‘Bee-ing’ in Second Life

Debbie Holley, Anglia Ruskin UniversitySandra Sinfield & Tom Burns, London Metropolitan University

AAB & ‘right’ subject – place &

fundsNon-privileged

student excluded and/or alienated Squeezed, cut,

debt-ridden

UKHE policy context: privatisation, fees,

cost cutting: student or client? 3D bee or crushed in a digital

diploma mill?

Where is the student?

Knowledge for work, not work for knowledge

Needs of business

paramount

A reconfiguration or rehabitation

of learning spaces thatis politically,

economically and ecologically

sustainable?

Emancipatory pedagogy

Locating pedagogy in theories that posit that learning requires the place, space and context that embodies ‘the actor’:

Brecht (1967) experiential learning Freire (1996) & Castelles (1979) – education for action Rogers: Freedom to Learn Gunther Kress (2001& 2004) Multimodalities... As opposed to:

Employability paramount – and ‘failing’ students seen as SEN or deficit – needing to be ‘fixed’ (Sinfield et al 2009)

Student does not require ‘fixing’ but to inhabit spaces that enable them to be both ‘actor’ and ‘agent’ in their learning

...but space itself is contested (Lefebvre/Soja)

Physically - designing lovely learning spaces

(Temple)? But - maximise space usage – few meeting

spaces and over-used classrooms

Pedagogically - creative space for students (Eisner)

But - confined by formal curriculum & ‘hysteria’ around employability

New spaces... The final frontier?What happens when we and our students leave our physical space and start to engage with our learning in cyber- or hyperreal space? In Web 2.0 & animation worlds, can we:Name, occupy and liberate new pedagogic and virtual spaces? Devise authentic assignments and engaging pedagogy that promote students as actors and agents? Use space differently?

Lefebvre & Soja (Trialectics)First Space

‘Spatial Practice’Space

and commonsensical view

Third SpaceSpatial representations

(Lebfebvre/Soja)Potentialities that

come out of 1 and 2

when acted with, upon,subverted that

leads to the imagined space this could become‘imagined futures’

Second SpaceRepresentations of Space

PlaceIdeological, political,

cultural, social attributes and meanings

Adapted from Rob Shields http://www.ualberta.ca/~rshields/f/lefebvre.htm

Challenges for teachers, researchers ... and our students

(1) Different schools of thought emerging about the potentials of virtual worlds:

- the total ‘real life’ immersion in the virtual world - the augmentation of the virtual into the real

(2) Methodological challenges as “epistemological assumptions are blown apart” (Jester [blog] The Unlimited Dream Company 24/04/2011)

(3) Research opportunities: new methods by which to research and comprehend visual literacies in a social media world

(4) Risk contingency within multi modality pedagogies (cf Kress)(5) New challenges for universities: Digital & academic literacies;

Costcutting; Virtualisation of courses - but ‘designing out remediation’.

Why Second Life & Visual Hermeneutics? “What is truth but a mobile army of metaphors.” Nietzche

Multimodal: promoting multiple literacies Reflective/reflexive tool: reflective commentary that

encourages metacognition Reflexive: prompting action and change -nothing is

fixed and fluidity is possible Engaging & meaningful learning: authentic tasks and

assignments that challenge and provoke ... Research tool: gives a point of analysis in fields of

gender, masculinities, popular culture

Case Studies

From Second Life, a 3D Virtual World (www.secondlife.com)

Why I chose a bee It's not easy to find a single reason why I

chose that Avatar - I partly chose it because a bee is quite an out of the ordinary avatar in SL... and it's such a big, rather clumsy but at the same time beautiful bee - it's made up of a lot of complex shapes/pieces - it must have taken someone a long time to make and design it...

And it takes a long time to build up over my original avatar, so I get to appreciate the complexity every time I change into a bee, and see the transformation in slow motion (also a little bit grotesque).  

When I'm flying it buzzes its wings, unlike people avatars whose arms don't really do anything  

Finally I really enjoy seeing a bee sitting in a lecture theatre for example  There is something a little bit absurd about virtual worlds, and I like to make the most of that :-)

Why I dress as a Klingon…

Students on the module: building in SL – but also being in SL: One student came dressed

as a Klingon. This places this student’s

identity within western popular culture - at the same time, in opposition to it

The virtual allows visual hermeneutics as a research analytical tool

Eco warrior

Man in suit

Or a student!

Alan’s shipwrecked shore:

Theoretical Implications

Tutor’s can disrupt space and time also: Alan created an active and reflective space in SL – that

disrupted expectations and enabled ‘difference’Epistemology & pedagogy are disrupted: ‘grounded’ to

be de-centred, disembowelled - in a postmodern playground redolent of leisure activity - deckchairs and bonfire on the beach

This narrative tableau has potential to transform production and ‘consumption’ of education: students explore the shipwreck; they ‘salvage’ the goods; they sit around the campfire, solve puzzles & discuss: they become both producers and consumers in an exchange process

(We are encountering Sojas’ trialectic and potential of third space.)

On the bridge – the potential of the ‘other’

Identity constructions/imaginary friends

The avatar throws up some challenges for us viewing ‘her’ in her space:

Role play of Captain, possible femininities/ masculinities – challenging male role models by being there (ie an (assumed) woman on the bridge of a ship);

Hybridity (Bhabha) The informal clothing: American, informal, leisure active wear western jeans Branded t-shirt: her reflexive device showing her links with expert institution,

UniversityFitted white t-shirt oppositional to ‘blue stocking’ women from universities

(Archer); Francis & spice girls/nice girls & girl power challenged masculinities

The hair – both bouncy and preppy and sculpted c.f. headdress Imaginary friend : My avatar my imaginary friend (Taylor) through the

‘friend’ it is possible to risk take and experiment ) ‘Thirding’ produces what might best be called a cumulative trialectic that is

radically open to additional otherness (Soja)

Next steps?“The process of cultural hybridity gives rise to something different, something new and unrecognizable, a new area of

negotiation of and representation meaning”“The Third Space. Interview with Homi Bhabha” Identity: Community, Culture,

Difference London: Lawrence & Wishart 1998 p211

The student fashion show 2010

Selected References

Brecht (1967) Brecht On Theatre. Bertolt Brecht The Development Of An Aesthetic.

Translation And Notes By John Willet. With Plates, Including Portraits Fo, Hood, Emery A & C Black (1986) Mistero Buffo : The Collected Plays of

Dario FoFreire (1997) The Pedagogy of the oppressedHaggis (04) ‘Constructions of learning in higher education: metaphor, epistemology

and complexity’ in Satterthwaite et al (04) The Disciplining of Education: new languages of power and resistance Stoke on Trent; Trentham

Harrison (04) ‘Telling stories about learners and learning’ in Satterthwaite et al (04) The Disciplining of Education: new languages of power and resistance Stoke on Trent; Trentham

“The Third Space. Interview with Homi Bhabha” Identity: Community, Culture, Difference London: Lawrence & Wishart 1998 p211

Homi Bhabha’s Theory of cultural hybridization: http://prelectur.stanford.edu/lecturers/bhabha/reviews.html Kress & Van Leeuwen (2001) Multimodal Discourse: the modes and media