Dilemmas of Learning and Teaching

In an essay written in 1982, Shoshana Felman described some paradoxical statements made by Socrates and Freud on education and learning. In the context of a discussion on pedagogy, they both talked at different times about the "radical impossibility of teaching." (Felman, 1982: 21) I would like to argue, in some agreement with Felman’s conclusions, that a recognition of the "impossibility" of teaching, enables and encourages the development of new and innovative approaches to pedagogy and learning. (Most of the discussion which follows deals with undergraduate education.) I will also link my discussion of teaching and learning with some comments on the creation of technologically mediated environments for education. My ultimate goal is to enrich the debate on technology and learning by linking innovation in education with the history and theory of classroom practice.

At the root of the claim about the impossibility of teaching is my feeling that learning never progresses along a "simple one-way road from ignorance to knowledge." (Felman, 1982: 27) In addition, teachers cannot fully anticipate the outcome of the processes of communication and interaction with their students unless the learning process is framed by a set of very narrow concerns. The balance between where students have come from and where they are headed is rarely linear and is often not clear. There is a legitimate desire on the part of teachers to structure ideas and values, as well as knowledge and content, for the purposes of presentation and discussion. What must be recognised is the role of "desire" in communication and teaching, as well as the gap between what teachers know and how well they have come to grips with what they don’t know. This profoundly affects the teacher’s capacity to create a site of learning for students. The same problems and potential solutions apply to learners.

As Felman herself suggests, "Ignorance is thus no longer simply opposed to knowledge: it is itself a radical condition, an integral part of the very structure of knowledge." (Felman, 1982: 29) For Freud, and for Socrates, knowledge is only gained through struggle and as a result of the recognition that ideas have an impact because of the dynamic interplay of words and spoken language, interpersonal communications and public discourse. It is their recognition of the importance of speech and of the balancing act between knowing and not knowing that opens up new possibilities for discussion and learning.

Ignorance is about resistance. It is about the desire to think and act in certain ways, most of which are rooted in a conscious refusal to engage with processes of inner reflection. The problem is that some pedagogical strategies try to anticipate what students need to know, as if teachers have already solved their own contradictory relationship with learning. The result is that teachers create (if not imagine) an ideal student and then make judgements about the students who are unable to attain the standards set by their instructional methods. If there is to be some equality of exchange here, then the teacher has to be learning nearly all of the time. This can then set the stage for some linkage and visibility between the foundational assumptions of the instructor and her own past, as well as her own history of learning. This may then return the teacher to a closer understanding of what it means to be a student.

The underlying presumption of most teachers is that students need to learn. There is a moral imperative to this assumption that is often linked to the overall values of a society, even if those values are themselves the site of intense struggle. Ironically, as the age of students at the undergraduate level increases, the question of who knows what drives teachers into using more and more specialised knowledge constructs.

The difficulty is that the need to learn cannot be understood in isolation from actual classroom practice. And the classroom is not necessarily a site of communication and exchange. The more specialised the teacher is, the more likely that the teaching will orient itself towards a power relationship that is results-oriented. But why should students learn in the first place? It seems almost heretical to ask that question. I ask it in the context of institutionalised forms of education that are driven by a complex set of motives, where the student is often not the primary focus. The culture of education has bred a tree of contradictions. Many of the supposed beneficiaries of the educational experience participate because they have to, not because they want to. This combination of resistance and acquiescence is framed by an increasingly complex system of assessment and evaluation. In order to fill the obvious gaps here, institutions rely on survey strategies to find out what is working and what isn’t. If the students are ambivalent about their learning experiences, their capacity, even their need to respond to survey-type questions, will be influenced by a set of impulses that are unlikely to appear in the results. This only further amplifies the difficulties in getting to know what students know.

The Age of Six Feet Under (2)

In today's New York Times, Joan Didion describes her shock and grief at the sudden death of her husband John Gregory Dunne. It is a very moving article about pain, loss and the ways in which the death of a loved one bring memories and feelings to the surface that are often buried and sometimes inaccessible until the shock of death rears its head. In an age (zeitgeist) which as a friend of mine recently said, pathologizes everything that is related to the body, health and death, Didion's piece brings personal confession, the confessional into the foreground. As she explores the confusion, the sheer magnitude of death and the finality of everything that surrounds it, Didion tries to bring the craft of writing forcefully into play while also recognizing that nothing she says will fully explain the complexities of what she is going through. At one point, she mentions a strong urge to make a film, to create images as a way of explaining what is happening to her.

Most of the plots of Six Feet Under centred on confessions of guilt, pain, incomprehension and of course, death. The personal became public — emotions otherwise hidden away in the private worlds that we all inhabit were brought to the surface. This confessional mode is audience-centric. Confessions reveal that which is normally hidden. But confessions are only possible if someone is listening. Didion's piece is as much for us as it is for her husband. We are the transitional listeners who allow her to regain some control over the loss. In a fictional TV show the dead can be brought to life and can listen and react to their loved ones. It is that fiction which is at the heart of all confessions, because they are ultimately for the living, for the living who still have memories.

What is happening to this Blog?

Well, the answer is not that simple. Work, fatigue and many other things, but in reality, it is difficult to write meaningfully on a continual basis. So, rather than add to the dross, rather than simply write for writing's sake, my approach will be to write when there is something important to say.

In addition, I will be adding some video log work to this site in the form of Quicktime clips. I can't promise the actual timing of this, but hope that VLOGS will become a regular part of what happens here. I am particularly interested in clips about the Emily Carr Institute and what is happening among students.

I will be posting more details on my new book, The Age of Six Feet Under over the next week or so. Thanks to those of you who have emailed me over the last while asking me when I will be posting again.

The Age of Six Feet Under

The title of this blog entry is also the title of a new book that I am developing for the University of Chicago Press. One of their top editors is an old friend and we have been talking about the extraordinary degree to which the contemporary environment in North America is dominated by various forms of hypochondria, paranoia and anxiety. This is more than post 9/11 worries about terrorism, although there is much to be concerned with, including the challenges of confronting the dystopic vision of modern terrorists. Hypochondria, for example, has become a social narrative, a way of talking about the world through the lenses of fear with respect to the human body, nutrition and disease.

The book will also explore the television series, which in its narrative content and character development is not only superb television, but an exploration of precisely all the issues that surround mortality, love and apprehensions of death. While these may seem to be grand themes, almost clichés, the program manages to move far beyond the rather limited story-telling 'body' of television into a profound examination of the dynamics of family life.

So, the book will be an in-depth study of the show and an exploration of of how mediascapes build the infrastructure to support anxiety in the digital age.

My intention is to provide extracts of the book on this blog as I write in order to get feedback and suggestions.

Bad News, Richard Posner and New Media (2)

One of the ironies of modern mainstream media is their belief, loudly trumpeted, that they have a major influence on the opinions and outlook of readers. Clearly, there is some influence. But, overall, if the media are all liberal (another myth), then one would assume that everyone watching would also be liberal. In general, if processes of communication were as direct as the media themselves suggest, we as a society would be buffetted by an endless storm of changing opinions and beliefs.
Rather, as is evident in the US., the reverse is true with conservative values firmly dominant in the society as a whole. This suggest that the influence of the media is more diffuse and that in order to understand that influence new models of critical analysis are needed.
These models would make no claims on the effect of the media and would instead examine the plethora of influences that impact on the daily lives of everyone in Western societies. This would include the now complex and multi-layered infuences of the Blogosphere.
[Ze Frank](http://www.zefrank.com) at has created a site that amplifies the effects of the blogosphere and provides us with some insight into what he calls the AUTHORSHIP society. With a new Blog being created every second, traditional notions of authorship do not apply. In fact, the spread of authors across many realms means that the vast majority of Blogs are, as I mentioned in the previous entry, small and for a specific community. This extension of the bulletin board in your local community hall provides those who are interested with an insight into the everyday life of a large number of communities.
The questin is, is that a usful and productive outcome of the creation of the Blogosphere.