
columbia, canada V6T 1Z4
dchodges who-is-at interchg.ubc.ca