From Dr Lee Campbell: ‘Disruptions, Interventions and Liminalities: Performative Teaching and Learning in the Arts, on the topic of critical performative pedagogies.’
‘The collection asks: ‘What happens when performative arts meet pedagogy?’ and explores the possibilities of the emerging field of ‘performative pedagogy’ and its potential as useful and applicable to enabling learning across a range of artistic and possibly other disciplines. Contributions will be made from individuals and groups across all creative disciplines who deploy pedagogic approaches with an emphasis on performativity to drive learning.’
‘The first set of chapters will propose how the strategies of performative pedagogy relate in some way to ‘disruption’, ‘intervention’ and ‘liminality’ and consider disruption, intervention, liminalities as ‘risky’ pedagogic strategies/ forms of expression that do not necessarily correspond with conventional criteria that lean towards focus, precision, clarity, coherence and structure.’
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Working chapter title
Assembling Agency – Learning in Liminal Spaces
Introductions
Why (Personal) (300)
I have had an interest in spaces and places where art and design can be thought about, created, and exhibited, since I started an art and design foundation course in Cambridge, in an aptly named street call Paradise Row. It was at this time, a realisation that art could be produced in many different ways and located in many different sites, became a driving force in my own art practice.
For one project I produced designs for a new arts centre next to the Mill Pond in the old warehouses that surrounded it and that I used to play in as a child. These where liminal spaces that I wanted to deterritorialise and then reterritorialise in a Centre Georges Pompidou type of way. For the final Foundation course exhibition I produced over 50 various sized sculptures that inhabited the spaces that nobody else wanted to use. These were the spaces that exited me. The forgotten spaces, the places nobody else wanted to be, the nooks and crannies, the in between spaces, the spaces that connected one space to another space.
The mixing up of thresholds, verges, brinks, edges, lips, borders, peripheries, new beginnings, for me these where the places of becoming, places of frisson. I assembled found stuff in spaces that became more dynamic through; an intervention, an encounter, a change in attitude, a revelation. This site-specific art installation work has spilled over into my teaching practices over the last 30 years and has made me curious about where the multiple ways of learning, making and thinking about art and design can happen.
For me thinking about spaces and places for learning in higher education art and design institutions to be productive, it is imperative to create a teaching and learning environment that allows for curiosity to flourish and be recognised as an attribute that requires critical encouragement. Effective art and design teaching should allow space and time for experimentation, enquiry and exploration of ways of making and thinking. It should be holistic and enable the student to productively join together all aspects of the curriculum offered by their course. In an art and design context it is especially important that transformative teaching should encourage students to be self-reflective and have an independence of thought.
It will aim to become a map, a reformation of the territory of learning spaces rather than a copy of what has already been done. As Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari explain in their 1980 book A Thousand Plateaus, ‘A map has multiple entryways, as opposed to the tracing, which always comes back “to the same.” The map has to do with performance, whereas the tracing always involves an alleged “competence.”‘ (Deleuze & Guattari 1980/2005:12-13) In this sense learning spaces can be places of ‘becoming’, where actions are constructed by all who participate in the practices that take place in these spaces. (Semetsky 2006)
What is the project?
‘Agents, Agency, Agencies in Assembling Liminal Learning Spaces’ is a London College of Communication (LCC) teaching and learning funded research project and will investigate the types of learning landscapes at LCC and the University of the Arts London (UAL). This is in order to propose a remodelling of the way students are taught and learn in the spaces and places that already exist and might exist in the future. It recognises that the more involved all participants in the hosting, delivery and acquisition of teaching and learning become in this research, the more likely we are to have a building that delivers even more world class teaching and learning. As Dr Cathy Hall states in the literature review in, The impact of new learning spaces on teaching practice (2013) ‘To “create a world-class learning environment for students by offering opportunities for collaboration, team work, a sense of belonging, a creative culture and opportunities to excel…” (Hall 2013)
The research will look at how we can create, physical, virtual and representational learning spaces, that fully allows for ‘learning gain’ and aims to question idea that. ‘…no one knows how to prevent ‘learning-loss’ when you design a room ‘pedagogically’, whereas we know lots about designing for minimum ‘heat loss’ (Heppel et al (2004) cited in Hall 2013) Stephen Heppel and his colleagues in their research ‘building learning futures…’ argue that, ‘Dialogue with architects revealed that whilst they can design with some precision to minimise heat loss from a building, the target of minimising a loss of potential learning through good design is considerably more elusive.’ (Heppel 2004)
This research will interrogate a number of key questions such as ‘What do we want our learners to become? (LSC 2018). The Learning Spaces Collaboratory (LCS) has given a number of answers to this question based on their research one of them is that our leaners becoming ‘Agents of their own learning’. (LSC 2018). This would then lead to the question. ‘What experiences make that becoming happen? (Narum 2015) Ideas that are already being considered are that access is created to “laboratory” ‘hack’ ‘maker’ ‘prototype’ spaces to experiment with innovative pedagogies. Thought has also gone into the idea that we use more temporary mobile spaces, which fill an urgent pedagogical need. This research project aims to have a radical look at these and other ideas about want we want from our future learning spaces.
Theoretical frameworks
This research project will analyse learning spaces in multiple ways, therefore a number of theoretical frameworks will be used to help understand the complexities of using and creating transformative these spaces and to embrace ideas of ‘whole systems thinking’. (Gordon 2010:4) (Footnote: ‘Whole Systems Thinking is a method to understand how things (elements and systems) are related, and how they influence one another within a whole. https://bit.ly/2vYglyv)
Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari’s (1980/2005) concepts of assemblage will be an over arching organisational structure for this project. Their key ideas dealing with assemblage will help map out the terrains of the investigation. According to Deleuze. ‘…an assemblage is first and foremost what keeps very heterogeneous elements together: e.g. a sound, a gesture, a position, etc., both natural and artificial elements. The problem is one of “consistency” or “coherence,” and is prior to the problem of behavior. How do things take on consistency? How do they cohere? Even among very different things, an intensive continuity can be found’. (Bryant 2009)
The idea of research as an assemblage derives from the DeleuzoGuattarian view of assemblages as ‘machines’ that link elements together affectively to do something, to produce something. Applying the conception of a ‘machinic assemblage’ different stages in the research process such as data collection or analysis, or techniques used, for example, to sample data or increase validity, can be treated as a machine that works because of its affects.
[Will expand on this] Bricolage methods will be used in this research project: Papert (1980) used the concept of bricolage in relation to the concept of ‘chunking’ (Miller, 1956), a process in which knowledge is broken into ‘mind-size bites’, which enables new knowledge and understanding to be constructed from it. His thesis was that the use of previously learned strategies could be used as a tool in concept formation. (Cuthell & Preston 2011:14)
To help understand how liminality can be constructively used in an art and design university context, notions of ‘smooth space and striated space ‘ (Lysen & Pisters 2012), (Deleuze & Guattari 1980/2005:494), (Lorraine 2017) will be mobilised. Dr Maggi Savin-Baden (2007) uses these ideas of space to argue that ‘Smooth learning spaces are open, flexible and contested, spaces in which both learning and learners are always on the move. Students here would be encouraged to contest knowledge and ideas proffered by lecturers and in doing so create their own stance toward knowledge(s).’ (Savin-Baden 2007:13-14)
In conjunction with the ideas of smooth and striated spaces, deterritorialisation (Bryant 2012), another key concept of Deleuze and Guattari, will be a framework used to help understand how we can create and use liminal spaces in art and design education contexts. As Savin-Baden (2007) questions, ‘The pursuit of a line of flight into smooth spaces beyond that of the formal learning space is described as a process of deterritorialisation as boundaries are broken down and fluid movement and cultural heterogeneity emerges. This can present issues, as she continues to argue, ‘The contrast between smooth and striated learning spaces introduces questions about the role and identity of universities and academics in terms of what counts as a legitimate learning space and who makes such decisions of legitimacy.’ (Savin-Baden 2007:14)
The idea of Threshold Concepts (Flanagan 2018) will be critiqued in terms of their usefulness to ideas of construction liminal learning spaces. As Mike Neary (2010) and his colleagues at the Centre for Educational Research and Development in their report, Learning Landscapes in Higher Education state, “Adovcates of ‘threshold concepts’ refer to ‘liminal spaces’ as places that students occupy as they move from a confused cognitive state of mind on the way to grasping what ‘threshold concepts’ mean, but say nothing about the physical spaces where learning occurs.” (Neary 2010:11) This project will interrogate how we can use our physical, virtual, and representational spaces to help students move through ideas of thresholds and liminality and make their learning more productive.
Co-joined with Threshold Concepts ideas of Troublesome Knowledge (Hill 2010) will be used to enable liminal learning spaces to be thought about as places where students and staff can safely take risks with encounters that are unfamiliar. ‘This is knowledge that appears, for example, counter-intuitive, alien (emanating from another culture or discourse) or incoherent (discrete aspects are unproblematic but there is no organising principle). Disjunction, then, is not only a form of troublesome knowledge but also a ‘space’ or ‘position’ reached through the realisation that the knowledge is troublesome.’ (Savin-Bladen 2008) This research will look at the variety of spaces and places students in habit, before, during and after they are at university so we can use their prior knowledge and independent learning time most affectively.
It may be useful to note that through out the students academic life in art and design HEIs only approximately 15% of their time is spent in ‘formal’ timetabled teaching experiences/spaces. This project wants to look at the remaining 85% to their time and how it can be more productively activated.
Where (Intended Impact)
Using the University of the Arts London’s Strategy 2015-2022 this project place(s) curiosity, making, critical questioning and rigour at the heart of our curriculum and create the spaces for this to happen. This project will engage,’… our students in developing flexible modes of teaching delivery, taking into account the particular characteristics of a London-based education and advances in digital technologies. At the core of this project would be to place diversity and inclusivity at the core of our recruitment and education for staff and students, and the access to inclusive spaces and place where they help at home with us. (UAL 2015)
It would address, ‘Improving student transition, understandings of independent learning & Retention’ and the ‘Innovation of use of physical and digital learning spaces with an emphasis on flexibility and change’. (UAL 2015) ‘The most compelling innovations are spaces that attempt to re-engineer the relationship between teaching and research. Spaces have been created to link teaching with research activity between undergraduates and postgraduates, and to facilitate collaboration between students and academics. (Neary et al 2010;27)
Who will benefit?
This project I hope you be a small part of helping the transformation of learning spaces at LCC, now and it the future. I would want it to be a collaboration between all our stakeholders, from Deans to students from Estates to Teaching and Learning academics, subject specialists to workshop technicians, Associate Lecturers to Quality managers and everything and every body in-between. Without all voices being heard and given the chance to help build these new experiences we could be left with retrofitting spaces reactively rather than being proactively creating productive innovative teaching and learning spaces.
When will it happen?
If LCC wants to be for, ‘..for the curious, the brave and the committed: those who want to transform themselves and the world around them…’ (LCC 2018) we need physical spaces, conceptual spaces, virtual spaces and representational places that foster these aims. I believe we have a chance to do this as we transform and transpose from one place, on the north side of Elephant and Castle to cross to the south side of where we are now. I see this as a opportunity to use our existing infrastructures to model new ones for our future learning spaces.
What (Structure of chapter)
This chapter is one of the precursors, one ‘becoming’, of this research project. It acts as a rehearsal of the theoretical and methodological frameworks that will be used to critically investigate the past, present and future, learning spaces at LCC and UAL. This chapter will concentrate on ideas of liminality and how physical, virtual, representational and symbolical, liminal spaces and places might be utilised and constructed to help students gain there full educational potential.
The 4 parts to the main body text will be made up of a series of ‘lines of flight’ derived from Deleuze and Guattari’s concept as advocated in A Thousand Plateaus (1980/2005). The explain that, ‘There is a rupture in the rhizome whenever segmentary lines explode into a line of flight, but the line of flight is part of the rhizome. These lines always tie back to one another. That is why one can never posit a dualism or a dichotomy, even in the rudimentary form of the good and the bad. You may make a rupture, draw a line of flight,…’ (Deleuze & Guattari 1980/2005:9)
In the initial ‘line of fight’ I will start by defining some of the pertinent terms being used to conduct this research, including; assemblage, agency, smooth and striated space, liminality, becoming.
Then a ‘line of fight’ will be an assemblage of the theories dealing with space and learning in those spaces that might be used and might be useful and why. These will include, De-territorialisation, Smooth learning spaces, Troublesome Knowledge, Threshold Concepts, rhizomatic learning.
Another ‘line of fight’ will look at the types of spaces and places that could be used for learning. Physical, virtual, representational, symbolic, transitory, liminal.
The concluding ‘line of fight’ will be a summation of the ways a means this project will carried out as developed in the previous ‘lines of flight’.
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Body text as ‘lines of flight’
A line of flight of key concepts and terminologies: assemblage, bricolage, agency, smooth and striated space, liminality, becoming.
Assemblage
For this research project I am using the concept of assemblage as discussed by Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari in their 1980 book, A Thousand Plateaus, (1980/2005). In his unpicking of this concept Thomas Nail, an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Denver defines it as, ‘An assemblage is not just a mixture of heterogenous elements; this definition is far too simplistic. The definition of the French word agencement does not simply entail heterogenous composition, but entails a constructive process that lays out a specific kind of arrangement.’ (Nail 2017). He argues that, ‘…all assemblages are composed of a basic structure including a condition (abstract machine), elements (concrete assemblage), and agents (personae). Although the content differs depending on the kind of assemblage (biological, amorous, aesthetic, and so on), the structural role or function of these three aspects are shared by all assemblages. Nail 2017).
The idea of assemblages is important for this project as it helps to see the idea of learning and teaching in a UK HEI as one that is complex yet with all elements of the organisation connected and important to the way students learn and are taught in the multiple environments they inhabit before, during and after they are at LCC. In simple terms I see the ‘condition’ the terrain where art and design higher educational institutions inhabit in the UK today. The ‘elements’ are the parts that make these organisations operate; the curriculum, the pedagogies, the administration, the governance, the maintenance and the estate. The ‘agents’ are all the staff and students who have shared, are sharing and will share the experiences of being at LCC and UAL.
In an interview with Deleuze the question is posed that, ‘In reading your work, one gets the feeling that those distinctions which are traditionally most important have disappeared: for instance, the distinction between nature and culture; or what about epistemological distinctions?. Quote from (Bryant 2009) He answers, ‘…an assemblage is first and foremost what keeps very heterogeneous elements together: e.g. a sound, a gesture, a position, etc., both natural and artificial elements. The problem is one of “consistency” or “coherence,” and it prior to the problem of behavior. How do things take on consistency? How do they cohere? Even among very different things, an intensive continuity can be found. We have borrowed the word “plateau” from Bateson precisely to designate these zones of intensive continuity.’ (Two Regimes of Madness, pgs. 176 – 179)’ (Bryant 2009)
Agency
A key concept in this project is that students have agency in their own learning and become agents in all of the learning spaces and place the inhabit whilst at university. Markus Schlosser Lecturer/Assistant Professor In Philosophy at UCD, introduces the idea of agents and agency by stating that, ‘In very general terms, an agent is a being with the capacity to act, and ‘agency’ denotes the exercise or manifestation of this capacity. The philosophy of action provides us with a standard conception and a standard theory of action. The former construes action in terms of intentionality, the latter explains the intentionality of action in terms of causation by the agent’s mental states and events. From this, we obtain a standard conception and a standard theory of agency. There are alternative conceptions of agency, and it has been argued that the standard theory fails to capture agency (or distinctively human agency). Further, it seems that genuine agency can be exhibited by beings that are not capable of intentional action, and it has been argued that agency can and should be explained without reference to causally efficacious mental states and events.’ (Schlosser 2105)
John Cuthell et al (2011), in their article, Learning in Liminal Spaces, state that, ‘Cook, Pachler and Bradley (2009) suggest that the key defining aspect of informal learning is one of agency: that is who determines the learning goals. They view informal learning as a natural activity by a self-motivated learner. This could be in a group, without a tutor being aware of such activity; it could be either intentional or tacit learning, in response to some stimulus; it could be what they term ‘serendipitous’, without the learner necessarily being aware of what is being learnt.’ (Cuthell & Preston 2011:15)
‘The aim of researching the personal wide image does not appear to be for its confessional, therapeutic value, nor does it seem to be intended as a merely solipsistic exercise in self-discovery. Firstly there is a strong emphasis on collaborative work in students’ devising of their method for mystory construction. Secondly, and more fundamentally, through students’ documentation of their relations to dominant discourses and institutions, the pedagogy aims to constitute them as rhetorical agents (‘egents’) capable of orienting themselves to issues of public policy and community in a move which places the personal, the expressive and the visual back into academic discourse.’ (Bayne 2004:308)
‘Ulmer’s stated pedagogical principles and goals seem at first glance quite conventional – to foster active learning, collaborative learning and independent learning within a context of problem based learning (Ulmer, 2003b). It is only on further investigation that his approach, as one reviewer put it, ‘all seems, well, radical’ (Dickson, 2003). The problem Ulmer poses to his students is the issue of their own identity and its modes of formation. The reason for this focus appears to be partly metaphorical – ‘the problem of one’s own identity is a simulacrum of the unknowns of any field of knowledge’ – and partly pedagogical – ‘it is difficult to remain indifferent or disengaged when the heart of the inquiry is a vision of one’s own being’ (Ulmer, 2003b).’ (Bayne 2004:307)
Smooth and striated space
In the ‘plateau’, ‘1440: The Smooth and the Striated’ (Deleuze & Guattari 1980/2005: 474) in ‘A Thousand Plateaus’, Deleuze a Guattari introduces smoothness and striation as a conceptual pair to rethink space as a complex mixture between nomadic forces and sedentary captures.’ (Lysen & Pisters 2012)
While the smooth and the striated are not of the same nature and de jure oppositional, Deleuze and Guattari indicate that de facto they only exist in complex mixed forms. Moreover, the smooth and the striated work in different domains. (Lysen & Pisters 2012)
Tamsin Lorraine in her article smooth space states that, ‘The conventional notion of space as a homogeneous whole within which movement unfolds is thus, for Deleuze and Guattari, a totalised construct of space that emerges from heterogeneous blocks of space-time. They contrast their concept of ‘smooth space’ to the more conventional notion of space; ‘smooth space’ haunts and can disrupt the striations of conventional space, and it unfolds through ‘an infinite succession of linkages and changes in direction’ that creates shifting mosaics of space-times out of the heterogeneous blocks of different milieus.’ (Deleuze & Guattari 1980/2005: 494). (Lorraine 2017)
Deleuze and Guattari explain that, ‘The opposition between the striated and the smooth is not simply that of the global and the local. For in one case, the global is still relative, whereas in the other the local is already absolute. Where there is close vision, space is not visual, or rather the eye itself has a haptic, nonoptical function: no line separates earth from sky, which are of the same substance; there is neither horizon nor background nor perspective nor limit nor outline or form nor center; there is no intermediary distance, or all distance is intermediary. (Deleuze & Guattari 1987: 494-495)
‘Where smooth space is informal and amorphous, striated space is formal and structured. Striated space is associated with arboreal, hierarchical thought, which Deleuze & Guattari oppose to rhizomatic thought – non-hierarchical, underground, multiply-connected. Movement happens differently within each of these spaces. Smooth’ (Bayne 2004:303)
Smooth learning spaces
[Expand from introduction] Dr Maggi Savin-Baden (2007) uses the ideas of Deleuze and Guattari in education contexts to argue that ‘Smooth learning spaces are open, flexible and contested, spaces in which both learning and learners are always on the move. Students here would be encouraged to contest knowledge and ideas proffered by lecturers and in doing so create their own stance toward knowledge(s).’ (Savin-Baden 2007:13-14)
Liminality
‘…liminality is one of the three cultural manifestations of communitas—it is one of the most visible expressions of anti-structure in society. Yet even as it is the antithesis of structure, dissolving structure and being perceived as dangerous by those in charge of maintaining structure, it is also the source of structure.’ (Shure 2005)
‘In a Deleuzian framing, a liminal space has no beginning or end. It is emergent, a temporal and spatial configuration or assemblage that “allows us to name a terrain” (Fendler, 2013, p. 787).’ (Mulcahy 2017:111)
‘…a term drawn from anthropology that describes a rite of passage, in which a person moves from one state of being to another’ (Cuthell & Preston 2011:1)
Becoming
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A ‘line of flight’ of theories that include; de-territorialisation, troublesome knowledge, threshold concepts, rhizomatic learning.
Deterritorialisation (mentioned 338 times in ATP)
[Expand from introduction] De-territorialisation (Bryant 2012), is another key concept of Deleuze and Guattari, that will be another framework worked with during this research project. It is valuable as it helps us move away from the ever present and assumed ways we tend to work in our lecture halls. studios and seminar rooms. Teacher centred and front facing desks in rows type set ups.
Deleuze and Guattari describe it as, ‘The function of deterritorialization: D is the movement by which “one” leaves the territory. It is the operation of the line of flight. There are very different cases. D may be overlaid by a compensatory reterritorialization obstructing the line of flight: D is then said to be negative. Anything can serve as a reterritorialization, in other words, “stand for” the lost territory; one can reterritorialize on a being, an object, a book, an apparatus or system…’ (Deleuze & Guattari 1987: 508)
As Savin-Baden (2007) questions, ‘The pursuit of a line of flight into smooth spaces beyond that of the formal learning space is described as a process of deterritorialisation as boundaries are broken down and fluid movement and cultural heterogeneity emerges. This can present issues, as she continues to argue, ‘The contrast between smooth and striated learning spaces introduces questions about the role and identity of universities and academics in terms of what counts as a legitimate learning space and who makes such decisions of legitimacy.’ (Savin-Baden 2007:14)
‘The four kinds of deterritorialization or change that define assemblages are: (1) “relative negative” processes that change an assemblage in order to maintain and reproduce an established assemblage; (2) “relative positive” processes that do not reproduce an established assemblage, but do not yet contribute to or create a new assemblage—they are ambiguous; (3) “absolute negative” processes that do not support any assemblage, but undermine them all; and (4) “absolute positive” processes that do not reproduce an established assemblage, but instead create a new one. Let us look more closely at each of these types of change that define all assemblages.’ (Nail 2017)
Troublesome Knowledge
[Expand from introduction] Troublesome Knowledge (Hill 2010) will be used to enable liminal learning spaces to be thought about as places where students and staff can safely take risks with encounters that are unfamiliar. ‘This is knowledge that appears, for example, counter-intuitive, alien (emanating from another culture or discourse) or incoherent (discrete aspects are unproblematic but there is no organising principle). Disjunction, then, is not only a form of troublesome knowledge but also a ‘space’ or ‘position’ reached through the realisation that the knowledge is troublesome.’ (Savin-Baden 2008)
Threshold Concepts
“The idea of threshold concepts emerged from a UK national research project into the possible characteristics of strong teaching and learning environments in the disciplines for undergraduate education (Enhancing Teaching-Learning Environments in Undergraduate Courses). In pursuing this research in the field of economics, it became clear to Erik Meyer and Ray Land [1-7], that certain concepts were held by economists to be central to the mastery of their subject. These concepts, Meyer and Land argued, could be described as ‘threshold’ ones because they have certain features in common.” Glynis Cousin, An introduction to threshold concepts’ (Flanagan 2018) [last accessed 26 April 2018]
‘The process of defining our threshold concepts should be an active and collaborative one, because the definitions are relative and shifting. Cousin warns against the permanent labelling of threshold concepts- in order to keep our teaching alive to this we need to listen out, watch closely and build a supportive environment that allows successful mastery via multiple routes. The anxieties faced by students are not inevitable or to be dismissed: they are signposts to a better understanding of how they are learning.’ (Williams 2014)
Critiquing Threshold Concepts
[Expand from introduction] The idea of Threshold Concepts (Flanagan 2018) will be critiqued in terms of their usefulness to ideas of construction liminal learning spaces. As Mike Neary (2010) and his colleagues at the Centre for Educational Research and Development in their report, Learning Landscapes in Higher Education state, “Adovcates of ‘threshold concepts’ refer to ‘liminal spaces’ as places that students occupy as they move from a confused cognitive state of mind on the way to grasping what ‘threshold concepts’ mean, but say nothing about the physical spaces where learning occurs.” (Neary 2010:11)
Rhizomatic Learning
‘Rhizomatic learning recognises that learning is a complex process of sense-making to which each learner brings their own context and has their own needs. It overturns conventional notions of instructional pedagogy by positing that “the community is the curriculum”; that learning is not designed around content but is instead a social process in which we learn with and from each other (Cormier 2010). In rhizomatic learning there is little structure to guide community learning, learners negotiate the curriculum, create and share artifacts (there is no pre-packaged content), harness personal learning networks, make creative connections across traditional boundaries, determine their own goals or “learning subjectives”, and are not measured or graded in any traditional sense.’ (HEA 2017)
‘…as Pete Rorabaugh points out, “The act of writing is organic and generative. . . . Composing is a demonstration of thinking.” Writing is not ordered. Like thinking it is messy, recursive, fragmentary. It shares the organic structure that Dave Cormier describes in his considerations of rhizomatic education. If we want our students to self-identify as writers and students of writing, then we must invite and encourage the chaos that is authentic writing.’ (Sasser 2012)
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A line of flight of Spaces and Places (1000): Learning Landscapes, Physical, virtual, representational, liminal. symbolic, transitory, formal, non-formal, informal.
Learning Landscapes
As the RMIT Learning Spaces Advisory Group state, “We now understand that learning spaces are not just classrooms: any space where a student can access a computer; talk with another student; read a book or join peers around a table at a café, is a potential learning space … the whole university is a potential learning space” (Jamieson et al. (2009) in Hall 2013:22)
Thody (2008) defines university learning spaces as ‘learning landscapes’ that broadly encompass “… conceptually holistic, loosely-coupled interconnections of all formal and informal, on- and off-campus, virtual and physical facilities, sites and services” (p. 2) The spaces in which we work, live and learn can have profound effects on how we feel, how we behave, how we perform. (Hall 2013:5)
Physical learning spaces and places
Despite the enthusiasm for the development of new teaching and learning spaces in higher education, the relationship between effective undergraduate teaching and learning and innovative new spaces is not well understood. This lack of understanding is perpetuated by the limited amount of research in this area (Temple 2007 4). The lack of research may be one reason why there is resistance to change among academics in higher education (Temple 2007 49). (Neary 2010:11)
Virtual learning spaces and places
‘If there is constructive debate to be had over the extent to which the web in general describes smooth or striated space, few doubts can exist in relation to that element of the web which consists of the virtual learning environment – it is a space of pure striation.’ (Bayne 2004:312)
Representational learning spaces and places
‘Representational spaces embody symbolisms, some of which may be coded, but importantly the representation is linked to what is hidden, what is clandestine. The notion of representational spaces is symbolized by activities that necessarily occur within them, while at the same time they embody complexity and symbolism. Representational spaces are not therefore integrated concepts, but symbolic and covert. Put more simply, representational spaces can be seen in formulations of lived spaces, which may, for example, change according to the weather when workers move indoors from the outside office (shed). Alternatively it may change with time when the children go to bed and the laptop is put on the kitchen worktop so that one partner can work while the other cooks. In the main, domestic life tends to shape representational space in the home, yet with the blurring of boundaries between home and work the meaning of ‘lived space’ and the symbolism attached to particularly areas of representational space have shifted. Yet this understanding of representational space remains problematic when the change in use of a space is not recognized by all who utilize that space. For example, many complaints are made about learning groups in campus bars and about the noise in the library – the latter is no longer a symbolic, nor an actual, silent workspace. Lefebvre’s constitution of spaces, along with territorial, disciplinary and institutional spaces impact on learning spaces by preventing the development of creative spaces, yet an understanding of the diversity and complexity of learning spaces can also inform the ways that they are (re-)created and managed. For example, spaces between people and places are important learning spaces.’ (Savin-Baden 2007:10)
Lefebvre’s theory on the production of space is based on his three-dimensional dialectic (Schmid, 2008). This conceptual triad is made up of conceived, perceived, and lived. Christian Schmid explains the moments of the triad as “material social practice”; “language and thought”; “and the creative, poetic act” (Schmid, 2008, p. 33). This is Lefebvre’s understanding of social reality, and he applies it to a variety of fields, most famously space. Each part of the conceptual triad is a moment in the process of creation of social reality (Lefebvre, 1974/1991). Lefebvre translates his conceptual triad into spatial terms to explain the production of space: spatial practice, representations of space, and spaces of representation. This spatial triad links these three moments, which interact to produce space. (Wolf & Mahaffey 2016)
‘Lefebvre describes representational space as the space of inhabitants and users. It is the passively experienced space, which the imagination seeks to change and appropriate. Theories, ideologies and much of Lefebvre’s earlier conception of ‘thought’ dominate this space (2000: 135). Representational space overlays physical space, making symbolic use of its objects (1991:39). The slogans, signs of protest and murals that flooded the streets of Paris in May of 1968, were symbolic manifestations of this space. Representational Spaces have their source in history (1991:41). Therefore, the study of the history of thought is crucial to understanding the formation of a representational space in a particular context. However according to LeFebvre, there are no rules of consistency or cohesiveness in this space. This is the space where ideals and social movements form’
Symbolic learning spaces and places
‘The relationships between space, power and identity are necessarily mediated by symbols. A symbol is a concrete reality (a building, a statue, a coin, etc.) that communicates something intangible (an idea, a value, a feeling) : consequently, a place of power is by definition a symbolic place, which is a vehicle for power in the spatial order and for space in the order of power. The symbolic mediations between these different orders of reality are therefore produced and interpreted only in the context in which they emerge. A place can be considered as “ symbolic ” whenever it means something to a group of individuals, in such a way that it contributes to giving an identity to the group. With examples taken across the Americas, this paper investigates how symbolic places are produced and controlled by public authorities, civil societies and economic actors.’ (Monnet 2011)
Building better learning and learning better building, with learners rather than for learners. https://bit.ly/2HyVuTA
Transitional ‘in-between’ learning spaces and places
‘For Winnicott, life itself is always expressed in symbol, for it plays an integral part in the formulation and realization of transitional space.’ (Praglin 2016)
Formal, non-formal, informal learning spaces and places
‘“Learning that takes place in formal education and training systems is traditionally the most visible and recognised in the labour market and by society in general. In recent years, however, there has been a growing appreciation of the importance of learning in non-formal and informal settings. New approaches are needed to identify and validate these ‘invisible’ learning experiences.”‘ (Cuthell & Preston 2011:15 quoting The European Commission on Education and Training 2010)
Validation of Non-formal and Informal Learning: ‘There is no agreed legal national position or approach to validating or recognising non-formal and informal learning in England’ https://bit.ly/2HUwUQD
Liminal learning spaces and places
‘The conventional ecosystem of learning is based on the separation of home, the institution (school, college, university), neighbourhood, work: all of these are bound into a system. This system operates the constraints of age, class, money and expectations, all of which act as gatekeepers for the system. In contrast, the liminal spaces that we inhabit and within which we work are everywhere, and nowhere.’ (Cuthell & Preston 2011:2)
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References
Barton, G. and James, A. (2017) Threshold Concepts, LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® and whole systems thinking: towards a combined methodology, Practice and Evidence of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education (PESTLHE), Special Edition: Threshold Concepts 2017, Eds. Ray Land and Julie Rattray, 12, (2), 249-271. https://bit.ly/2Ht4CJw [last accessed 26 April 2018]
Bayne, S. (2004) Smoothness and Striation in Digital Learning Spaces. E-Learning, Volume 1, Number 2, 2004. https://bit.ly/2qBNg6W [last accessed 26 April 2018]
Brown, M. (205) Learning Spaces. EDUCAUSE. https://bit.ly/2w2zz6f [last accessed 2 May 2018]
Bryant, L. R. (2009) Deleuze on Assemblages. Larval Subjects https://bit.ly/2HAZRkC [last accessed 27 April 2018]
Bryant, L. R. (2012) Deterritorialization. Larval Subjects https://bit.ly/2JvrPv7 [last accessed 27 April 2018]
Carr, J. (2017) Student transitions and liminal spaces. LSE: The Education Blog. https://bit.ly/2H6m6iV [last accessed 26 April 2018]
Cousin, G. (2006), An introduction to threshold concepts, Planet No 17, December 2006, pp 4-5. https://bit.ly/2HVl6ep
Cuthell, J.P., Cych, L., & Preston, C. (2011) Learning in Liminal Spaces. Paper presented at “Mobile learning: Crossing boundaries in convergent environments” Conference, 21–22 March 2011, Bremen, Germany. http://bit.ly/2yx7cOs [last accessed 26 April 2018]
Deleuze, G. & Guattari, F. (1980/2004) A Thousand Plateaus: capitalism and schizophrenia. London: Continuum.
Deleuze, G. & Guattari, F. (1980/2005) A Thousand Plateaus: capitalism and schizophrenia. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. https://bit.ly/2H6Yc6S
Flanagan, M. (2018) Threshold Concepts: Undergraduate Teaching, Postgraduate Training, Professional Development and School Education. A Short Introduction and a Bibliography. UCL. https://bit.ly/2Kf6nf2 [last accessed 26 April 2018]
Gordon, P., Plamping, D. & Pratt, J. (2010) Working in Systems: The Landscapes Framework. Leeds. CIHM Leeds Univesity https://bit.ly/2r4hWgv [last accessed 27 April 2018]
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Hall, C. (2013) The impact of new learning spaces on teaching practice. Academic Development Group. RMIT University. Melbourne. http://bit.ly/2ygA0u5 [last accessed 27 April 2018]
HEA (2017) Rhizomatic learning. https://bit.ly/2qQPQW6
Heppell. S. et al. (2004) building learning futures. A research project at Ultralab within the CABE / RIBA “Building Futures” programme. https://bit.ly/2HDruKE [last accessed 30 April 2018]
Hill, S. (2010) Troublesome knowledge: why don’t they understand? Wiley Online Library https://bit.ly/2HY16dS [last accessed 27 April 2018]
Jamieson, P. (2003) ‘Designing more effective on-campus teaching and learning spaces: a role for academic developers’, International Journal for Academic Development, vol. 8, issues 1-2, pp. 119-133
Johnson. R.B. & Onwuegbuzie, A. J. Mixed Methods Research: A Research Paradigm Whose Time Has Come. Educational Researcher, Vol. 33, No. 7 (Oct., 2004), pp. 14-26 https://bit.ly/2zRQKsy [last accessed 30 April 2018]
La Shure, C. (2005) What is Liminality? Liminality: the space in between. https://bit.ly/2HXGK1G
Lifelong Learning Policy. (2017) Validation of non-formal and informal learning. European Commission Education and Training UK England https://bit.ly/2HUwUQD [last accessed 26 April 2018]
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Lysen, F. & Pisters, P. (2012) Introduction: The Smooth and the Striated. Deleuze Studies 6.1 (2012): 1–5 DOI: 10.3366/dls.2012.0042. Edinburgh University Press. https://bit.ly/2HUjKR4
Macfarlane, B. (2015) Student performativity in higher education: converting learning as a private space into a public performance. In Higher Education Research & Development Volume 34, – Issue 2. https://bit.ly/2HHwYji [last accessed 1 May 2018]
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Mulcahy, D. (2017) The salience of liminal spaces of learning: assembling affects, bodies and objects at the museum. Geogr. Helv., 72, 109–118, 2017. https://bit.ly/2HLoAA9
Neary, M. et al (2010) Learning Landscapes in Higher Education. Centre for Educational Research and Development University of Lincoln. http://bit.ly/2zlImAU
Nail, T. What is an Assemblage? in SubStance. Volume 46, Number 1, 2017 (Issue 142). https://bit.ly/2qKVx7F
Praglin, L. (2016) The Nature of the “In-Between” in D.W. Winnicott’s Concept of Transitional Space and in Martin Buber’s das Zwischenmenschliche. Universitas. Volume 2, Issue 2 (Fall 2006) https://bit.ly/2HXgkzu [last accessed 27 April 2018]
Rutherford V., Pickup I. (2015) Negotiating Liminality in Higher Education: Formal and Informal Dimensions of the Student Experience as Facilitators of Quality. In: Curaj A., Matei L., Pricopie R., Salmi J., Scott P. (eds) The European Higher Education Area. Springer, Cham. https://bit.ly/2Fzlv3G [last accessed 1 May 2018]
Sasser, T. (2012) Bring Your Own Disruption: Rhizomatic Learning in the Composition Class. Hybrid Pedagogy. https://bit.ly/2HOKXF4
Schlosser, M. (2015) Agency. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. https://stanford.io/2F2cpMp
Semetsky, I. (2006) Deleuze, Education and Becoming. Rotterdam. Sense Publishers. https://bit.ly/2vAuwJI
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Williams, J. (2014) The design studio as liminal space, Charrette, Journal of the Association of Architectural Educators 1 (1), 61-71. https://bit.ly/2KeNHfz
Wolf, G. & Mahaffey, N. Designing Difference: Co-Production of Spaces of Potentiality. Urban Planning (ISSN: 2183-7635) 2016, Volume 1, Issue 1, Pages 59-67 [last accessed 27 April 2018]
UAL: University of the Arts (2015) strategy (2015-2022) https://bit.ly/2KiaRBP [last accessed 27 April 2018]
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Bricolage
‘The French term for this is ‘bricolage’ – whether for a do-it-yourself store, a builders’ merchant or the act of constructing new knowledge and understanding in this way. In ‘The Savage Mind’ (1962) Levi Strauss used the term ‘Bricolage’ to describe the way in which the non-literate, non-technical mind of ‘primitive’ man responds to the world around him, as someone who works with his hands and uses devious means compared to those of a craftsman and who has nothing else at (his) disposal. Levi Strauss describes the bricoleur as adept at performing a large number of diverse tasks, with the rules of his game, always to make do with ‘whatever is at hand’. Whereas an engineer works with concepts, Levi Strauss describes the brocoleur as working with signs, the very concrete objects with which meaning is constructed.’ (Cuthell & Preston 2011:14)
Another ‘line of fight’ will gather together the possible methods and methodologies that will be used to interrogate the project. ‘Concept Mapping’, Structuration Theory’, ‘Contextual Design’, and Assemblage Methods.
How will it be investigated?
As the project’s aims is to look at multi versatile spaces I would want to use ‘… multi-method [types of] analysis…’ (Hall 2013:22) As R. Burke Johnson and Anthony J. Onwuegbuzie argue, ‘Today’s research world is becoming increasingly interdisciplinary, complex, and dynamic; therefore, many researchers need to complement one method with another, and all researchers need a solid understanding of multiple methods used by other scholars to facilitate communication, to promote collaboration, and to provide superior research.’ (Johnson 2004)
Initially I will use ideas from ‘Concept Mapping’ (Trochim 1989) as a data collection method, ‘…[as it] is especially valuable when researchers want to involve relevant stakeholder groups in the act of creating the research project.’ This will be useful as I want this research project to be a collaboration between all our stakeholders, from Deans to students from Estate teams to Teaching and Learning academics, subject specialists to workshop technicians, Associate Lecturers to Quality managers and everything and every body in-between. Without all voices being heard and given the chance to help build these new experiences we could retrofit spaces reactively rather than being proactively creating productive innovative teaching and learning spaces.
[Will expand on this] I will borrow ideas from ‘Structuration Theory’ which ‘…is a social theory of the creation and reproduction of social systems that is based in the analysis of both structure and agents (see structure and agency), without giving primacy to either. Further, in structuration theory, neither micro- nor macro-focused analysis alone are sufficient.’
[Will expand on this] ‘Contextual Design’ as a process that consists of the following top-level steps: contextual inquiry, interpretation, data consolidation, visioning, storyboarding, user environment design, and prototyping.’
A line of flight of Methods (1000): Concept Mapping, Structuration Theory, Contextual Design, Bricolage and Assemblage Methods.
Concept Mapping
[Expand from introduction] ‘Concept Mapping’ (Trochim 1989) as a data collection method, ‘…[as it] is especially valuable when researchers want to involve relevant stakeholder groups in the act of creating the research project.’
Structuration Theory
[Expand from introduction] ‘Structuration Theory’ is a social theory of the creation and reproduction of social systems that is based in the analysis of both structure and agents (see structure and agency), without giving primacy to either. Further, in structuration theory, neither micro- nor macro-focused analysis alone are sufficient.
Contextual Design
[Expand from introduction] ‘Contextual Design’ as a process that consists of the following top-level steps: contextual inquiry, interpretation, data consolidation, visioning, storyboarding, user environment design, and prototyping.’
Bricolage and Assemblage Methods.
[Expand from introduction] Bricolage and Assemblage Methods: The idea of research as an assemblage derives from the DeleuzoGuattarian view of assemblages as ‘machines’ that link elements together affectively to do something, to produce something. Applying the conception of a ‘machinic assemblage’ different stages in the research process such as data collection or analysis, or techniques used, for example, to sample data or increase validity, can be treated as a machine that works because of its affects. Papert (1980) used the concept of bricolage in relation to the concept of ‘chunking’ (Miller, 1956), a process in which knowledge is broken into ‘mind-size bites’, which enables new knowledge and understanding to be constructed from it. His thesis was that the use of previously learned strategies could be used as a tool in concept formation. (Cuthell & Preston 2011:14)
‘The qualitative and quantitative research tools that record both the numbers involved in the different activities, levels of participation and the extent of the professional knowledge created are identified. The processes an be described as Bricolage (Levi Strauss, 1962), in which people build new knowledge from what is at hand.’ (Cuthell & Preston 2011:2)
‘The French term for this is ‘bricolage’ – whether for a do-it-yourself store, a builders’ merchant or the act of constructing new knowledge and understanding in this way. In ‘The Savage Mind’ (1962) Levi Strauss used the term ‘Bricolage’ to describe the way in which the non-literate, non-technical mind of ‘primitive’ man responds to the world around him, as someone who works with his hands and uses devious means compared to those of a craftsman and who has nothing else at (his) disposal. Levi Strauss describes the bricoleur as adept at performing a large number of diverse tasks, with the rules of his game, always to make do with ‘whatever is at hand’. Whereas an engineer works with concepts, Levi Strauss describes the brocoleur as working with signs, the very concrete objects with which meaning is constructed.’ (Cuthell & Preston 2011:14)
Appendices
Definitions
Assemblage
(Mentioned 646 times in ATP)
‘Contra DeLanda, Deleuze and Guattari, do in fact have a “fully fledged” assemblage theory. This theory is fully fledged not in the sense that it explains all the consequences of the theory, but simply in the sense that it gives us the core concepts and typologies by which the theory can be successfully deployed. What Deleuze and Guattari call their “general logic of assemblages” is based on three major theoretical formations. First, all assemblages are composed of a basic structure including a condition (abstract machine), elements (concrete assemblage), and agents (personae). Although the content differs depending on the kind of assemblage (biological, amorous, aesthetic, and so on), the structural role or function of these three aspects are shared by all assemblages. Second, all assemblages are arranged according to four basic political types: territorial, statist, capitalist, and nomadic. Each type describes a different way in which the conditions, elements, and agents of the assemblage are ordered. Each assemblage is always a mixture of these four types to varying degrees. Finally, all assemblages are constantly changing according to four different kinds of change or “deterritorialization”: relative negative, relative positive, absolute negative, and absolute positive. (Nail 2017)
‘The four kinds of deterritorialization or change that define assemblages are: (1) “relative negative” processes that change an assemblage in order to maintain and reproduce an established assemblage; (2) “relative positive” processes that do not reproduce an established assemblage, but do not yet contribute to or create a new assemblage—they are ambiguous; (3) “absolute negative” processes that do not support any assemblage, but undermine them all; and (4) “absolute positive” processes that do not reproduce an established assemblage, but instead create a new one. Let us look more closely at each of these types of change that define all assemblages.’ (Nail 2017)
‘In reading your work, one gets the feeling that those distinctions which are traditionally most important have disappeared: for instance, the distinction between nature and culture; or what about epistemological distinctions?. Quote from (Bryant 2009)
There are two ways to supress or attenuate the distinction between nature and culture. The first is to liken animal behavior to human behavior (Lorenz tried it, with disquieting political implications). But what we are saying is that the idea of assemblages can replace the idea of behavior, and thus with respect to the idea of assemblage, the nature-culture distinction no longer matters. In a certain way, behavior is still a countour. But an assemblage is first and foremost what keeps very heterogeneous elements together: e.g. a sound, a gesture, a position, etc., both natural and artificial elements. The problem is one of “consistency” or “coherence,” and it prior to the problem of behavior. How do things take on consistency? How do they cohere? Even among very different things, an intensive continuity can be found. We have borrowed the word “plateau” from Bateson precisely to designate these zones of intensive continuity. (Two Regimes of Madness, pgs. 176 – 179) (Bryant 2009)
Agency
‘In very general terms, an agent is a being with the capacity to act, and ‘agency’ denotes the exercise or manifestation of this capacity. The philosophy of action provides us with a standard conception and a standard theory of action. The former construes action in terms of intentionality, the latter explains the intentionality of action in terms of causation by the agent’s mental states and events. From this, we obtain a standard conception and a standard theory of agency. There are alternative conceptions of agency, and it has been argued that the standard theory fails to capture agency (or distinctively human agency). Further, it seems that genuine agency can be exhibited by beings that are not capable of intentional action, and it has been argued that agency can and should be explained without reference to causally efficacious mental states and events.’ (Schlosser 2105)
‘Cook, Pachler and Bradley (2009) suggest that the key defining aspect of informal learning is one of agency: that is who determines the learning goals. They view informal learning as a natural activity by a self-motivated learner. This could be in a group, without a tutor being aware of such activity; it could be either intentional or tacit learning, in response to some stimulus; it could be what they term ‘serendipitous’, without the learner necessarily being aware of what is being learnt.’ (Cuthell & Preston 2011:15)
‘Ulmer’s stated pedagogical principles and goals seem at first glance quite conventional – to foster active learning, collaborative learning and independent learning within a context of problem based learning (Ulmer, 2003b). It is only on further investigation that his approach, as one reviewer put it, ‘all seems, well, radical’ (Dickson, 2003). The problem Ulmer poses to his students is the issue of their own identity and its modes of formation. The reason for this focus appears to be partly metaphorical – ‘the problem of one’s own identity is a simulacrum of the unknowns of any field of knowledge’ – and partly pedagogical – ‘it is difficult to remain indifferent or disengaged when the heart of the inquiry is a vision of one’s own being’ (Ulmer, 2003b).’ (Bayne 2004:307)
‘The aim of researching the personal wide image does not appear to be for its confessional, therapeutic value, nor does it seem to be intended as a merely solipsistic exercise in self-discovery. Firstly there is a strong emphasis on collaborative work in students’ devising of their method for mystory construction. Secondly, and more fundamentally, through students’ documentation of their relations to dominant discourses and institutions, the pedagogy aims to constitute them as rhetorical agents (‘egents’) capable of orienting themselves to issues of public policy and community in a move which places the personal, the expressive and the visual back into academic discourse.’ (Bayne 2004:308)
Bricolage
‘The French term for this is ‘bricolage’ – whether for a do-it-yourself store, a builders’ merchant or the act of constructing new knowledge and understanding in this way. In ‘The Savage Mind’ (1962) Levi Strauss used the term ‘Bricolage’ to describe the way in which the non-literate, non-technical mind of ‘primitive’ man responds to the world around him, as someone who works with his hands and uses devious means compared to those of a craftsman and who has nothing else at (his) disposal. Levi Strauss describes the bricoleur as adept at performing a large number of diverse tasks, with the rules of his game, always to make do with ‘whatever is at hand’. Whereas an engineer works with concepts, Levi Strauss describes the brocoleur as working with signs, the very concrete objects with which meaning is constructed.’ (Cuthell & Preston 2011:14)
Learning ideas in this context
‘Rhizomatic learning recognises that learning is a complex process of sense-making to which each learner brings their own context and has their own needs. It overturns conventional notions of instructional pedagogy by positing that “the community is the curriculum”; that learning is not designed around content but is instead a social process in which we learn with and from each other (Cormier 2010). In rhizomatic learning there is little structure to guide community learning, learners negotiate the curriculum, create and share artifacts (there is no pre-packaged content), harness personal learning networks, make creative connections across traditional boundaries, determine their own goals or “learning subjectives”, and are not measured or graded in any traditional sense.’ (HEA 2017)
‘…as Pete Rorabaugh points out, “The act of writing is organic and generative. . . . Composing is a demonstration of thinking.” Writing is not ordered. Like thinking it is messy, recursive, fragmentary. It shares the organic structure that Dave Cormier describes in his considerations of rhizomatic education. If we want our students to self-identify as writers and students of writing, then we must invite and encourage the chaos that is authentic writing.’ (Sasser 2012)
Formal, non-formal, informal
‘“Learning that takes place in formal education and training systems is traditionally the most visible and recognised in the labour market and by society in general. In recent years, however, there has been a growing appreciation of the importance of learning in non-formal and informal settings. New approaches are needed to identify and validate these ‘invisible’ learning experiences.”‘ (Cuthell & Preston 2011:15 quoting The European Commission on Education and Training 2010)
Validation of Non-formal and Informal Learning
‘There is no agreed legal national position or approach to validating or recognising non-formal and informal learning in England’ https://bit.ly/2HUwUQD
Liminality
‘…liminality is one of the three cultural manifestations of communitas—it is one of the most visible expressions of anti-structure in society. Yet even as it is the antithesis of structure, dissolving structure and being perceived as dangerous by those in charge of maintaining structure, it is also the source of structure.’ (Shure 2005)
‘In a Deleuzian framing, a liminal space has no beginning or end. It is emergent, a temporal and spatial configuration or assemblage that “allows us to name a terrain” (Fendler, 2013, p. 787).’ (Mulcahy 2017:111)
‘…a term drawn from anthropology that describes a rite of passage, in which a person moves from one state of being to another’ (Cuthell & Preston 2011:1)
Liminal Spaces
‘The conventional ecosystem of learning is based on the separation of home, the institution (school, college, university), neighbourhood, work: all of these are bound into a system. This system operates the constraints of age, class, money and expectations, all of which act as gatekeepers for the system. In contrast, the liminal spaces that we inhabit and within which we work are everywhere, and nowhere.’ (Cuthell & Preston 2011:2)
Smooth and striated space
Lysen, F. & Pisters, P. (2012) Introduction: The Smooth and the Striated. Deleuze Studies 6.1 (2012): 1–5 DOI: 10.3366/dls.2012.0042. Edinburgh University Press. https://bit.ly/2HUjKR4
Lorraine. T. (2017) smooth space. The Deleuze dictionary. https://bit.ly/2HIhFu0
‘A Thousand Plateaus’ ‘1440: The Smooth and the Striated’ introduces smoothness and striation as a conceptual pair to rethink space as a complex mixture between nomadic forces and sedentary captures.’ (Lysen & Pisters 2012)
While the smooth and the striated are not of the same nature and de jure oppositional, Deleuze and Guattari indicate that de facto they only exist in complex mixed forms. Moreover, the smooth and the striated work in different domains. (Lysen & Pisters 2012)
‘The conventional notion of space as a homogeneous whole within which movement unfolds is thus, for Deleuze and Guattari, a totalised construct of space that emerges from heterogeneous blocks of space time. They contrast their concept of ‘smooth space‘ to the more conventional notion of space; ‘smooth space‘ haunts and can disrupt the striations of conventional space, and it unfolds through ‘an infinite succession of linkages and changes in direction‘ that creates shifting mosaics of space-times out of the heterogeneous blocks of different milieus (Deleuze & Guattari 1980/2005: 494). (Lorraine 2017)
1440: THE SMOOTH AND THE STRIATED
‘The opposition between the striated and the smooth is not simply that of the global and the local. For in one case, the global is still relative, whereas in the other the local is already absolute. Where there is close vision, space is not visual, or rather the eye itself has a haptic, nonoptical function: no line separates earth from sky, which are of the same substance; there is neither horizon nor background nor perspective nor limit nor outline or form nor center; there is no intermediary distance, or all distance is intermediary. Like Eskimo space.28 In a totally different way, in a totally different context, Arab architecture constitutes a space that begins very near and low, placing the light and the airy below and the solid and heavy above. This reversal of the laws of gravity turns lack of direction and negation of volume into constructive forces. There exists a nomadic absolute, as a local integration moving from part to part and constituting smooth space in an infinite succession of linkages and changes in direction. It is an absolute that is one with becoming itself, with process. It is the absolute of passage, which in nomad art merges with its manifestation. Here the absolute is local, precisely because place is not delimited. If we now turn to the striated and optical space of long-distance vision, we see that the relative global that characterizes that space also requires the absolute, but in an entirely different way. The absolute is now the horizon or background, in other words, the Encompassing Element without which nothing would be global or englobed. It is against this background that the relative outline or form appears. The absolute itself can appear in the Encompassed, but only in a privileged place well delimited as a center, which then functions to repel beyond the limits anything that menaces the global integration. We can see clearly here how smooth space subsists, but only to give rise to the striated. The desert, sky, or sea, the Ocean, the Unlimited, first plays the role of an encompassing element, and tends to become a horizon: the earth is thus surrounded, globalized, “grounded” by this element, which holds it in immobile equilibrium and makes Form possible. Then to the extent that the encompassing element itself appears at the center of the earth, it assumes a second role, that of casting into the loathesome deep, the abode of the dead, anything smooth or nonmeasured that may have remained.29 The striation of the earth implies as its necessary condition this double treatment of the smooth: on the one hand, it is carried or reduced to the absolute state of an encompassing horizon, and on the other it is expelled from the relative encompassed element. Thus the great imperial religions need a smooth space like the desert, but only in order to give it a law that is opposed to the nomos in every way, and converts the absolute. (Deleuze & Guattari 1987: 494-495)
‘Where smooth space is informal and amorphous, striated space is formal and structured. Striated space is associated with arboreal, hierarchical thought, which Deleuze & Guattari oppose to rhizomatic thought – non-hierarchical, underground, multiply-connected. Movement happens differently within each of these spaces. Smooth’ (Bayne 2004:303)
Threshold Concepts
“The idea of threshold concepts emerged from a UK national research project into the possible characteristics of strong teaching and learning environments in the disciplines for undergraduate education (Enhancing Teaching-Learning Environments in Undergraduate Courses). In pursuing this research in the field of economics, it became clear to Erik Meyer and Ray Land [1-7], that certain concepts were held by economists to be central to the mastery of their subject. These concepts, Meyer and Land argued, could be described as ‘threshold’ ones because they have certain features in common.” Glynis Cousin, An introduction to threshold concepts’ (Flanagan 2018) [last accessed 26 April 2018]
References
Barton, G. and James, A. (2017) Threshold Concepts, LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® and whole systems thinking: towards a combined methodology, Practice and Evidence of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education (PESTLHE), Special Edition: Threshold Concepts 2017, Eds. Ray Land and Julie Rattray, 12, (2), 249-271. https://bit.ly/2Ht4CJw [last accessed 26 April 2018]
Bayne, S. (2004) Smoothness and Striation in Digital Learning Spaces. E-Learning, Volume 1, Number 2, 2004. https://bit.ly/2qBNg6W [last accessed 26 April 2018]
Bryant, L. R. (2009) Deleuze on Assemblages. Larval Subjects https://bit.ly/2HAZRkC [last accessed 27 April 2018]
Bryant, L. R. (2012) Deterritorialization. Larval Subjects https://bit.ly/2JvrPv7 [last accessed 27 April 2018]
Carr, J. (2017) Student transitions and liminal spaces. LSE: The Education Blog. https://bit.ly/2H6m6iV [last accessed 26 April 2018]
Cousin, G. (2006), An introduction to threshold concepts, Planet No 17, December 2006, pp 4-5. https://bit.ly/2HVl6ep
Cuthell, J.P., Cych, L., & Preston, C. (2011) Learning in Liminal Spaces. Paper presented at “Mobile learning: Crossing boundaries in convergent environments” Conference, 21–22 March 2011, Bremen, Germany. http://bit.ly/2yx7cOs [last accessed 26 April 2018]
Deleuze, G. & Guattari, F. (1980/2004) A Thousand Plateaus: capitalism and schizophrenia. London: Continuum.
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Assembling Agency 