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ERIC Number: EJ983575
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2012
Pages: 16
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0158-037X
EISSN: N/A
Available Date: N/A
(Re/Dis)assembling Learning Practices Online with Fluid Objects and Spaces
Thompson, Terrie Lynn
Studies in Continuing Education, v34 n3 p251-266 2012
Actor network theory (ANT) is used to explore how work-learning is enacted in informal online communities and illustrates how researchers might use sociomaterial approaches to uncover complexities, uncertainties, and specificities of work-learning practices. Participants in this study were self-employed workers. The relational and material aspects of work-learning, along with notions of the workspace of the self-employed as hybrid, distributed, and shifting, are considered. This study then examines the work that web-technologies, such as postings, do as they are entangled in an array of networks. Far from being singular objects unified in function, form, or effect, the posting provides multiple entry points for exploring online work-learning practices. The informal learning enacted in this study was the effect of multiple networks and attempts to stabilize fluidity. Different associations with knowledge and novel ways of knowing were also enacted, although there are contradictions between Web2.0 rhetoric and the practices of these self-employed workers. Findings suggest that practitioners and researchers should not be too quick to paint work-learning practices in online communities, or even the notion of online community, with a broad brush.
Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 325 Chestnut Street Suite 800, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Fax: 215-625-2940; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Adult Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: N/A