Week 23: Meaning-making and metaphors

This week I look at the meaning of words in association with the application of digital technology in education. This is important as words and discourses have numerous connotations. This is more than just the proverbial 'is the glass half empty or is the glass half full'; there is an argument that a whole new vocabulary is needed, especially since the technology is new and rapidly changing. It is important to aware of 'spin doctoring' academically as well. No words are not completely neutral and may eschew debate.

'It matters because the language you use carries with it connotations and hidden assumptions'.
http://learn.open.ac.uk/mod/oucontent/view.php?id=502707

Making sense of complexity
Stepping over the edge (Conole, 2011).

There Conole looks at some of the limitations that current metaphors have in the context of technology. The main problem stems from use of 'common place' metaphors to describe the new phenomenon of the web 2.0 applications. Eg a desktop and a filing system from the traditional office setting is used as a term for an application on the windows operation system. This is no longer suitable suitable for the complexity of the computer desktop and filing system

She proposes 5 new types of metaphors which are more suitable for providing a holistic view of technology, viewing web 2.0 in terms of a 'brain', an 'organism' (eg ecosystem), a 'political entity', 'machines' and 'cultures'. With metaphors based on these headings we can find a proper and better meaning of what is happening in the Web 2.0, rather than be limited by old fashioned metaphors based on old technologies.

In the Ariadne article by Conole, ‘New schemas for mapping pedagogies and technologies’; she lists further examples of how Web 2.0 is different than the disciplines you might expect in education. Wn 2.0 means information is arrived at 'fast', but education is about reflection. Commenting and using peoples work is considered plagarism in the world of education, but this is commonplace in the use of wikis etc.