Introduction to Actor-Network Theory and its application in learning research
Course provider: School of Education (DPU), Aarhus University, Tuborgvej 164, 2400 Copenhagen NV (please note that the address is in Copenhagen, not Aarhus)
Date: Wednesday 2 September 2009, 10:00 am-4:00 pm on DPU campus, and
Thursday 8 October, 9:00 am-Friday 9 October, 4:00 pm, Dragør Badehotel
Price: 1200 Dkr (162 Euro)
Deadline for applications: 31 July 2009
Venue: 1st day: DPU, Copenhagen, 2nd and 3rd days: Dragør Badehotel, Drogdensvej 43, Dk-2791 Dragør. Residents outside Denmark, who cannot come twice to Denmark, please contact Estrid Sørensen before registration: esso@dpu.dk
ECTS credits: 3
Teachers:
Professor Alan Prout, Warwick University, UK
Assistant professor Estrid Sørensen, DPU
Associate professor Helen Verran, Melbourne University, Australia
Limit: 20 students
Course language: English.
Content:
Interest in Actor-Network Theory has increased the recent years among students and researchers of learning and education. The aim of the course is to introduce this complex theory and methodology to the educational field. More than a general introduction to ANT the course aims at linking the vocabulary and methods specifically to the area of learning or educational research. Focus of the course will be on the craft of writing in an ?Actor-Network Theory style?. Only very few scholars have yet made the connection between education/learning and Actor-Network Theory, but this course gathers some of the most inspiring scholars of the study of children, knowledge and materiality. They are all passionately engaged in discussions of the relationship between these topics, how they are scientifically represented and the society and culture they are part of. For this purpose, they apply Actor-Network Theory.
Actor-Network Theory is known from the field of Science and Technology Studies and has successfully been applied in the field studies of scientific work and of technology design and use of technology. By focusing on technoscience Actor-Network Theory emphasises that science is always technologically mediated, just as any application of technology always involves (scientific or other) knowledge. Methodologically, Actor-Network Theory is inspired by Ethnomethodology and through field work in laboratories and among design and use of technology, the approach has helped to show that knowledge and technology are genuinely practical achievements; results of efforts of practices involving both local negotiations as well as geographically more distant or absent phenomena. Actor-Network Theory has demonstrated that what we use to talk about as local and global or as micro and macro consists of situated actors connected in networks. Notably, the actors are heterogeneous in that they include both humans and nonhumans. With this heterogeneous and symmetric approach, Actor-Network Theory offers a vocabulary that help us describe collectives, cultures, practices and societies as products of relations between different objects, subjects and knowledges that are fabricated and that can be unmade.
Even though Actor-Network Theory centres on questions of science and technology, it is a methodology applicable on a variety of issues of social science rather than just a theory of technoscience, Like science, many other areas of contemporary society are saturated with technology and knowledge (re)production. One of these is the educational field, and consequently a number of scholars of learning and education have turned towards Actor-Network Theory for tools to approach and analyse the entanglement of humans and materials, knowledge and bodies in learning, knowledge and subjectivity.
Through the course students become familiar with the Actor-Network Theory vocabulary, gain competences in applying this vocabulary on their own research and in reflecting on the methodological implication of the application of Actor-Network Theory. Following the logic of Actor-Network Theory research will be approached as craft work, and the course alternates between lectures, discussions and writing exercises.
Course overview
The course is directed to PhD students with some or no prior experience with Actor-Network Theory. It is divided into two parts: an on-campus part and an off-campus part. The first part will provide an overview over the development of Actor-Network Theory from the 1980s till today, and introduce to central Actor-Network Theory concepts. The second part of the course focuses on the application of Actor-Network Theory in research on learning, and the students will be asked to work with their own research and discuss their possible application of Actor-Network Theory. The course is thus also relevant for students with advanced knowledge of ANT, who do research in the area of learning/education. Students interested in Actor-Network Theory but working with other research areas than learning/education are asked to contact Estrid Sørensen prior to registration: esso@dpu.dk.
Instructors
Helen Verran is Senior Lecturer at the Department of History and Philosophy at the University of Melbourne. She has taught at the Obafemi Awolowo University in Nigeria, and done extensive studies comparing Yoruba and English number systems and analysing how science, mathematics and logic come to life in Yoruba primary schools.
Alan Prout is Professor of Sociology at the University of Warwick, and has published widely on childhood in contemporary society, just as he has critically examined social studies of childhood.
Estrid Sørensen is assistant professor at the School of Education, Aarhus University and the author of several works on educational technology.
Course requirements:
Prior to the first meeting, students must hand in a short description of their research project, including the research question(s), methods and current state of your work. The document should furthermore make clear which are the project?s central theories and which are the central you work with. Finally, students are asked to formulate a short section concerning how they believe Actor-Network Theory may help them answer their ? or parts of their ? research question. The paper is the basis for other students and instructors to engage in discussions about the project. Students are furthermore required to read the course literature prior to the course.
Day 1: Introduction to Actor-Network Theory
Time: Wednesday 2 September 2009, 10:00-4:00
Place: DPU Campus, Copenhagen
Instructor: Estrid Sørensen
The instruction method will lecture alternate between lecture/discussion and writing exercises. Each lesson involves writing exercises in which students on the basis of short passages from the literature will be asked to write a text about their own research applying the vocabulary and style of the selected passage (NOTE: bring a laptop ? if this is a problem, contact Estrid Sørensen: esso@dpu.dk). All writing will be distributed electronically among the participants.
9.00-9.30: Welcome and presentation of participants
9.30-10.15: Symmetry: Lecture and discussion
Break
10.30-11.15: Writing exercise and discussion
Break
11.30-12.15: Laboratory Studies and beyond the lab: Lecture and discussion.
12.15-13.15: Lunch Break
13.15-14.00: Writing exercise and discussion
Break
14.15-15.00: After-ANT and Ontology. Lecture and discussion
Break
15.15-16.00: Writing exercise and discussion
Literature day 1:
Intoduction to ANT
Latour, Bruno. 2005. Second Source of Uncertainty: Action is Overtaken. In ders: Reassembling the Social: an Introduction to Actor-Network Theory, Oxford University Press: pp. 43-62
Latour, Bruno. 2005. Fourth Source of Uncertainty: Matters of Fact vs. Matters of Concern. In ders: Reassembling the Social: an Introduction to Actor-Network Theory, Oxford University Press: pp. 87-120
Symmetry
Callon, Michel 1986. "Some Elements of a Sociology of Translation: Domestication of the Scallops and the Fishermen of St Brieuc Bay." Pp. 196-233 in Power, Action and Belief: A New Sociology of Knowledge, edited by John Law. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
Latour, Bruno. 2005. Third Source of Uncertainty: Objects too Have Agency. in ders: Reassembling the Social: an Introduction to Actor-Network Theory, Oxford University Press: pp. 63-86
Laboratory Studies - and beyond the lab:
Latour, Bruno & Woolgar, Steven. 1979. An Anthropologist Visits the Laboratory. In ders: Laboratory Life: The Social Construction of Scientific Facts, Sage Publications: pp. 43-103
Latour, Bruno 1999: Circulating Reference: Sampling the Soil in the Amazon Forest. In ders : Pandora's Hope, Harvard University Press: pp. 24-79
After-ANT and Ontology
Mol, Annemarie. 1999. "Ontological Politics. A word and some questions" in Law, John & Hassard, John (eds.): Actor-Network Theory and After, Blackwell Publishers: pp. 74-89
Law, John & Mol, Annemarie. 2008. "Globalisation in practice: On the politics of boiling pigswill" Geoforum 39: pp. 133-143
Day 2-3: Actor-Network Theory and Learning Practices
Time: 8-9 October 2008
Place: Dragør Badehotel
Instructor: Helen Verran (AU), Alan Prout (UK) and Estrid Sørensen (DK)
The focus of the second and third course days is knowledge and quantification; childhood and the learning subjects; the materiality of learning; and research and ontology. Prior to the stay at Dragør Badehotel the students are divided into groups of 4-5 students. Day 2 and 3 are a shift between lectures, writing exercises and group work. In the groups students present and discuss their project. Instructors circulate between the groups. (NOTE: bring a laptop ? if this is a problem, contact Estrid Sørensen: esso@dpu.dk). All writing will be distributed electronically among the participants.
Thursday
09:00-09.30: Welcome and introduction
09.30-10.30: Lecture and discussion: Helen Verran: Knowledge and quantification
Break
10.45-11.00: Individual writing
11.00-12.00: Group discussions
Lunch Break
13.00-14.00: Lecture and discussion: Alan Prout: Childhood and the Learning Subjects
14.00-14.15: Individual writing
14.15-15.15: Group discussions
Break and check-in
15.45-16.45: Questions and discussions with the panel: Helen Verran, Alan Prout and Estrid Sørensen
19.00: Dinner in the restaurant
Literature day 2:
Knowledge and quantification:
Verran, Helen. 2000. "Aboriginal Australian Mathematics: Disparate mathematics of Land Ownership" in Selin, Helaine (ed.) The History of Non-Western Mathematics. Kluwers Academic Publishers, Dordrecht: pp. 289-312
Verran, Helen. 2000. "Accounting mathematics in West Africa: Some Stories of Yoruba Number " in Selin, Helaine (ed.) The History of Non-Western Mathematics Kluwers Academic Publishers, Dordrecht: pp. 345-372
Further reading:
Verran, Helen. 2001. ?Two consistent logics of numbering? in Verran, H: Science and an African Logic Chicago: University of Chicago Press: pp. 177-205
Verran, H. et al 2008. Singing the land Signing the Land: http://singing.indigenousknowledge.org/
Childhood and the Learning Subjects
Prout, Alan. 2005. ?The dualities of the social? in Prout, A: The Future of Childhood: Towards an Interdisciplinary Study of Children. London: RoutledgeFalmer: pp.59-82
Prout, Alan. 2005. The Future of Childhood: Towards an Interdisciplinary Study of Children. London: RoutledgeFalmer: any other chapter than chapter 3
Further reading:
The rest of The Future of Childhood: Towards an Interdisciplinary Study of Children.
Friday
9:30-10:30: Lecture and discussion: Estrid Sørensen: The materiality of learning
Break
10:45-11:00: Individual writing
11:00-12:00: Group discussions
Lunch Break
13:00-14:00: Lecture and discussion: Helen Verran: Ontology and Research Practice
Break
14:15-14.30: Individual writing
14.30-15.15: Group discussions
Break
15.30-16.15: Final questions and discussions with the panel: Helen Verran, Alan Prout and Estrid Sørensen
Literature day 3:
The Materiality of Learning
Sørensen, Estrid. 2009. ?Components and opponents?. In ders: The Materiality of Learning: Technology and Knowledge in Educational Practice, New York: Cambridge University Press: pp. 30-61
Sørensen, Estrid. 2009. ?Forms of Technology?. In ders: The Materiality of Learning: Technology and Knowledge in Educational Practice, New York: Cambridge University Press: pp. 62-88
Further reading:
The rest of The Materiality of Learning: Technology and Knowledge in Educational Practice, especially chapter 6
Ontology and research practice
Verran, Helen. 2001. ?Part three: Generalizing? in Verran, H: Science and an African Logic Chicago: University of Chicago Press: pp. 120-173
Further reading:
Verran, Helen. 2002. ?Transferring Strategies of Land Management: Indigenous Land Owners and Environmental Scientists? in Marianne de Laet (ed.) Research in Science and Technology Studies, Knowledge and Society. Oxford: Elsevier & JAI Press (13): pp.155?181.
Verran, Helen. 2008. ?Software for educating aboriginal children about place? in Kritt, D.W. and Winegar, L.T. (eds): Education and Technology: Critical Perspectives, Possible Futures. Lexington Books
Course responsible:
Assistant professor Estrid Sørensen
Applications should be sent to: Laila Parbst, PhD-committee, School of Education, Aarhus University, Tuborgvej 164, 2400 Copenhagen NV. E-mail: phd@dpu.dk.
