Exploring Avenues to Interdisciplinary Research: From Cross- to Multi- to Interdisciplinarity

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Author: M. Karanika-Murray | R. Wiesemes

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List of contributors Exploring Avenues to Interdisciplinary Research: From Cross- to Multi- to Interdisciplinarity

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List of contributors Nottingham University Press Manor Farm, Main Street, Thrumpton Nottingham, NG11 0AX, United Kingdom NOTTINGHAM First published 2009 © M. Karanika-Murray and R. Wiesemes All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form (including photocopying or storing in any medium by electronic means and whether or not transiently or incidentally to some other use of this publication) without the written permission of the copyright holder except in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. Applications for the copyright holder’s written permission to reproduce any part of this publication should be addressed to the publishers. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Exploring Avenues to Interdisciplinary Research: From Cross- to Multi- to Interdisciplinarity Editors: I. Karanika-Murray, M. II. Wiesemes, R. ISBN 978-1-904761-68-6

Cover photo: The Atomium, Brussels - taken by Eelco Miedema Typeset by Nottingham University Press, Nottingham Printed and bound by MPG Books Group in the UK

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List of contributors

Exploring Avenues to Interdisciplinary Research: From Cross- to Multi- to Interdisciplinarity

Editors: M. Karanika-Murray and R. Wiesemes

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Contents List of Contributors The Cross-Disciplinary Research Group: Overcoming isolation, promoting communication and interdisciplinarity

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Rolf Wiesemes and Maria Karanika-Murray Complex systems and plastic brains: A trans-disciplinary approach to education and the cognitive sciences

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Teresa N.R. Gonçalves Interdisciplinarity in the ecological systems paradigm: How do we promote our future researchers’ ecological thinking?

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Shoshana Keiny Understanding teachers’ use of educational technologies

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Tony Fisher Drawing strands together: Cross-disciplinary dialogue around computer-based assessment

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Brett Bligh Estonian Content and Language Integrated Learning programme development viewed through the stakeholder approach

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Peeter Mehisto and Hiie Asser Reverse intergenerational learning: Can barriers to learning be overcome using reverse intergenerational learning so that businesses maintain competitive advantage?

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Carol Baily

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List of contributors Building sustainable schools: Are places of social interaction more important than classrooms?

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Andrea Wheeler Memory and assimilation: Philosophical issues in culturally significant architecture

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Fidel Meraz Music – the visual arts – architecture: Meaning production in media systems

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Anna V. Ullrich The need for and challenges of interdisciplinary research in 141 biomedical neuroscience: Alzheimer’s disease as a critical example Marie-Christine Pardon Cross-disciplinary practice: Applications to Health Care

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Zoe Stamataki The legal method reconsidered: Contextual legal research from an interdisciplinary perspective – towards developing a new paradigm

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Ubaldus R.M.Th. de Vries and Lyana M.A. Francot Confronting internal and external problems of cross-, inter- 179 and multi-disciplinarity: Researching cyber conflict and global politics Athina Karatzogianni Index

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List of Contributors H. Asser Department of Pedagogy, Tartu University, Estonia ([email protected]) Hiie Asser teaches at Tartu University. She focuses on intercultural relations, teaching through the medium of a second language, and the management of language immersion programmes. She is a former teacher and deputy head teacher. She is the author of student learning and teacher training materials. In addition to teaching at university level, she is the head teacher of a Russian language school. This school offers students the option of studying part of their programme through the medium of Estonian and part through Russian. Hiie was one of the first people in post-war Estonia to spearhead the development of multilingual education programming. She is an interdisplinarian at heart, with a strong interest in intercultural studies, management, good practice in pedagogy and multilingual education.

C. Baily Faculty of Business, Adult and Professional Studies, Kingston College, United Kingdom ([email protected]) Carol Baily is a full-time degree lecturer in the field of business and accounts in the Faculty of Business, Kingston College, and is studying parttime for a PhD in the area of organisational learning. She has worked in the fields of accountancy, sports and leisure, construction and both public and private sector education. Ten years of teaching outdoor pursuits has left her fascinated with the way knowledge is communicated and how young people can often challenge our preconceptions of who actually knows more! Her PhD aims to explore this phenomenon in detail.

B. Bligh Learning Sciences Research Institute and Visual Learning Lab, University of Nottingham, United Kingdom ([email protected]) Brett Bligh is Learning Research Systems Developer at the University of Nottingham. He works with the Learning Sciences Research Institute, which conducts research into the cognitive, social and cultural aspects of learning, and the Visual Learning Lab, a HEFCE Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning which promotes innovative teaching and learning practices using new technologies within Higher Education. Current interests include specialised technologies for education, collaborative vii

List of contributors tools and video editing for assessment. Brett’s interest in the educational uses of technology stems from his previous involvement in the Learning Technology Research Group at Nottingham, where his work centred on computer-based assessment.

T. Fisher School of Education, University of Nottingham, United Kingdom ([email protected]) Tony Fisher is a teacher educator and researcher at the University of Nottingham School of Education and Learning Sciences Research Institute. Before this he was Head of Humanities in a comprehensive school where he taught geography and humanities. As a schoolteacher he was involved in some early attempts to incorporate the use of computers into subject teaching. Since moving into teacher education, he has taught at all levels, and has been involved in the development of an online professional doctorate (EdD) in teacher education. He has a particular research interest in teachers’ reactions to their exposure to new information and communications technologies, and during the course of various contract research projects he has interviewed a total of around 150 teachers about aspects of their response to these technologies.

L.M.A. Francot Department of Legal Theory, School of Law, Utrecht University, the Netherlands ([email protected]) Lyana Francot graduated from Maastricht University, the Netherlands. She recently finished her PhD, focusing on social systems theory and normativity, in Utrecht. In 2001 she accepted a position as a lecturer in the Department of Legal Theory, School of Law, Utrecht University, the Netherlands. In the Working Group on Reflexive Modernisation & Law she seeks to contribute to the analysis of the interdependencies between legal developments and societal evolution. Current research centres on global justice, reflexive normativity and an inquiry into a legal paradigm in the reflexive modernity.

T.N.R. Gonçalves Department of Theory and History of Education and Social Pedagogy, University of Seville, Spain ([email protected]) Teresa Gonçalves is a member of the research group Pedagogical Research viii

List of contributors on the Person at the University of Seville, Spain. She obtained her PhD in Education from the University of Seville (2008), she was Doctoral Fellow with the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, Portugal (2004-2007). Teresa was professor of Theory and History of Education at Escola Superior de Educação de Beja, Portugal (1997-2003). She studied philosophy at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Institute of Philosophy, Belgium (1997) and at the University of Lisbon (1995). A major focus of her research is the relation between educational sciences and cognitive neurosciences, complex systems approaches to education, cognition, learning theories, theories of education, learning processes, teacher’s education and transdisciplinary research.

M. Karanika-Murray School of Social Sciences, Nottingham Trent University, United Kingdom ([email protected]) Maria Karanika-Murray is a Lecturer in Psychology at the School of Social Sciences at Nottingham Trent University. Maria’s work focuses on risk and risk assessment for work-related health, the management of work-related health, organisational interventions, the role of leadership and managerial behaviours for employee health, and interdisciplinarity. Her work has been funded by the UK Economic and Social Research Council, UK Health and Safety Executive, European Agency for Safety and Health at Work, University of Nottingham, as well as a range of industry partners. During her work at the University of Nottingham as a Research Fellow, Maria co-founded the Cross-disciplinary Research Group with Rolf Wiesemes in 2003. The group’s aim was to promote and facilitate research dialogue across the disciplines. Maria sees interdisciplinary work as a prerequisite for innovative, relevant, and practical research.

A. Karatzogianni Media, Culture and Society, Department of Humanities, University of Hull, United Kingdom ([email protected]) Athina Karatzogianni is a Lecturer in Media, Culture and Society at the University of Hull, author of The Politics of Cyberconflict (Routledge, 2006), and editor of Cyber Conflict and Global Politics (Routledge, 2008). Athina writes on internet politics, the broader appreciation of the theoretical implications of networked forms of communication and organization, and the cyber conflict agenda. Currently, she is developing work with Andrew Robinson on Power, Conflict and Resistance in the Contemporary World for the Routledge Advanced Series in International ix

List of contributors Relations and Global Politics, which sets out to reinterpret world systems theory, attempting to understand resistance and opposition movements in terms of a combination of networked rhizomes and the assertion of reactive ethnoreligious identities. Other research focuses on small states’ online representations, the global periphery, and war coverage in the Middle East.

S. Keiny Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel ([email protected]) Today Shoshana Keiny is a retired Professor in the Department of Education at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel. She began her professional life as a Biology teacher. With a PhD in Science Education, she moved to Ben-Gurion University, where she has been teaching and researching for 30 years. Shoshana’s book ‘Ecological Thinking: A new approach to educational change’ relates the development of her conceptual framework as an interaction with field practice. Her fields of research are: environmental/ecological education; action research; teachers’ professional development as means of triggering school change; collaborative learning; and conceptual change.

P. Mehisto Institute of Education, University of London, United Kingdom ([email protected]) Peeter Mehisto has approached life with a multidisciplinary focus that is now developing into a passion for interdisciplinarity. Having initially studied music, speech and drama, French literature, education, and business and public administration, he is now working towards a doctorate at the University of London’s Institute of Education. Originating from Canada, based in England and Estonia, Peeter Mehisto is currently researching multilingual education programmes focusing both on their management and best practice in teaching. Previously, Peeter Mehisto worked in the performing arts, foreign affairs, the print media, public administration, and in education. More specifically, he worked with a wide range of stakeholders to develop Estonia’s capacity to meet pre-accession European Union legislative translation requirements. In more recent years, he worked with diverse stakeholders to develop Estonia’s national Estonian language immersion programme.

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F. Meraz School of the Built Environment, University of Nottingham, United Kingdom ([email protected]) Fidel Meraz is an architect graduated from Anahuac University (Mexico), where he has also taught. He obtained the Master’s in Architecture: Restoration of Sites and Monuments, from the National University of Mexico. In 2004 he was granted a scholarship from Mexico’s government to embark on PhD studies at the University of Nottingham. He studies philosophical issues about architecture and conservation in the School of the Built Environment, where he has been involved in teaching. At present he teaches theory and architectural design at Nottingham Trent University. In his practice, he has worked in Italy, Mexico and Central America doing commercial, residential, education and corporative projects.

M.-C. Pardon University of Nottingham Medical School, Institute of Neuroscience, School of Biomedical Sciences, Queen’s Medical Centre, United Kingdom ([email protected]) The overall aim of Marie-Christine Pardon’s research is to better understand the role of stress in mental disease and ageing using animal models of vulnerability to stressful events. Following a PhD in life sciences (University Paris VI, France, 1995-1999) dealing with the interactions between stress and ageing in mice, Marie-Christine moved to the US (Department of Pharmacology, University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, USA, 2000-2002), where she worked on the role of the brain noradrenergic system in susceptibility to stressrelated pathology in a vulnerable rat strain. She arrived in Nottingham in 2002 as a Research Fellow, where she worked on the impact of anticipation on stressinduced damage to the brain until 2005. She then obtained an internal research fellowship in 2005 followed by a prestigious RCUK Fellowship in translational neuroscience in 2006, allowing her to develop an interdisciplinary research programme to investigate the role of stress in Alzheimer’s disease, using a genetic mouse model of this pathology.

Z. Stamataki School of Nursing, University of Nottingham, United Kingdom ([email protected]) Zoe Stamataki is a full time Postgraduate PhD student from the School of Nursing at the University of Nottingham and is currently working part xi

List of contributors time as a registered nurse in an oncology ward. Her interests include working with families and patients with cancer and providing psychosocial support and education; exercising interdisciplinary collaboration and communication, nursing theory development and practice using a variety of research methods. Interdisciplinarity has inevitably emerged from her every day practice in the health care industry with the aim to connect and integrate several academic disciplines or professions and their specific perspectives, in the pursuit of quality patient care.

A.V. Ullrich RWTH Aachen University, Institute of Linguistics and Communication Studies, Germany ([email protected]) Anna Ullrich is a Research Assistant at the Institute of Linguistics and Communication Studies, RWTH Aachen University and Doctoral Fellow at the Collaborative Research Centre for ‘Media and Cultural Communication’ at the University of Cologne (February 2005 to present). Prior to that, she was Junior Fellow at the ‘International Research Centre for Cultural Studies’, Vienna (October 2006-June 2007). She has an MA in Communication Sciences, History of Architecture and International Technical and Economic Cooperation from the RWTH Aachen University (2004). The topic of Anna’s doctoral thesis is references in architecture, and she has numerous publications about meaning productions in different symbol systems.

U.R.M.Th. de Vries Department of Legal Theory, School of Law, Utrecht University, the Netherlands ([email protected]) Ubaldus de Vries graduated at Leiden University, the Netherlands, and finished his PhD in Dublin. Since 2001 he is lecturer in the Department of Legal Theory at the School of Law of Utrecht University, the Netherlands. In the Working Group on Reflexive Modernisation & Law he is engaged in conceptualising a contextual approach towards understanding law and legal developments in the new modernity. Of special interest are issues of autonomy and self-determination as well as the structure and pedagogy of legal education and legal research.

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A. Wheeler Institute of Architecture and School of Education, University of Nottingham, United Kingdom ([email protected]) Andrea Wheeler is an Early Careers Interdisciplinary Research Fellow working in the Schools of Education and Built Environment at the University of Nottingham. Her work is part of a three-year ESRC funded research project: How Can We Design Schools as Better Learning Spaces and to Encourage Sustainable Behaviour? Co-Design Methodologies and Sustainable Communities, addressing a key strategic gap within the current portfolio of the Research Council Energy programme relating to research carried out within the Towards a Sustainable Energy Economy initiative.

R. Wiesemes School of Education, University of Nottingham, United Kingdom ([email protected]) Rolf Wiesemes is one of the founders of the Cross-disciplinary Research Group at the University of Nottingham. He is currently employed as Senior Research Fellow at the School of Education, University of Nottingham. He works mainly in the area of educational research, a field which could be described as interdisciplinary by nature. Overall, his research interests are concerned with questions of learner identities in classrooms with a particular focus on language use in foreign language classrooms. He is also working in the area of Holocaust and genocide education together with project partners in the UK, continental Europe and sub-Saharan Africa. Currently, he is involved in evaluating and researching visual learning. Rolf is keen to develop inter-disciplinary research further, as he considers it as vital for promoting more research conversations across the disciplines and as a means to gain a better understanding of complex issues (and related learning interactions).

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The Cross-Disciplinary Research Group

The Cross-Disciplinary Research Group Overcoming isolation, promoting communication and interdisciplinarity Rolf Wiesemes and Maria Karanika-Murray ‘Your planet is very beautiful’, said the Prince. ‘Has it any oceans?’ ‘I couldn’t tell you,’ said the geographer... ‘But you are a geographer!’ ‘Exactly,’ the geographer said. ‘But I am not an explorer. I haven’t a single explorer on my planet. It is not the geographer who goes out to count the towns, the rivers, the mountains, the oceans, and the deserts. The geographer is much too important to go loafing about. He does not leave his desk.’ Antoine de Saint Exupéry, The Little Prince

Introduction This edited work presents a collection of chapters on a range of key areas in multi- and interdisciplinary research. They represent some of the current thinking and practice of interdisciplinary research, and are an outcome of the 1st Cross-Disciplinary Research Conference held in November 2007 at the University of Nottingham. The conference was organised by the University of Nottingham’s CrossDisciplinary Research Group (CDRG). To our knowledge, it was the first event to target in particular the growing numbers of new researchers who are active in interdisciplinary research. This one-day event attracted approximately 60 researchers from a wide range of fields, from the UK, the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, and Portugal, among others. It also provided a fertile forum to discuss interdisciplinary research among scholars with a particular interest in promoting such research. Its success was evidenced by the number of submitted registrations exceeding the capacity of the conference, and the high number of requests that were expressed for follow-up conferences. This collection seeks to contribute to the emerging literature and academic debate in interdisciplinary research. In this introductory chapter, we will first examine the CDRG activities, aiming to link them to broader interdisciplinary developments both internal to the University of Nottingham and further afield. We provide a short overview of current 1

R. Wiesemes and M. Karanika-Murray discussions on interdisciplinarity and related areas, followed by an overview of the chapters in this book.

Interdisciplinarity: Challenges and promises The focus on developing and supporting interdisciplinarity is reflected nationally and internationally in current UK and EU research policy. Locally, this is reflected in the University of Nottingham’s support for researchers and its current research strategy. Nationally and internationally, it is reflected in various funding bodies’ foci, guidelines and priorities, in research areas promoted by researchers, and in applied problems and questions raised by the industry and the end users of research. Such foci on interdisciplinarity stem from a realisation that, often, applied research problems do not originate with science and do not correspond to one discipline. As an extension, disciplinary methodological constraints are exposed, highlighting the need for new methods across diverse disciplines. In turn, this can impact on the criteria for research evaluation and dissemination of results. This awareness of interdisciplinarity is reflected in the emergence of new fields since the 1950s, such as ecology, environmental sciences, biotechnology, sociology of knowledge, discourse studies, cultural studies and systems sciences, to name a few. At the same time, these emerging fields reflect different degrees of interaction and integration between various knowledge domains, ranging from the disciplinary to the cross-disciplinary, the multidisciplinary and the interdisciplinary, to the transdisciplinary (Mansilla and Gardner, 2006). These issues reflect the complex evolving relationship between applied research and disciplinary/interdisciplinary work (Klein, 2004). Nissani (1997) sums up the arguments for interdisciplinary research as: • enabling creative breakthroughs • developing objective outsiders’ perspectives • discovering disciplinary omissions • helping to solve complex applied problems • promoting a unity-of-knowledge ideal • developing flexible research • contributing to communication and mobilisation of resources • facilitating the defence of academic freedom New researchers, especially those trained in a number of fields and/or exposed to current debates in the disciplines tend to be aware of these 2

The Cross-Disciplinary Research Group issues. Networks such as the University of Nottingham Cross-Disciplinary Research Group (CDRG), Interdisciplines (http://www.interdisciplines. org), and interdisciplinary research institutes such as Hybrid Vigor (http://hybridvigor.org) aim to (i) raise awareness of the potential that interdisciplinary approaches can offer, and (ii) address and overcome limitations and barriers for the promotion and adoption of interdisciplinarity. Such critical awareness can also contribute to developing a clearer understanding of the theory and practice of interdisciplinarity, its purposes, research processes and research applications, and of issues related to research dissemination and evaluation. Whilst these various points hint at the scholarly excitement that interdisciplinarity and its promoters can help to develop, its complex nature also creates challenges for establishing interdisciplinary networks and raises a number of questions related to accessibility and understanding of research. For example, outsiders and amateurs could miss essential facts if interdisciplinary work is not communicated effectively. In addition, broader issues in relation to evaluation of research that goes beyond disciplinary norms (Boix-Mansilla and Gardner, 2003) have been raised. Interdisciplinarians may have to be ‘jacks of all trades, but master of none’. This could lead to naïve generalism and the danger of interdisciplinary dialogue becoming stale or superficial. Also, interdisciplinary research is demanding and requires substantial resources and intellectual energy (Nissani, 1997), challenges which are inherent to the practice of interdisciplinarity. Finally, universities might pose barriers for interdisciplinary work through their disciplinary environments, competition and control and rigid university structures (Nissani, 1997). The established non-transparent and inflexible communication channels and the lack of criteria for evaluating interdisciplinary initiatives are additional barriers. All these challenges have been experienced to some degree by the CDRG. In view of the traditional disciplinary hierarchies, it can often be difficult to develop the types of resources and activities required to support interdisciplinary work and research skills. Whilst it is possible to overcome these barriers through ongoing dialogue, as the CDRG has demonstrated, they can still pose a threat to similar initiatives. The focus on interdisciplinary research is perhaps a by-product of a shift in the way that knowledge is produced. The hierarchical, homogeneous mode of disciplinary work and certification is being replaced by one characterised by complexity, hybridity, heterogeneity, and transdisciplinarity (Gibbons, Limoges, Nowotny and Schwartzman, 1994). From segmentation to boundary crossing, unity to integration, and isolation to cooperation, these changes are reflected in official EU research foci. Whilst these new foci are commendable, it remains to be seen how they can be translated into 3

R. Wiesemes and M. Karanika-Murray research priorities and university strategy. Although traditional disciplinary/ faculty structures will most likely remain in place in the future, there are sufficient scope, flexibility and incentives for a number of new research groups and centres to function along disciplinary structures; examples abound (e.g. the Learning Sciences Research Institute or the Institute for Science and Technology at the University of Nottingham). Universities, in the UK at least, seem to be forward-thinking and flexible enough to recognize that overly formal closed structures are not viable if their strategies on interdisciplinarity are to be realised. Overall, the CDRG has been described as a success story. Evaluation of its activities suggests that such a network structure is seen in an extremely positive light in terms of bringing researchers together to explore interdisciplinary fields. As a bottom-up initiative, the CDRG has allowed to further develop and contribute to academic debates and address researcher isolation. Whilst its links to university structures have helped to support its activities, we would argue that it is crucial for the CDRG to maintain its academic independence as an initiative led by researchers for researchers. Ultimately, we hope that the CDRG has helped prevent researchers from adopting the view of Saint Exupéry’s monodisciplinary geographer and, instead, has allowed researchers across a number of disciplines to collaborate and to develop scholarly creativity in interdisciplinary ways.

A short history of the CDRG and introduction to its activities The CDRG was created informally in 2003 by a small group of ‘new’ researchers in the social sciences as a support forum for new researchers across the University of Nottingham and as a means for developing interdisciplinary dialogue. The group consisted initially of a small network of (mainly) social scientists with an interest in developing a shared knowledge base focusing on methodological approaches used across a range of fields. It received informal support from the University of Nottingham in September 2004 and was formally funded in January 2005 (for 3 years) as one of the Graduate School’s Roberts Projects1. As an outcome of the Sir Gareth Roberts’ Review Set for Success (http://www. hm-treasury.gov.uk/documents/enterprise_and_productivity/research_and_ enterprise/ent_res_roberts.cfm) focusing on the need for developing additional transferable skills for postgraduate research students and contract research staff, the University of Nottingham Graduate School set up the Roberts Money Initiative, which allowed Schools and Departments to bid jointly for funding for projects related to developing transferable skills for researchers. The CDRG was one of initially 6 initiatives to receive funding.

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The Cross-Disciplinary Research Group One of the key aims of the CDRG was to give ‘new’ researchers in (disciplinary and) interdisciplinary areas a ‘voice’. This was achieved by organising the CDRG in a manner that is bottom-up instead of topdown. The successful implementation and running of the CDRG illustrates that, given time to evolve, such a bottom-up structure that encourages researcher involvement is more important for the success of such distributed communities than financial support. Since its inception, the CDRG has helped to develop a sense of community amongst researchers at the University, and to raise the profile of cross- and interdisciplinary research through regular seminars and events. The CDRG has invited eminent interdisciplinarians, and thus has promoted interdisciplinary research, awareness and support. As a grassroots bottom-up approach, the CDRG has been embraced by both researchers and University management structures. Furthermore, the CDRG was successful in achieving (1) sharing experiences and learning about interdisciplinary research, (2) developing further networks and inclusive practices, and (3) attracting interest from university support structures with regards to interdisciplinarity. Nevertheless, the challenges of promoting interdisciplinary dialogue not only within an institution but also between universities and other stakeholders remain. Whilst the approach chosen by the CDRG was a means for supporting new researchers, it also raised a series of questions with regards to impact on the sense of community among new researchers, the potential of such groups for promoting interdisciplinary communication and collaboration, and whether it could serve as one possible model (amongst many) for developing interdisciplinary research in university settings. Furthermore, the challenges of getting people to talk outside their disciplines and developing a sense of community among researchers, and helping networks that allow for interdisciplinary and interfaculty dialogue to become the norm rather than the exception remain. The CDRG’s work in promoting interdisciplinary research continues.

Book structure In this book, we present a collection of contributions on interdisciplinary research, its theory and practice, as viewed through the experience of the interdisciplinarians. The reader can either read the book as a whole or read the chapters that they are particularly interested in. The opening chapter, Chapter 1, by Teresa Gonçalves, whilst focusing on education and the related development of cognitive sciences, covers a wide range of issues in interdisciplinary research. It draws from a variety of disciplines, such as philosophy and psychology, and explores questions 5

R. Wiesemes and M. Karanika-Murray relating to inter- and transdisciplinarity, emerging and new methodologies and the related need for new research organizations. In this sense, the chapter allows us to set the scene for the wide variety of topics that follow. Chapters 2-7 focus on educational research in some form. However, all of these chapters address education from slightly different interdisciplinary perspectives either located within established research paradigms or drawing from educational and other discipline theories. In Chapter 2, Shoshana Keiny focuses on developing interdisciplinary approaches in science education and argues for locating interdisciplinarity as part of an ecological systems paradigm. In Chapter 3, Tony Fisher explores interdisciplinary models in the interplay between technology and education referring to Bronfenbrenner’s (1979) ecological systems theory model. In Chapter 4, Brett Bligh examines computer-based assessment from the perspective of a computer scientist with an interest in the application of educational theories in his field of interest. Peeter Mehisto then, in Chapter 5, combines second and foreign language acquisition theories with management literature in the area of implementing Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL), i.e. bilingual education. In Chapter 6, Carol Baily uses the opposite approach from Peeter Mehisto’s and whilst focusing on intergenerational learning in the field of business management, she uses mentoring literature to ground her arguments. In Chapter 7, Andrea Wheeler explores the links between education and architecture when critiquing the Building Schools for the Future programme. In Chapters 8-9, the focus of this book moves away from a wide range of learning contexts and various ways to explore learning from interdisciplinary and, as Teresa Gonçalves suggests, transdisciplinary perspectives. In Chapter 8, Fidel Meraz focuses on architecture, like Chapter 7, and explores a range of philosophical issues regarding culturally significant architecture. He draws from a range of fields such as phenomenology, the philosophy of history, history and sociology and argues for the development of an ‘assimilation’ model whilst also touching on the politics of research. In Chapter 9, Anna Ullrich contributes by focusing on the notion of ‘transcription’ borrowed and transferred from the field of applied linguistics into architecture, visual arts and the media, and presents a model for ‘transcription’. In Chapters 10 and 11, the authors focus on interdisciplinarity in the Health Sciences. Marie-Christine Pardon (Chapter 10) argues that the ‘need to increase our basic understanding of the complexity of biological systems and the escalating costs of health care are the major drivers of interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience’ (p. 121) using the example of the current lack of a cure for Alzheimer’s disease. She also touches on questions of politics of 6

The Cross-Disciplinary Research Group research regarding funding. Zoe Stamataki’s contribution in Chapter 11 focuses on the collaboration across different disciplines in healthcare and complements Pardon’s overall arguments by raising the issue of power relations between different disciplines in healthcare settings and equally mentioning the politics of research. In Chapter 12, Bald de Vries and Lyana Francot develop their arguments about interdisciplinarity in the area of law studies. They suggest that law cannot be studied in isolation from its context and argue for the inclusion of a ‘socio-theoretical level’ in law studies. Finally, in Chapter 12, Athina Karatzogianni explores the field of cyberpolitics by telling her personal story about research into politics and technology, describing some of the challenges and again raising the question of the politics of research. We present in this edited volume some of the outcomes of the 1st CrossDisciplinary Research Conference held at the University of Nottingham in November 2007. It is important to stress that no research takes place in a vacuum. Research is never neutral or value free; it is conducted by individuals and groups of people who have their own interests, agendas, and backgrounds and histories. We do not claim to cover all areas of cross-, multi-, inter- and trans-disciplinary research in this volume. However, we believe that the present chapters represent some of the variety and exciting developments in interdisciplinary research as well as some of the challenges and problems facing interdisciplinary research. In summary, the chapters presented in this book illustrate a range of understandings and applications of interdisciplinary research in different research fields. In this sense, we hope that the book contributes to a learned debate about the multifaceted character of interdisciplinary research and illustrates at the same time its strengths and limitations. Acknowledgements We would like to thank all those who have been involved in running the Cross-Disciplinary Research Group over the years (Dr Paraskevi Kallinteri, Dr Athina Karatzogianni, Dr George Kuk, Dr Sara Maioli, Dr George Michaelides, Dr Suchith Anand, Dr Sadanand Guhe, Kate Haworth, Andy Townsend, Dr Rodrigo Velasco, and Dr Varuni Wimalasiri). We are grateful for the generous support offered over the years by the University of Nottingham Graduate School, Research Innovation Services, and Research Committee (Professor Ron Carter, Dr Ged Hall, Professor Paul Heywood, Peter Lewis, Dr Jo Longman, Dr Richard Masterman, and Professor Sarah O’Hara), Professor Tom Cox and Professor Carol Hall. It is these individuals who recognised the potential importance and impact of a community such as the CDRG. We hope that such communities will 7

R. Wiesemes and M. Karanika-Murray grow and continue to exist within University structures. Finally, we always retain an admiration for those researchers who dare to venture outside their disciplinary comfort zones.

References Boix-Mansilla, V., and Gardner, H. (2003). Assessing Interdisciplinary Work at the Frontier: empirical exploration of ‘symptoms of quality’. Interdisciplinary Studies Project: Project Zero. Harvard Graduate School of Education. Bronfenbrenner, U. (1979). The ecology of human development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Gibbons, M., Limoges, C., Nowotny, H., and Schwartzman, S. (1994). The new production of knowledge: The dynamics of science and research in contemporary societies. Sage Publications. Klein, J.T. (2004). Interdisciplinarity and complexity: An evolving relationship. E:CO, 6, 1-10. Mansilla, V.B., and Gardner, H. (2006). Assessing interdisciplinary work at the frontier. An empirical exploration of ‘symptoms of quality’. Available online at http://www.interdisciplines.org/interdisciplinarity/ papers/6 (Accessed September 2008). Nissani, M. (1997). Ten cheers for interdisciplinarity: The case for interdisciplinary knowledge and research. Social Science Journal, 34(2), 201-216.

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Complex systems and plastic brains

Complex systems and plastic brains A trans-disciplinary approach to education and the cognitive sciences Teresa N.R. Gonçalves In this chapter, I deal with the hypothesis of the emergence of a new learning science, such as it is recognised and defined by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development documents Understanding the Brain: Towards a New Learning Science (2002) and Understanding the Brain: The Birth of a Learning Science (2007), bringing together education, cognitive neuroscience, psychology and philosophy. In order to do so, I present an analysis, using qualitative methods, of a set of seven interviews with experts in the above mentioned areas. They were asked about the need, nature, implications, difficulties and possibilities for such a cooperation to succeed. Together, their different but complementary perspectives show us that we are only making the first steps in a long process which can transform educational sciences, cognitive sciences and crossdisciplinary research in general. This process may have important implications for educational practice, policy, school curriculum and organization and for academic research in the future. In order to clarify some of those implications I present the example of a transdisciplinary research organisation in this particular field. Moreover, by integrating the experts’ perspectives with relevant research, I suggest that the success of such cooperation, in this particular field, implies a shift from inter- to trans-disciplinarity, understood as the need to bridge and fuse different scientific procedures, methods and findings into a new comprehensive discipline, which also requires new methodologies and new research organisation.

Context In the last decades cognitive sciences have made great progress in understanding the function of the human brain. Research into artificial intelligence, evolutionary biology and neuroscience has generated a new cognitive paradigm which recognizes the complexity of cognitive mechanisms and development as well as the existence of different cognitive dimensions. Cognitive dimensions such as, for example, emotions and 9

T.N.R. Gonçalves feelings (Damásio, 1999), and social and biological aspects of cognition (Varela et al., 1997; Maturana, 2003), have been ignored or devalued in scientific research and educational practice in the past. Research evidence shows the complexity and plasticity of the brain, understood as a dynamic organ capable of learning and change throughout the life span. At the same time, there is relevant data which shows that learning and educational processes can modify the brain’s functional and structural organisation (Castro-Caldas, 1998), revealing the importance of the learning experiences and opportunities to its development. These findings are at the centre of the recent emerging interest and experiences of collaboration between cognitive sciences and education, as well as of the interest in the scientific community in exploring the possibilities of such collaboration. In this chapter, I deal with the hypothesis of the emergence of a new learning science, such as it is recognised and defined by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) documents Understanding the Brain: Towards a New Learning Science (2002) and Understanding the Brain: The Birth of a Learning Science (2007), bringing together education, cognitive neuroscience, psychology and philosophy. In order to analyse the need, nature, implications, difficulties and possibilities for such a cooperation to succeed, I will present: 1. The results of an analysis of a set of seven interviews with experts in the above mentioned areas which present their perspectives on the epistemological issues related to this emergent reality of the brain and the need of convergence between different disciplines which can help to fully understand and explore the brain’s complexity and multidimensionality and 2. An example of a trans-disciplinary research organization, the Learning Lab Denmark (LLD), which is developing research in these particular fields, in order to illustrate the practical issues and implications related with the practice of trans-disciplinarity.

Interviews The interviews were conducted by the current author, in person, by telephone, or by e-mail. The interviewees included seven experts in the disciplines of philosophy, educational theory, neuroscience and psychology, with relevant research and work in this area. They where asked about the epistemological issues concerning the relation between education and the cognitive sciences: the need, nature, implications, difficulties and possibilities of such cooperation. Their answers were analysed and compared using qualitative methods in order to test the 10

Complex systems and plastic brains hypotheses, define concepts and compare different perspectives, following the methodological procedures suggested by Gil Flores (1994) in the application of qualitative data analysis to education. The collected data were organised according to the following categories: 1. nature of the cooperation between sciences 2. arguments presented to defend the need of such cooperation 3. methodological proposals 4. existing signs of a change in attitude 5. difficulties 6. open questions The categories were established a priori according to the themes present in the questions and were adapted along the process of analysis in order to correspond to the nature of the collected data. The interviews were numbered as indicated in Table 1, according to the experts’ speciality. Table 1. Interviewees’ expertise areas Interviewee 1 Philosophy Interviewee 2 Educational Theory Interviewee 3 Educational Theory Interviewee 4 Neuroscience Interviewee 5 Neuroscience Interviewee 6 Psychology Interviewee 7 Psychology

The textual units were divided using a thematic criterion and organised according to the above mentioned categories. Afterwards, the central ideas belonging to each category were organised in tables of content indicating the corresponding number of the interview to which they correspond. Finally, they were compared and interpreted in order to present the following conclusions.

Findings It is indicative of the growing importance of the cognitive neuroscience and its relevance to educational research and practice, that all the experts agree and defend the need to relate both fields of knowledge. The experts also recognize the importance and contributions of cognitive sciences for education. All of them, philosophers, educational theorists, neuroscientists and psychologists are consensual on that matter, although, there is not a 11

T.N.R. Gonçalves total agreement between them about that possibility in the present, as we shall see. The terms used to define the nature of that relation are: ‘trans-disciplinary’, ‘transversal’ and ‘systematic’: [P]eople usually think that the trans-disciplinarity supposes the end of disciplines, but the truth is that one articulating mind supposes the possibility of entering in other levels of comprehension beyond dichotomizations and compartimentations. (Interviewee 1) What is interesting is to confirm that the more heterogeneous or transversal (…) is the perspective from which a problem is analysed, the more things I find. And the perspective is justified because the approach is systemic and being systemic implies lots of integrated elements, but also levels of organisation, different properties according to the levels. (Interviewee 2) These perspectives suggest that the traditional interdisciplinary methods used in educational research need to be complemented with a more radical or comprehensive approach to the complex educational problems, specially those related with a better understanding of the learning processes and the findings in cognitive neuroscience. The following arguments are presented to defend the need of cooperation between the different sciences: • The artificial nature of the separation between natural sciences and humanities and the underlying need to surpass the Cartesian separation between res cogitans and res extensa – the mind-body problem – which has a dualist perspective about human nature, with important consequences either in science or in education (Interviewees 1, 2 and 3) • There is a general recognition that human education has transversal, complex and systemic components, and that the resolution of some important pedagogical problems, such as plasticity, and multidimensional subject, need a research attitude of that nature (Interviewees 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7) • Furthermore, it is recognised that some findings in brain sciences represent important contributions for human sciences as well. (Interviewees 1, 2, 3, 5 and 7) • A unification of the sciences would be in correspondence with the unity of nature itself (Interviewees 2 and 5) 12

Complex systems and plastic brains Some of the methodological procedures discussed by the interviewees related to the practice of trans-disciplinarity: • An interrogative and vigorous questioning attitude (Interviewees 1 and 2) • Research freedom to answer specific and practical problems (Interviewees 1, 2 and 3) • Flexibility and plasticity concerning working itineraries (Interviewees 2, 3 and 5) • A well-articulated mind and method (Interviewees 1 and 7) In this matter the words of one of the interviewees can help to clarify the working and research attitudes in this field: I think that what we should do in epistemology is to build the part of epistemology which corresponds to each one of us by the kind of problems we have to solve. (Interviewee 2) Some existing signs showing a changing attitude in science and education research were pointed out: • The proliferation of publications which intend to bridge the different fields of knowledge in this topic (Interviewees 2 and 3) • A less reductive perspective on human nature in either science or educational research (Interviewee 3) • A more global perspective on cognition and the emerging of new cognitive models – mainly plastic model of the brain functioning and evolution – with important consequences in the understanding of the learning processes (Interviewees 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 7) However, the existence of some difficulties in this field is also recognised: • Differences in language and the definition of concepts in the different fields of knowledge (Interviewees 2 and 3) • Different perspectives and mentality about the human nature (Interviewees 1 and 3) • The existence of very rigid mental models in what concerns research and practice (Interviewees 1 and 3) • The compartmentalised functioning of the academic institutions (Interviewees 1 and 3) 13

T.N.R. Gonçalves • The difficulties and inherent risks in transposing knowledge from one field to another (Interviewees 4 and 6) • The speculative nature of cognitive neuroscience and the incapacity to offer a second order theory which connects theoretical research with educational practice (Interviewee 6) In the experts’ discourse we underline the need to practise cross-disciplinary research, breaking the boundaries between sciences, by exploring new knowledge, based on the complexity of questions and challenges faced by education in the present times. In spite of the difficulties and conditions to which educational practice is submitted, as well as the questions related to the recent emergence of a new cognitive science, the future development of the new discipline and of the educational reality itself will contribute to shaping the relation between the different fields of knowledge. Some of the open questions in this matter were pointed out by the experts: • How to transpose some neuroscience concepts to the field of educational theory and specifically to: a) relate neuronal (biological concept) with mental plasticity (cognitive concept) and b) relate plasticity (cognitive neuroscience concept) and educability, that is, to the human capacity for being educated (education concept) (Interviewees 2 and 3) • How to promote transversal practices in pedagogy, changing the existing disjunctive mentality (Interviewees 1, 2 and 3) • How to control the transposition of the knowledge in cognitive neuroscience to educational practice (Interviewee 4) • How to rethink and reformulate the cognitive models underlying cognitive intervention and training according to the new cognitive neuroscience model of the brain (Interviewee 6) These are some of the questions which can be solved by a trans-disciplinary approach, which also suggest some possible research directions.

Discussion A deep analysis of the experts’ discourses about the epistemological questions focusing on the collaboration between education and the cognitive sciences, show us that there are consensual issues such as the need for collaboration and trans-disciplinary research in these study areas, as well as some divergence 14

Complex systems and plastic brains concerning the way and the possibilities offered by such a collaboration given the present conditions and epistemological status of both disciplines. There are epistemological questions to consider and analyse in order to make this collaboration effective and fruitful in the future. In general, there is some correspondence in the discourses of philosophers, educational theorists, and neuroscientists, in terms of the concerns and perspectives on the issues they were asked about: the recognition of the importance of the plasticity model of the brain, the relevance of the new knowledge about the brain to educational research and practice, and the need to promote transversal research and educational methods. Philosophers, psychologists, educational theorists are paying attention and interested in the emerging knowledge in cognitive sciences. However, there are some differences between the perspectives of the neuroscientists and the psychologists interviewed concerning the relevance and the possibilities of the application of this knowledge to educational practice. Given the present research panorama, there is some scepticism about the immediate application of relevant scientific data to educational practice and its future outcomes, especially considering the risks involved. Two of the interviewees stated that it may be too early to start thinking about that possibility as the neuroscience model is still too speculative and that we need to take into account some existing risks and difficulties in this particular field, in order to avoid reductionism and oversimplification. Underlying the epistemological questions we have been analysing so far, there are emergent concepts and methodological issues that must be considered: the complex nature of the educational phenomenon and the multidimensionality of the learning subject which request comprehensive analysis based on systemic approaches. The complexity of the problems faced by the educational systems nowadays demands a trans-disciplinary approach to the emergent problems and questions, beyond epistemological boundaries. Also, the recognition of the relevance of cognitive neuroscience research and the plastic brain model leading to a new understanding of cognition and learning legitimates and demands a much greater investment in trans-disciplinary research in this particular field, surpassing existing difficulties and obstacles. As discussed at the 1st World Congress on TransDisciplinarity (1994), a trans-disciplinary research attitude implies the recognition of different levels of reality, with different types of logic, and an open attitude of all disciplines to what crosses and surpasses them. Trans-disciplinarity implies an open rationality, it is multireferential and multidimensional, promotes the dialogue between the natural sciences, human sciences, art, literature, poetry and personal experience.

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The Learning Lab Denmark: An example of a transdisciplinary research organisation From the results of the interviews some questions arise concerning the possibility and implications of effective trans-disciplinary work, and the practical implications of such a collaboration. Data collected from a visit to the Learning Lab Denmark (LLD) in the School of Education, University of Aarhus, Denmark, can help to illustrate the possibilities offered by the cross-disciplinary research between education and the cognitive sciences, especially cognitive neuroscience. During the visit, some information about the lab was collected; several meetings were held, especially with the Neuroscience, Corporality and Learning Research Unit researchers, as well as with the Director of LLD. The data collected may offer a general overview of the organization, the researchers, the research dynamics and the relation with the community. Interest in this institution in particular relates to four main aspects: 1. Its main research fields: neuroscience, biology and learning 2. Being a quite recent organization 3. Being part of an education university and, at the same time, preserving its autonomy and particular working dynamics 4. Its researchers’ profile This example can serve as a basis to expand on the reflection about the issues related to trans-disciplinary research in these particular fields and can lead to some further questions and conclusions. LLD is an example of a cross-disciplinary network, created in order to develop trans-disciplinary research exploring the relation between neuroscience, biological and educational research. Origins, organization and functioning LLD is a research organization created by the Danish Government in order to promote trans-disciplinary work about learning. Its main goal is to promote practice-orientated multidisciplinary research, about learning processes in formal and informal contexts, contributing to the development of teaching and learning methods. One of its priorities is neuroscience and learning research, developed by its Neuroscience, Corporality and Learning Research Unit.

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Complex systems and plastic brains According to its Director, the foundation of the LLD corresponds to the need to promote interdisciplinary research through the construction of a research field in neuroscience, cognitive sciences and learning theory. It is connected, on the one hand, to the social sciences’ progressive opening into trans-disciplinary research, and is especially linked to emerging knowledge in biology and neuroscience, and on the other hand, to the increasing criticism of traditional learning psychology. In this context LLD tries to create the basis for a broader, science-based theory of learning which also incorporates brain research. Its foundation is also related to the need to create new knowledge platforms which may allow different types of research, based on broader theories: theories of meaning originating in neuroscience, biology and semiotics. This requires joining together people with a broad view of cognitive issues, willing to work together in the search for answers to emerging questions in this field. LLD is divided into four research units: Science, Technology and Learning; Neuroscience, Corporality and Learning; Learning, Youth and Society; and Learning, Knowing Organization. Each unit has a director and a research coordinator and is divided into research groups. All units are organized in the same way, but they develop their work in an autonomous way. Every year they formulate short and medium term research plans, apply for funding and fellowships, and develop publications. They are funded mainly by the university, private foundations, companies and other public research organizations. I will focus mainly on the research work developed by the Neuroscience, Corporality and Learning Research Unit. Research unit on neuroscience, corporality and learning This unit is divided into two main research groups, developing different projects: one works on corporality and learning, and the other on neuroscience and learning. The first tries to determine whether, and how, body affects learning, including perspectives on sports and daily life, as well as formal and informal learning. The procedures include the identification of type and activity level, physical and non physical forms and spaces. Its objective is to improve the understanding of the importance of the body for cognition and learning. The group works essentially using qualitative data analysed through phenomenological and socio-psychological methods. The second group researches the neuronal and cognitive aspects of learning, and tries to demonstrate how neuroscience knowledge can be applied in educational contexts. The developed work is divided into five 17

T.N.R. Gonçalves categories: a) the relation between explicit and implicit learning, b) the importance of emotions in decision-making processes and learning; c) knowledge organization in the brain, d) ontogenetic brain development, and e) the necessary pre-conditions for a truly educational neuroscience. It mainly uses qualitative data analysed from a neurobiological and neuropsychological perspective. Within the research groups, work is organized around projects. These groups consist of multidisciplinary teams formed by people with diverse and broad academic backgrounds: economics, neuroscience, biology, sociology, psychology, education, and so on. They approach the different research questions related to the learning processes from their different but complementary perspectives, forming true trans-disciplinary research teams, looking through and beyond disciplines (Lima, Morin & Nicolescu, 1994). Some of the current work relates to: research into tacit and implicit knowledge, research into individual differences in brain maturation, research into creativity in sports, publications on neuroscience and pedagogy, learning projects in collaboration with schools, television documentaries, and so on. Communitarian research practice The research dynamics developed in LLD are a practical example of transdisciplinary research. The institution itself is an example of an emergent research organization practising and promoting trans-disciplinary research, where different sciences converge in order to address specific research questions. Using this example it is possible to identify some of the questions related to trans-disciplinary research and its implications, especially concerning cognitive sciences and education. It allows the analysis of some questions concerned with communitarian research practice, its advantages as well as its problems. For the analysis of the LLD as a trans-disciplinary research community I will consider the following issues: organization, researchers, research work, and relationship with the community. I make this analysis on the basis of the data collected during the visit: • At an organizational level, I stress the division in research groups working on different research projects. This makes possible and facilitates team work, as organized in a common research task, with common goals. The project gathers people together and allows the conjugation of different perspectives, approaches and academic backgrounds. Everyone works 18

Complex systems and plastic brains for the same project and the same questions, although they may have different perspectives. This kind of organization facilitates also the diversification of research methodologies, either quantitative or qualitative, and facilitates triangulation. • The autonomy to hire researchers allows LLD to join together a set of people with different and broad academic backgrounds and research experience, very competent and pragmatic. The LLD researcher profile is, in general, a professional with a broad background, with a solid research experience, and open to multidisciplinary research. Most of them have a multidisciplinary formation, originated and guided by the questions they have been researching. • Besides bridging and fusing different disciplines, perspectives and methods, the organization of research and projects around questions allows each project to function according to its own dynamics and context, and to the questions that it tries to answer. There is also a certain flexibility and diversity regarding group functioning and project development. However, this kind of work and organization demands pragmatism, application and relevant findings from the research undertaken, as well as a serious evaluation. • There is also a great concern with the social relevance and recognition of the research conducted. Although there were some initial communication problems, there has been a progressive opening to the external community, especially the educational community. Some of the ongoing projects are conducted in collaboration with schools, teachers and educational communities. An effort has also been made in building bridges between the research communities and the teachers in the field, in specific projects. In practical terms, besides the possibilities directly connected with the trans-disciplinary research practice, there are some problems or difficulties of a different nature which must be considered, as pointed out by the LLD researchers: • Being a recent organization, researching in an innovative way and working in an emergent field of knowledge, represents some difficulties and challenges: to find a solid orientation, the responsibility of making significant research recognized by the scientific community, the obligation to inform society or the need to get funded, are some examples • Difficulties in finding researchers, especially in neuroscience, who are open to this type of work and concerned with the application of knowledge and research 19

T.N.R. Gonçalves • Communication difficulties with the educational community in some projects and the receptivity to collaboration The advantages include developing research projects which would not be possible in traditional organizations, developing applied research, working and organization autonomy, possibility to research together, and opportunities for building bridges with practice.

Conclusions The interviews were conducted with a small group of experts and it is therefore important to acknowledge the difficulty of generalizing the findings and extrapolating from the data. However, the present results correspond to the general relevant literature in this area, which sustains that: • the emergence of a new learning subject characterized by its plasticity and multidimensionality (Damásio, 1999) • the new perspectives on cognition as a ‘situated cognition’, with emotional, social and biological aspects acknowledged by experts as well as present in relevant research in this field (Varela, 1997) • the ‘emergence’ of a new ontological reality which demands the ‘convergence’ between fields and research approaches initially separated (Bunge, 2004) The complexity of the educational phenomenon and the new knowledge about the brain and cognition, the systemic nature of some of the most important educational problems in the present, especially if we take into account the implications of globalization, information society, and the ever-growing changing reality which we live in, implies a trans-disciplinary approach to those questions in the present. I argue that if we recognize the systemic nature of some educational problems of our times we should also defend and promote a trans- disciplinary approach to such problems. Complexity demands convergence. Educational science must depend on many other disciplines and interdisciplines because: • The brain is plastic and capable of learning throughout the life span • The learner is a multidimensional and complex entity 20

Complex systems and plastic brains • Learning processes are complex • The subject has a mental life and is inserted in complex and changing social networks • Human beings occupy different organization levels, from physical to social, which is the reason why they cannot be understood if we focus our attention only on a single level • Learning sciences and pedagogy need a scientific basis which provides a basis for research and sustains teachers’ action, their techniques and strategies of intervention • Educational research is transversal and, as such, demands a considerable effort, efficient teams and effective results, which must be financed by governments and administrations Although there is not much contact between brain and education scientists and researchers and there is not much consensus concerning the educative application of brain research findings, there are some examples or signs we must consider: first, educational researchers’ growing recognition of the importance of neuroscience research on the brain; second, neuroscientists’ growing interest for research into the learning processes and for the application of such findings; and third, the existence of a number of initiatives, publications and organizations which aim to bridge both sciences (Wolfe, 2001; OECD, 2002; Frith et al., 2005). If we consider that cognitive neuroscience, has provided some key ontological concepts – such as neural plasticity, the neural basis of mental processes, parallel integral architecture – which have important implications for the understanding of the educational institutions, learning processes and the learning subjects, we can easily admit the need of convergence between education and the cognitive sciences, in order to better understand the new emerging reality. By arguing for the need of convergence between different sciences we are not denying the contribution and the importance of specialization, the need of the existence of particular sciences. Both specialization and integration are necessary, and each one emerges to correct the excesses and limitations of the other. In the words of Mario Bunge: Specialization is demanded because of the world’s diversity and the growing richness of our mental tools, while integration is needed for the contraposition between knowledge fragmentation and the unity of the world. (Bunge 2004: p. 335) 21

T.N.R. Gonçalves However, we must recognize that the evolution of scientific knowledge has been, in a significant way, directly related to the capacity of a number of sciences to cooperate and fuse with each other. One of the most recent and productive examples is cognitive neuroscience, which is the result of the fusion between psychology and neurobiology. Furthermore, the dimension of the challenges faced by educational systems today, and the progress made by cognitive sciences in the understanding of the brain and the learning processes, support the need for collaboration between different disciplines. Many educational systems face the need to adapt to the emerging problems and profound changes brought by globalization. Also, the fast and complex social and political transformations of the 21st century point to the need for a different, more systematic approach to educational questions, promoting educational change and reorganization of educational systems. On the other hand, progress made in the last decades in the cognitive sciences may offer some concepts and tools needed to undertake some of the necessary educational changes, which could help to reorganize different educational systems in order to face the growing complexity of the educational reality of our times. The LLD example demonstrates the possibility and need to develop initiatives which encourage collaborative work, bridging different disciplines. Those bridges should be better understood as specific mechanisms to advance the study of mind, brain and learning. This cooperation will benefit both educators and neuroscientists, once they can add new perspectives and open new horizons to education, allowing to ask and answer important questions about how humans learn. In the OECD document Understanding the Brain: Towards a New Learning Science, the problem is presented in the following way: ‘The more we learn about the human brain, specially in the early years, the less comfortable we find ourselves with the traditional classroom model and imposed curriculum of formal education’ (OECD, 2002: p. 14). Emergent complexity requires new institutions, new curricula, new methods and new knowledge. As mentioned in the OECD document, to unravel the complexities of the human brain, understand the nature of memory and intelligence and what exactly happens when learning occurs, are some of the main goals that can be achieved through the collaboration between learning and cognitive sciences. They can help us to support educational practice with a solid theory of learning. ‘In particular they can shed new light on old questions about human learning and suggest ways in which educational provision and the practice of teaching can better help young and adult learners’ (OECD, 2002: p. 27). In this sense, such collaboration may also represent an opportunity to reorganize educational institutions and reconsider research priorities. In a trans-disciplinary perspective, 22

Complex systems and plastic brains anchored in a systemic approach, and based on the recognition of the complexity and multidimensionality of the educational phenomenon, this implies taking into account different levels of reality and different but complementary perspectives: social, cultural, historical, as well as psychological, biological or physical. Trans-disciplinarity, understood as unification through fusion (Bunge, 2004), rather than through reduction, implies bridging and fusing different scientific procedures, methods and findings into a new comprehensive discipline. This also requires developing new methodologies and new ways to organize research and research organizations. I therefore argue that that the possibility of a new learning science based on a trans-disciplinary approach depends on the following key capacities: • creating a common language, defining and integrating concepts of different sciences • establishing new research priorities and institutions • opening the debate to other disciplines • distinguishing between what is well-established, what is probable and what is a myth about brain functioning and learning processes • promoting the practical application of neuroscience knowledge • promoting research based on the problems coming from educational practice and pedagogy • establishing a common methodology Beyond these practicalities, an open research attitude both in the cognitive sciences and in education must also be considered as a necessary condition for research progress in this field. This attitude must refer to the complex systemic nature of the reality of education and be guided by the relevant questions which need to be addressed in this field. The need of a transdisciplinary approach to education and the cognitive sciences based on the complex nature of education, demands the transgression of the frontiers between disciplines (Nicolescu, 1996). It also must be established in the context of the individual, social, historical and cultural aspects of the educational task and, as such, must refer to the individual, social, and political goals behind the organization of educational systems. Transdisciplinarity complements both pluri-disciplinarity (the study of a certain discipline by using the vision of other disciplines) and inter-disciplinarity (the transfer of the methods adopted by a certain discipline to another one) in order to grasp the different levels of a multidimensional reality in a complex and systemic way. 23

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Acknowledgments I wish to thank LLD, especially Associate Professor Theresa Schilhab, for all the help and information given. Special thanks are due to Professor Antonio Bernal Guerrero for his support and precious help. Special thanks are also due to Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia for supporting my doctoral research during the last four years.

References Bunge, M. (2004). Emergencia y convergencia: Novedad calitativa y unidad del conocimiento [Emergence and convergence: Qualitative novelty and the unity of science]. Barcelona: Gedisa. Castro-Caldas, A. (1998). The illiterate brain: Learning to read and write during childhood influences the functional organization of the brain. Brain, 121, 1053-1063. Damásio, A. (1999). The feeling of what happens: Body and emotion in the making of consciousness. New York: Harcourt Brace. Frith, U., and Blakemore, S. (2005). The learning brain. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. Gil Flores, J. (1994). Análisis de datos cualitativos: Aplicaciones a la investigación educativa [Qualitative data analysis: Applications in educational research]. Barcelona: PPU. Freitas, L., Morin, E., and Nicolescu, B. (1994). Carta da transdisciplinaridade [Letter on Transdisciplinarity]. Working document adopted to guide research on transdisciplinarity by the 1st World Congress on Transdisciplinarity, Convento da Arrábida, Portugal. Maturana, H., López, M., Pérez, A., and Santos, M. (2003). Conversando con Maturana de educación [Talking with Maturana about education]. Málaga: Ediciones Aljibe. Nicolescu, B. (1996). La transdisciplinarité – Manifeste [Trans-disciplinarity – Manifest] Monaco: Editions du Rocher. OECD (2002). Understanding the brain: Towards a new learning science. Paris. OECD (2007). Understanding the brain: The birth of a learning science. Paris. Varela, F.J., Thompson, E., and Rosch, E. (1997). De cuerpo presente [The embodied mind]. Barcelona: Gedisa. Wolfe, P. (2001). Brain matters – Translating research into classroom practice. Alexandria, Virginia: ASCD.

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Interdisciplinarity in the ecological systems paradigm

interdisciplinarity in the ecological systems paradigm How do we promote our future researchers’ ecological thinking? Shoshana Keiny Education today is dominated by the positivistic paradigm, whereby knowledge is an external objective entity, compartmentalized in different structures termed disciplines. Ecology was originally defined as a cross-disciplinary area, aimed to investigate the relationship between the different disciplines, between the organism and its biotic and a-biotic environment. Yet to cope with authentic interdisciplinary problems that constitute humans, ‘opensystem ecology’ is required, which we term ‘ecological thinking’. According to ecological thinking, humans are positioned in the system in a double role: As interactive insiders as well as reflective outsiders. As such, they are able to conceptualize their experience, and draw models which could inform us on how to use the natural resources without exploiting the planet. Our focal question was how today, within a system that is geared towards disciplinary knowledge acquisition, can we prepare future citizen’s ecological thinking? A Science, Technology and Society project that aimed to enhance high-school teachers’ conceptual change, was chosen as our case study. As a pilot team, all the INSET (In Service Education and Training) meetings were audio-taped and transcribed. These formed our database. The participating teachers’ collaborative learning process generated a new interdisciplinary pedagogy. Characterized by six guiding principles, the congruence of the emergent new pedagogy with ecological thinking is discussed.

Introduction Education today is dominated by the positivistic paradigm, whereby knowledge is an external objective entity, compartmentalized in different structures termed disciplines, each of whom has developed its unique ‘language’ consisting of concepts as well as methodology. The higher a student climbs, from school to university, the more socialized he/she becomes in the disciplinary communities of practice (Wenger, 1998).

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S. Keiny Ecology was originally defined as a cross-disciplinary area, aimed to investigate the relationship between the different disciplines, between the organism and its biotic and a-biotic environment (Likens, 1992). An example of a cross-disciplinary research is the Desert-Watershed study, whose aim was to understand the water management in the desert (Yair et al., 1982). An experimental site was plotted on a first-order watershed in the desert, and a team of scientists consisting of a climatologist, hydrologist, pedologist, botanist and zoologist were engaged in data collection, using each their disciplinary methodology. Thus rainfall and runoff water were measured, eroded soil was collected, and soil moisture was estimated. A survey of the flora yielded distribution of plant associations and the activity of the animal inhabitants was estimated by the amount of erodable soil produced by their burrowing (Shachak, 1980). To understand water management in the desert, this cross-disciplinary data had to be translated into system language. Three new variables, water, energy and soil were identified and their respective flow-chains were drawn. A system model disclosing the relationship between energy, water and soil flow-chains, led them finally to understand how a first order watershed functions in the desert (Figure 1) (Keiny et al., 1987). temp. wind CLOUDS

RAINFALL

rocky surface

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RIVER WATER

SOIL MOISTURE

GEOPHYTES SOLAR ENERGY

SOIL

PREDATORS

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ERODED SOIL

Figure 1. The double loci model of conceptual change 26

Interdisciplinarity in the ecological systems paradigm What began as a cross-disciplinary research, carried out using different research methodologies, made sense only once it was translated into common system variables and new interdisciplinary connections were disclosed namely, when new knowledge was generated. Another indication of the study points to the shortcoming of the scientific methodology to cope with authentic problems that cut across disciplines. Yet, this type of ecological research, is based on close-system-ecology (Picket et al., 1985), whereby the problems studied are purely natural without any human intervention. As such, it is not applicable for cases where humans are involved, for example, for people who live in the desert and have to cope with the process of desertification or with the need to grow food on an average of 100mm rainfall a year. Authentic problems of this kind require open-system ecology, or what we term ecological thinking, whereby humans are regarded as important components of the system, rather than as outside intruders. Positioned in a double role, they are both interactive insiders as well as reflective outsiders, able to conceptualize their interactive experience, draw models which can inform us about how to use our natural resources, or how to make sustainable resolutions. Our question as science educators was: how do we prepare our future citizens to cope with authentic interdisciplinary problems? A partial answer was given half a century ago by the Science Technology and Society (STS) movement (Aikenhead, 1973; Baybee, 1985; Ramsey, 1993; Solomon et al., 1994). The underlying assumptions of the STS were that science is not an objective neutral outside entity, but rather a human creation, and thereby subjective, context bound, and value laden. Science and technology, rather than regarded as an objective, disciplinary body of knowledge, are part of the social discourse that should be taught as an ongoing process of discovery, a human endeavour to understand and cope with the world (Aikenhead, 1973). A somewhat different way of looking at STS was Layton’s Interactive model (Layton, 1993) which viewed context as an integral aspect of cognitive events. Once thinking is interwoven with the context of the problem to be solved, there is no disjunction between theory and practice in the process of problem solving (Layton, 1993; Keiny et al., 1996). This formed the background to our STS project whose aim was to prepare highschool teachers to become STS teachers. Our focal question in this chapter is how today, within a system that is geared towards disciplinary knowledge acquisition, can we prepare the future citizen’s ecological thinking? 27

S. Keiny

The rationale of the STS project Our implicit rationale drew on the following assumptions: 1. High-school teachers (of different disciplines), all university graduates, disciplinary orientated and socially compartmentalized, have to undergo a conceptual change in order to become STS teachers. 2. Teachers’ professional development and conceptual change is coupled with the process of curriculum development and implementation, thus, STS should be associated with School-Based-CurriculumDevelopment (SBCD) namely, STS curricular units would be developed by the teachers who would also teach them in their respective schools (Keiny,1993). 3. A problem-based curriculum, that engages the teachers in authentic interdisciplinary problem solving, would develop their capacities to guide students to cope with an open ended problem based curriculum.

The framework of the project Participants were twenty five high-school teachers (with an age range of 35-55) of different disciplines, from six comprehensive schools, all of whom chose to teach STS in their various schools. The framework of the STS project was two-tiered: A university in-service-course (INSET) for the teachers, and a pilot team’ whose aim was to run the activities of the INSET. The pilot team comprised (1) three experienced teachers of different disciplines, (2) a high-tech manager (of a successful high-tech company) who represented technology, and (3) two educational researchers, one of whom is the author of this chapter. The INSET met in the university every fortnight for four hours, and the pilot team meetings took place on the alternate weeks. This two-tiered framework drew on the double loci model of conceptual change (see Figure 2) (Keiny, 2002). The teachers’ INSET served as the context of practice, where teachers developed their curricular units. The pilot team served as social-reflective context where we could reflect on the process of SBCD. By experimenting STS ideas and methodology and reflecting on the learning process of the INSET, new knowledge was constructed which guided our further steps of action.

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Interdisciplinarity in the ecological systems paradigm Practice

PRACTICE Reflection

Action

T

T1 SOCIAL

Reflective Group

T2 T3

Figure 2. A system diagram representing the ‘focal system’ of the desert watershed

The process of learning of the ‘pilot team’ We assumed that there was no real STS body of knowledge, and that our first aim was to unfreeze teachers’ disciplinary way of thinking. This led us to open the meetings with authentic social problems and the case of Nina, a ‘hot’ issue in the media at that time, was chosen as an example. Nina, who was a divorcee, claimed she had the right to conceive her frozen fertilized eggs in order to have a baby, while her ex-husband, who had by then remarried, refused to give his consent. As an introduction the case triggered a lively discussion that succeeded to illuminate the multi-dimensional and multi-disciplinary aspects of the problem, touching on genetics, embryology, communication (the media), sophisticated technology, as well as judicial and ethical aspects. Yet the teachers, although highly involved in the problem, did not see the connection and could not treat it as a model for STS problems. A new approach was taken: we decided to use the high-tech company as a possible medium for authentic social problems. A visit to the company was organized and computer simulations of problems they were dealing with were presented to the teachers (for example, how to design a sensitive

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S. Keiny glove, that would transmit electric signals to a paralyzed person). Yet again, the impact of the visit was great but the participants seemed to be tied to the examples, unable to use them as analogies. Reflecting on our action, the members of the pilot group could not overlook their own ambiguity and doubts. Based on our reflection over the meetings’ transcripts, we realized we ourselves were captives, conveying double meanings which disclosed the dissonance between our manifested aims and actual pedagogy. At the same time, we became aware of another communication dissonance: It seemed that basic concepts used in our discussions, carried different meanings. For example ‘inter-disciplinarity’ was understood by the teachers as ‘multi-disciplinarity’. To clarify the point, let us use an example from the teachers’ INSET. All along the meetings, the participants were encouraged to identify a problem that would start their research study. One team suggested to examine colour, through the different disciplinary lenses. Thus, they would start by studying the chemistry of colour, the biological perception of colour, optics as the physics of colour, and technology as the manufacturing of colour. The discussion that followed exposed their idea of interdisciplinarity in terms of the different aspects and different ways of looking at the issue. The educational researchers, on the other hand, understood interdisciplinarity as the new area that emerged from the interactive relationship between the different disciplines. We shall return to this issue later. At this point, we decided to change course, and organize a visit to the Desert Research Institute (which is affiliated to our university, the BenGurion University of the Negev). The Desert Research Institute enjoys a world-wide reputation due to its interdisciplinary applied research. Examples of their research problems are how to grow vegetables on brackish water, how to build ecological houses in the desert and use solar energy for air- conditioning, and so on. The visit provided an opportunity for small teams of teachers to meet a researcher, learn about their work and ask questions. The impact of the visit has eventually created the change, which was best voiced by one teacher’s feedback: We actually envied the researchers for living in a world where they can ask questions and seek for answers […] but then we realized that as STS teachers, we have the same privilege […] this revelation created a real breakthrough. 30

Interdisciplinarity in the ecological systems paradigm STS was finally understood as a novel way of learning which is synonymous with research. Back in their teams, the teachers were now able to generate or identify inter-disciplinary, open ended problems. They learned to collect data from various sources, deal with different types of knowledge, analyze and reflect, and eventually work towards a possible resolution. To trace the process of their joint group research, I shall describe the learning process in one team who chose to study Israel’s water management. The team consisted of teachers of biology, geography, English and computer science.

Following the learning process in one team Water in Israel, and more so for those who live in the desert, is considered as a most precious resource. The team opened their investigation with an archaeological survey of the numerous wine-presses scattered in the Negev area, evidence to the amount of grapes that grew in the desert. They learned about the ingenious agricultural methods (termed runoff water agriculture) developed some two thousand years ago by the Nabbatiens. Accordingly, vines which normally require 500 mm of rainfall per year were grown in a desert area with the average precipitation of 100mm per annum. Surveying the present situation, they learned that all water resources in Israel were nationalized. That the ‘national transporter’, a huge pipeline laid in 1964, pumps a million cubic meter water per year, from the lake of Galilee, the country’s main watershed, to the arid Negev. Studying numerical data of water distribution, they learned that agriculture was the main water consumer, using 75% of the national resource. With the constant growth of population and development of new areas, they learned that the question of new resources became pertinent. They visited recycling projects in which recycled water from sewage pools was used in agriculture, a desalination plant which worked on brackish water, and an agricultural experimental station where vegetables (such as tomatoes) were grown on brackish water. Finally, they were exposed to new ingenious ideas such as digging wells to retrieve water from deep geological aquifers in the Negev area. Apart from the interesting scientific and technological aspects of these solutions, they also served as a platform for triggering new questions concerning their economical profitability, for example: 31

S. Keiny How would the high price of water affect the price of exported vegetables or flowers in the common market? Should Israel’s economy become less agriculturally oriented? It became clear to the team that water management today is not merely an ecological problem, but rather an interdisciplinary problem, touching a wide range of subjects. Symbolically, it so happened that at the same time, peace negotiations with Jordan were launched, opening new prospects in the region and, coincidentally, introducing new social-cultural aspects. Discussing the pro and con arguments, the participant teachers could not rely on rational data only and overlook their personal value systems. The price of peace had to be confronted, which meant disclosing their deeply anchored beliefs and political assumptions.

Conceptual change As a pilot team we were aware of the need to evaluate our work, in other words to be able to show the impact of the INSET in terms of the teachers’ conceptual change. Yet, ‘effective’ learning, in our case could not be assessed in terms of the participants’ control of STS knowledge. There was no real STS body of knowledge. STS content was contextual, determined by the particular research question. An alternative evaluative framework was thus developed, which was based on four new criteria or dimensions that underlie the ecological paradigm: • Complexity – dimension of space, indicating multi-disciplinarity or multi-variable • Dynamism – dimension of time, indicating change and development • Interaction – dimension of interwoven mutual dependence • Involvement – dimension of moral and personal participation. The evaluation yielded interesting findings, indicating a significant increase in the three dimensions, complexity, dynamism and interaction (involvement was beyond the methodology of the study; more details on the evaluation can be found in Gorodetsky et al., 1995). The point relevant for this chapter is that our learners’ conceptual change, their paradigm shift towards ecological thinking could be clearly illustrated.

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Interdisciplinarity in the ecological systems paradigm

Discussion What could be learned from the STS project? In other words, what is the nature of the new interdisciplinary pedagogy? In what way does it inform us, towards new avenues to cross-disciplinary research? I would venture to suggest that we have to move beyond interdisciplinarity, towards ecological thinking. Ecological thinking represents an alternative educational orientation, based on circular instead of linear thinking, on collaborative and interactive orientation of learning. It is thus both the process and product with emphasis placed on the double role, of inside interactors as well as outside reflectors, of teachers, students and researchers, all those who take part in the learning process. It is a dialectical process of learning between the individual and the learning group, whereby each participant interacts as a whole person, recruiting not merely his/her cognition but also values, beliefs or basic assumptions. At the same time, the common understanding that emerges within the group, the newly constructed knowledge, forms a new identity. Ecological thinking implies conceiving this duality of the individual as part of a group (Keiny, 2002). This newly constructed knowledge, we regard as a new pedagogy rather than a theory. To characterize this new pedagogy, I shall use the following six guidelines. Each guideline will be contrasted with the disciplinary or interdisciplinary approach, in order to emphasize the suggested paradigm shift. Locus of control The inquiry into authentic interdisciplinary problems is initiated by the learners, and stems from the socio-cultural context they are engaged in. The issues are associated with the rapidly changing culture, which bear on their future. This is in contrast to learning situations, guided by a predetermined curriculum, which is dictated by external agencies (teachers, schools or the Ministry of Education). Process orientated Enquiry is geared towards better understanding and better coping with the issues studied. Reflective inquiry is part of the ongoing dialogue that incorporates questioning, observing and analysis of the information.

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S. Keiny The learners involved expose their underlying epistemologies. Validity of the data is influenced by their world views and personal preferences. This stands in contrast to the disciplinary or interdisciplinary curricula, whose major goal is to transmit canonical knowledge that is conceived as objective and neutral. Sources of knowledge In inquiry of authentic problems, data is sought in the real world of the learners, serving their understanding and needs. Ingenuity and creativity direct the process as well as their values and worldview. It involves critical discussions that reveal their underlying assumptions. Thus the emerging knowledge is contextually embedded. This stands in contrast with the predetermined curriculum knowledge, which has been legitimised by the scientific communities and is part of the formal curriculum and textbooks. Scope and boundaries The process of inquiry provides the direction and scope of knowledge construction, as compared to the predetermined curriculum, where the boundaries of the content (knowledge) to be mastered are set by the developers of the curriculum. Ambiguity/uncertainty Ambiguity is associated with the process as well as with the nature of the constructed knowledge. The learners are part of a dynamic system that may change even on a short time scale. Thus, by definition, it is an ambiguous learning process without a predetermined direction or outcomes. This is in contrast to teaching the established sciences, where there is a tendency to transmit a notion of certainty – the existence of an ‘absolute truth’. This is also the case of interdisciplinary curricula that draw on established disciplinary bodies of knowledge and their underlying positivistic assumptions. Responsibility Inquiry into authentic problems is an open, learner-centred situation that leaves the responsibility for learning on the learner. As compared to teaching within the available curriculum that prompts the ‘covering of

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Interdisciplinarity in the ecological systems paradigm the learning materials’, and where the pace, the sequence and evaluation are decided by the teacher or the prescribed official curriculum, without involving the students (Gorodetsky et al., 2003) Our teachers have undergone a conceptual change from their basic positivistic orientation whereby knowledge is regarded as an objective neutral entity, to Ecological Thinking. Engaged in SBCD, they have generated new curricular knowledge which is subjective in the sense that it is based on their own ideas. They assumed responsibility for their new curriculum which was not predetermined but emerged from their collaborative group learning. Ingenuity and creativity directed their process of learning as well as their values and worldview, as was evident from the example of the team who investigated Israel’s water management. To cope with the problems entailed in having to negotiate water resources with Jordan, the neighbouring Arab country, they had to face their entrenched assumptions and basic beliefs concerning the relationship between the two people. As teachers, they have changed their conception of their role from mainly teaching by transmitting objective knowledge, toward enhancing learning, or developing their students as learners. By identifying real world problems and turning them into research studies, the teachers guide their students to act like researchers, collect data from different sources, triangulate them, and re-construct knowledge. By dealing with open ended real world problems, they gained a deeper understanding of their context, which could eventually lead them towards better coping with their reality. The participants in the group were engaged in the holistic process of learning, i.e. in ways which went beyond purely cognitive but included the whole person as a learner. Thus the emergent knowledge generated in the group was not merely cognitive. This is how we understand the process of conceptual change, as an experiential change rather than merely cognitive. The experience of identity in practice is a way of being in the world. It is not equivalent to self image. Who we are lies in the way we live day to day, not just in what we think or say about ourselves (Wenger, 1998). As a cultural-historical phenomenon, activity integrates human actions into a coherent whole, forming the basis for meaningful interpretations and actions of the learner. How a person acts on objects demonstrates how he/she stands in the world. The interrelation between the individual process of learning and that of the group or the community was formulated by Davis and Sumara:

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S. Keiny As the learner learns, the context changes simply because one of its components changes, and conversely, as the context changes, so does the very identity of the learner (Davis et al., 1997) One last word about collaborative learning: Our project was aimed to develop teachers who were socially compartmentalized in their different disciplines, to become STS teachers. In order to develop STS curricular units, they were grouped in mixed teams, and engaged in collaborative learning. This was a new and rather ambiguous setting for our teachers. Deprived of their safe ‘crutches’ of disciplinary knowledge, they had to learn. The INSET as well as the different teams had thus developed to become communities-of-learners (Keiny, 1996; Keiny, 2002). Macmurray (1957) distinguished between ‘collaboration’ and ‘community’ by using the following criteria: relationship, equality and freedom. He contended that in a community they all score high. Thus, the mutuality of high equality and high relationship facilitate the emergence of individuality. Community is a medium in which participants can be themselves in the sense of voicing their ‘half-baked’ ideas without being ridiculed (Belenky et al., 1986). Reciprocity of freedom and equality implies that roles, positions, status and so on, become latent in the community and do not affect relationships. Belenky et al. (1986) use the term ‘real-talk’ to define a conversation that included both discourse and exploration typified by talking, listening, questioning, arguing, and speculating. Conversations of this kind trigger reflection and critical thinking. A group reaches this stage only when participants feel safe enough and are able to criticize each other’s work and, at the same time, accept criticism. Thus, the social aspect of the community is reflected in the personal relationship climate that best serves the epistemological goal of the ‘community of learners’: to reconstruct knowledge (Keiny, 2002). The STS project, which involved the teachers in the process of curriculum development, became an optimal medium for developing their ecological thinking. Each participant acted as interactive learner in the process of his/her team’s curricular unit development, generating new curricular knowledge. At the same time, each acted also as an outsider reflector, reflecting on the other teams’ units which were presented in the INSET plenary. This double role of the teachers, acting as insider interactive learners and outsider reflectors, who are able to conceptualise the learning experience into a new pedagogy, is what we mean by ecological thinking. Coming back to our focal question, namely, how can we prepare future citizen’s ecological thinking? My suggestion is to form cross-disciplinary 36

Interdisciplinarity in the ecological systems paradigm groups of teachers, interested to develop their own interdisciplinary curriculum units. As communities of learners they would indulge in a dialectical process of learning between the individual and the learning group. Recruiting not merely their cognition, but also values, beliefs or basic assumptions, they would arrive at a common understanding namely to construct a new pedagogy anchored in an alternative ecological paradigm.

References Aikenhead, G.S. (1986). The content of STS education. STS Research Network Missive, 2(3), 18-23. Baybee, R.W. (1985). Science Technology Society. NSTA Yearbook. Washington: National Science Teacher Association. Belenky, M.F., Clinchy, B.M. Goldberg, N.R., and Tarule, J.M. (1986). Women’s ways of knowing: The development of self, voice and mind. New-York: Basic Books. Davis, B., and Sumara, D. J. (1997). Cognition, complexity, and teacher education. Harvard Educational Review, 67(1), 105-125. Gorodetsky, M., and Keiny, S. (1995). Conceptual change and environmental cognition. International Journal of Science Education, 17(2), 207-217. Gorodetsky, M., Keiny, S., Barak, J., and Weiss, T. (2003). Contextual Pedagogy: Teachers’ journey beyond interdisciplinarity. Teachers and Teaching: Theory and Practice, 9(1), 21-33. Keiny, S. (1993). School-based curriculum development as a process of teachers’ professional development. Educational Action Research, 1(1), 65-93. Keiny, S. (1997). A Community-of-Learners: Promoting teachers to become learners. Teachers and Teaching: Theory and Practice, 2(2), 243-272. Keiny, S. (2002). Ecological Thinking: A new approach to educational change. University Press of America (UPA). Keiny, S., and Gorodetsky, M. (1996). Curriculum development in Science, Technology and Society (STS) as a means of teachers’ conceptual change. Educational Action Research, 4(2), 185-195. Keiny, S., and Shachak, M. (1987). Educational model for environmental cognition development. International Journal of Science Education, 9(4), 449-448. Layton, D. (1993). Inarticulate science? Or does science understand its public as well as its public understand science? Mathematics, Science & Technology Education (MISTE) News, 3(2). Likens, G.E. (1992). The ecosystem approach: Its use and abuse. Excellence in Ecology, 3, Oldendorf/Luhe, Germany: Ecology Institute. 37

S. Keiny Macmurray, J. (1957). The self as an agent. Humanity Press International. Pickett, S.T.A., and White, P.S. (1985). The ecology of natural disturbances and patch dynamics. Orlando: Academic Press. Ramsey, J. (1993). The science education reform movement: Implications for social responsibility. Science Education, 72, 235-258. Shachak, M. (1980). The desert biome – A simple system for field investigations of ecological principles. In: T.S. Bakshi and Z. Naveh (Eds), Environmental education: Principles, methods and applications. New York and London: Plenum Press. Solomon, J., and Aikenhead, G.S. (1994). Science technology and society education. New York: Teachers College Press. Wenger, I. (1998). Communities of practice: Learning, meaning and identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Yair, A., and Shachak, M. (1982). A case study of energy, water and soil chains in an arid ecosystem. Oecologia, 54, 389-397.

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Understanding teachers’ use of educational technologies

Understanding teachers’ use of educational technologies Tony Fisher The drive to increase the use of information and communications technology (ICT) to support learning in and out of schools continues. Governments seek ‘the educational fix’, achieved through ICT-related ‘transformation’, which is seen as a necessity for competitive survival in an uncertain future, in the knowledge economy of a globalised world. In this chapter, I seek to re-establish a focus on the teacher as a key social agent in the educational use of such new technologies. I argue that this involves attention not only to the role of the teacher, but also to the wider contexts of contemporary society within which that role is exercised, if the interaction between the teacher’s role and the factors bearing upon it are to be understood. Here I offer an adaptive use of a theoretical construct from social psychology – Bronfenbrenner’s classic model of the ecology of human development – as a means of setting some of the issues in a multiscalar context, bringing together scales from the macro (processes of globalisation) to the micro (the work of the individual teacher), and theoretical insights from several disciplinary perspectives. Ask about the theory of the educational use of new technologies, and the answer might make reference to ‘constructionism’ in the pioneering work of Seymour Papert in his seminal book The Children’s Machine. The title is significant. The focus, naturally enough, is on the learner. The paradigm is computer-based learning (CBL) or computer-aided learning (CAL), and the unit of analysis is hence the learner and her/his interaction with a technological tool or tools. Recent rhetoric surrounding the educational use of new technologies is often that of ‘transformation’ of education, with the teacher being decentred from ‘sage on the stage’ to ‘guide on the side’. Sometimes the teacher as human agent is lost from view altogether, with the assemblage of hardware and software itself being elevated to the role of ‘teacher’. Frequently the discourse is one of technical rationalism and instrumental reason, layered onto casual, but deeply ingrained, technological determinism. Elsewhere, teachers may be characterised as self-interested and slow or reluctant to change. 39

T. Fisher Here I seek to re-establish a focus on the teacher as a key social agent in the educational use of new technologies. My purpose is also to sketch out some of the components of the wider theoretical landscape within which teachers exist, both as users of, and as mediators of the use by others of, new educational technologies (hereinafter ‘information and communications technology’: ICT). My attention is here restricted to teachers in schools, primarily in the UK, though much of what I have to say will be of wider relevance, since the development of the use of ICT in education is a global phenomenon. This necessarily involves attention not only to the role of the teacher, but also - importantly - to the context of contemporary society within which that role is exercised, if the interaction between the teacher’s role and the factors bearing upon it are to be understood. This is an inherently complex undertaking, inescapably cross-disciplinary in nature: In the current specialized academic landscape, modernity is the object of study of modernity theory, and technology is studied in technology studies. Few works exist that bridge these two fields and that study technology with extensive reference to modernity, or modernity with extensive reference to technology, or that concentrate on both by studying the way in which evolutions within modernity intersect with technological changes. (Brey, 2003: p. 34) Brey describes how modernity theory often treats technology as ‘a “black box” […] discussed, if at all, in abstract and often essentialist and technological determinist terms’ (ibid.). By contrast, technology studies, whilst paying detailed attention to the technology, generate their own black box, which is society. The larger sociocultural and economic context in which actors operate is either treated as a background phenomenon to which some handwaving references are made, or it is not realised at all. (Brey, 2003: p. 34) Having for some years been involved in various instances of evaluation research in educational ICT, I suggest that the great majority of studies that we undertake from the perspective of ICT in education fall into Brey’s second category: technology studies with a black box in place of society. In this chapter, I suggest that some of the contents of that black box include theories of globalisation, the social shaping of technology, power and control, and the changing nature of work. 40

Understanding teachers’ use of educational technologies Brey (2003: p. 34) notes that one of the difficulties in achieving a synthesis of modernity theory and technology studies is that the former tends to operate at the macro scale, whereas the latter tend to concentrate on the micro (and meso) level. Here I offer an adaptative use of a theoretical construct from social psychology - Bronfenbrenner’s (1979) classic model of the ecology of human development - as a means of setting some of the issues in a multiscalar context, bringing together scales from the macro (processes of globalisation) to the micro (the work of the individual teacher), and theoretical insights from several disciplinary perspectives.

Globalisation and government education policy I argue here for the recognition of a direct link between globalisation and the use of ICT in education. Globalisation has provided the impetus for increased governmental concern with international economic competition, and this has led in turn to a renewed focus on direct intervention in education. Further, the cultural impact of globalisation is not just ‘out there’ at the macro level; it is also felt as an ‘in here’ phenomenon at the level of individuals – and hence, individual teachers – ‘influencing intimate and personal details of our lives’ (Giddens, 1999: p. 12). For teachers, this includes pressure and encouragement to use ICT, and its actual use, in the highly personal activity of teaching. ‘Driven by interrelated political, economic and technological changes, globalization is transforming societies and world order’ (Held and McGrew, undated). This ‘macro-level’ context provides a set of drivers for change at other levels, including education, as the nation-state confronts legitimation and fiscal crises. Governments, seeking to respond to the pressures of globalisation, exert downward pressure for change onto national education systems. The educational fix, achieved through ICTrelated ‘transformation’, becomes seen as a necessity for competitive survival in an uncertain future, in the knowledge economy of a globalised world. A major recent educational technology initiative in the UK has been the National Grid for Learning (NGfL). The government publication Open for Learning, Open for Business (Department for Education and Employment (DfEE)/NGfL 1998) brought together issues and challenges for learners, education providers and industry; it explicitly linked economic and educational priorities in the context of the NGfL as a technological initiative. In the foreword by the then Prime Minister, we read that it was time ‘to make Britain a world leader in the development, deployment, use and 41

T. Fisher export of digital learning services’ (Tony Blair in DfEE/NGfL, 1998: p. 2). ‘The Government aims to see a tripling of the market in educational ICT by 2002 as an incentive to industry to develop such services, and to stimulate significant growth in the amount and quality of educational software and on-line broadcast content available to learners’ (p. 10). The vision is one of ‘Britain as a learning society which makes the maximum creative use of new technologies to raise educational standards, improve the quality of life and significantly enhance our international competitiveness’ (p. 14). Hence, one of the targets is to make Britain ‘a centre for excellence in the development of networked software content, and a world leader in the export of learning services’ (p. 13). Thus from the example of the NGfL we see demonstrated very clearly the way in which the programme of increasing the use of ICT in schools cannot be divorced from governmental attempts to steer the economy in times of globalisation and technological change. This is an example of what Giddens (1991: p. 38) calls ‘reflexive modernity’ in which knowledge of social (in this case economic and technological) conditions, derived from constant monitoring of the system, is applied to the nature of social action (in this case education). My point here is not that this is either ‘right’ or ‘wrong’, but that teachers are being required and encouraged to use ICTs in their work in ways which are often untested, for reasons that go far beyond the putative enhancement of learning and the meeting of learning objectives for their students. In this way, globalisation, mediated by government, penetrates into the enacted curriculum and the very interactions and individual pedagogical decisions of individual teachers. In order to understand the latter, we must appreciate the former. Writing over ten years ago, Watson identified a ‘dichotomy of purpose’ among government initiatives for educational ICT, which left teachers in the UK unclear as to why they were being asked to use new technologies (Watson 1997). The dichotomy was between a pedagogic, subject-focused rationale on one hand (using computers will improve teaching and learning in curriculum subjects) and a more vocational, ‘technocentric’ rationale on the other (the country needs young people who are technologically literate for the work force of the future). This dichotomy resulted in teachers receiving confusing messages about why they should use computers in their work, with the result that the process of implementation of ICT-related change was impaired, becoming ‘more complex and haphazard’ (p.82). From today’s perspective it is perhaps appropriate to view the two rationales as complementary rather than dichotomous. Certainly both continue to characterise the discourse, albeit in modified form. The 42

Understanding teachers’ use of educational technologies pedagogical rationale has evolved into the wider ‘transformation agenda’ (for instance, DfES 2002; DfES 2003; DfES 2005). The vocational rationale has been subsumed into the global economic competitiveness agenda. Together, the vision of the ‘transformation of education’ and the drive for global economic competitiveness combine as a totalising discourse of ICT in education: it is an economic necessity which in any case will bring improvement to the education system. I refer to this as a ‘totalising discourse’ because it brooks no argument or alternative. It is presented as the only way, containing all the answers. The extension and development of the use of ICT in education becomes so taken for granted that it is effectively ‘common sense’, and hence indicative of Gramsci’s notion of ‘hegemony’ where ‘the will of dominant groups within society and culture is maintained through the creation and recreation of a ‘common-sense’ view of the world [which] happens to coincide with the interests of the powerful groups’ (Smyth et al., 2000: p. 28). A position that explicitly accommodates both domination by powerful groups, and manoeuvre by subordinate groups, in the change process, was set out in ‘School Subjects and Curriculum Change’ (Goodson, 1993). In setting up his argument for ‘domination’ and ‘mediation’ he notes that, in the change process, ‘there are certain “conjunctures” where dominant interest groups intervene to set up a structure’ (Goodson, 2000: p. 3). If we apply Goodson’s ideas to the circumstances around the imposition of ICT on schools and teachers we find we are at such a ‘conjuncture’, where the Government and the ICT industry are in a dominant position. As noted above, government seeks to support the home ICT industry in times of globalisation, whilst at the same time continuing the reform process in schools by ‘ensuring that serving teachers feel confident and are competent to teach using ICT [and] enabling school leavers to have a good understanding of ICT, with measures in place for assessing their competence in it’ (DfEE/NGfL, 1998: p. 13). To achieve this, the Government has used legislative power to mandate curricular, pedagogical and assessment change in school, and economic power in purchasing ICT infrastructure, designed and marketed by the ICT industry it seeks to support. Hence, ‘at that dominant moment, structure is put in place and it includes a pattern of resources and a pattern of aspirations. That’s a moment of, we can say, domination’ (Goodson, 2000: p. 3). Following such a ‘moment of domination’ there is a ‘a long period of mediation’ during which ‘that structure is administered and managed and run and activated by other people who will take back from it certain degrees of autonomy, space and other strategic politics […] Power doesn’t work in most places most of the time, by constantly telling you what to do […] I 43

T. Fisher don’t think domination works as systematic oppression. I believe it works as mediated surrender by subordinate groups’ (Goodson, 2000: p. 3). In order to understand the use of educational ICT, there is a need for research which will explore to what extent teachers who have participated in educational ICT initiatives have ‘surrendered’ to the project to increase the use of the technology; also, whether ‘degrees of autonomy’ and ‘space’ have been discovered by these teachers, and, if so, how those opportunities have been used.

Teachers’ work One of the most profound consequences of globalisation for education is the transfer of certain precepts from the economic sphere to the social sphere, resulting in ‘the arrival of the market’ in the social sphere, and the ‘marketisation’ or ‘commodification’ of education (e.g. Ball, 1990; Lawn, 1996; Woods et al., 1997; Graham, 1999; Helsby, 1999; Robertson, 2000). Globalisation is the wider context in which ‘the discipline of the market’ has been extended to education, where ‘… the ideology of the market has been used by the state as a means of disembedding the institutional structures and practices that were central to the organisation of teachers’ work as welfare state professionals in the post-war years’ (Robertson 2000, p.15). However, this is not merely an ideological - or pragmatic - response on the part of government, to the impact of new technologies and the restructuring of global capitalism. It also represents the continuation of ‘governmental responses to the problem of funding the public sphere which involve introducing quasi-free market economic policies and practices into the domain of education’ (Smart, 1992: p. 119). It is in this context that the infusion of ICT into education continues. In attempting to deal with the complex repercussions of globalisation, government has sought greater control over the curriculum and, in that sense, has sought to mediate between the macro level of forces of globalisation, and the micro level of the work of individual teachers. ‘We are talking about investing in human capital in the age of knowledge […] to compete in the global economy...’ (DfEE, 1997). This ‘age of knowledge’ I take to be close in meaning to such phrases as ‘knowledge society’ or ‘information society’. In the information society, teaching is modernised by ‘by re-engineering the profession to a post-welfarist specification, and by inserting it into the marketplace for knowledge workers’ (Graham, 1999: p. 89). Teachers’ work is re-positioned as an explicit part of a knowledge/ information economy, with international comparisons of educational performance now a commonplace. 44

Understanding teachers’ use of educational technologies Pressure to increase the classroom use of computers by all teachers reveals a further impact on teachers’ work – that of intensification. Intensification is a widely experienced and reported phenomenon in the work of teachers (e.g. Apple, 1988: p.105-108; Hargreaves, 1994: p. 117-140; Woods et al., 1997: p. 58-59; Helsby, 1999: p. 171). ICT becomes yet another thing to learn and think about, and to incorporate into lesson plans and schemes of work at a time of increased workloads and constant change. Other aspects of ICT-related intensification of teachers’ work are: increases in the pressure for immediate responses to parents and outside agencies, and increases in schools’ capacities for monitoring individual and group performances leading to more analysis of assessment data by teachers, and by those who monitor their performance. The notion of intensification draws from more general Marxist labour process theory and provides part of the account of the wider degradation of work. Braverman’s original formulation of labour process theory (1974) was related to capitalist production in manufacturing industry. Later work has applied Braverman’s ideas to education. In such an analysis, teachers have an important part to play in educating future labour power, and in developing in their students the skills and knowledge which ultimately increase labour productivity. Teachers’ work can in this way be seen as part of the total production process. Hence schools are seen as producers of human capital needed by the economy, with a specialised workforce of teachers whose labour has the key function of producing the larger workforce (Connell, 1995: p. 94). The introduction of computers into that process changes the nature of the process. This is complex, being more than just a technological ‘add-in’ to a pre-existing process, intended to improve that process in some way. The natures of education and schools are themselves changing and new technologies are reflexively part of those changes, being both a contributor to, and symptom of, change. In Western economies experiencing consequences of globalisation, control over the conception of teachers’ work has been increasingly taken by an ever more interventionist state, driven by technical-rationalist precepts, engaged in a process of educational reform (Lawn, 1996: p. 2-3; Trushell, 1999: p. 67-68). Hence, in a context of imposed national curricula and centrally devised teaching strategies, together with ‘high stakes’ inspection, frequent testing and the publication of performance tables, there is both a reduction of the space for teachers’ professional autonomy and, at the same time, an increase in teachers’ responsibilities for implementation (Ball, 1990). Globalisation has been accompanied by change in industrial ideas and practices. Fordism has given way to ‘post-Fordism’ (Gee and Lankshear, 45

T. Fisher 1995; Helsby, 1999: p. 4), with a greater emphasis on flexibility and teamworking among other characteristics, and this shift has echoes in education and the work of teachers. Lawn (1996) argues that reforms of curriculum and assessment, together with new inspection systems and decentralised management, have had both quantitative effects (including hours of work, resources, new skills) and qualitative effects (new problems in ‘the social relations of work’, including new kinds of management and ways of working). Thus there are numerous similarities which can be perceived between the ways of working in new industries or businesses and those in schools. ‘A similar language is used in both places, emphasizing quality, human resources, management cycles, teams of specialist staff, flexibilities of operation, focussing of resources etc.’ (Lawn, 1996: p. 2). Thus, in seeking to understand what is happening in post-Fordist conditions, we see how the ‘fast capitalism’ of globalisation and post-Fordism (Gee and Lankshear, 1995) in business and industry is mirrored by the emergence of ‘fast schools’, as ‘the traditional distinctions and divisions between schools and the economy have all but collapsed’ (Robertson, 2000: p. 163). In such circumstances collegiality becomes part of teachers’ work. Rather than being a desirable teacher-to-teacher relationship, it becomes instead a mandatory option for providing ‘collegial forms of professional development for teachers, but in a context in which the steerage and policy directions are unquestionably being framed from outside of schools’ (Smyth, 1995: p. 80). In these circumstances of ‘contrived collegiality’ (Hargreaves, 1994: p. 195-209), teachers are incorporated (or co-opted) to work out the implementation details whilst lacking a real voice in determining the nature of change. This represents what Smyth et al (2000: p. 21) call a ‘control regime’ for the implementation of the educational settlement. Thus, in order to understand the impact of new technologies on teachers’ work, it is necessary to understand the systems and strategies of control that are embedded in the apparatus of the education system, and in the educational settlement that obtains at the time. These include the curriculum, in both its overt and hidden forms, the ‘marketisation’ of education and the extension of managerialism (Helsby, 1999: p. 8-12), and the application of a discourse of economic rationalism in post-Fordist times (Graham, 1999: p. 92). A ‘control regime’ brings together and coordinates three elements in varying proportions: definition of the curriculum; supervision and evaluation of teachers; the engineering of compliance and consent (Smyth et al., 2000: p. 38). The form of each of these elements is socially constructed through a political process involving various interest groups seeking to establish and maintain dominance. Hence, none is as ‘normal’ as those who control the agenda may wish it to appear. 46

Understanding teachers’ use of educational technologies Here, a focus on control sees deskilling as perhaps some sort of ‘collateral damage’ associated with central determination of the curriculum. From this perspective the state sets out to ensure that a particular curriculum development (such as the use of ICT) is promoted, rather than expressly to deskill its teachers. In such circumstances the effect may well involve the necessary reskilling of some or all teachers, though technical reskilling may be accompanied by ‘ideological deskilling’ (Smyth, 1991: p. 47-48). Hence, teachers’ development of new technical skills in the use of ICT may be accompanied by ideological deskilling in the reduction of control over the curriculum.

Technological determinism or social shaping? Further important contextual understanding may be drawn from the sociology of technology. Much of the rhetoric around educational ICT includes what we might call casual technological determinism. Technological determinism is based on a view in which ‘technologies change, either because of scientific advance or following a logic of their own; and then they have effects on society.’ (MacKenzie and Wajcman, 1999: p. 3) ‘Deterministic impact studies’ (Kling, 2000: p. 218-219) are studies which work from the premise that the introduction of a technology will have certain impacts, and hence the purpose of such a study will be to ascertain the extent of the impact. This reflects a tendency, particularly in public discourse, for claims about the impact of technology in social settings to be framed in deterministic ways (MacKenzie and Wajcman, 1999: p. xv; Kling, 2000: p. 218). Evidence of technological determinism is also to be found in ‘official’ discourse, for instance in the claim that: ICT is more than just another teaching tool. Its potential for improving the quality and standards of pupils’ education is significant. Equally, its potential is considerable for supporting teachers, both in their everyday classroom role, for example by reducing the time occupied by the administration associated with it, and in their continuing training and development. (DfEE, 1998: Annex B, p. 1) In the above quotation, the technology is credited not only with the power to improve the ‘quality and standards of pupils’ education’, but also to reduce the time teachers spend on administration. It is couched more moderately, in terms of ‘potential’, but the power remains with the technology. Similarly, in relation to the transformation agenda: 47

T. Fisher ICT can do more than motivate and empower. It has the potential to transform the way that education is delivered and to provide new opportunities, enhancing scholarship and investigation. (David Blunkett, NGfL Curriculum Online consultation paper, April 2001; as cited in Becta, 2001: p. 1). And, opening Bett 2005, Ruth Kelly (then Secretary of State for Education) said: ‘I see ICT and its potential to transform how we teach, learn and communicate as crucial to our drive to raise standards’. One of my concerns here is that technological determinism in education, by appearing to locate causation in the technology, leaves largely invisible the work - including intellectual and emotional work - which teachers must undertake, in order to use the technology to realise the claimed potential improvements and transformations. One of the dangers inherent in technological determinism is that, in over-simplifying the complexity of the process of implementation, it is doomed to disappoint. Exaggerated claims for what the technology can do, apparently unaided, can lead to disillusion, neglect and waste (e.g. Cuban 2001). ICT is not a ‘silver bullet’ for educational problems. Further, technological determinism implies that the uniform application of a given technology will yield uniform results, taking no account of the highly contingent nature of teaching and learning and the complexities of individual settings. It is silent on the fundamental importance of contextual factors. Complexity theory, itself originating in the field of particle physics, offers the important insight that, in schools as ‘complex, adaptive systems’, even if similar initial conditions obtain, dissimilar outcomes may result (Morrison 2002, p. 9). Hence, one school’s ICT-fuelled ‘transformation’ may be another’s white elephant. However, despite the fact that technological determinism is inadequate, both as a theory of technology and as a theory of society (and hence of education), it nonetheless ‘contains a partial truth. Technology matters.’ (MacKenzie and Wajcman, 1999: p. 3). A more complete explanatory framework acknowledges the importance of the technologies, but also gives due regard to processes of social shaping of technologies in use. Teachers, through their engagement with educational ICT, are vital agents in the social shaping of such technologies. The shaping of technology is complex (MacKenzie and Wajcman, 1999: p. 9-15). Science, itself a human endeavour, shapes technology. Technology shapes technology, for instance through an existing technology being a precondition for a newer technology (a simple example would be that 48

Understanding teachers’ use of educational technologies without the computer there would have been no Internet, and without the Internet there would be no World-Wide Web). Economic considerations shape technology, as technology is inextricably a part of society, and economic shaping is social shaping as ‘the way a society is organized, and its overall circumstances, affect its typical pattern of costs, and thus the nature of technological change within it’ (ibid, p. 14). Finally, the state – itself a social institution – acts as a further component of this complex shaping of technological change, for instance through the sponsorship of military technology (ibid, p. 15) which influenced the development of the digital computer and the Internet. Thus, much of the application of ICTs in education may be viewed as an adaptive use of technologies that were fundamentally shaped for other purposes. It is in recognition of the complexity of the social shaping of technology, not just in the design context and at the site of development, but also subsequently in ‘use/abuse’ (Bromley 1997, p. 55) at the local level in schools during implementation, that a ‘social informatics’ perspective is helpful. Social informatics allows for a more complete, explanatory framework, paying attention to the nature and impact of the technologies themselves whilst also acknowledging the complexities of processes of local, social shaping (see, for instance, Garson, 2000).

Bringing it together: an ecological perspective An awareness of the significance of the nature and features of context may be thought of as ‘an ecological perspective’. Such a perspective on educational change avoids a technicist approach (‘fix the teachers’), adopting instead an ecological approach (‘fix the environment’) (Kling, 1999). However, a focus on the environment alone carries another danger: that of propagating an ‘environmentally determinist’ view, in which the environment becomes the determinant of human action. This is as limited (and limiting) as a technicist approach. Here we need a rather more developed view, avoiding crude cause and effect models of one sort or another, in favour of a more subtle, nuanced view of the interaction between teachers and their environment/s. In arguing for a ‘social informatics’ approach, Kling asserts that ‘business models’ for ICT implementation are insufficient; rather, an ecological view is needed (Kling 2000, p. 220). Postman takes this a stage further, by arguing that ‘technological change is not additive, it is ecological […] A new medium does not add something; it changes everything’ (Postman, 1998: not paginated, emphasis added). Hence, I argue here that an ecological approach will see educational ICT as newly constitutive of the 49

T. Fisher environment into which it is introduced, as well as itself being influenced by that environment, including human and organisational factors. In researching the work of teachers, we should endeavour to use ‘a modality that embraces stories of action within theories of context. In so doing stories can be located, seen as the social constructions they are, fully impregnated by their location within power structures and social milieux’ (Goodson, 2003: p. 48; emphasis as in original). The ‘theory of context’ which I propose here is based on Bronfenbrenner’s Ecology of Human Development (Bronfenbrenner, 1979). The theory was originally developed in order to provide a framework in which to consider the development of the individual in early childhood. However, its characteristics may be applied to other aspects of human development, including that of teachers learning how to use ICT in their work. At the heart of Bronfenbrenner’s theory is a recognition that aspects of ‘the environment’ are quasi-spatially arranged as a series of expanding ‘systems’ (in his own explanation Bronfenbrenner uses the metaphor of Russian dolls) around a given individual at the centre. In such a series of systems there is progressive mutual accommodation between an active, growing human being and the changing properties of the immediate settings in which the developing person lives, as this process is affected by relations between those settings, and by the larger contexts in which the settings are embedded (Bronfenbrenner, 1979). From this differentiated view of the developing individual’s environment arises a typology of four levels of ‘hierarchical, nested structures’ constituting that environment – the micro-, meso-, exo-, and macrosystems. These systems may be summarised (after Bronfenbrenner, 1979) as follows: • the microsystem is the immediate setting of the developing person at a given time, involving activities, roles and interpersonal relations in a process of progressive mutual accommodation • the mesosystem is the relationships between the multiple immediate settings of the various microsystems • the exosystem comprises those settings in which the individual is not present, but in which events occur that have an impact upon the immediate setting, and may in turn be affected by changes in the immediate setting • the macrosystem comprises the common, overarching patterns of interconnections between lower-order systems, together with any ‘belief systems or ideology underlying such consistencies’ 50

Understanding teachers’ use of educational technologies In the following table I apply Bronfenbrenner’s four systems to the case of a teacher developing her use of ICT, in England in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. Table 1. Educational ICT at the different scales of Bronfenbrenner’s Theory System scale Relationship with educational ICT Microsystem • • • • • • • Mesosystem

• •

• Exosystem

Use of ICT in classroom teaching, e.g. interactive whiteboard Use of ICT in the staffroom/work-room, e.g. preparation, communication Participation in a specific ICT project, initiative or training programme Use of ICT at home for personal, family and professional purposes Use of ICT in other locations Encounters with information about, and constructions and discourses of educational ICT, e.g. press, radio, TV Discussion of ICT (educational and otherwise) in situations where the technology is not present Relationships between the above around the common factor of the individual teacher learning to use ICT Teacher as possessor of multiple identities (professional, family member, member of local community and various social groups etc.) Classroom as part of the wider school, itself part of a wider education system

Components of ‘control system’, including government policies and guidance on development of educational use of ICT, for instance: • National Curriculum Orders • National Strategies • Curriculum Online materials • specific projects and ‘pilots’ • inspection, assessment, league tables and other instruments of ‘performativity regime’

Macrosystem Globalisation, economy’

‘information

society’

and

‘the

knowledge

As shown in Table 1, teachers’ direct encounters with ICT occur within various microsystem settings, though an individual will carry aspects of skills in, and attitudes towards, the use of ICT from setting to setting. Thus the teacher is the linking factor in the mesosystem. At another scale 51

T. Fisher of operation, the state, in responding to a perceived imperative from the macrosystem, seeks to use its power to disrupt the microsystem by manipulating the exosystem so as to introduce computers and various requirements to use them. Hence the imposition of ICT in schools results in what Goodson et al. identify as a ‘culture clash’ between school as a social technology, and ICT as a different social technology (Goodson et al., 2002). In Bronfenbrenner’s terms, such an intervention is ‘a transforming experiment’ which ‘involves the systematic alteration and restructuring of existing ecological systems in ways that challenge the forms of social organization, belief systems, and life styles prevailing in a particular culture or subculture’ (Bronfenbrenner, 1979: p. 41). The teacher, then, is encouraged in the current ‘transforming experiment’ to make ‘ecological transitions’ to the use of ICT. To return to some of the constructs reviewed previously, a ‘moment of domination’ (Goodson, 2000) has enabled the state to initiate a ‘transforming experiment’ and to exert its influence on the micro- and meso- systems through what Smyth et al identify as a ‘control regime’, operating through the interplay of six ‘control systems’ (Smyth et al., 2000).

Conclusions To fully understand teachers as users (and/or non-users) of ICT, it is necessary to draw on a number of theoretical perspectives, some of which have been explored briefly here. In an attempt to respond to Brey’s diagnosis, outlined in the introduction, I have identified some of the theoretical contents of the ‘black box’ which stands in place of society in many technology studies, and which might usefully be considered in future research into educational ICT. In addition, in an attempt to address the scale question, I have proposed the adaptation of Bronfenbrenner’s multi-scalar ecological model within which research on teachers as users of, and mediators of the use of, new educational technologies, might take place.

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Understanding teachers’ use of educational technologies Becta (2001). Joining up local government: the role of education in the local authority ICT strategy. Coventry: Becta. Braverman, H. (1974). Labour and monopoly capital. London: Monthly Review Press. Brey, P. (2003). Theorizing modernity and technology. In: T.J. Misa, P. Brey and A. Feenberg (Eds), Modernity and Technology. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Bromley, H. (1997). The social chicken and the technological egg: Educational computing and the technology society divide. Educational Theory, 47(1), 51-65. Bronfenbrenner, U. (1979). The ecology of human development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Connell, R. (1995). Transformative labour: theorizing the politics of teachers’ work. In: M.B. Ginsburg (Ed), The politics of educators’ work and lives. London: Garland. Cuban, L. (2001). Oversold and underused: Computers in classrooms. Harvard University Press. Department for Education and Employment (1997). Excellence in schools. London: Stationery Office. Department for Education and Employment (1998). Circular 4/98 Teaching: High status, high standards. London: DfEE. Department for Education and Employment/National Grid for Learning (1998). Open for learning, open for business: The government’s national grid for learning challenge (Summary). London: DfEE/NGfL. Department for Education and Skills (2002). Transforming the way we learn: A vision for the future of ICT in schools. London: DfES. Department for Education and Skills (2003). Fulfilling the potential: Transforming teaching and learning through ICT in schools. London: DfES. Department for Education and Skills (2005). Harnessing the potential: Transforming learning and children’s services. London: DfES. Garson, G.D. (2000). Social dimensions of information technology: Issues for the new millennium. Hershey, PA: Idea Group Publishing. Gee, J., and Lankshear, C. (1995). The new work order: Critical language awareness and ‘fast capitalism’ texts. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 16(1), 5-20. Giddens, A. (1991). The consequences of modernity. Cambridge: Polity Press. Giddens, A. (1999). Runaway world: How globalisation is reshaping our lives. London: Profile Books. Goodson, I.F. (1993). School subjects and curriculum change. London: Falmer Press. Goodson, I.F. (2000). An interview with Ivor Goodson. Re-open (online), 1(1), 1-4. 53

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Cross-disciplinary dialogue around computer-based assessment

Drawing strands together Cross-disciplinary dialogue around computer-based assessment Brett Bligh This chapter describes the impact of theory from the discipline of Education upon a project rooted in Computer Science. Freeresponse computer-based assessment systems can provide a useful mechanism for meaningful formative assessment, but they are viewed with suspicion by educationalists with prior negative experiences of fixed response systems. This chapter documents a process whereby established principles from outside the researcher’s home discipline were used to identify shortcomings in existing work, allowing new perspectives to become apparent and new requirements to be identified. Based on these requirements, new extensions were developed which improved the ability of the system to provide appropriate responses to students. Results from experiments with student volunteers demonstrate that students found the improved system easy to use and comprehend, useful and motivational. Whilst acknowledging difficulties inherent in cross-disciplinary research, the chapter argues that the acceptance of extra-disciplinary influence can be useful in encouraging critical re-evaluation and consciousness raising.

Interdisciplinarity Typical definitions of interdisciplinary research (IDR) focus upon the integration of both knowledge and methodology from two or more disciplines. Such work ‘embraces the goal of advancing understanding […] in ways that would have not been possible through single disciplinary means’ (Mansilla and Gardner, 2003). Crucially, IDR does not act as a process of averaging. Instead, it retains characteristics of the ‘home disciplines’ whose work is being integrated. Falcioni (2004: p. 4) emphasises that interdisciplinarity ‘celebrates the whole without jeopardizing its parts’. This chapter outlines an IDR project which combines knowledge and methodology from Computer Science and Education. In view of the 57

B. Bligh definitions already considered, the chapter argues that IDR must seek to answer recognisable research questions from each home discipline. Research which merely appropriates information from an external discipline is actually unidisciplinary, since there is only a single home discipline within which a meaningful research question can be formulated. The research project described within the chapter is contextualised as IDR according to this view.

Computer-Based Assessment Higher education institutions are confronted with the challenge of providing academic courses to a higher number of students without the benefit of a proportionate increase in teaching staff. Student-to-staff ratios (SSRs) are less favourable to academic staff than in the past (Markham, 1997) and SSR increases of 150% since the 1970s have been reported (AUT Research, 2005). As a result, there is considerable interest among academic staff in adopting technology-based approaches to student interaction. Computer-Based Assessment (CBA) refers to the delivery of materials for teaching and assessment, the input of solutions by the students, an automated assessment process and the delivery of feedback, all achieved through an integrated, coherent online system. It has been contrasted with other areas of educational technology in terms of the number and types of process which are automated (Higgins and Bligh, 2006). CBA aims for a completely automated assessment process and, as a result, it offers the best potential for resource-saving. However, since automated marking processes can be difficult to define, CBA has often come to be associated with simple, fixedresponse question types such as multiple choice questions (MCQs). CBA of free-response question types has, thus far, been largely constrained within its researchers’ home discipline of Computer Science. This has negative consequences: firstly, practitioners outside Computer Science know little of the potential of free-response CBA (Bull and Danson, 2004) and approach all CBA with correspondingly low expectations and, secondly, free-response CBA itself has seldom been subject to evaluation against pedagogically sound guidelines (Bligh, 2006). A key objective of this research was to ‘close the gap’ between the pedagogical practices of assessment, specifically formative assessment, and the field of CBA. Strategies in the literature which attempt to bolster the position of formative assessment within contemporary higher education range from a managed reduction to mechanisation; however, this mechanisation rarely extends beyond ideas such as paper tick-sheets and pre-written feedback statement banks (Rust, 2001). Free-response 58

Cross-disciplinary dialogue around computer-based assessment CBA systems, on the other hand, are often derived from earlier ad-hoc marking scripts informally developed to aid individual lecturers, with little forethought given to design. The motivation was to prove that the delivery of a CBA course whose primary aim was for formative assessment could be feasibly achieved, could adhere to principles of good formative assessment and would be useful in practice. Diagram-based domains were used as a vehicle for the research due to the prevalence of diagram-based coursework in many academic disciplines and the free-response nature of the student submissions (Tsintsifas, 2002). In terms of IDR, the work set out to answer research questions from the perspective of both Computer Science and Education. From a Computer Science perspective, the work asked to what extent CBA techniques can be used to reduce the resource required in setting formatively assessed coursework in diagram-based domains, while still adhering to good formative assessment principles. Secondary research questions revolved around issues such as the standardisation of CBA practices and the design of CBA architecture to support formative assessment within a free-response CBA context. From an Education perspective, the research question was: can the process of formative assessment be meaningfully supported by a computer system in complex question domains such as diagrams? Secondary research questions investigated the extent to which it is possible for educators to formulate feedback in complex domains without programming, and the relationship between specialist CBA software and more general mechanisation strategies such as those proposed by Rust (2001).

CourseMarker and DATsys CourseMarker The CourseMarker system is the successor to the widely used Ceilidh (Higgins et al., 2003). Ceilidh introduced many key concepts into CBA, such as a multilayer architecture, a hierarchical course structure, different user views and configurable marking tools. CourseMarker is the direct successor to Ceilidh, but Ceilidh’s design has nonetheless influenced many other CBA systems (Daly, 1999; von Matt, 1994). Therefore, the methods described here, which allow a more flexible approach to exercise marking within the context of formative assessment, have relevance across the CBA field rather than being mere system-specific improvements. 59

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Figure 1. CourseMarker’s student client Figure 1 illustrates the graphical client programme which the students load in order to interact with the CourseMarker system. The student initialises the exercise by clicking the Setup button, which causes CourseMarker to transfer a copy of the relevant exercise files to the student’s networked home directory. Next, the student chooses the Develop option, which causes an appropriate development environment to be loaded with the student’s saved solution. For a computer programming exercise, a text development environment is loaded so that the student can type their programme. When the exercise is diagram-based, then the student diagrammer Theseus is loaded. Theseus is described in the following section. Once the student is ready for the exercise solution to be assessed, they click the Submit button. A copy of the solution is securely transmitted to the CourseMarker server. In practical terms, the marking process occurs instantaneously and the marks awarded for the student submission are returned to the student along with feedback. The CourseMarker server keeps an audit trail of all submitted student solutions, as well as the feedback and marks that were returned to the student, for the joint purposes of accountability and research. At the discretion of the educator, any number of submissions by the student may be allowed. It is this ability to allow large numbers of submissions which makes an iterative process of learning scaleable for large student cohorts. 60

Cross-disciplinary dialogue around computer-based assessment DATsys DATsys is an object-oriented framework for educational diagram editors (Bligh, 2003). Three diagram editor programmes have currently been implemented using the framework. Daidalos is used by exercise developers to describe new notations for diagrams when exercises are to be developed in a new diagram-based domain. Ariadne is used by educators to develop the exercises themselves. The educator can draw the model solution within Ariadne and has access to a set of tools which allow the marking schemes to be described. Theseus is the diagram editor used by students to develop their solutions. Theseus is launched by CourseMarker whenever a student clicks the Develop button.

Figure 2. A DATsys diagram editor Figure 2 illustrates the interface of the diagram editors. The user selects the appropriate diagram nodes and collection lines from the library panel. The elements are then placed on the drawing canvas, where their positions, connections and text content can be edited. Using Daidalos, developers can create new libraries of elements by combining graphical primitives such as lines and circles or by using bitmap images produced outside the system. Any diagram library saved by Daidalos can be used by educators and students in the other diagram editors. In this way, the 61

B. Bligh DATsys framework caters for a theoretically very large number of diagram domains. Initially, a series of domain dependent marking tools were developed to mark diagram domains using CourseMarker’s marking system (Tsintsifas, 2002). For example, analogue circuit diagrams were assessed using a circuit simulator. Although these tools worked well functionally, several drawbacks were identified when a prototypical experiment considered how the system met best practice guidelines for formative assessment (Higgins and Bligh, 2006). At this stage, an interdisciplinary approach was deemed appropriate because the research questions arising from the current status of the work were no longer exclusively within the Computer Science discipline.

A change of perspective It cannot be argued that the development of CourseMarker and its predecessor systems occurred without thought for the student experience. Benford et al. (1993) considered the subject in some detail. Ceilidh was seen to have several benefits for students: • Confidence building, since early simple exercises resulted in positive feedback which boosted the confidence of students; • Providing assistance to weaker students, since Ceilidh’s statistics packages could be used to spot struggling students earlier than would otherwise be the case; • Consciousness raising, since immediate automated feedback brought about an increased willingness in students to question the marks they were given and the criteria being applied to mark their work, which improved the quantity and quality of dialogue with students about the learning and assessment process. Noted disadvantages were the twin phenomena of perfectionists, students who would continue to submit even after a satisfactory mark had been achieved in an attempt to gain a 100% mark, and gamblers, students who would submit many times with varying modifications in an attempt to ‘stumble’ upon a good mark. Later, Foxley et al. (2001a) reported similar benefits when using CourseMarker. Student responses were positive, lecturers ‘appreciate the fact that they no longer have to mark hundreds of exercise solutions’ (Foxley et al., 2001a: p. 197), and CourseMarker was even more popular than Ceilidh due to its improved graphical user interface. 62

Cross-disciplinary dialogue around computer-based assessment However, several misconceptions about the student learning process had started to appear. Foxley et al. (2001b), for example, considered the CourseMarker feedback system. Advantages were seen in the way in which a large amount of information is presented to the student through a rich graphical interface. However, Juwah et al. (2004) state that a key principle of good feedback to students, especially for formative assessment purposes, is that the information is ‘focused’ and not overwhelming in quantity. Furthermore, conducting formative assessment using CourseMarker was seen to be possible by merely discarding the marks (Tsintsifas, 2002), while research into formative assessment states that this is not, in fact, the case (Knight, 2001). Formative assessment aims to establish what progress a student is making during learning and to assist the learning process by providing feedback (Bull, 1993). Formative assessment occurs during the process of learning and its most important deliverable is feedback (Knight, 2001). Juwah et al. (2004) suggest principles of formative assessment feedback based upon their model of student-centred learning methodologies. Good formative assessment feedback should seek to support a process which facilitates self-assessment, encourages teacher and peer dialogue around learning, clarifies the standards by which performance can be judged as ‘good’, is redeemable and provides basis for improvement, delivers focused information to students, encourages positive beliefs, and provides feedback to teachers which can aid in the improvement of teaching. These principles would form a new basis for analysing the effectiveness of the CBA software in providing automatic feedback to students. As a first step towards investigating this apparent disconnection between pedagogic theory and CBA, a practical experiment was carried out (Higgins and Bligh, 2006), in which CourseMarker and DATsys were used to formatively assess a cohort of 141 Computer Science undergraduates over four diagram-based coursework exercises. For the first time, results were analysed according to the principles of formative feedback outlined above, as well as by criteria which were more conventional to CBA, such as whether student marks improved and whether student feedback was positive. The experiment produced many positive outcomes, both those in line with the previous work and when considered in relation to formative assessment criteria. Advantageously, marking is conducted and feedback returned on a timescale which is, in practical terms, instantaneous. Students are allowed unlimited submissions and are therefore provided ample opportunity to act upon their feedback. Furthermore, students can be assessed frequently, but without pressure to attain high marks. 63

B. Bligh However, it was felt that three significant drawbacks could be identified in the system as it stood. Firstly, the feedback was indeed too lengthy. Many comments provided feedback related to aspects of the exercise which the student had already successfully completed, while those relating to areas of improvement tended to directly state the student failure. Secondly, the features marking system assessed only the semantics of the diagram. The aesthetic appearance of the diagram was effectively ignored by the system. Even tutors familiar with the diagram domain often found difficulty in comprehending student diagrams due to poor layout. Thirdly, the marking system of CourseMarker was not sufficiently flexible to assess the mutually exclusive solution cases which arose in the more complex later exercises.

A change in practice As a result of the findings described in the previous section, three extensions to the CourseMarker system were proposed, designed and implemented (Bligh, 2006). The first extension enables the assessment of the aesthetics of student diagrams. A series of aesthetic measures are chosen to represent commonality across educational diagram domains, while domain-specific structural measures, which represent the differences between domains, can be implemented through parameterisation. The second extension deals with solutions which possess mutually exclusive alternate solution cases. The approach is based upon the notion that some uncommon features define the difference in reasoning between the mutually exclusive cases. The third extension is responsible for prioritising and truncating the feedback provided to students, using a series of configurable strategies for ‘pruning’ the tree of results which is generated by the marking subsystem. A detailed examination of the working of the extensions is outside the scope of this chapter, but a high-level overview of the relationships between the extensions is presented in Figure 3. The extensions are used by the CourseMarker marking system. From the point of view of the student, the extensions operate transparently in the background. Following the implementation of the extensions, formative exercises were implemented which made use of the extensions. These exercises were evaluated by being provided to students. Results from the exercises were available for scrutiny and great attention was paid to comments from students and to the responses to questionnaires. Prototype exercises were developed in two domains: UML Class Diagrams and UML Use Case Diagrams. UML Class Diagrams are used in the design process of objectorientated systems to describe the classes within the system and their 64

Cross-disciplinary dialogue around computer-based assessment Student solution Exercise Specific Configuration Mutually exclusive features marking Common features tests

Mutually Exclusive features tests

Aesthetic layout marking Aesthetic Measures configuration Full feedback Structural Measures configuration

Prioritisation and truncation 1. Solution case Priority and pruning

2. Features prioritisation

3. Aesthetics Prioritisation

4. Truncation

Prioritised, truncated Student feedback

Figure 3. A high level view of the extensions

relationships to each other. UML Use Case Diagrams are used to describe sets of scenarios which describe interactions between external actors and the system. A simple UML Class Diagram is illustrated in Figure 4. 65

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Figure 4. A simple class diagram in DATsys The student cohort comprised volunteers, who were asked to register by email to receive access to the courses. The Use Case Diagram exercises were attempted by students first, since they are the easiest to understand conceptually and have simpler model solutions. Students subsequently moved on to the more challenging Class Diagram exercises. The unit specification gives reference to a small example exercise specification and model solution, for the purposes of demonstrating good practice to the students. The following section provides an overview of the results obtained.

Results A total of 36 students, all Computer Science undergraduates, volunteered and were added to the course. Of these students, 6 subsequently failed to set up any exercises while 30 attempted the UML Use Case Diagram exercises. Of these 30 students, 28 continued on to attempt the UML Class Diagram exercises. Student marks for all exercises were consistently high. In all exercises, nearly all students achieved effectively full marks by the time of their final submission. 66

Cross-disciplinary dialogue around computer-based assessment Students were asked to complete a brief questionnaire, in order to summarise their experience of using the exercises and learning from the feedback. The majority of the questions asked the student to agree with a series of statements which were then scored on a five point Likert scale, from 1-disagree to 5-agree. Students found the courseware easy to use (4.2). The questions were regarded as easy to comprehend in both domains (4.4 and 4.1). Generally, students felt that the feedback was useful in improving their diagrams in both domains and re-submitting a better version (4.0 and 3.5) and many students were motivated to further research between submissions to find information which elaborated on the feedback comments (3.5). This was helped, no doubt, by the references included in the feedback comments themselves. Also, in general, students thought the exercises helped their learning process (3.5) and were a good use of their time (3.8). The Use Case Diagram exercises were more popular with students than the Class Diagram exercises. Several students noted, in free-form comments boxes at the end of the questionnaire, that the Class elements were difficult to edit. It is clear that the authoring of a new domain notation for class diagrams might improve student response in future. The most common critical comment was that there were not enough exercises. It seemed that many students had hoped for a comprehensive series of courses to assist them up to modular examination level. Unfortunately, the development of such courses was not feasible due to time constraints and the difficulty encountered in constructing good formative feedback comments for the features tests. Howsoever critical, these comments do imply that the students wanted more formative assessment using these methods. This is a desire which only the continued development of the exercises would help to fulfil. The truncated feedback provided to students was considerably more focused than that in the earlier experiment described above (A Change of Perspective). While the process of constructing relevant feedback comments for the system to provide to the students proved arduous and time-consuming, once the feedback comments were in place then the system effectively selected the most appropriate comments. The extension to assess the aesthetics of student diagrams was also successful, and motivated students to construct diagrams with a more suitable layout, which would better convey the meaning of the diagram to a human reader. The extension to allow multiple, mutually exclusive solution cases allowed students more freedom in choosing an approach to solving the problem, and allowed the educator more freedom in the wording of the problem specification. It must be noted, however, that all these improvements came 67

B. Bligh at the cost of a marked increase in development time for the exercises themselves. This chapter concludes by reflecting on how the interdisciplinary angle impacted upon this work, and what was gained by the practitioner as a result.

Reflection In terms of interdisciplinarity, the process of explicitly stating the research questions within each home discipline was successful in ensuring that the knowledge and methodologies of both home disciplines were reflected in the outcomes. Significant amounts of data, from both computer log files and interaction with students, were generated which significantly addressed all the research questions outlined in the section on computerbased assessment. From this, it can be shown that a true interdisciplinary approach took place. It is a fact that the project occurred within a Computer Science department. The students who have used the system so far have been Computer Science undergraduates, largely for practical reasons. However, the work cannot be said to represent pure Computer Science research, since the thrust of the research programme was to investigate the impact of a specific intervention in the student learning process, determining the benefits and drawbacks of the approach from the point of view of both students and teachers using methodologies such as obtaining feedback data from the participants. This aspect of the work clearly falls within the Education home discipline. However, the work addresses genuine Computer Science research questions on CBA architectural design, the generic representation of diagrams as objects, and user interface design for student learners. An interdisciplinary approach was needed in this situation due to the limitations of previous methods. To refer back to the section on computerbased assessment, previous attempts to create free-response CBA had resulted in technically advanced systems which failed to address core concepts of student learning such as the formative assessment process. Conversely, experiments using less technically advanced systems had seemed to show that high-order learning outcomes were inappropriate objects for assessment through CBA. Evidently, an IDR approach was able to advance the situation, producing both useful experimental results and an 68

Cross-disciplinary dialogue around computer-based assessment attendant re-examination of established ideas, even if the process by which each home discipline ‘enriched’ the other is far from straightforward. It is apparent that exposure to research from another discipline caused existing work to be viewed from a new angle. Evaluation, the highest cognitive function in the original taxonomy of Bloom et al. (1956), can be defined as ‘to critique on the basis of explicit standards’; exposure to other disciplines, logically, causes re-evaluation of existing work by defining new standards which, in turn, can directly inspire new avenues of research. It can be seen, for example, that the identification of the formative feedback as too lengthy relates very directly to the interdisciplinary input, in this case the formative feedback guidelines. The link between these criteria and the other extensions, however, is less obvious and may have more to do with an indirect, more overarching critical re-evaluation of the work as a whole. While the previous work had much merit, it could be considered to have been ‘stuck in a rut’, principally because its measures of success – assessment results and student feedback – had remained constant for a great length of time. By definition, the assessment results, which were those generated by the CourseMarker system, could only provide a measurement of those aspects of the experience which could be captured successfully, while the students had no frame of reference for direct comparison with other systems due to the novelty of the work. Therefore, an ‘injection’ of interdisciplinarity helped to identify what had been missed by current practice, but this subsequently necessitated a change of direction which qualifies the research as IDR. It must be acknowledged, however, that several barriers to IDR had to be overcome in order for the work to succeed. Rather than being simply collections of knowledge, academic disciplines are the result of large periods of historical discourse, encapsulating methodological traditions and disciplinary language which may unfortunately constitute barriers to effective interdisciplinary communication. A good example is postmodernism, for which many scientists express open distrust (Dawkins, 1998), while scientific publications are often densely littered with inconsistent acronyms. Furthermore, little support is provided by academic institutions for academics wishing to venture away from their home discipline, and there is an inherent period of acclimatisation which may result in an objective temporary decrease in work output. It is clear that, if IDR is to be promoted, 69

B. Bligh then both informal networking opportunities and formal programmes, at the institutional level, would be an advantage. Despite these barriers, the outcomes from this work are but one example of an IDR approach producing progress which had proved previously elusive. Research questions arise out of material conditions inherent across all of academia and the world at large. It is unsurprising, therefore, that such questions do not always fit tidily into a pre-existing research discipline. If such naturally occurring research questions are to be addressed satisfactorily, then the promotion of IDR, together with mechanisms for ameliorating common obstacles, is crucial.

References AUT Research (2005). Packing them in: The student-to-staff ratio in UK Higher Education. London: Association of University Teachers. Benford, S., Burke, E., Foxley, E., Gutteridge, N., and Zin, A.M. (1993). Experiences with the Ceilidh system. In: P.M. Nobar and W. Kainz (Eds), Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on ComputerBased Learning in Science (CBLIS’93). Vienna, Austria. Bligh, B. (2003). CourseMarker and DATsys: Next generation automated assessment systems. In: The Use of CAA in ICS Education. University of Brighton, UK: LTSN ICS Centre. Bligh, B. (2006). Formative computer-based assessment in diagram based domains. Unpublished PhD thesis. School of Computer Science, University of Nottingham. Bloom, B., Englehart, M., Furst, E., Hill, W., and Krathwohl, D. (1965). Taxonomy of educational objectives: the classification of educational goals (Vol. 1). New York: Longman. Bull, J., and Danson M. (2004). Computer-assisted assessment (CAA). York: LTSN Generic Centre: Assessment Series. Bull, J. (1993). Using technology to assist student learning. Sheffield: The UK Universities’ Staff Development Unit (TLTP Project Alter). Daly, C. (1999). RoboProf and an introductory computer programming course. In: B. Manaris (Ed), Proceedings of the 4th Annual ACM SIGCSE/ SIGCUE Conference on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education. Cracow, Poland. Dawkins, R. (1998). Postmodernism disrobed: A review of Intellectual Impostures. Nature, 394, 141-143. Falcioni, J.G. (2004). Editorial: The agile engineer. Mechanical Engineering, 126(9), 4. Foxley, E., Higgins, C.A., Hegazy, T., Symeonidis, P., and Tsintsifas, A. (2001a). The CourseMaster CBA system: Improvements over 70

Cross-disciplinary dialogue around computer-based assessment Ceilidh. In: M. Danson (Ed), Proceedings of the 5th CAA Conference. Loughborough, UK. Foxley, E., Higgins, C.A., Symeonidis, P., and Tsintsifas, A. (2001b). The CourseMaster automated assessment system – A next generation Ceilidh. In: Computer Assisted Assessment Workshop. Warwick, UK. Higgins, C.A., and Bligh, B. (2006). Formative computer-based assessment in diagram based domains. In: M. Goldweber and P. Salomoni (Eds), Proceedings of the 11th Annual ACM SIGCSE Conference on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education. Bologna, Italy. Higgins, C.A., Hegazy, T., Symeonidis, P., and Tsintsifas, A. (2003). The CourseMaster CBA system: Improvements over Ceilidh. Journal of Education and Information Technologies, 8(3), 287-304. Juwah, C., Macfarlane-Dick, D., Matthew, B., Nicol, D., Ross, D., and Smith, B. (2004). Enhancing student learning through effective formative feedback. York: The Higher Education Academy (Generic Centre). Knight, P. (2001). A briefing on key concepts: Formative and summative, criterion and norm-referenced assessment. York: LTSN Generic Centre: Assessment Series. Mansilla, V.B., and Gardner, H. (2003). Assessing interdisciplinary work at the frontier. An empirical exploration of ‘symptoms of quality’. GoodWork Project Report 26. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Interdisciplinary Studies Project Zero. Markham, L. (1997). Staff-student ratios in commonwealth countries. London: Association of Commonwealth Universities. Rust, C. (2001). A briefing on assessment of large groups. York: LTSN Generic Centre: Assessment Series. Tsintsifas, A. (2002). A framework for the computer-based assessment of diagram based coursework. Unpublished PhD thesis. School of Computer Science and IT, University of Nottingham. von Matt, U. (1994). Kassandra: The automatic grading system. Technical Report UMIACS-TR-94-59. Department of Computer Science, University of Maryland, USA.

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Estonian CLIL programme development

Estonian Content and Language Integrated Learning programme development viewed through the stakeholder approach Peeter Mehisto and Hiie Asser This chapter seeks to apply the stakeholder approach, which has its origins in business management, to the development of multilingual education in Estonia. Its focus is interdisciplinary. First the stakeholder approach literature is researched and second the stakeholder approach is applied in researching Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) programme management. CLIL is an umbrella term for various types of bilingual or multilingual education. In response to a need to improve language learning opportunities, Estonia launched a voluntary Estonian-language CLIL programme for seven year-olds in four Russianmedium schools in 2000. The Estonian programme has expanded rapidly to a total of 53 kindergartens and schools. The programme is coordinated by an Immersion Centre. In addition to a literature review of the stakeholder approach, this chapter reports on research into the Immersion Centre based on an interview with its director and through a review of Immersion Centre documentation. It also reports on interviews conducted with school managers. Stakeholder relations that are inclusive of key partners in CLIL have been at the heart of programme success. Programme success factors reported by school managers during interviews include centrally developed in-service training and student learning materials, and the management of the programme by a central agency. Cooperation among a wide range of stakeholders is a major factor contributing to CLIL programme success in Estonia. A systematic application of the stakeholder approach in CLIL education holds the promise of improved programming.

Introduction Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) is a dual-focused educational approach in which an additional language is used for the learning and teaching of both content and language (Mehisto et al., 2008). For example, CLIL has been used to teach geography through the medium of French to English-speaking students in the UK. The approach, which is 73

P. Mehisto and H. Asser rising in popularity, is being applied in the vast majority of EU member states (Eurydice, 2006). This chapter aims to enrich the debate about language learning by applying knowledge gained through management sciences to CLIL. In particular, the stakeholder approach, which has its origins in business management, will be explored. This approach aims to help businesses, public institutions and others to navigate through the concerns and interests of various groups that can affect or be affected by an organisation or a movement such as bilingual or multilingual education. To date language learning literature has focused on linguistics, methodology and teacher training. A more interdisciplinary approach holds the promise of contributing to the improvement of language programme management. The chapter consists of two parts. The first, theoretical part focuses on the stakeholder approach. The development of the approach is traced from its origins in business to its application in the public sector. Although the approach itself has generally not been applied in the educational sector, working with stakeholders is common practice. The second part reports on research into the management of Estonia’s CLIL programme. It also presents empirical research on the perceptions of school principals and vice-principals in those schools that launched this Estonian-language CLIL programme in 2000.

The theoretical basis of the stakeholder approach The stakeholder approach has its roots in the world of business management and finance. Indeed, the first recorded use of the term, which dates to 1708, is associated with placing a bet in gambling (Clarke, 1998: p. 186), meaning that the holder of the bet or the stakeholder must deliver the winnings to the winner(s), who take(s) all. Stakeholders, as a term now used in the stakeholder approach, were initially defined in 1963 in a Stanford Research Institute memorandum as ‘those groups without whom the organization would cease to exist’ (Freeman 1984, as cited in Näsi, 2002: p. 16). In 1984, Freeman expands on that definition creating what is widely quoted by stakeholder theorists as the classic definition of the term stakeholder – ‘any group or individual who can affect, or is affected by, the achievement of the organization’s objectives’ (Lépineux, 2005: p. 100). As with many best practices adopted by business, the stakeholder approach was also embraced by the public sector. Bryson, in Strategic Planning for Public and Nonprofit Organizations (1995: p. 27), defines stakeholders 74

Estonian CLIL programme development ‘as any person, group, or organization that can place a claim on an organization’s attention, resources, or output or is affected by that output.’ Bryson’s definition adds two tangible elements (resources and outputs) to the stakeholder debate. Resources (costs) and outputs (outcomes) are also central to performance measurement and organisational management in general. As the old adage states ‘you can’t manage what you can’t measure’ (Neely et al., 2002: p. xii). Bryson posits an example of a stakeholder map for government (see Figure 1). Governing Body

Political Parties

Other Governments

Citizens

Financial Community Future Generations

Suppliers

GOVERNMENT

Interest Groups

Competitors

Taxpayers

Media Employees

Unions

Service Recipients

Figure 1. A stakeholder map for government (Bryson, 1995: p. 72) All communication runs through the focal organisation. There is no indication of stakeholder-to-stakeholder communications taking place independently of the focal organisation (the government). Business literature echoes a similar model that Phillips (2003: p. 126) deems as traditional. A shift in the development of the stakeholder approach takes place in 1997, with Rowley positing a network theory of stakeholder influences. Rowley (1997) defines a new model that reflects direct ties between stakeholders taking place without the focal organisation acting as the main intermediary. However, Rowley’s focus is on pressure and power, as opposed to cooperation. In more recent times, there is an increased understanding of the benefits for organisations of a more collaborative and dialogic approach. Heugens et al. (2002: p. 57) conclude that ‘companies may derive very concrete competitive benefits from building mutually enforcing relationships with 75

P. Mehisto and H. Asser their external stakeholders’, including the possibility of ‘a higher percentage of successful innovations’ (Ibid.: p. 51). Moreover, external pressures, namely changes in societal trends, have driven the rise of collaboration and communication. As a case in point, Svendsen and Laberge (2005: p. 93) describe the rapid development of information and communications technology that supports networking on a local, national and international scale. They claim that from 2000-2005 the number of Internet users worldwide has increased from 20 to 940 million. Consequently, ever-increasing numbers of people have the capacity to share information quickly, and communities of interest are easily and inexpensively formed to influence others. Further, Neely et al. (2002: p. 22), referring to Mark Wade (Head, Sustainable Development Group, Shell International), ‘identify the gradual shift in society from a “trust me”, to a “show me”, to an “involve me” attitude’. In addition to ‘involve me’, Kaptein and Van Tulder (2003) put forth that people today also say ‘join me’ and ‘engage me’. Such a shift necessitates increased collaboration and dialogue among groups that can affect or be affected by one another. Crane and Livesey (2003) cite evidence of such collaboration, pointing to businesses like Nike™ and Shell™ that work hard to respond to internal and external stakeholders, including their critics, and to non-governmental organisations, such as Greenpeace, Amnesty International and Save the Children who, in turn, also are using a more collaborative approach. Kaptein and Van Tulder (2003) and Svendsen and Laberge (2005) document similar cases. Collaboration and dialogue must be more than just theoretical exercises: they must lead to change and the required solutions or outcomes that take into account a balance of varying stakeholder concerns (Crane, Livesey, 2003). Similarly, Bendell (2003: p. 69) states that ‘[f]or stakeholder dialogue to be worthwhile it must not be seen in isolation from real outputs and outcomes, and must involve a tangible sharing of power’. Previously, Clarkson et al. (1999) have written of the importance of collaboration and of taking legitimate stakeholder concerns ‘into account in decisionmaking’. The point is concisely summed up by Hardy et al. (2005: p. 58) who state that effective collaboration ‘produces innovative, synergistic solutions and balances divergent stakeholder concerns’. However, if stakeholder networks are focused on implementing changes and finding solutions to balance diverse stakeholder concerns, it is these 76

Estonian CLIL programme development problems and concerns that are at the centre of the debate and not any one organisation per se. Hardy et al. (2005: p. 65) state that ‘[t]he collaboration in question is thus constructed as a real and distinct entity, separate and different from the organizations involved in it’. This view is also supported by the concept of societal learning and change (SLC) where ‘rather than thinking of stakeholders vis-à-vis an organisation, SLC initiatives are [seen as] stakeholders vis-à-vis a jointly defined issue’ (Waddell, 2005: p. 11). This affects the focal organisation. Crane and Livesey (2003: p. 41) state that ‘the network conception of stakeholders decentres, or displaces, the firm as the central node in the stakeholder model’. Svendsen and Laberge (2005) posit a model depicting stakeholder ties, where no organisation holds a central position in the network and where relationships are driven by common issues (see Figure 2).

Figure 2. Network focused emerging whole systems view (Svendsen and Laberge 2005: 97) Despite the fact that the term stakeholder ‘has passed the ‘tipping-point’ into common use, and the notion that key stakeholders must be attended to is an idea in ‘good currency’, there is relatively little in the public and nonprofit literatures on exactly how to systematically identify and analyze stakeholders’ (Caldwell, 2000, and Schon, 1971; cited in Bryson, 2004: p. 22). Yet, it is difficult to envisage how state institutions could operate effectively and serve the needs of their citizenry without entering into a dialogue with citizen groups. ‘In […] sectors like primary and secondary education, the quality of the public agency’s output greatly depends on the feedback it receives from the ultimate consumers of government services’ (Fukuyama, 2004: p. 26-27). 77

P. Mehisto and H. Asser A clear attempt to increase the power of certain stakeholders can be seen in market-based educational system reforms introduced during the last 25 years. These include vouchers that parents can use to select the school of their choice and the publication of student achievement results by school that aim to place pressure on schools to improve results and attract more clients (Adnett et al., 2005). Although there is considerable debate about their effectiveness, these market-based reforms are intended to raise the quality of education through increased competition among schools by giving greater power to stakeholders, namely parents and students. Despite the fact that the stakeholder approach is not systematically applied in literature on education, there is a strong consensus regarding the need to include stakeholders in educational reforms. Bush and Coleman (2004), referring to Hardie (1998) stress the importance of stakeholder inclusion in public education stating that ‘the evaluation of stakeholder expectations is critical’. The development of positive relationships with students, teachers and parents, who invest in a joint effort to improve schools, is described by Harris (2003a, 2003b, 2003c) as an indicator of effective leadership in education. Professional learning communities in education literature speaks of working with a broad range of stakeholders who are internal and external to the school (Stoll et al., 2007). In CLIL related practice, Cloud et al. (2000) consider parental involvement as integral to the success of bilingual programmes and throughout their book touch upon the benefits of working with many different partners in education. Baetens Beardsmore (2002) speaks of the need to increase coordination among all those who have a stake in bilingual education including teachers and parents. Frosst (2004) and McConnell (2004) both detail in practitioner handbooks the need for co-operation with partners in immersion education. Yet, what is missing from the CLIL literature is a widespread application of the stakeholder approach. However, it is likely that considerable benefit could be gained by a more systematic application of the approach (Mehisto et al., 2007).

The Estonian context Estonia is a nation state where 32% of its 1.34 million inhabitants has a mother tongue other than the official state language - Estonian. The vast majority of non-native speakers of Estonian speak Russian as a first language. Estonian language knowledge is seen as the primary vehicle for the social, economic and political integration of non-Estonians. One particularly successful Estonian language-learning programme is a voluntary CLIL programme. The programme was launched nationally 78

Estonian CLIL programme development in September 2000 for seven-year-olds in four Russian-language schools beginning in Grade 1. When third language instruction is left out of the equation, the programme uses the medium of Estonian to deliver at least half of the national curriculum. The CLIL programme is coordinated nationally by the Estonian Language Immersion Centre (henceforth Immersion Centre) that was established in 1999 by the Ministry of Education and Research (henceforth Ministry). By October 2007, over 4,200 children in 53 institutions (schools and kindergartens) were studying in the programme. In addition to the rapidly increasing enrolment, independent research on student achievement attests to the success of the programme (Asser et al., 2004). According to the Centre’s annual report for 2005, the CLIL programme is additive in nature. It intends to give students an additional set of linguistics skills and do this without harming a student’s mother tongue development or impeding the learning of content in non-language subjects. The report states that the programme aims to provide students in participating schools with: • advanced levels of functional Estonian-language proficiency in listening, speaking, reading, and writing; • age-appropriate levels of Russian-language competence in listening, speaking, reading, and writing; • grade-appropriate levels of academic achievement in non-language subjects, such as mathematics; • an understanding and appreciation of the Russian and Estonian cultures; and • functional proficiency in listening to, speaking, reading and writing a third language. The above goals seek to add value as opposed to detract from regular non-CLIL educational programming. Thus, the intent of the programme is value-added in nature.

Research goals and method The goal of the research reported on in this chapter was to determine factors contributing to the success of the CLIL programme management, as well as conditions required for programme sustainability and measures that need to be taken for programme development. In order to achieve the goal, the researchers reviewed the Immersion Centre annual reports, results-based management frameworks and strategic 79

P. Mehisto and H. Asser plan 2004-2008. One researcher interviewed the director of the Centre. Four school principals and four vice-principals (VP) in the initial four schools offering CLIL were interviewed by two researchers at one time in Estonian. One researcher recorded answers and the other asked questions. The person recording the answers was able to ask follow-up questions for clarity. The research took place in late 2004.

Immersion Centre The Immersion Centre, which manages the Estonian language CLIL programme, places considerable emphasis on working with stakeholders. Its bi-annual reports (2001, 2003, 2005) describe partnerships with a wide range of local and international stakeholders. Some of these include the Ministry, teacher training institutions, the Integration Foundation (manager of national integration programme), teachers and administrators, as well as parents and students. Several international partners such as the Toronto District School Board and the Finnish National Board of Education were also listed. Similarly, the results-based management frameworks, which were used to manage the establishment of CLIL programming, identify dozens of stakeholders. Accomplishments detailed in the Immersion Centre’s annual reports speak of conferences bringing stakeholders together to evaluate progress and plan future directions. The teaching materials development process depicted in the 2005 annual report shows an inclusive process involving several stakeholders and including teachers testing material, as well as providing input into their improvement. The Immersion Centre’s training policy as described in the 2005 report is highly inclusive of stakeholders. It is also heavily focused on building a common knowledge base among stakeholders, on supporting joint planning, and on building partnerships and networks. According to the 2005 annual report, when delivering training the Centre aims to: • articulate a common understanding [among stakeholders] of a learning environment that supports children; • define the competencies required by stakeholders (training participants), as well as training needs and activities; • improve the Centre’s and its partners’ capacity to develop, implement and expand immersion programming; • support planning with stakeholders through the articulation of future directions and action plans; 80

Estonian CLIL programme development • increase the capacity of partners in the delivery of training and advice; • define the principles and policies of co-operation; and, • create a network capable of supporting programme establishment, development and expansion. Moreover, in the 2005 annual report in comparison to previous reports, a conscious shift takes place with parents and students having been moved to the top of the list of key partners. Quotes supplied to the report by the Estonian President and Prime Minister, by several government ministers and officials, trainers, a business community leader, parents, teachers, principals and by internationally renowned experts in bilingual education, among others, all point to well managed stakeholder relations. The Immersion Centre has a steering committee representing several key stakeholders. The original committee advised the Ministry from 2000-2004 on CLIL programme management. It approved plans and budgets. Its positive impact is attested to by the fact that, according to the then director of the Immersion Centre, the Ministry accepted all of the committee’s decisions. Another example of the Centre’s capacity to involve stakeholders was the development of its strategic plan for 2004-2008. Schools were involved in developing the draft plan. Over a dozen key stakeholder representatives, including a member of parliament, two deputy mayors, a programme researcher and school principals, spent one week on a retreat to finalise the plan. The Minister of Education and Research joined the last day of the retreat and participated in agreeing on plan-related implementation measures. These agreements were achieved despite the fact that no one had ever defined the organisational structure for the management of the Estonian CLIL programme. In the initial years after the committee’s formation, based on personal observations of the meetings and according to the then director of the Centre, the steering committee members were unable to define the management structure of the programme. It was felt that the Centre, above all, coordinated the programme based on moral authority, as opposed to power emanating from its position in public administration and that the driving force behind the programme was a common interest in ensuring quality multilingual CLIL education. The Immersion Centre as the focal organisation was ‘decentred’ in these discussions. Discussions focused on programme management, quality education, professional development, teaching materials, communications and public relations, and programme research. A review of annual reports, 81

P. Mehisto and H. Asser backed up by the previously described inclusive strategic planning process allows one to posit the following figure detailing CLIL programme management in Estonia (see Figure 3).

Figure 3. Framework for the Management of the Estonian CLIL programme

School managers’ perspectives In Estonia, school managers (principals and vice-principals) are accountable for the effective and efficient management and development of CLIL programming in schools. This requires that they take into account the student’s, his or her parents’ and the teacher’s perspective, as well as that of other stakeholders. As a case in point, the establishment of a CLIL programme initially presented a major challenge to school managers. Despite receiving considerable training, they reported feeling ‘not competent’ in starting up CLIL programmes. They felt they lacked the skills to effectively recruit enough students, find classroom and subject area teachers, support teachers and to deal with staff who resisted and undermined the new programme. Assuaging parental fears, particularly regarding overall academic achievement and the unknown, was also a challenge. 82

Estonian CLIL programme development School managers raised the following additional CLIL-specific challenges: • finding and paying for teaching assistants; • providing teachers with a full teaching load in Grades 4-6; • low level of cooperation with other CLIL schools; • integration of subjects; • application of student evaluation criteria; • difficulty in coordinating the work of an expanded management team; • getting teachers who did not speak Estonian to accept the need to learn the language; and, • getting CLIL and non-CLIL staff to cooperate. None of the above challenges are likely to be solved through a single action or without a coordinated effort involving several stakeholders. For example, integration of subjects may involve all or some of the following: teachers of various subjects, CLIL and non-CLIL teachers, students, parents, inspectors, and the vice-principal. Although managers felt that many of the initial challenges have been met, they remain particularly concerned about staffing issues. Also, teaching load is an issue, as the number of contact hours and salaries can vary from year to year. Getting key internal stakeholders such as CLIL teachers, nonCLIL teachers, vice-principals responsible for CLIL and those responsible for the regular programme to cooperate also remains a serious challenge. Also, integration of subjects, which requires teachers to work together, was identified as a challenge. It has also been difficult to get librarians to take into account CLIL programme needs and to hire Estonian-language speech therapists. As one principal remarked, he soon realised that starting a CLIL programme was not simply a matter of hiring a teacher, but it impacted on many groups within and outside of the school, and those groups required constant attention. Despite challenges raised by school managers, the high levels of parentreported satisfaction with the programme (Mehisto et al., 2007), expected levels of student achievement (Asser et al., 2004), steadily increasing government funding and a low rate of manager-reported staff turnover indicate that the programme is a success. In order to understand those investments that have allowed schools to successfully implement CLIL, school managers were asked to indicate factors contributing to programme success (see Figure 4). 83

P. Mehisto and H. Asser 0%

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Programme management by Immersion Centre Teacher training Moral support provided by school managers Programme management by school managers Teaching materials Cooperation with parents Independent programme research School's own surveys Financial support by school managers Local government's support

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Figure 4. Factors contributing to CLIL programme success Management of the programme by the Immersion Centre is reported as the most significant factor contributing to programme success. This underlines the value of coordinating the programme centrally. It is noteworthy that the initial results based management framework used to plan for the establishment of the CLIL programme was developed in response to what was learned by Estonian stakeholders on study visits to Canada and Finland. Canadian and Finnish colleagues had expressed concern that the lack of a central body to coordinate materials development or to lobby for improved programming was an impediment to improving their CLIL initiatives. It is also significant that seven other success factors were considered by all school managers as very important or important, which gives further credence to the multiple variables that should be considered when launching CLIL programmes (Marsh, 2002). Among these seven success factors, independent research conducted into student achievement was stressed as an important means for winning parental support. Also, all managers spoke of good staff relations and a strong team focused on learning and development. Teachers (96%) had a similar view, indicating that they strongly agree, or somewhat agree, that CLIL teachers constitute a good team (Mehisto et al., 2007). Six managers mentioned active, skilled teachers who have a sense of responsibility as an important programme success factor. The fact that managers reported so many success factors and stakeholder groups demonstrates their understanding of the complex nature of programme development and the value brought to the programme by diverse stakeholders. School managers were asked to indicate those factors that motivated them during programme development (see Figure 5). 84

Estonian CLIL programme development Salary New responsibilities Fear Student achievement Opportunities for training Recognition by principal / VP Participation in teamwork Recognition by students Recognition by teachers New challenges Recognition by parents Recognition by Immersion Centre 0

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Figure 5. Factors motivating managers Clearly, salary is reportedly the single least motivating factor for school managers. Recognition by parents and by Immersion Centre staff were reported as the two greatest sources of motivation. Of the seven most important motivators, five are associated with recognition. All except one school manager stated that they receive sufficient recognition for their work. All school managers also indicated that increased attention from local government and the Ministry’s School Administration Network Bureau would motivate them and their school staff as a whole. Three respondents indicated fear resulting from threats or possible sanctions from superiors as a motivator. Nonetheless, the focus on recognition by several stakeholders seems to indicate a strong preference for a positive and supportive work culture. This has implications for all stakeholders, as an increased focus on applying best practices and taking the time for recognition of achievements could motivate and stave off turnover among managers. Seven managers reported being very satisfied and one satisfied with the programme. Reasons given for satisfaction were that: • School staff are satisfied with CLIL, and the attitudes of teachers teaching in Russian and in Estonian vis-à-vis each other have improved. • The initial CLIL project has become an ongoing educational programme that serves as a model and a motor for reform. • Research results and teacher feedback have proved the programme is successful. • CLIL draws new students, helping to stem declining enrolment. • CLIL students are developing a bicultural identity. Although the above reasons were not expanded upon or defined further, they are likely to be inter-related. For example, increased enrolment may 85

P. Mehisto and H. Asser help to indicate why stakeholders consider CLIL to be the right choice. Moreover, despite the fact that the CLIL programme was established to provide increased opportunities for language learning, the reasons given by managers for satisfaction have to do mostly with other factors such as increased enrolment and the driving of school reform. Also, the fact that all the reasons given pertain to several internal and external stakeholders indicates that the school manager’s frame of mind is stakeholder-centred. This augurs well for the building of partnerships that can sustain Estonian CLIL programme implementation.

Conclusions An interdisciplinary approach can bring greater intellectual power to CLIL programme development. The stakeholder approach, which has grown out of business management, can be drawn on to better manage the large number of stakeholders who are or could potentially be impacted by CLIL. The first challenge is to identify those people or groups who are ‘affected by or who can affect’ the CLIL programme. All stakeholders are not immediately obvious and dialogue is required to identify them. Secondly, stakeholders need to be involved from the outset in programme development. This involvement needs to include open and frank dialogue and a real sharing of power. In Estonia, a systematic application of the stakeholder approach has been a major driver in the delivery of successful programming. This was greatly facilitated by a central agency, the Immersion Centre, that has coordinated stakeholder dialogue. That dialogue has focused on the delivery of quality CLIL programming with no one group dominating the stakeholder network. However, there is scope for increasing and improving stakeholder cooperation. Finally, a more systematic application of the stakeholder approach may well have the potential to bring benefits to CLIL programme development elsewhere in the world.

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Estonian CLIL programme development Baetens Beardsmore, H . (2002). The significance of CLIL/EMILE. In: D. Marsh (Ed) CLIL/EMILE – The European dimension. Actions trends and foresight potential. Jyväskylä: UniCOM Continuing Education Centre. Bendell, J. (2003). Talking for change? Reflections on effective stakeholder dialogue. In: Andriof, S. Waddock, B. Husted and S. Sutherland Rahman (Eds) – Unfolding stakeholder thinking 2: Relationships, communication, reporting and performance. Sheffield: Greenleaf Publishing. Bryson, J.M. (1995). Strategic Planning for Public and Nonprofit Organizations (revised edition). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Bryson, J.M. (2004). What to do when stakeholders matter: Stakeholder identification and analysis techniques. Public Management Review, 6(1), 21-53. Bush, T., Coleman, M. (2004). Leadership and Strategic Management in Education. London: Paul Chapman Publishing. Clarke, T. (1998). The stakeholder corporation: A business philosophy for the information age. Long Range Planning, 31(2), 182-194. Clarkson, M.B.E., Preston, L.E., Donaldson, D., and Brooks, L.J. (1999). Principles of stakeholder management. Toronto: University of Toronto. Crane, A., and Livesey, S. (2003). Are you talking to me? Stakeholder communication and the risks and rewards of dialogue. In J. Andriof, S. Waddock, B. Husted, and S. Sutherland Rahman (Eds), Unfolding stakeholder thinking 2: Relationships, communication, reporting and performance. Sheffield: Greenleaf Books. Eurydice (2006). Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) at School in Europe. Brussels: European Commission. Frosst, M. (2004). L’immersion en français au Canada: Guide pratique d’enseignement. [French immersion in Canada: A practical guide to teaching] Nepean: l’Association canadienne des professeurs d’immersion. Fukuyama, F. (2004). State-Building: Governance and World Order in the 21st Century. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Hardy, C., Lawrence, T.B., and Grant, D. (2005). Discourse and collaboration: The role of conversation and collective identity. Academy of Management Review, 30(1), 58-77. Harris, A. (2003a). Introduction. In: B. Davies and L. Ellison (Eds), Effective leadership for school improvement. New York: RoutledgeFalmer. Harris, A. (2003b). The changing context of leadership: Research theory and practice. In: B. Davies and L. Ellison (Eds), Effective leadership for school improvement. New York: RoutledgeFalmer. Harris, A. (2003c). Teacher leadership and school improvement. In: B. Davies and L. Ellison (Eds), Effective leadership for school improvement. New York: RoutledgeFalmer. 87

P. Mehisto and H. Asser Heugens, P.P.M.A.R., Van Den Bosch, F.A.J., and Van Riel, C.B.M. (2002). Stakeholder integrations: Building mutually enforcing relationships. Business and Society Review, 41(1), 36-60. Hopkins, D. (2002). School improvement for real. London: RouteledgeFalmer. Kaptein, M., and Van Tulder, R. (2003). Toward effective stakeholder dialogue. Business and Society Review, 108(2), 203-224. Lépineux, F. (2005). Stakeholder theory, society and social cohesion. Corporate Governance, 5(2), 99-110. Lopez, E., and Kreider, H. (2003). Beyond input: Achieving authentic participation in school reform. The Evaluation Exchange, 9(2), 2-3. Marsh, D. (2002). CLIL/EMILE in Europe: Dimensions. In: D. Marsh (Ed), CLIL/EMILE – The European dimension. Actions trends and foresight potentia. Jyväskylä: UniCOM Continuing Education Centre. McConnell, R. (2004). Immersion Handbook. Tallinn: Estonian Language Immersion Centre. Mehisto, P., and Asser, H. (2007). Stakeholder perspectives: CLIL programme management in Estonia. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 10(5), 683-701. Mehisto, P., Marsh, D., and Frigols, M.J. (2008). Uncovering CLIL: Content and Language Integrated Learning in bilingual and multilingual education. Oxford: Macmillan Publishers Limited. Näsi, J. (2002). What is stakeholder thinking? A snapshot of a social theory of the firm. In: J. Näsi (Ed), Understanding thinking of business and economics (1995, Reprint). Helsinki: LSR-Publications. Neely, A., Adams, C., and Kennerley, M. (2002). The performance prism. London: Prentice Hall: Financial Times. Phillips, R. (2003). Stakeholder theory and organizational ethics. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers. Rowley, T.J. (1997). Moving beyond dyadic ties: A network theory of stakeholder influences. The Academy of Management Review, 22(4), 887-910. Stoll, L., and Seashore Louis, K. (2007). Professional learning communities: Divergence, depth and dilemmas. Berkshire: Open University Press. Svendsen, A., and Laberge, M. (2005). Convening stakeholder networks: A new way of thinking. Journal of Corporate Citizenship, 19(autumn), 91-104 Waddell, S. (2005). Societal Learning and Change: How Governments, Business and Civil Society are Creating Solutions to Complex MultiStakeholder Problems. Sheffield: Greenleaf Publishing.

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Reverse intergenerational learning

Reverse intergenerational learning Can barriers to learning be overcome using reverse intergenerational learning so that businesses maintain competitive advantage? Carol Baily This chapter seeks to explore the relationships between learning and generations in an organisational context. Four generations are in the workforce, with strategic challenges for organisations (Eisner, 2005). Mentoring is a traditional pedagogical teaching method, but, practitioners lead researchers by using reverse mentoring. Young people with theoretical business knowledge and work experience are teaching senior colleagues about IT and its uses. Unlocking this business knowledge-base could provide an organisational competitive advantage. Intergenerational management research (research into the relationships between levels of management structure which have a tendency to reflect age in terms of seniority) has only recently begun. Research into reverse mentoring (situations where a younger/junior colleague advises an older/more senior colleague), in terms of barriers to learning/teaching/communicating between generations is missing. This research will try to identify the learning barriers between generations, and identify those which have been overcome so that more efficient transfer of knowledge in organisations can be encouraged. This topic is inter-disciplinary (‘relating to more than one branch of knowledge’, Oxford English Dictionary, 2004: p. 740) in nature because it will need to utilise research and theory from various fields within management, and also from within education. It is also multi-disciplinary in that it will involve ‘several academic disciplines or professional specialisations’ (Oxford English Dictionary, 2004: p. 938). Practitioners in the management and Human Resource professions are already observing and reporting on the impacts and potential of intergenerational learning (Eisner, 2005; Zielinski, 2000).

introduction The topics discussed in the chapter provide an opportunity for crossdisciplinary research in several fields: social sciences (identifying generational issues), education (learning processes and barriers to 89

C. Baily learning), human resource management (training and development, continuing personal development), and management (communication, culture, change, etc.). There is also a desire to facilitate communication and cooperation between the business world and academia. Organisations Organisational structures are changing and becoming more dependent on networks and virtual organisations (Kochan and Foote-Whyte, 1999, Michalski et al., 2002, in Jorgensen, 2003). The importance, manipulation and control of information are becoming the basis for social organisation, and the action of knowledge on knowledge is increasingly the source of productivity (Castells, 2000, as cited in Jorgensen, 2003)1. Organisations are improving individual capacity to participate in new ways of making and implementing decisions through increasing use of technology. IT and social networks which access the tacit and explicit knowledge (Rugg and McGeorge, 1999) of employees are emerging. Hierarchical relationships and habits (traditions) are changing so that the benefits associated with the technological and social dynamism of today can be more fully utilised. Organisational learning Mentoring is often used to introduce a new, young recruit to the organisation, using a traditional approach to teaching/learning: the old teach the young. However, business practitioners (in the insurance and pharmaceutical industries) are ahead of researchers, turning this concept upside-down with reverse mentoring. Younger members are teaching senior colleagues about IT and its uses, extending into wider organisational issues that need to be addressed (Hoare, 2000; Zielinski, 2000). Today, many young people start full-time work with degrees or MBAs, and also have part time work experience, representing a pool of valuable theoretical knowledge potentially providing their organisation with a competitive advantage. Are these young people able or encouraged to share this knowledge with their senior colleagues? Academic research has not yet begun to investigate the underlying issues of reverse mentoring in terms of identifying possible barriers to learning/teaching/communicating between generations. The challenge for research in this topic area is that learning, teaching and communicating are so closely inter-linked that it is Castells was talking here about the way in which learning occurs when new (more) knowledge is added to existing knowledge – this continuous learning process makes the individual more productive for the organisation.

1

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Reverse intergenerational learning difficult to identify which aspect to focus on. This chapter focuses more on the learning aspect of the relationship, while acknowledging that both the ability to teach and to communicate effectively are necessary for a process of learning. It would be useful to identify which techniques have been most successful and rewarding for the participants of reverse mentoring. This knowledge could be used to expand the scope of reverse intergenerational learning beyond only learning how to use the latest IT once initial barriers have been overcome (Zielinski, 2000; Hoare, 2000). It is this crossdisciplinary interaction between education and management that this chapter focuses on. Organisational learning represents the process of improving actions through better knowledge and understanding (Fiol and Lyles, 1985) and occurs through repeated and modified organisational routines – a process called exploitative or adaptive learning (Gupta et al., 2006; March, 1991; Levitt and March, 1988). Exploitative learning improves or refines existing organisational routines using coping mechanisms, encouraging the development of operational capabilities (senior managers learning how to use the latest IT technology) (Zielinski, 2000). This is a type of learning which occurs through a process of repetition and improvement. Explorative or generative learning is an infrequent occurrence – a ‘flash of brilliance’ – which enhances creativity, encouraging new breakthroughs and facilitating strategic flexibility to sustain competitive advantage (March, 1991). Burgelman (2002) posits that exploitation and exploration learning occur in a process of ‘punctuated equilibrium’, i.e. long periods of exploitation learning followed by sharp bursts of exploration learning. Both are necessary to achieve on-going success (March, 2001), but explorative learning can provide the competitive edge that organisations look for. The new MBA graduate, with their theoretical knowledge could potentially be the key to triggering a phase of explorative learning within the organisation. Intergenerational learning Traditional teaching pedagogy has the younger person learning from the older (Cozzi, 1998), evident in all human social interactions (Tempest, 2003). Academic literature identifies generational differences as potential barriers between people. Sociological and psychological behavioural research highlights the difficulties that generationally close people experience in overcoming barriers to communication and learning (Raines, 2002; Tempest, 2003). 91

C. Baily In social research, the working population is split into four generational groups: Traditionalists; Baby Boomers; Generation X and Generation Y (Eisner, 2005; Hansen, 2004). Generational differences cause friction, and communication breakdowns, preventing effective teamwork, and thus impact on productivity (Ruch, 2005). Generation X (born 1965-1980) are middle management, independent and entrepreneurial, who challenge their environment and love work. Generation Y (born 1981-1999) are an ideas generation, living in virtual realities, who enjoy working as team members. ‘Each [generation] brings unique attitudes and expectations to work’ (Ruch, 2005: p. 11). Generation X are the parents of Generation Y, with associated parental authority subconsciously inherent in intergenerational interactions (Eisner, 2005). ‘We need to understand other generations so that we can build relationships that lead to cooperation and job satisfaction’ (Ruch, 2005: p. 11). If these relationships can be seen to be carried over into the workplace, and can be traced as operating as potential barriers to prevent the transfer of knowledge, then the topic discussed here can take on far more meaning and relevance for business today. Generational issues are not the only barriers to learning within an organisation, but are of particular interest with regard to reverse intergenerational learning. Information from practitioners shows that technology can bridge the gap between new entrants and their line managers by reverse mentoring – a process of the young coaching the senior (Coles and Gardner, 2001; Coles, 2001; Pyle, 2005; Stone, 2004; Chang, 2004; Greengard, 2002; Zielinski, 2000; Gerstner, 2000; Smith, 2000; Hoare, 2000; Solomon, 2001). Anecdotal evidence from the above practitioners suggests that the process is mutually beneficial: the young person learns practical business strategy from their more experienced colleague in return. Pearl Assurance (Hoare, 2000) and Proctor and Gamble Co. (Zielinski, 2000) are cited as leading the field in reverse intergenerational learning, adopting a ‘best practice’ approach of linking senior management with junior employees. The approach was not limited to IT, but also included areas of diversity and biotechnology (Solomon, 2001). Senior management not only learnt about the new technology, but also sensitisation to wider organisational issues (Zielinski, 2000). Extending the use of reverse intergenerational learning beyond learning how to use the latest IT is not yet common practice in business (Craig, 2001) – does this represent a missed opportunity? Are organisations being short-sighted when it comes to the use of their new MBA graduates? Young people start work with experience of part-time work. In the UK, students start part-time work at the age of 16 or 17, sometimes up to 20-30 hours per week. Some of them are experienced junior managers, particularly in retail. MBA graduates 92

Reverse intergenerational learning learn the latest business theory and techniques from Baby Boomers and Generation X. They have IT expertise, theoretical knowledge, and practical experience. Using this resource in a very narrow way is missing a valuable pool of knowledge. ‘It is said that youth are the future, but in today’s rapidly changing world, youth really are the present’ (Pyle, 2005: p. 40). Business is concerned with efficiency and profits. People are increasingly valuable resources to be managed effectively. ‘Attaining effective knowledge management integration is an important challenge facing both general management and project managers’ (Enberg et al., 2006: p. 143). For senior managers, ‘the main problem lies in assuring the most effective integration of individuals’ specialised knowledge at the lowest attainable cost’ (Grandori, 2001: p. 391). Research in Canada suggests that the skills of university graduates are often under-utilised (Jorgensen, 2003). There is an opportunity for business organisations to tap into the pool of theoretical knowledge brought by the MBA graduate and to link this theory with the practical experience acquired by the more senior manager to maintain competitive advantage. Factors which might prevent this from happening are explored briefly below.

Research Methodology Why, then, is reverse intergenerational learning not more widespread? Why is it often limited to IT learning? ‘Generational diversity also brings creative synergy to problem-solving. It can generate new opportunities’ (Legault, 2003: p. 23). What are the barriers which prevent middle or senior management from learning from their younger colleagues? Are there barriers or assumptions that prevent the younger generation from becoming effective teachers or mentors or trainers? We examine these issues from two perspectives: an organisational perspective and an individual perspective. Organisational research issues Dan Tapscott argues that to benefit from this reverse approach ‘organisations have to fundamentally rethink everything about themselves and their future’ (as cited in Gerstner, 1999: p. 20). Organisational culture is a precondition for success – if there is a positive attitude to change and learning, then reverse intergenerational learning can begin to take place. Organisational culture and adaptability to change is an enormous field of study in itself. ‘A culture that accepts and values each person can make a 93

C. Baily positive difference for everyone involved. Incorporating multi-generational workforce management into business goals is one effective way to develop an accepting culture’ (Ruch, 2005: p. xx). According to Roth (1998: p. xx) ‘[t]he real difference [to effective closing of the generation gap] lies in the organisational learning patterns’. What an organisation knows how to do today is a function of what was learned yesterday (Pisano, 2000). This would imply the use of exploitative learning within the organisation to begin to change patterns of behaviour to make the concept of learning from a younger colleague possibly more common in business. Research in the field of organisational learning has already begun to identify some of the factors which might prevent this change from taking place, as outlined below. Causes of lack of learning in organisations have been identified as including (Dixon, 2006, working paper): • Weak ‘absorptive capacity’ (Lyle and Salk, 1996) – the ability of the organisation to incorporate new ideas and routines into its operations. Absorptive capacity is a function of prior learning and a set of learning skills provided by similar learning experiences (Cohen and Levinthal, 1990) • Lack of managerial knowledge (Child and Czegledy, 1996) • Organisational cultures that inhibit knowledge sharing (Michailova and Husted, 2003) • Cognitive barriers to recognising and implementing new organisational routines (operational learning) (Newman, 2000) • Organisational learning being constrained by an organisation’s administrative heritage (Bartlett and Ghoshal, 1989) – its ongoing set of relationships (between parties in the organisation). • Characteristics and management leadership styles which influence organisational learning at different stages (Dixon, 2006) These are only some of the potential barriers to organisational learning which it is hoped to be able to identify in future research. Within this incomplete list, there are inter-disciplinary links between the fields of education and organisational learning. There are also cross-disciplinary links between management theory (organisational structure, channels of communication, operations management, organisational culture), human resource management theory (training and development, resistance to change, motivation, leadership styles) and theories of learning (absorptive capacity, cognitive barriers). The inter- and cross-disciplinary nature of this research adds interest, depth and challenge to the topic. 94

Reverse intergenerational learning Individual’s research issues Two approaches are proposed for investigation: to investigate both the senior manager’s barriers and the new employee’s barriers to learning and communicating from and with each other. In this particular research, the new employee is an MBA graduate, entering into a full-time management position. The ‘senior manager’ is envisaged as being at a fairly senior level within the organisation. The rationale for this is related to the generational issues discussed previously. Firstly, it is proposed that the barriers that might cause a lack of reverse intergenerational learning will be less by ‘skipping’ a generation (Eisner, 2005). Secondly, the influence that this senior manager can then bring to bear on the ‘middle’ management level can be exerted more effectively than might be possible for a junior colleague. Thirdly, it is the most senior levels of management which are involved in the strategic decision-making for the organisation. If they are fully aware of the latest business theory, then their roles are enhanced. From a senior manager perspective, some of the reluctance to learn from the younger generation comes from the parental connection with the younger colleague – it can be very difficult to acknowledge needing to learn from ‘your child’. Age and experience are often equated with knowledge and wisdom. Professor David Birchall says ‘managers would question what on earth they could learn from someone with little business experience’ (Coles and Gardner, 2001: p. 24). Increasingly, middle management levels in the UK (Generation X) often also have MBA qualifications. So the knowledge needs to jump a generation to the next generation – the Baby Boomers. There may be a power concern here, linked to a traditional perspective of hierarchy and roles. The senior manager may feel threatened by an admission of lack of knowledge – ‘they generally don’t like to admit their ignorance to others in the organisation, particularly those well down the hierarchy’ (Coles, 2001: p. 7). Fear of losing their job to a younger person may prevent reverse intergenerational learning from taking place. It is proposed that these issues can be resolved through organisational change and individual mind change. A young person can often feel uncertain and intimidated by the confidence and self-assurance of the people around them – people who are established in the organisation. Communication may also be a problem – ‘they may lack the self-confidence needed to teach senior executives’ (Stone, 2004: p. 5). This is a generation which has been ‘socialised in a digital world’ (Eisner, 2005: p. 4) but ‘their strong technical skills are not matched by strong soft skills such as, listening, communicating’ (Pekala, 2001: p. 34). Teaching skills are not developed, leading to coaching difficulties, especially with someone who has the (perceived and perhaps real) ability to fire you. 95

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Justification for research Worldwide, the average fertility rate for developed countries has fallen from 5.0% to 1.6% in the last 30 years (Jorgensen, 2003). The future will see the supply of older workers, relative to the supply of younger workers, increase. Given the importance of skilled people to innovation and competitive advantage organisations older workers will need to supplement their skills and knowledge to succeed. ‘Organisational learning is limited by existing organisational structures and hierarchies, by organisational cultures that frequently encourage antilearning values and routines, and by shared structures of organisational cognition’ (Salaman, 2001: p. 343)2. These structures and cultures need to be challenged to adapt (Pettigrew and Whipp, 1991). Firms use organisational learning to develop the organisational capabilities needed for survival and success in new situations. Most organisational learning is exploitation learning - small changes to routine within an existing structure (Newman, 2000) insufficient to provide a competitive advantage in rapidly changing business environments. Explorative learning is needed. If these problems can be overcome, then the benefits to the organisation can be substantial. ‘Whether organised on a formal or casual basis, reverse mentoring can offer businesses an opportunity to improve internal communications processes’ (Coles and Gardner, 2001: p. 7). ‘The diverse knowledge base that junior employees can offer is an advantage that can be capitalised on’ (Smith, 2000: p. 7). Craig (2001), Tempest (2003) and Eisner (2005) are starting to identify the barriers to organisational learning and possible solutions, with scope for more research. If organisations can learn from all employees, the benefits will be seen at a social and financial level. Researching into and helping to identify the barriers to learning between MBA graduates and senior managers will be a help in the process of taking advantage of the practitioner-based evidence that reverse mentoring can offer opportunities for businesses in terms of improved communications, and can also help to begin a process of disseminating the theoretical knowledge of the junior employee among senior colleagues. There are researchers who disagree about the importance of generational factors in recruitment and employment. Jorgensen (2003) posits that topflight employers are looking to win talent by tailoring employment policy to Some examples of anti-learning values and routines are many of the potential barriers to learning which have already been identified: weak absorptive capacity; an organisational culture which inhibits knowledge-sharing, and lack of management knowledge.

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Reverse intergenerational learning capture the dynamism of the modern era rather than discrete generational values, i.e. ignore generational differences and focus on the skills and knowledge that each new employee can bring to the organisation. • In business, there is poor utilisation of academic research. Research needs to be integrated with practitioner expertise to guide decisionmaking and action (Leseure et al., 2004). • There is a need to change the ways in which individuals in organisations learn in order to maintain a competitive advantage. In order to understand the process of learning in an organisation, it is necessary to elicit individual explanations from the participants in that organisation (Fleetwood, 2005). • Reverse intergenerational learning is already being used, in a limited sense, successfully, in a few organisations, so it needs to be identified and publicised as ‘best practice’ (Zielinski, 2000; Hoare, 2000).

Conclusion At present, this research represents (primarily) a review of the literature which has identified issues discussed above. Because of the cross-disciplinary nature of the research (as previously identified), it has been difficult to know how far to investigate each separate line of investigation. It has been easy to be lead further into the individual areas (e.g. explorative versus exploitative learning; cognitive barriers; theories of learning, etc.) than may perhaps be necessary for the purpose of this study. Whilst recognising the need to have a good grasp and understanding of as many of the issues as possible, in order to make reasoned judgements and assessments, it is not necessary to become an expert in each individual area. Knowing where to draw the line is an ongoing decision-making process. It is also recognised that the surface has only been scratched and that far more research needs to be done specific to the concept of reverse intergenerational learning. The inter- and cross-disciplinary nature of the topic has made narrowing down relevant literature searches difficult. Refining search parameters can result in articles which are either far too specific in their nature or far too general for the purposes of this research. For instance, in the field of education, much research has been carried out about barriers to learning of young people within a traditional (school) setting. Much of the theory of learning is based on observations of primary and secondary age participants. There is a question as to how much or even if that theory can be translated across and used in a study of adults in a business setting. Turning to Human Resource Management literature to look for answers applicable to adults seems to focus on a narrow perspective regarding the 97

C. Baily learning needs of an organisation. Looking into the research on training and development, the literature and theory reflect training interventions carried out using traditional (school-based) practices of teaching. These training interventions are often not targeted at management level, and are primarily skills based in nature, so there is a question mark as to their relevance for the transfer of theoretical knowledge at management level. There is a gap in the theory of knowledge which this research topic is seeking to address. Conversely, the cross-disciplinary nature of the research, while providing problems for the researcher, is also a strength. Answers to questions can be found in a variety of sources. The range of resources and the body of theory to be drawn upon is much larger. Here is an area where research into a business-related topic will be able to inform the fields of education and management practice. Cross-disciplinary knowledge and expertise has been available from Human Resource researchers to business and management researchers and experts, and educationalists. Feedback and comments from a wide variety of colleagues have been instrumental in developing the research to this point. This indicates that cross-disciplinary research requires an openness of mind, an ability to navigate unfamiliar territory, and a large degree of co-operation and communication. At the same time, I would argue that using knowledge and experience gained from other related fields can enhance the value and validity of the research being carried out. Management theory, educational theory and existing evidence from practitioners in the field of business will be used to build the conceptual framework for the subsequent research.

References Bartlett, C., and Ghoshal, S. (1989). Managing across borders: The transnational solution. Boston: Harvard Business School Press. Benner, M.J., and Tushman, M.L. (2003). Exploitation, exploration and process management: The productivity dilemma revisited. Academy of Management Review, 28, 238-56. Burgelman, R.A. (2002). Strategy as vector and the inertia of co-evolutionary lock-in. Administrative Science Quarterly, 47, p. 325. Chang, J., and Hampton, A. (Jan. 2004). Backward learning. Let your younger workers take the mentoring lead. Sales and Marketing Management, 156(1), p. 24. Child, J., and Czegledy, A. (1996). Managerial learning in the transformation of Eastern Europe: Some key issues. Organisation Studies, 17, 167-80. Cohen, W.M., and Levinthal, D.A. (1990). Absorptive capacity: A new perspective on learning and innovation. Administrative Science 98

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C. Baily Lleras, E. (2003). Communities of learning: A case in local development. Kybernetes, 32(5/6), 644-652. Lyles, M.A., and Salk, J.E. (1996). Knowledge acquisition from foreign parents in international joint ventures: An empirical examination in the Hungarian context. Journal of International Business Studies, 27, 877-903. March, J.G., (1991). Exploration and exploitation in organisational learning. Organisation Science, 2, 71-78. Michailova, S., and Husted, K., (2003). Knowledge-sharing hostility in Russian firms. California Management Review, 45, 59-77. Miller, M., and Siggins, I. (2003). A framework for intergenerational planning. Foresight, 5(6), 18-25. Newman, K.L. (2000). Organisational transformation during institutional upheaval. Academy of Management Review, 25, 602-19. Soanes, C., and Stevenson, A. (2004). Oxford enlish dictionary (11th Ed). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Pekala, N. (2001). Conquering the generational divide. Journal of Property Management, 66(6), 30-38. Pettigrew, A.M., and Whipp, R. (1991). Managing change for competitive success. Oxford: Blackwell. Pisano, G.P. (2000). In search of dynamic capabilities: The origins of R&D competence in biopharmaceuticals. In: G. Dosi, R.R. Nelson and S.G. Winter (Eds), The nature and dynamics of organisational capabilities. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Pyle, K. (May 2005). Youth are the present. Telephony, p. 40. Raines, C. (2002) Managing millenials. Available online at http:// generationsatwork.com/articles/millenials.htm (Accessed January 2007). Roth, M. (Winter 1998). Closing Generational and Learning Gaps. Marketing Management, 6(4), p. 26. Ruch, W. (Dec 2005). Full engagement: Manage multiple generations. Leadership Excellence, 22(12), p. 11. Ruigg, G, and McGeorge, P. (1999). Questioning methodology. Working paper. Northampton: Publisher?. Salaman, G. (2001). A response to Snell: The learning organisation: Fact or fiction? Human Relations, 54, 343-59. Smith, M. (Jul 17, 2000). Teaching the “old dogs” new tricks: Reverse mentoring. Canadian HR Reporter, 13(13), 7. Solomon, M. (Jan 29, 2001). Coaching the boss. Computerworld, 35(5), p. 42. Stone, F. (Feb 2004). Leadership Coach. Mentor your emerging leaders. Executive Excellence, 21(2), 5. Tempest, S. (Jun 2003). Intergenerational learning: A Reciprocal Knowledge 100

Reverse intergenerational learning Development Process that Challenges the Language of Learning. Management Learning, 34(2), 181-200. White, R. (Nov 2006). Four generations learning to work better together. Public Management, 88(10), 35. Zielinski, D. (Oct 2000). Mentoring up. Training, 37(10), 136. Zollo, M., and Winter, S.G. (2002). Deliberate learning and the evolution of dynamic capabilities. Organisation Science, 13(3), 339-351.

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Building sustainable schools

Building sustainable schools Are places of social interaction more important than classrooms? Andrea Wheeler Are places of social interaction more important than classrooms? Is tackling poverty and social integration first and foremost in sustainable development? This chapter examines how British government policy to improve learning and to create sustainable communities, through the new schools building programme Building Schools for the Future, is being addressed by architects and educationalists. It explores a variety of ways of teaching young people about sustainability, but it also demonstrates that young people’s attitudes to sustainable lifestyles can illuminate many of the problems of current policy. Participation practices suggest empowerment, citizenship, ownership, place-making and community, but many questions have been ignored concerning the approaches to these interactions. Despite social relationships being a key to building sustainable communities and to the well-being of young people in schools, exploring and encouraging positive relationships through the design of school buildings has been poorly researched. Furthermore, questions of well-being have to be directed to young people themselves, but current practices of consultation are not necessarily ones that can allow architects or educationalists to listen to and respond to more social and emotional needs. So, can architects and educationalists work within this context to explore expanded notions of care for the environment and for others? Can they respond to young people’s needs? Participation within the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme may risk becoming tokenistic, but understanding the relationship between participation and sustainability through new educational philosophies cannot only counter these accusations, but also enable the British government to achieve the dual objectives of providing better learning environments and sustainable schools. Interdisciplinary research provides a way of tackling some of the most difficult issues at the heart of new school design.

Introduction The Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme aims to improve the quality of education in the UK, by building new schools of low 103

A. Wheeler environmental impact. Sustainability and transformative learning, inclusion and connecting to the community are important themes. The participation of children in design is promoted as a means to engage children in this vision. However, the ways to achieve the government objectives are under-researched. The two disciplines of architecture and education have very different perspectives on how to approach such a task. If this programme is to be the success it has been anticipated to be, it requires an interdisciplinary approach. The social and ethical dimensions of sustainable development are important aspects of the architectural design problem, but they are also places where common ground can be established. They are areas where shared research can contribute to a criticism of participation and co-design methods and provide the foundations for different, more appropriate approaches. Children’s alienation from their environments is cited as one of the causes of anti-social, environmentally unfriendly behaviour (Department for Education and Skills, DfES, 2006; House of Commons, Education and Skills Committee, 2007b). However, one of the realisations of climate change is how intimately our future is bound to those of others. These questions provide the basis of an interdisciplinary path towards sustainable development that can inform the material and educational visions of architects and teachers alike. We need some very different ways of both teaching and designing in the 21st century if we are to address the social and environmental problems that climate change will bring.

A critical analysis of the Building Schools for the Future programme Launched in 2004, the BSF programme is committed to rebuilding or renewing every secondary school in England over a 10-15 year period and in the process is spending £45 billion on the schools’ estate in the UK. It is now in its very early stages. The first BSF school, Bristol Brunel Academy designed by Wilkinson Eyre Architects, was officially opened by the Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, on 6 September 2007. The BSF programme is described as being set up to improve the fabric of school buildings, either through refurbishment or new build, at the same time as transforming learning and embedding sustainability into the educational experience. However, in the inquiry commissioned by the Education and Skills Committee, one particularly significant criticism suggested that the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF, formerly the DfES) should provide more practical design guidance on how to achieve these aims, and moreover that head teachers needed more time to develop their approach. 104

Building sustainable schools Head teachers are expected to set out the educational vision for their own schools, according to the government White Paper Higher Standards: Better Schools for All (DfES, 2005). They are also required to demonstrate that they have discussed their vision with the school community (staff, parents, governors and children) and wider community groups. This vision contributes to a ‘strategy for change’ representing the relation of their vision to the school estate. The challenge facing the BSF programme is that of designing high quality schools to replace or refurbish old stock: schools that are good value for money and that will support innovation in teaching and learning for years to come. The problem teachers and architects face is how to meet these objectives. The Education and Skills Committee report states: ‘The crucial question here, and one that the Department has not fully answered, is what do we want education to be in the 21st century? A clear statement of the national ambitions for 21st century education could help to provide guidance and challenge to the local decision-making process’ (House of Commons, Education and Skills Committee, 2007a: p. 4). It could help architects and teachers to develop a shared vision for school buildings. On the other hand, it could also be stifling to the creativity of the community. Design guidance for the BSF programme exists, but a problem with this guidance is that it has been developed to promote exemplars, case studies and standard layouts. The danger is that these will lead to a level of standardization within the BSF programme at the expense of well-functioning and site-specific buildings responding to the needs of the school community. Furthermore, David Hills argues that it would be an uneconomic strategy in the long run (Critchlow and Hills, 2007). Standardization for the purposes of speed ignores complex architectural issues of how to design for the unique social and cultural environment of schools. It also potentially introduces a conflict with the school and community visioning processes: between those keen to deliver on the government’s targets to build the number of new school buildings required, and those concerned that the programme fulfils its potential for future learning.

BSF and sustainable development agendas Improving educational performance has always been vital to the BSF programme. Equally, the regenerative potential for disadvantaged communities has had a high priority. The foreword to the consultation 105

A. Wheeler document for BSF states: ‘Schools should inspire learning. They should nurture every pupil and member of staff. They should be a source of pride and a practical resource for the community’ (DfES, 2003: p. 1). Sustainability, however, is not an explicit theme; it has certainly received little mention in the BSF launch publications. However, the focus has changed. In The Children’s Plan: Building Brighter Futures published in December 2007, the government stated an ambition for all schools to be sustainable by 2020 and new school buildings to be zero carbon by 2016. The DCSF also declares that a taskforce is being appointed to find out how this can be achieved (DCSF, 2007). The foreword to the recent Design of Sustainable Schools describes how all major school building projects will undergo formal environmental assessment using the Building Research Establishment’s Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM for Schools; DfES, 2006). However, the Sustainable Development Commission (SDC) has already criticised the method as limited, providing only incremental improvement, whilst a step change is needed (House of Commons, Education and Skills Committee, 2007b; SDC, 2006). Moreover, the SDC argues that the BSF programme will not deliver sustainable schools because: ‘[t]he vision for sustainable schools delivery through BSF has not yet been sufficiently developed. A number of elements are currently limiting the potential to deliver sustainable schools through BSF’ (SDC, 2006: p. 18). Similarly, Scott proposes that if schools are to take the challenges of sustainable development seriously, they will have to address thinking and working in profoundly different ways. More thought is needed, he suggests, towards educating for social and ecological justice and towards the relationship between the two (Scott, 2007). The very fact that a ‘taskforce’ is deemed necessary to find out how to achieve zero carbon schools demonstrates that the relationship between future sustainable educational environments and teaching sustainable citizenship has not been considered. However, for the SDC, the BSF programme is still an important opportunity. It argues that we need to make a radical impact on children’s understanding if they are to develop the life skills needed to build a sustainable society: ‘… the vast majority of the population will pass through the 3,500 secondary schools during their lives. This natural “bottleneck” provides a unique opportunity for learning about sustainable development’ (House of Commons, Education and Skills Committee, 2007b: p. ev114; SDC, 2006: p. 3). However, the SDC also argues that the BSF programme will not contribute sufficiently to delivering the UK Sustainable Development Strategy or the DfES Sustainable Schools Strategy. It writes: ‘Sustainable development needs to be the overarching principle of BSF and not one in a list of many agendas’ (House of Commons, Education and Skills Committee, 2007b: p. ev121; SDC, 2006: p. 18.) 106

Building sustainable schools The invariable response of teachers and designers, however, looking to transform learning, has been to separate the issue from sustainability, and to promote the addition of high quality Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to classroom environments as a means to transform learning. ICT is even described as the fourth utility and a natural part of new school buildings, but extensive ICT facilities can be expensive, energy greedy, and are by no means future-proofed. Each potential BSF-funded school redevelopment will have its own set of issues to address, in addition to attempting to meet BSF objectives. Just as the social, economic and environmental aspects of sustainable development are not separate issues, neither are improved learning and sustainability those to be addressed independently or in the abstract. Each BSF school will require a unique, context-based solution to both the learning environment and sustainable development. There is no guarantee that focusing on providing innovative learning technologies in the BSF programme, or indeed teaching young people about physical sustainability features in buildings (the two ways that the policy aims of improved learning and sustainability are currently being considered), will teach them the skills that they will need in order to respond to the environmental and social challenges of a rapidly changing world. Anticipating those skills is one of the most problematic issues of the BSF programme.

The ethical dimensions of sustainable development The Stern Review (Stern, 2006) describes climate change as the greatest market failure the world has ever seen. It describes the effects of CO2 emissions as different from any other human action: they are global, longterm, involve risks and uncertainties, and potentially major and irreversible change. For Stern, the cost of action is currently much less than the cost of inaction. Stern argues that the projected impacts of climate change are failing crops (particularly in developing regions), threatened water supplies, damage to eco-systems (e.g. damage to coral reefs and the extinction of some animal species), more extreme weather events and abrupt changes to the earth’s climate system. But are they seen as issues that will transform education or the learning needs of the 21st century? The issue of climate change is challenging on a number of levels, many of which cannot be addressed without engaging in difficult ethical issues. Dietz, a contributor to the Stern report, recognises this need to include ethics in policy discussion. He writes: It is not enough to simply presume that existing markets can provide a technocratic solution to ethical questions of intergenerational 107

A. Wheeler justice. Indeed, by its very nature climate change demands that a number of ethical perspectives be considered, of which standard welfare economics is just one. Other relevant and important approaches highlight rights, freedoms and the prevention of harm, as well as approaches based on virtues, as well as social contracts (Dietz et al., 2008: p. 1). Amatya Sen’s work is cited by Dietz for the potential solution it offers to the social problem of encouraging sustainable behaviour. Dietz writes: Sen’s focus on human capabilities, as well as outcomes, is relevant to climate-change policy and economics. While we do not pursue the capabilities approach here, we nevertheless consider it to have substantial potential as an ethical framework for climate change policy evaluation (Dietz et al., 2008: p. 5). Capabilities are a measure of development based on the capability of people to act in certain ways. Sen’s work suggests a wholly different approach that could overcome some of the more simplistic measures used to determine the effectiveness of government policy aimed at limiting consumption. A capabilities approach would differ from prosperity-based measures of well-being. It would attempt to measure the freedoms people have to act in certain ways as a measure of wealth (Sen, 1993). Jacqueline McGlade, Director of the European Environment Agency, in the recent European Commission (EU) Towards a Post Carbon Society conference in Brussels, October 2007, proposed that patterns of behaviour need to change and value systems need to adapt to measure quality of life: ‘Society needs to shift from seeking ownership of assets towards wealth based on access to services and this needs smarter measures of welfare. Social cohesion […] is the most important factor in life expectancy’ (European Commission, 2008: p. 20). Tim Kasser, in the High Price of Materialism (2002), writes of the need for a revolution in values, more regulation of advertising aimed at children and encouraging the social movement of voluntary simplicity. The question of whether we can still maintain our existing models of wealth and well-being and even of democracy, in the context of addressing climate change, is vital to this debate. Arguments abound towards a change in thinking, but policy lags behind. As Lewis suggests, policy decisions are being based on old-fashioned modes of thinking about how we understand human relations. However, there is a move towards an understanding that people need to participate in policies concerned with behavioural change if they are to work. She writes: ‘Policy is still being developed on the back of anachronistic understanding of how behaviour is influenced and what 108

Building sustainable schools makes people change. If we are to move beyond the current limited policy approach, then new thinking is required’ (Lewis, 2007: p. 5). If we are to adapt to the challenges of environmental change, we need to think about what it means to be human and to be ‘in relation’ (Arendt, 1999).

School architecture and children’s participation In view of the ethical dimensions of sustainable development, the observations and recommendations of the Education and Skills Committee are rather disappointing, especially where the authors state: ‘Even the research base has little to tell us about how we should design sustainable learning environments for the future’ (House of Commons, Education and Skills Committee, 2007a: p. 12). The committee refers to a literature review carried out for the Design Council which looks for evidence that learning environments have an impact on learning outcomes (Higgins et al., 2005). In her paper, based in part on the research for the Design Council commissioned report, Pamela Woolner argues that architects tend to assume a relationship between the behaviour of man and architecture which, in the context of learning, is in no way proved. She proposes the need for evidence to inform design practice. Woolner writes: ‘Although there are those with architectural backgrounds (for example Dudek, 2000) who support this assumption that aspects of the physical school must affect behaviour and influence learning, these ideas do not appear to be firmly based on empirical evidence’ (Woolner et al., 2007: p. 48). This suggests that the experience or education of architects is inadmissible as evidence. Green Schools: Attributes for Health and Learning, the UK National Research Council for the National Academies (NRCNA), looking at the relation between sustainability and productivity in learning environments, similarly declares the problem of a lack of evidence-based research, stating: ‘The committee did not identify any well-designed, evidence-based studies concerning the overall effects of green schools on human health, learning, or productivity or any evidence-based studies that analyse whether green schools are actually different from conventional schools in regard to these outcomes’ (NRCNA, 2007: p. 5). The Design Council review is motivated by a preference for a methodology that Woolner argues is apparently lacking in BSF policy, but this drive towards evidence-based policy clearly leads to questions about how we understand knowledge. Packwood, for example, argues: An evidence-based approach to policy is ideological in that it supports particular beliefs and values compatible with the dominant cultural paradigms that define how people and society function. At present these are determined by definitions of effectiveness as a 109

A. Wheeler quantitative measure, professionalism as performativity, teaching as technicist delivery, research as randomised clinical trials, and ‘credible’ evidence as statistical meta-analysis. These paradigms will become taken for granted unless they are considered in relation to the alternatives of effectiveness as being determined by both qualitative and quantitative outcomes; professionalism as the freedom to engage critically in debates regarding practice; teaching as a reflexive, dialogic process; research as an eclectic activity, and evidence as being that which most appropriately answers the questions posed by research, be that words, numbers, or indeed images as debated in the on-line BERA debate concerning educational research. (www.bera.ac.uk) (Packwood, 2002) Nevertheless, despite Woolner’s argument for design based on empirical evidence and evidence-based policy, innovative arts-based research methods within the social sciences have growing academic credibility as tools by which to research complex emotional and relational issues excluded from ‘evidence-based approaches’. These methods may be more favourable to research within interdisciplinary spheres of education and architecture, where ideologies may conflict. At the British Council for School Environments’ Summit 2007, the US Schools’ architect, Prakash Nair, described a number of different archetypes of the learning environment, including cave space, campfire space and watering hole space. He proposes that these patterns (based on his and other architects’ experiences) will create better connections to the environment: ‘Our book’, he writes, ‘…does not claim to be scientifically based. The book draws upon our own experience as school planners and the best practice of school design over 20 countries, represented by hundreds of innovative school designs that we have published at DesignShare.com’ (Nair and Fielding, 2005: p. 1). Nair refers to design theorist Christopher Alexander as influential, writing: ‘He looked at the real world of people plus the buildings and spaces they inhabited in order to understand the connections between the built environment and the human psyche’ (Nair, 2005: p. 1). However, Nair also argues that his patterns are not quite like Alexander’s timeless patterns (Alexander, 1980). His patterns are starting points for community and school. This sort of architectural theory is not obviously accommodated by designs driven by empirical evidence, and this approach is very different from consultation being carried out currently in the BSF programme. When teachers are asked what they think the important issues for new schools are, they are far less poetic, citing: space, sustainability, improved consultation, ICT/technology, temperature control, fairer funding, schools 110

Building sustainable schools for the community and flexibility (‘Memorandum Submitted by Teachers TV’, House of Commons, Education and Skills Committee, 2007b). The Sorrell Foundation’s Joinedupdesignforschools project identified twelve issues which all children demand in school buildings, including the almost universal request for better toilets, dedicated social space, civilised dining spaces and inspiring learning spaces. The problem, however, with these kinds of participation projects is the focus on spaces with specific functions. There is no discussion of more complex ideas or emotions felt by children in relation to the working environment, how this affects learning and how this might be interpreted by architects. There are many different participation tools aimed at architects and designers for involving young people in the design of their schools. The Sorrell Foundation’s Joinedupdesignforschools and SchoolWorks are just two. The government is promoting participation in decision-making at a number of levels, suggesting positive benefits for individuals and communities. These include empowerment, place-making and community building. One of the most obvious risks is that decisions can easily be made by researchers to suit either economic or political expediency and aims remain empty of any meaning for those involved. Potentially they could have conflicting aims and objectives to those of the participants’. Children, especially, can be easily guided by the participation method and have limited understanding of the potential, both in terms of curriculum and architecture, for their new school buildings. Questions of power, place, community and belonging are sociological, psychological and philosophical concepts that need careful analysis in the context of research with young people. Participation with children can extend from basic design exercises to children designing and building their own schools. It can range from uncritical forms of consultation to those that seek to explore power relations in depth. Arnstein’s (1969) ladder of citizen participation was the first attempt to devise a model for the levels of participation of researchers and individuals in these processes. This extended from the manipulation of citizens, at the bottom rung, to citizen control, at the top rung, which represented full and meaningful participation. Hart (1992) described a similar nine-step ladder in participation for child participation. However many later argued that all levels operate to some degree within a participation process. More fluid and dynamic models have been devised which explore where the power is, within particular relationships at particular times, in the development of a process exercise (Petrescu, 2005). Children, however, will need their own age-specific participation methodologies if their own desires for education curriculum and spaces 111

A. Wheeler are to be heard. Lee, in the review of the FutureLab Fountaineers project, writes of a participative process aimed at transforming learning through group design work where the age differences and capacity of the children played an important role in the approach adopted (Lee, 2007). Bruce Jilk, a schools architect and educator, makes this similar request when he argues that children cannot fully participate in the co-design of their schools unless power issues are addressed and they understand their views and opinions to be of equal value to those of the teachers. He suggests creating a ‘Declaration of Learners’ Rights and Responsibilities’ as part of the participation and co-design processes with children. Participation is being promoted as a means for improving self-esteem and assisting learning, as both research tools and drivers for change, but the ethical and theoretical motives or backgrounds underpinning such methods are not being fully explored. The BSF programme runs the risk of using participation in a tokenistic manner. Trying to determine only practical design issues in highly planned consultation events neglects the more complex needs of users of school buildings. The issue for participation in the design of school buildings is precisely about who gets a say, and who is and is not listened to. In practice, architects’ consultations with children are carried out with the higher performing children, and it would be unusual for architects to discuss design with special educational needs children, or indeed with those excluded from mainstream schools.

Social cohesion and sustainable development There is a history of radical educational practices transforming the learning experience, often of very troubled children, based in and through the community. David Gribble, an educator with many years’ experience of democratic schools, suggests that it is social interaction that is the most important issue for education. In an interview with the author, he identifies some of the most important aspects in schools design as: smaller schools, more places of social interaction, and student ownership. For Gribble, it is student ownership that governs the success of a school – both the ownership of buildings and of the curriculum. Part of the challenge for new schools is curriculum development and asking what sorts of educational practices would be considered as appropriate to encouraging sustainable lifestyles. Gribble argues that many associate democratic schools with middle class preoccupations. He writes: People in general think that if there is no obligation to go to lessons, children will not go, but it just isn’t the case […] There are street children in India, who are changing government policy, 112

Building sustainable schools lobbying. In reality it is the most deprived children that need this sort of education most, they really need it far more than the middle class children whose parents can afford to send their children to independent schools of this kind. (Gribble, 2007) Nevertheless, when asked about participation with children in the design of their buildings, he is somewhat critical, arguing that children who have never experienced participation do not know what is possible. Moreover, he suggests that it is the emotional impact of a school that needs to be discussed with children: Clients need to brief architects about the emotional impact of a building, they don’t need to be told how many doors or windows there should be. (Gribble, 2007) With regard to recent initiatives to build schools without playgrounds and the emphasis on more work to be carried out at home, he states: It’s a dreadful idea, both are, what’s important about schools is relationships and I think there should be more opportunities for relationships to form, more playgrounds, more social spaces, more cafés, that sort of thing. It is important for young people. Places of social interaction are probably more important than classrooms. (Gribble, 2007) The ethical issues for a teaching practice which encourages sustainable behaviour, where the social norms of young people have to be challenged, are in no way simple. Early development workers and theorists, such as Paulo Freire, argued that education was essential to allow oppressed groups to participate in the forces that affect their lives, and ultimately to change those forces (Freire, 2001). Participatory action research (PAR) approaches suggest methods of engaging with communities that, at the same time, produce alternative ways of thinking and being that can inspire different behaviour, including sustainable behaviour. PAR approaches are presented as emancipatory and fostering radical social change (Kindon, 2007). They also suggest that it is those who have been oppressed, denied or excluded who carry specifically revealing wisdom about existing social structures and communities (Kindon, 2007). Nevertheless, PAR methods of participation, like many others, have been criticised for under-theorising issues of power and marginalisation. These arguments are derived from post-structuralist critiques in other fields, such as feminism (Wheeler, in press). The problem with participation exercises with children that dominate the BSF programme is that they are uncritical of current social and 113

A. Wheeler educational paradigms, but this will only be remedied by collaborative work with educationalists. Fielding, for example, argues that currently schools are functionally modelled as ‘little factories’. He writes: ‘In these little factories, every day we can find teachers encouraged (and often compelled) to mass produce learning and marginalise the differences in aptitudes, interests, and abilities of students […] But this model is no place to prepare students for the fast-changing global society they will inherit’ (Fielding et al., 2006). Contemporary educational philosophers similarly comment on commitment by the educational establishment to this sort of ‘closed economy’. Influenced by the work of Emmanuel Levinas, Paul Standish proposes two sorts of thinking and economies that are possible in education: thinking towards totality – corresponding to closed economies, and thinking towards infinity, to what is beyond oneself – corresponding to the gift economy (Standish, 2005). This alternative way of thinking, he argues, would transform our approach to learning.

Summary and conclusions In building schools for the future, are places of social interaction more important than classrooms? There is no right or wrong answer to this question, but there is a need, which is being underestimated by policy makers, educationalists and architects, to explore the ethics of our relation to the environment and to others. The BSF programme represents a unique opportunity for schools and communities to do this. If governments are to change people’s behaviour towards more environmentally friendly lifestyles, this has to be motivated at the level of individuals and communities. The BSF programme will be plagued by criticism and accused of underperformance if its aims and objectives are not investigated in depth at the level of community in participation projects. Questions about the sustainable development of schools, of transforming learning and encouraging sustainable behaviour are complex. They could never be answered by standard layouts for schools or adequately addressed by a standardised kit of parts for school buildings. There are far too many variables to suggest that there can ever be a direct reproducible relationship between effective learning and an architectural form. The problem of how to build a sustainable school that encourages lifestyle change is interdisciplinary and wide-ranging, and it has to involve teachers, architects and other professionals working together. However, the differing methodological and theoretical approaches of each are examples of how much complex negotiation is required. Any approach adopted will require a strong philosophical foundation, and if sustainable development is to be honestly and effectively encouraged, young people will need to enter into 114

Building sustainable schools a discussion of community, relation, social cohesion and all the political and philosophical complexities this entails. Priority is being given to rebuilding schools in areas of greatest need. What is certain is that those in the poorest and most disadvantaged communities of the world will suffer first from the economic and environmental consequences of climate change. One of the realisations of climate change is how our future is so intimately bound to those of others, but this is not so easy for young people to grasp. Participation and co-design processes need to be ways of effectively teaching young people the decision-making skills to respond and adapt to the material and social insecurities arising from global warming. How global economic inequalities are to be addressed in the future has to be one of these most important issues, as the social consequences of climate change may be some of the most difficult to address. Interdisciplinary research provides a place from which to acknowledge conflict in the approaches of different academic fields, to seek insight and to overcome artificial obstructions to developing new ideas, theories and methods in architecture and education. The BSF programme offers the potential to revolutionise school buildings. However, unless far more thought is given to its aims, there will be nothing transformative about new schools, and questions about sustainable lifestyles will remain unresolved. Architects, it seems, are being given the almost overwhelming task of solving social and community issues, in addition to meeting objectives for buildings to improve learning – the success of which will be measured almost unquestionably by better exam results. But there can be no certainty that new schools will improve learning. It cannot be assumed that even the most up-to-date theory of how learning best takes place – in which environment, using which model – will result in a better school. The only way to improve the performance of some of the most vulnerable young people is to involve schools, families and communities in educational initiatives that are lasting and consistent (see Gates et al., 2007). Participation and community engagement is vital. We need to ensure that schools and communities are motivated not only to design new schools, but to discuss the consequences of design decisions and to feel that it matters to them. The question of sustainable development, transformative learning and good participation practices used in the design of new schools is a philosophical as well as a practical one, and requires an investigation into what we mean by dialogue: it is about who gets a say, who decides and what this means for schools and communities. These are questions for both architects and teachers. Remaining within our traditional disciplinary boundaries will only risk the failure of the new schools building programme. 115

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References Alexander, C. (1980). The timeless way. New York: Oxford University Press. Arendt, H. (1999). The human condition (2nd Ed). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Arnstein, S.R. (1969). A ladder of citizen participation. Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 35(4), 216-224. Critchlow, S., and Hills, D. (2007). Is secondary school design standardisation a good idea? Building Design, 2nd November 2007. Department for Children, Schools and Families (2007). The children’s plan. Building brighter futures. London: Stationery Office. Department for Education and Skills (2003). Building schools for the future: Consultation on a new approach to capital investment. London: TSO. Department for Education and Skills (2005). Higher standards: Better schools for all. London: Stationery Office. Department for Education and Skills (2006). Schools for the future: Design of sustainable schools – Case studies. Nottingham: DfES Publications. Dietz, S., Hepburn, C., and Stern, N. (2008). Economics, ethics and climate change. In: K. Basu and R. Kanbur (Eds), Arguments for a better world: Essays in honour of Amartya Sen (Volume 2: Society, institutions and development). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Available online at http://personal.lse.ac.uk/dietzs/Economics,%20ethics%20and%20 climate%20change.pdf (Accessed April 2008). Dudek, M. (2000). Architecture of Schools: The new learning environments. London: The Architectural Press. European Commission (2008). Towards a post-carbon society: European research on economic incentives and social behaviours. Conference proceedings, Brussels, 24 October 2007. Luxembourg: Office for the Publications of the European Commission. Fielding, R., Lackney, J. and Nair, P. (2006). Master classroom: designs inspired by creative minds. Edutopia Magazine, June 2006. Available online at http://www.edutopia.org/master-classroom (Accessed May 2008). Freire, P. (2001). Pedagogy of the oppressed. (30th Anniversary Edition). London: Continuum. Gates, P., Byrom, T. and Wheeler, A. (2007). Location of further education and young people’s participation in Nottingham North. Nottingham, UK: CREDE, The School of Education, University of Nottingham. Gribble, D. (2007). An interview with the author. Available online at http://www.sustainability-and-schools.com/interviews.php (Accessed April 2008). Hart, R. (1992). Children’s participation: From tokenism to citizenship. Innocenti Essays, 4, Florence: UNICEF. 116

Building sustainable schools Higgins S., Hall E., Wall K., Woolner P., and McCaugley C. (2005). The impact of school environments: A literature review. Report produced for the Design Council. Newcastle, UK: The Centre for Learning and Teaching, School of Education, University of Newcastle. House of Commons, Education and Skills Committee (2007a). Sustainable schools: Are we building schools for the future? Report of Session 2006-2007, Volume 1 (9 August 2007). London: Stationery Office. House of Commons, Education and Skills Committee (2007b). Sustainable schools: Are we building schools for the future? Government Response to the Committee’s Seventh Report of Session 2006-2007 (22 October 2007). Sixth Special Report of Session 2006–2007. London: Stationery Office Limited, London. Kasser, T. (2002). The high price of materialism. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press. Kindon, S., Pain, R., and Kesby, M. (2007). Participatory action research approaches and methods: Connecting people, participation and place. London: Routledge. Lee, T. (2007). Transforming learning spaces to personalise learning: Four months of fountaineering futurelab. Available online at http://www. futurelab.org.uk/resources/publications_reports_articles/web_articles/ Web_Article262 (Accessed April 2008). Lewis, M. (2007). States of reason: Freedom, responsibility and the governing of behaviour change. London: Institute of Public Policy Research. Nair, P., and Fielding, R. (2005). The language of school design: Design patterns for 21st century schools. Minneapolis, MN: Design Share Inc. National Research Council of the National Academies (2006). Green schools: Attributes for health and learning. Washington, DC: Board of Infrastructure and the Constructed Environment, The National Academies Press. Packwood, A. (2002). Review article: Evidence-based policy: rhetoric and reality. Social Policy and Society, 13, 267-272. Petrescu, D. (2005). Losing control, keeping desire. In: P. Blundel-Jones, D. Petrescu and J. Till (Eds), Architecture and participation. London: Routledge. Scott, W. (2007). Sustainable schools: An initial appreciation and critique. In: Headteachers and Bursars Handbook for Sustainable Procurement, Eastbourne: SCEMES Limited. Available online at http://www. teachernet.gov.uk/_doc/11418/Sustainable%20Schools%20-%20 appreciation%20and%20critique.pdf (Accessed April 2008). SDC (2006). Education and Skills Committee inquiry on sustainable schools. Submission from the Sustainable Development Commission, 15 June 2006. Available online at http://www.sd-commission.org. uk/publications/downloads/SDC-Education-and-Skills-Committee117

A. Wheeler Submission.pdf (Accessed April 2008). Sen, A. (1993). Capability and well-being. In: M. Nussbaum and A. Sen (Eds), The quality of life. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Standish, P. (2005). Towards an economy of higher education. Critical Quarterly, 47, 1/2, 53-71. Stern, N. (2006). The economics of climate change: The Stern review. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Wheeler, A. (in press) Architectural issues in building community through Luce Irigaray’s perspective on being-two. In: L. Irigaray (Ed), Teaching. Continuum. Woolner, P., Hall, E., Higgins, S., McCaughey, C., and Wall, K. (2007). A sound foundation? What we know about the impact of environments on learning and the implications for the Building Schools for the Future. Oxford Review of Education, 33 (February), 47-70.

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Memory and assimilation

Memory and assimilation Philosophical issues in culturally significant architecture Fidel Meraz This chapter illustrates the case of an interdisciplinary intersection between theoretical architectural reflection and the philosophical tradition of phenomenology, suggesting also implicit connections with philosophy of history, history and sociology. The difficulty for architectural conservation as an artistic and technical discipline to engage in philosophical analysis is addressed in this chapter and exemplified through the use of the phenomenological method. This is significant in order to offer theoretical and philosophical foundations to support truthful practice. Having as context conservation of architectural heritage, the phenomenon of assimilation is discussed. Assimilation is the cultural process that thrusts receptors to accept transformations in valuable environments. This implies that architecture be recognised as a bearer of relevant values. Therefore, the aims of the chapter are: first, to outline an ontology of culturally significant architecture; second, to correlate the proposed ontology with the phenomenon of memory; and finally, to argue that some pertinent considerations about memory should still determine theories of conservation. The advantages of the inclusion of interdisciplinary phenomenological analysis within architectural conservation are substantial since the considered values are not always evident for the scientific concerns of the practical activity.

Introduction Society often perceives a conflict in the sudden transformation of existing architectural heritage. Conservators protect heritage against these changes, while architects defend their new projects. Some philosophical questions arise out of this apparent tension, such as: How should culturally significant architecture (CSA) and its relation with memory be currently considered to allow the inclusion of new buildings? What is the role that memory plays as determinant of conservation theories? The interdisciplinary problem is defining the ontological characteristics of assimilation of new architecture into existing CSA, in order to take 119

F. Meraz informed practical actions. This definition needs to be constructed bearing in mind that CSA is a special case within architecture in general, since we are dealing with structures whose values have been celebrated as culturally significant. The theory of Roman Ingarden, in his work Ontology of the Work of Art: The Musical Work, the Picture, the Architectural Work, the Film (1989), is illuminating in order to define the ontological characteristics of CSA. He applied part of the ‘structure of being’ from his book Time and Modes of Being (1964), to the analysis of the work of art. Accordingly, we are proposing a correlation between the architectural work of art and CSA, with some discernment to modes and moments of being regarding the latter. This involves the crossing of phenomenological and architectural theories.

Interdisciplinary approach The problem to be embraced has been divided into two different layers. The criterion to establish these layers is in relation to their proximity to what could be called by a conservator real architecture. Thus, the first and most direct layer of analysis of the research is constituted by the particular phenomenon of CSA. The methodology proposed to approach this layer – based on the system suggested by Ingarden – is the development of a phenomenological ontology of the experience of assimilation of the new within the existent, trying to highlight its essence (Ingarden, 1989). The second layer is the one of theoretical knowledge, i.e. the intentionally and formally expressed explanation of architectural conservation (Groat et al., 2002). For this layer, the hermeneutical approach has been selected, mainly following the models of Ricoeur and Ingarden (Grondin, 1994). Therefore, the importance of an interdisciplinary approach has been demonstrated since a phenomenological examination is added to more scientifically-orientated approaches of the conservator architect. Conservation actions have usually been developed with pragmatical and technical aims, taking for granted the philosophical assumptions that support the practice. For instance, it has been frequently suggested how to conserve in a technically correct way; however, the reasons why one conserves are very often ignored. Thus the interdisciplinarity of the research is legitimated by its engagement with qualitative methods and mechanisms of validation different from the ones of quantitative research, which has been traditionally preferred for technical proposals of architectural conservation for its possibility of immediate application.

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Ontology of culturally significant architecture The departure point is the understanding that the human being has about its own built environment, i.e. the consciousness of CSA. It is built because it is not natural; and it is environment because it is the part of the world that surrounds the human being. The built environment as a whole is composed of discrete units called buildings that are usually constructions that define the space in a different way than when they were absent. With their emergence they change the status quo and with it, the objects that can be concretized from that environment change too, i.e. objects that the consciousness can address. Human societies take materials from nature – but also from pre-existent built environments – to build up these edifices. Technological developments improve the ways mankind builds, resulting in the production of more durable buildings. This condition helped to construct new buildings instead of maintaining or reconstructing the existing ones. However, humans have always found a tendency to disorder and deterioration in the real world as a constant resistance to be overcome. When buildings first started to be, society embellished not only the buildings, but also the environment with buildings. Human groups witnessed a succession of buildings that were new, buildings that decayed, buildings that were renewed, adapted, reconstructed, and buildings that were destroyed. The relation of society with each one of these cases determines the kind of memory about buildings that it has. After generations, society established special relations with buildings that are linked to it by history, and concretized values from them depending on numerous reasons. Consequently, society continues to transform them according to the necessities of the time, but also tends to retain them. Groups of observers concretize different kinds of social objects through them, for example sacred places, remembrance, authority, national pride, works of art, and so forth. It is worth highlighting that in phenomenology social objects are understood as concretisations from objects as such and from acts of consciousness also (Searle, 1995). Passports, money, flags, could be considered as examples of these objects, but nationalist feelings, collective memories and commemorations are considered social objects as well (Thomasson, 2005). These social objects acquire value and for that reason their physical support – in our case the building – is protected. CSA is identified as this manifold of concretized objects that the material building supports. For conservation, architecture is not conceived only because of its artistic quality – differently to what Ingarden (1989) does – but because 121

F. Meraz it is the source of multifarious significant concretisations. This means that additional objects can be identified within the constitution of this object. For instance, even aesthetically banal or ugly buildings are sometimes valued for different reasons, when society sees in them other values. The architectural work of art has been distinguished for being the product of human work, and by possessing certain properties that are not indispensable for fulfilling religious-social functions, but giving it certain aesthetically qualitative characteristics by virtue of which it is treasured as a work of ‘great art’. Hence a building is for humans not only a real object, but it goes beyond this reality. It has been observed as well how different attitudes toward the same building can be, depending on the viewer. These changes of attitude do not change the identity of the real thing, which remains receded in the background, but with every new attitude a new objectivity emerges. Therefore it is in this context that the correlation with CSA starts to be established; CSA is able to concretize many different values to society. Accordingly, a distinction among objects that arise after new intentionalities are directed to the building can be established. Ingarden (1989) has used these examples to demonstrate the necessity of a certain attitude in order to concretize the aesthetic object. However, this distinction is also significant in order to notice how this analogy is applicable to cultural objects, as other scholars have observed (Searle, 1995; Thomasson, 2005). The building does not only give origin to the so-called aesthetic attitude, but to remembrance and commemoration. Furthermore, certain types of buildings are culturally established (Ingarden, 1989). These types of buildings configure part of the cultural memory and consequently conservation actions can be philosophically founded. It follows that the architectural object is defined as a relative object, whose double relativity refers back to the creator and the viewer, but also to the physical shape and spatiality that it has (Ingarden, 1989). Describing the structure of the architectural work as two-layered, it has been stated that: ‘the architectural work consists principally in its objectual stratum, in the spatial shape of the work’s body and the aesthetically valuable qualities attaining to appearance on the basis of that shape’ (Ingarden, 1989: p. 296). Significant consequences for conservation theory are suggested from the proposed ontological structure, because its implications affect not only architecture as works of art, but the construction of cultural and social objectivities and their constant relation with memory (Ingarden, 1989). As a result, it is demonstrated that the work of art is not only the result of an aesthetic attitude, but also the result of a special connection between creator 122

Memory and assimilation and observer. At the same time, the work of art, being extra-temporal, does not constitute a form of memory as other socio-cultural concretisations can. This implies that architecture would be a manifold of moments of existence which find their origins in the building. Buildings and CSA are merged together. They are part of the real world inhabited by humans. Echoing Ingarden (1989), these ‘invented forms of finished architectural works of art’ can be conceived, for the purposes of conservation, as ‘culturally significant forms’, and they constitute also a fundamental part of the cultural memory of society. The inclusion of an interdisciplinary phenomenological analysis has assisted to distinguish values within CSA, other than the aesthetic ones. The significance of this in the consciousness about architecture in memory will be considered.

Memory and modes of being of architecture in time Let us explore now the second layer of the problem, i.e. the theoretical explanation about architectural conservation that society employs to protect its heritage. Humans favour seeing the transition from being to nonbeing more as transformation than as cessation of being (Ingarden, 1964). This phenomenon seems to explain why, in the assimilation process, it is more difficult for society to admit the cessation of existence of CSA than to accept its transformation into something changed or new. Ingarden (1969) categorizes objects according to their existential relation with time and its determination on the object. There are three initial modes of ‘beings in time’ that could be considered for architecture within this second layer: events, processes, and objects enduring in time. Their examination suggests that the latter mode supports more comprehensively the practice of contemporary conservation. In the following paragraphs, I will analyse why this is the case. Architecture as an event is perceived as a state of affairs, as the now of its experience, considered as trapped between the past and the present. Time for this kind of existence is not significant, since events by definition cannot endure. This architecture would be the one to be conserved following the principles attributed to Viollet-le-Duc. He for instance stated that to restore a building is ‘to re-establish it in a complete state that could have never existed at a given moment’ (Viollet-le-Duc, 1854)1. The understanding of this perception of architecture is as frozen in time or under the illusion of constant and timeless sameness (Ingarden, 1964). A conservator with this approach could even concretize an architectural object which is not ‘[l]e rétablir dans un état complet qui peut n’avoir jamais existé à un moment donné.’

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F. Meraz physically present at the time, but whose concretization suggests the hypothetical form of a building receiving conservation action. This is for example the case of the conservation process called restoration in style. This school tries to recover a pristine state that the building is supposed to have had in its original conception. When architecture is perceived as process it is characterised as a succession of phases. This implies the consideration of an origin and an end for architecture with phases in between. These phases, even if distinguishable, are not discrete entities. They constitute a continuum where an independent image of architecture is not distinguished in its actuality. This mode of being of architecture is, for example, the one in the stereotyped understanding attributed to John Ruskin in which the building’s ruin is expected to dissolve into nature. Architecture, then, is conceived as a being from its very initial conception, originated first in the project, as in drawings; then developed in its building process; its finishing; its conservation; alteration; and eventual destruction (Ingarden, 1964). The understanding of this architectural perception can be varied and changeable, and even when transformed – from a piece of paper, to technical drawings, to a construction site, a living building, or a ruin – a building maintains an identity as the same process experiencing the passing of time, from the beginning to the end. For instance, the seminary of St. Peter College in Cardross, a modern building currently in ruins, is considered the same entity in the drawings of the project as in the ruins that constitute its remains. This seems to be the actual approach in the practice of conservation nowadays. Finally, architecture as an object enduring in time is a mode distinguished from the previous one in which it appears to be constituted of several strata or layers, maintaining from the beginning to an eventual end its same identity. This makes architecture outlast individual phases. Architecture is conceived as a manifold of layers, with a different character for each (Ingarden, 1964). This view of architecture is compatible with the approach of Cesare Brandi’s theory of restoration (Brandi, 1963; Brandi et al., 2005). Within this perception of architecture, the understanding can be diverse according to the attitude of the subject. Other events, processes or objects constituting parts of this architecture can be recognised as part of the whole. Memory of this mode of being of architecture is analogous to remembering a person. As an example of this perception one could consider the Eiffel Tower. It can be appreciated by its being an engineering marvel, in which case its value is a technological achievement; or instead by the aesthetic qualities that the building conveys; or by the meaningful collective and individual memories it provokes in society. However, the considered 124

Memory and assimilation building is always the same. This understanding seems to encompass a more comprehensive understanding of architecture. Consequently, the ambition of conservation to be truthful depends on the objective moment with which CSA is understood. One more question arises in conservation: when does CSA finish and does it stop being architecture as such? It is suggested that a retentive essential core of the architectural object would be the ultimate essential physical component of it. Over this core other characteristics and variations could occur, but as long as this core is not changed or destroyed, the identity of the object is guaranteed. Sometimes fragments of buildings conserve this core. Ruins – as for instance the remaining parts of the Western Wall in Jerusalem – keep that core that is significant for the continuity of certain concretisations. Some of these remaining parts are not complete buildings anymore, but they constitute concretisations of CSA: In the instant when [the consistency of the object-core itself] is disrupted, […] the destruction of the object is effected. It loses the actuality of its being and its last present changes into the past. The final phase of its actual existence then also belongs to its history […]. If it leaves any traces or after-effects of its existence in subsequent presents, these maintain it or its history in retrogressively derivative being. (Ingarden, 1964: p. 138-139) These traces or after-effects of the existence of the object constitute memory itself. The character of this memory obtained as a result of reception of CSA depends on the observer – as subject or as society – and on its capacity to assimilate the new state of affairs resulting from its transformation. The phenomenological analysis of the understanding of architecture demonstrates its usefulness disentangling values – social memory included – which are not always evident.

Pertinent conditions of memory in conservation theory At this point it is convenient to notice that Ingarden considered architecture as a form of art with aesthetic values and valuable qualities. However, it seems pertinent to observe that architecture has additional relevant qualities to be concretized as a culturally valuable object. CSA then is not originated from any building, but from that which has the potential to generate cultural appreciation. In conservation this distinction is important, as the building can be of interest in a wider sense, whilst architecture taken only as art is significant from an aesthetic point of view. Buildings 125

F. Meraz instead can generally embody additional values other than aesthetics, as also can architecture as art. For example, these values may be associated with collective memories and social values. The building is a real material thing, but it is not formed by the concretisation of architecture as a cultural object. It is the physical foundation of CSA and the latter is certainly dependent on the former. The difference between building and architecture is determined by their mode of givenness; the experience of a building does not demand the same as the experience of CSA (Ingarden, 1964). Thus the building consists in the physical part whose givenness demands only the perception senses. Architecture as such, and by extension CSA, demands a consciousness contextualised in time and cultural space. The discussed ontological theory would distinguish three objectivities: the building, CSA, and its concretisations. It seems essential to understand how Ingarden conceives architecture, to determine how conservation can be theoretically consistent with the assumed architectural object. He finds the concrete architectural work as the result of different factors and perspectives, and states that: The ideal would be that the construction of the architectural work of art made possible the unitary coherence of all the moments determining it, which arise from three distinct sources: practical and artistic considerations and the architect’s creative individuality. [...] An architectural work of art in the pure sense of the term thus forms something like the only possible solution of an equation with a certain number of ‘unknowns’ (in the mathematical sense), so that all details of the form unequivocally result from the selection of these unknowns and of the equations formulated, which determine the reciprocal relations of the unknowns. (Ingarden, 1989: p. 291) Accordingly, the purpose of conservation should be to regain this mentioned coherence of moments when it is lost. It follows that, as time has passed, the historical, social and cultural conditions could have changed and therefore the ‘equation’ has to be reformulated again to find the possible solution to the transformed system. These conditions imposed in a first moment upon architecture by society, are sought after in the form of values linked to collective memories. These memories change, but never in a definitive way. The interdisciplinarity – demanded by the character of heritage and social memories – requires consideration about sociological issues. In this field, Maurice Halbwachs has presented collective memories as flexible interpretations of the past. These interpretations imply change 126

Memory and assimilation and the incorporation of new parts, made in order to render explicable the environment for the contemporaries (Halbwachs et al., 1992). Taking this social interpretation into account may explain the gradual shift that conservation is experiencing towards a new conception of it that would allow its legitimate performance in the present world. In a similar fashion, Halbwachs also analyses the refashioning of memories in social classes to admit novel ways of social and economic interaction. Consequently, the manifold of concretisations that architecture produces can be gradually adapted and transformed creatively to generate coherence in the whole socio-cultural environment. The double relativity that refers back to the viewer and the material support allows the possibility of social participation in the construction of the collective memory that leads to its assimilation. This means that in the foundation of CSA, there exists a constant field of action in which architects, conservators, users, viewers, and other social actors, can act and operate. The discussion about the autonomy conceded to memory is conflated with that of the truth that is sought in it, and as a consequence in some proposals of conservation of CSA. It has been suggested that: […] whenever we remember and in whatever way we remember we get a different past every time. […] We regain the past as different each time. (Casey, 2000: p. 285-286; author’s emphasis in bold) If memory is accepted as determinant of conservation, attitudes regarding assimilation of the new should evolve in order to learn how and when to receive the new. The understanding of the constitutive manifold of architecture can increase the ability of society to configure past concretisations in healthy and creative ways.

Conclusions This chapter illustrates that architecture, by considering it through a phenomenological lens as a manifold of layers, can contain several understandings. The pertinent evaluation of these layers may be a useful tool in the decisions that conservation involves. The analysis of the possible modes of being of architecture in conservation shows an evolution towards a new model more consistent with recent trends. The additional concern of sociological issues regarding collective memory constitutes evidence of phenomena of assimilation of change. In order to decide which CSA a given society intends to conserve, a phenomenological analysis was carried out, which uncovered intentionalities that convert it into something valuable. Thus, the interdisciplinary method 127

F. Meraz suggested here depends on the conception of architecture as a manifold of architectural objects which can be phenomenologically analysed. In contrast to the usual models of considering valuable architecture as a historical monument or as a work of art, the proposed model takes CSA as a manifold of entities, some of them anchored in the same physical and material whole, and others constructed from individual and collective consciousness. If as professional conservators we intend to deal with them, we need to understand their essential nature. This could be done relying on methods outside of our disciplines, which are more focused on technical aspects despite the need for philosophical methodologies to identify values. The inclusion of research procedures borrowed from philosophical phenomenology brings the possibility to isolate and identify the elements of this manifold. A phenomenology of the experience of CSA and its ontological consequences could become an important tool to improve the adequacy of the proposals of intervention.

References Brandi, C. (1963). Teoria del restauro [Theory of restoration]. Torino: Einaudi. Brandi, C., Basile, G., Rockwell, C., Urbani, G., Stanley Price, N.P., and Bon, C. (2005). Theory of restoration. Roma: Istituto Centrale per il Restauro. Casey, E.S. (2000). Remembering, a phenomenological study. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Groat, L.N., and Wang, D. (2002). Architectural research methods. New York: John Wiley and Sons. Grondin, J. (1994). Introduction to philosophical hermeneutics. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. Halbwachs, M., and Coser, L.A. (1992). On collective memory. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Ingarden, R. (1964). Time and modes of being. Illinois: Thomas Springfield. Ingarden, R. (1989). Ontology of the work of art: The musical work, the picture, the architectural work, the film. Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press. Searle, J.R. (1995). The construction of social reality. London: Allen Lane. Thomasson, A.L. (2005). Ingarden and the ontology of cultural objects. In: A. Chrudzimski (Ed). Existence, culture, and persons: The ontology of Roman Ingarden. Frankfurt: Ontos. Viollet-le-Duc, E.-E. (1854). Dictionnaire raisonné de l’architecture française du XIe au XVIe siècle [Reasoned dictionary of French architecture from the 11th to the 16th century]. Paris: Bance. 128

Music – the visual arts – architecture

Music – the visual arts – architecture Meaning production in media systems Anna V. Ullrich In this chapter, I present a concept for analysing the cultural production of meaning by reference. This concept allows us to compare from an interdisciplinary perspective different media strategies of reference by regarding them as sharing the same process to produce meaning. In media systems, there are diverse strategies for referring to existing materials. In language, we use commentaries or parodies; in the visual arts, imitations or adaptations; in music, samplings and variations; in films, various forms of remakes and even in architecture, copies or quotations of other buildings. Although a wide variety of forms, terms and techniques appear to be used in different media systems, each containing particular possibilities of reference, it seems that a common basic mechanism underlies all these procedures: the creation of new sense by using, adapting and contextualising existing materials within and also between media. Hence, I use an originally linguistic model called the ‘concept of transcription’ to clarify this process of referring and its consequences in symbol systems other than language. First, I introduce this concept and its terminology; then I apply its theoretical framework to some examples in the field of music, the visual arts and architecture, in particular to forms of quotation. In this way, it seems possible to relate different disciplines (musicology, art history, theory of architecture and cultural studies) and to apply the theoretical approach to varying products of a given culture.

Introduction Is there a similarity between a scientific work which cites other authors, on the one hand, and a hip-hop-song quoting pieces by classical composers, on the other? Both might be regarded as forms of appropriation. Within virtually every communication medium we can find various forms of reference and adaptation. These forms of reference are called parodies, collages, copies, homage, quotations, remakes or plagiarism and so forth. The variety of terms illustrates the spectrum and complexity of reference. Inside the terminological field, multiple intersections exist and it is therefore difficult to define and distinguish one kind from another. However, the terminological diversity reflects the cultural relevance of the 129

A.V. Ullrich different forms of adaptation. In general, we may say that an effect of the process of adaptation is the generation of new sense. In order to describe and analyse these productions of meaning by techniques of reference, I present a concept that allows these procedures to be expressed through various media systems. This ‘concept of transcription’ was developed by Ludwig Jäger (Jäger, 2002).

A concept for interdisciplinary cooperation Developed in the last six years, the concept of transcription represents a recent approach to study cultural semantics and has become popular in cultural studies in Germany. The collaborative Research Centre for Media and Cultural Communication in Cologne, funded by the German Research Association (DFG), concentrates, among other things, on transcription as a single cross-disciplinary research paradigm. As this theory is so recent, the literature has until now only been available in German. This chapter is, therefore, the first attempt to present the concept in English and to open this discussion about interdisciplinary research to the Anglophone scientific community. To affirm an interdisciplinary approach it is necessary to enumerate the disciplines which are connected by using this concept as meta-theory. In the definition of ‘discipline’ as institutionalised university disciplines, the concept links linguistics, cultural studies, musicology, art history, theory of architecture or film theory. In the framework of the model of transcription, we can relate knowledge of various disciplines to search for the common grounds, connections but also for media differences (for example between text and picture in case of quotation). The comparison of appropriations in different media and the forms of relations between media (for example an adaptation from picture to music) are not describable within the disciplines. The limits of disciplines can be exceeded by the terminological and theoretical inventory offered by Jäger’s concept (Jäger, 2002), so that synergy effects might be produced by the integration and combination of disciplinary knowledge about forms of appropriation. The theoretical framework of the concept provides the disciplines a consistent terminology and, in consequence, an insight into the analogies of practices of adaptation and of the media systems themselves. Furthermore, the concept combines the methodological lessons that we have learned through intertextuality, semiotics and media theories. Each research area encompasses a debate with wide ramifications for their objects and objectives. For the purposes of this paper, we can make the following general points: intertextuality is concerned with the correlations 130

Music – the visual arts – architecture and references between texts. Gérard Genette defines intertextuality as the presence of text in another as quotation, allusion or plagiarism – for example in the case of scientific work (Genette, 1993). In the following, I would like to extend the consideration of references and analyse adaptations in music, the visual arts and architecture. Within the concept of transcription, we augment intertextual approaches in the light of media. Music, pictures and architecture are not sufficiently describable in textual terminologies because they work in a different way to text. For instance, the sign system of pictures is quite different to that of writing. Therefore, it is also necessary to analyse the special use we make of media and their conditions. In this context, the approaches and findings of media theories are useful. We can classify media in general as media of sensory perception (light, space, time, sound waves), semiotic media of communication (special sign systems as writing, music, picture, architecture) and technical media of distribution (radio, TV, internet) (e.g. Sandbothe, 2001). Following this definition the research topic in this paper are the semiotic media. Each of these media has its own materialities, particular conditions, and procedures to generate things; each possesses its own system of signs, which is organised in a different way. According to Marshall McLuhan, ‘the medium is the message’ (McLuhan, 1964). We can adopt this position by saying that the medium forms the message sent in the medium. The medium’s particular function is to create sense (Krämer, 1998). Consequently, the message is not the same as an acoustic, pictorial or textual message. It is not neutral information which can switch between various media. Also, the different media allow different ways of accessing the world and, as a result, they generate diverse ways of producing and structuring potentials of knowledge. We live in a world of media signs and we have no way of understanding anything apart from signs and the codes into which they are organized.

Media references as transcriptions First, I shall introduce the concept and its particular terminology; then I will apply the theoretical framework to examples in music, visual arts and architecture. The assortment of examples of three media systems allows us to understand the plurality of cultural products and of the ways in which they produce meaning. The concept of transcription describes processes of adaptation. We may say that adaptation is a procedure of ‘transcription’. Transcriptions are characteristic actions of each media system and can be regarded as a fundamental strategy to produce meaning in a particular culture by means of references. In this way, we can distinguish references within single symbol systems, called ‘intramedial’, and between different systems, 131

A.V. Ullrich which are said to be ‘intermedial’. Intramedial self-references, then, have a long tradition in the visual arts; the spectrum extends from homage and study copies of the old artistic paragons to parodies, allusions and ironical quotations in the 20th century. For instance, Pablo Picasso deals with examples of art history: he painted more than forty variations on Velázquez’s ‘Las Meninas’ and numerous paraphrases on Manet’s theme ‘Déjeuner sur l’herbe’ (Zuschlag, 2002). By comparison the painter Paul Klee produced intermedial references: he examines the relations between music on the one hand and the visual arts and painting on the other among others in the watercolour ‘Fugue in Red’ (1921) (Düchting, 2003). Hence, Klee transforms the fugue, the musical principle for composing with a special arrangement of parts in form of imitation, into a visual representation. An interesting intermedial case are the ‘History Portraits’ that the artist Cindy Sherman created from 1988 to 1990; she re-enacts the picture ‘Bacchus’ by Caravaggio, imitates the arrangement herself (clothes, attitude, gesture of the figure, colours of the picture, and so on) and thus ‘translates’ the picture into a photograph (Aigner, 1993). The adaptation takes place in the artistic discourse of visual representation. However, Sherman also transforms the tableau into photography and plays in an intermedial way with the medial contrast and photography’s apparent quality of representing reality. As we have seen, processes of transcription can be based on different materials. Following this fact all cultural materials such as texts, songs, sequences in films and pictorial topics are resources for transcription, called ‘scripture’. Scripture is the overarching concept for all medial and cultural products. These scriptures can be used for transcriptional processes. They can be isolated from their contexts, modified, ‘transcribed’, and reintegrated into new contexts. According to Jäger, this cultural activity of cutting and inserting (copy and paste) should be labelled ‘transcription’. In the procedure of transcription several different statuses of scriptures can be distinguished: the source of the transcriptural procedure is called ‘prescript’, or ‘script’ where the prescript is viewed in retrospect the procedure of transcription. Prescript and script refer to the same scripture, but the terms indicate different perspectives on it. In the former case the recipient looks at the scripture before a transcription starts, in the latter case he or she interprets the source from the point of view of the transcription itself. Finally, the result of the transcriptural process is called ‘transcript’ (Jäger, 2002). For how long have transcriptions been used? We can ascertain that transcriptural practices are relevant in each epoch and genre in creative processes. Depending on historical circumstances, contexts, vogues and cultural conceptions diverse forms of appropriation and modification have 132

Music – the visual arts – architecture been developed. In the history of music in the 19th century, for example, quotations appear in many compositions, because in this period, a binding canon of important cultural works emerges (Lissa, 1970). In consequence, artists are able to refer to this cultural standard and play with allusions and subtexts. What is the result of a transcriptural activity? By using this technique old scriptures can be reused, rearranged and re-contextualised. So, in dealing with a transcription, scriptures which may have been forgotten in a culture can be reactivated for a new public. An adaptation allows for a new reading and interpretation of existing material; so new meaning is produced. To sum up: transcriptions engender not only new readability and the readdressing of scriptures but also produce semantic effects. Therefore, the production of sense is a result of transcription (Jäger, 2004; Jäger, 2008). To outline the transcriptural procedure, I will single out a particular form of adapting, quotation.

A special form of reference: quotation ‘Quotation’ is originally a linguistic category to describe direct and indirect speech in writing. But this term is also used in descriptions of compositions of musical scores, pictures or buildings by referring more or less explicitly to the linguistic idea of quotation. In every case quoting another scripture connects different contexts, places, periods, and semantic fields. Depending on the cultural conventions, one form is regarded as quotation, while the other as plagiarism. To start with, let us illustrate this phenomenon within the visual arts: The portrait of the ‘Mona Lisa’ by Leonardo da Vinci, painted between 1503 and 1506, is one of the most famous portraits in the world and most visited picture of the Louvre in Paris. In 1919, the year of the four hundredth anniversary of Leonardo da Vinci’s death, Marcel Duchamp formulated a pictorial answer to the Gioconda. He put his signature to a postcard reproduction of this painting and decorated the Mona Lisa with a beard and moustache as a man. Furthermore, Duchamp gives the work a new title: ‘L.H.O.O.Q’, which is homophone in French with ‘elle a chaud au cul’ (she’s got a hot arse) (Gamer, 2007). Through this quotation the meaning of the tableau is reinterpreted, the old semantic is confronted with a new, sardonic answer. In the 20th century an intensive artistic discussion about the Mona Lisa begins which produces a variety of literal comments, postcards, performances and so on – especially after the theft of the Mona Lisa from the Louvre 133

A.V. Ullrich in 1911 (recovered in 1913) and its voyage to the United States in 1963. The president John F. Kennedy announces the visit of the Mona Lisa as political symbol for the international understanding between France and the US. As reaction to this declaration, Andy Warhol arranges in the same year thirty Mona-Lisa-reproductions to a new picture and entitles his work ‘Thirty are better than one’. In Warhol’s oeuvre Mona Lisa appears as star faced with popular idols like Marilyn Monroe, Elvis Presley and Marlon Brando. Warhol reproduces his stars in screenprint by using submittals (photographs of the recent personalities and reproduction of the tableau for the Mona Lisa) (Lüthy, 1995). According to this procedure Warhol makes use of prescripts which are famous and popular and creates something new: his transcripts. Quotation also appears in the field of music: the modern German musician Bernd Alois Zimmermann inserts explicit, direct quotations in his composition. He cites a part of a prelude by Johann Christian Bach correctly in his work ‘Monologue for two pianos’ from 1964 and confronts this prescript with his own modern music passages. In the score, Zimmermann notes that the pianists should clearly announce the citation in the performance. And finally: what might a quotation in architecture look like? In architecture we can consider quotations of famous structures, architectural elements or spatial solutions and styles in a new building. For instance, the cladding of the Renaissance Palazzo Farnese in Rome, designed by Michelangelo, is quoted in the 19th century by Heinrich von Ferstel in the courtyard of the University of Vienna and also – more than a hundred years later – by Aldo Rossi at the Quartier Schützenstraße in Berlin (1997). In this case, the scripture of the Palazzo Farnese serves as several transcripts (in Vienna and Berlin) and develops diverse connotations in differing architectural contexts.

Original and secondary forms Thus the practice of transcription has the following implications: by referring and adopting our perspective of the old scripture is significantly modified. According to Jäger’s theory this aspect has consequences for the review on ‘original’ and secondary forms. He states that ‘original’ is not comprehended as the nature or as the attribute of a scripture. Rather, it is a status depending on existing adaptations of it. From the perspective of various adaptations, the recipient is able to designate an original ex post facto on which all others are based. Thus the status as original only results from the practices of transcription – hence, any original actually 134

Music – the visual arts – architecture needs transcriptions and depends on the perspective and knowledge the recipient has. For example, if we know the variations of the Mona Lisa, we observe the work in the context of the changing knowledge about the work and we recognize the Mona Lisa as original. Furthermore a scripture has no defined sense itself; semantic is produced by semantic negotiations, by commentaries, paraphrases and explanations of the scripture. From this approach, secondary transcriptural forms possess a constitutive importance for a culture to create sense and to define their relevant originals as part of cultural knowledge. Thus the concept of transcription gives us a reinterpretation of the term ‘original’ and a reappraisal of cultural products.

References need recipients: Mona Lisa and Mao What is necessary for a transcription to be successful? Who is able to recognize a reference? An essential condition is that the observer must have knowledge of the prescript, the source, to interpret the reference and the semantics of the transcript. The success of the transcription therefore depends on the knowledge the recipients have and also on the target group addressed by the author. For instance, in Vienna, the architect Ernst Mayr built a new public library quoting the large outside staircase of the Casa Malaparte at Capri, also known through the film ‘Le mépris’ by JeanLuc Goddard (Sarnitz, 2003). However, the public did not understand his intentions; instead, the building is perceived as (being a simile of) a ship of books situated above the ordinary traffic in the street below. The knowledge of the observer is a mixture of personal knowledge and cultural knowledge. Therefore, the question is always which elements are present in cultural knowledge or memory and can be identified as allusion. Some scriptures have a higher presence in cultural knowledge than others. Everybody, for instance, knows the Mona Lisa. In art history numerous transcriptions of the Mona Lisa are documented; I mentioned above the oeuvres of Duchamp and Warhol. One can also mention Roman Cieílewicz’s work from 1977: he arranged a reproduction of the Mona Lisa’s face with the typical cap and suit of Mao Tse-Tung and titled this work of art as ‘Mona Tse-Tung’ (Lüthy, 1995). Also in the popular field, the status of the iconic figure of European history of art and the myth of the woman with the enigmatic smile are used in several advertisements. So we can conclude that reference is a process: a circle of references which can never be finished; instead it may always be started again with new readings of pre-existent materials. 135

A.V. Ullrich We can identify forms of intra- and intermedial transcription in ‘high’ and ‘low culture’, in contexts of science, the arts or everyday life. For instance the fashion industry is currently reviving styles, cuttings, and patterns of the fifties or eighties. Sometimes designers get their inspiration from artworks, for example the designer Viktor and Rolf transform the photography ‘Le violon d’Ingres’ (1924) of Man Ray into a black and white gown: The cello’s sound holes on the woman’s naked back appear on the front of the gown (Elle fashion magazine, 2008). Thus the adaptations are all based on references to existing cultural products thus creating the new by using and modifying the old. The motives for recycling cultural material are either commercial or pragmatic or derive from creative inspiration or analytical and aesthetic causes. To explain in more detail possible motives for referring to other scriptures and for relating different contexts using this technique, I will turn to the architectural field and its use of quotations.

Architecture: References in the postmodernism and historicism

contexts

of

In general, what motivates the practice of quoting in architecture? In the history of architecture, quotations were primarily used for political purposes to produce symbolic gestures of victory, annexation and repression (Schwarz, 1988). In the historicism of the 19th century quotations were used to legitimate and authorise pretensions of power by referring to history in order to consign it into a genealogy. In the context of postmodernism, in contrast, quotations are used precisely to demonstrate an ironical distance from history. What we find is a creative form of play with architecture as a building set, with meanings of historical forms, and their original function. At the complex ‘Antigone’ in Montpellier (France) the architect Ricardo Bofill, for instance, uses enlarged columns to hide the staircases inside them. The function and the symbolism of the dignified and lordly columns are thus altered. Columns, originally used for temples of Grecian gods, are now applied to modern council housing (Collomb, 2002). Quotations in historicism display clear references to historical monuments, while the quotations in postmodern contexts are often unspecified allusions to history without a specific object of quotation (Haiko and Reissberger, 1989). Aside from sophisticated allusions to historical forms of architecture in the context of postmodernism, the industry of mall architecture plays with references too. American everyday architecture, such as prefabricated houses with historical decorations or shopping malls 136

Music – the visual arts – architecture with fake small-town character, uses different stylistic quotations to tie in with the dignity of historical forms or to create an atmosphere of an unspecified past (Wefing, 2004). The historical allusions are intended to create an ancient atmosphere; architecture thus provides the stimulating background for shopping.

Conclusion To summarise, various medial forms of reference, especially quotations, are considered as techniques of transcription. An answer is given to the questions where transcriptions are used, why, when and what is adapted and what the consequences of this procedure are. Furthermore, the role of recipients for a transcription to be successful and the importance of adapting practices for a culture are modified. So, the lesson learned by the transcription is that new sense is generated in media by re-contextualising cultural products in the interplay of repetition of the old and contrast with the new. Transcriptions in all media allow scriptures to be readdressed to another group of recipients and to make them readable again. In this way, cultural knowledge and memory is constituted and preserved. In this respect, such a cultural methodological approach as this concept gives a theoretical framework in which cultural productions can be described and analysed. It is possible to reflect both on scientific works as transcriptional process and on the significance of adaptation forms in culture in general outside in the division between high and low culture. In general, the difficulty of this scientific collaboration entails reflecting the different disciplinary terminologies (for example the various uses of ‘quotation’) and to find a common basis for discussion without disregarding the disciplinary differentiations. But to conclude, it seems necessary and fruitful to leave the disciplinary analysis of symbol systems and to discuss the specialised knowledge of the transcriptural connections between text, image, sound and so forth. Following the definition of ‘interdisciplinarity’ of the Centre for Educational Research and Innovation (CERI). This refers to the interaction of disciplines which is offered in the concept (CERI, 1972). Perhaps the concept of transcription possesses the potential for ‘transdisciplinary research’ as well, for common terms and methods in a meta-theory.

Acknowledgements I am very grateful to Adam Fergus for reviewing this text. 137

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References Aigner, C. (1993). Diskurse der Bilder [Discourses of pictures.] In: W. Seipel (Ed), Diskurse der Bilder. Photokünstlerische Reprisen kunsthistorischer Werke. Vienna: Catalogue for exhibitions Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna. Centre for Educational Research and Innovation (CERI) (1972). Interdisciplinarity: Problems of teaching and research in Universities. Paris: Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Collomb, M. (2002). Zitat und Ironie in der Baukunst und Literatur der Gegenwart [Quotation and irony in contemporary architecture and literature]. Stuttgart: DAV-Stiftung. Düchting, H. (2001). Paul Klee. Malerei und Musik [Paul Klee. Painting and music]. Munich: Prestel. Elle fashion magazine, February 2008, p. 26-30. Gamer, E.-C. (2007). Überlegungen zur Interikonizität. Malewitsch, Duchamp, Warhol und die Mona Lisa [Considerations about intericonicy. Malewitsch, Duchamp, Warhol and the Mona Lina]. In: K. Herrmann and S. Hübenthal (Eds), Intertextualität. Perspektiven auf ein interdisziplinäres Arbeitsfeld. Aachen : Shaker. Genette, G. (1993). Palimpseste. Die Literatur auf zweiter Stufe [Palimpseste. Literature at a second degree]. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp. Heiko. P., and Reissberger, M. (1988). Vom gebundenen Zitat der Historie im Historismus zum ungebundenen Umgang mit Geschichtlichkeit in der Postmoderne [From integrated quotation of history in historicism to free handlings of historicity in postmodernism]. Marburger Jahrbuch für Kunstwissenschaft, 22, 247-250. Jäger, L. (2002). Transkriptivität. Zur medialen Logik der kulturellen Semantik [Transcriptivity. About the media logic of cultural semantic] In: L. Jäger and G. Stanitzek (Eds), Transkribieren. Medien/Lektüre. Munich: Fink. Jäger. L. (2004). Störung und Transparenz. Skizze zur performativen Logik des Medialen [Disturbance and transparency. Outline about the performative logic of the medial]. In: S. Krämer (Ed), Performativität und Medialität. Munich: Fink. Jäger, L. (2006). Transkriptive Verhältnisse. Zur Logik intra- und intermedialer Bezugnahmen in ästhetischen Diskursen [Transcriptive relations. About logic of intra- and intermedial references in aesthetic discourses]. In: G. Buschmeier, U. Konrad and A. Riethmóller (Eds), Transkription und Fassung. Mainz: Academie der Wissenschaften un der Literatur. Krämer, S. (1998). Das Medium als Spur und als Apparat [The medium as trace and apparatus]. In: S. Krämer (Ed), Medien, Computer, Realität. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp. 138

Music – the visual arts – architecture Lissa, Z. (1970). Ästhetische Funktionen des musikalischen Zitats [Aesthetic functions of the musical quotation]. In: A.J. Greimas et al. (Eds), Sign, language, culture. The Hague, Paris: Mouton. Lüthy, M. (1995). Andy Warhol. Thirty are better than one. Frankfurt/ Main, Leipzig: Insel. McLuhan, M. (1964/1995). Understanding media: The extensions of man. London: Routledge. Sandbothe, M. (2001). Pragmatische Medienphilosophie [Pragmatical philosophy of media]. Weilerswist: Velbrück Wissenschaft. Sarnitz, A. (2003). Wien 1975-2005: Neue Architektur [Vienna 1975-2005: New architecture]. Vienna: Springer. Schwarz, H.-P. (1988). Architektur als Zitat-Pop? Zur Vorgeschichte der postmodernen Architektur [Architecture as pop-quotation? About postmodern architecture]. In: P. Kemper (Ed), Postmoderne oder der Kampf um die Zukunft. Die Kontroverse in Wissenschaft, Kunst und Gesellschaft. Frankfurt/Main: Fischer. Wefing, H. (2004). I feel lost without columns. Oberservations on the continued influence of Post-Modernism on American everyday architecture. In: I. Flagge and R. Schneider (Eds), Post-modernism revisited. Frankfurt/Main: Junius. Zuschlag. C. (2002). Vom Kunstzitat zur Metakunst. Kunst über Kunst im 20. Jahrhundert [From the quotation in arts to meta-art. Art about art in the 20th century]. In: E. Mai and K. Wettengl (Eds), Wettstreit der Künste. Malerei und Skulptur von Dürer bis Daumier. Wolfratshausen: Edition Minerva.

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Interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience

The need for and challenges of interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience Alzheimer’s disease as a critical example Marie-Christine Pardon The accelerating need to increase our basic understanding of the complexity of biological systems and the escalating costs of health care are the major drivers of interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience. The lack of cure for Alzheimer’s disease, the most prevalent senile dementia, is a typical example of a new public health challenge that can only be tackled by interdisciplinary research. Such a complex problem comprises a number of interconnected issues at the interface of several disciplines, and can thus only be solved through integrated expertise spread across these different disciplines. Recent human epidemiological studies suggest a role of stress in the pathological process of Alzheimer’s disease. By bringing together clinical and non-clinical experts in highly regarded interdisciplinary areas of neuroscience research, such as physics, cognitive and biological sciences, we have started to investigate the role of stress in the early development of Alzheimer’s disease at the level of the whole animal. Overall, our work allows identification of behavioural and neuropathological changes specific to the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease and markers of disease progression which are sensitive to environmental influences and can be translated to the human situation in collaboration with clinical expertise. Although we had some success, the progress in achieving such an ambitious research programme is limited by institutional and practical barriers, which can be overcome through the development of an interdisciplinary culture that will change the way funding bodies, graduate schools and scientists think and act, without dismissing the critical role of disciplinary research in interdisciplinary success.

The need for interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience Research in biomedical neuroscience is largely concerned with the development of knowledge and techniques relevant to the understanding of normal brain function, its deregulation in mental diseases and with the application of this knowledge and techniques to prevention, diagnosis, 141

M-C. Pardon treatment, and rehabilitation. By definition, neuroscience is an interdisciplinary field, that results from the integration of interests from many disciplines including cognitive, biological and computer sciences, statistics, physics, and medicine, into the scientific experimental and theoretical investigation of the nervous systems of biological organisms. Traditionally, the study of behavioural processes was dealt with by psychologists in humans and ethologists in animals, while biologists were focusing on the structural, cellular and molecular brain processes. Researchers in these disciplines used to have little interaction, but these now appear essential due to the accelerating need to increase our basic understanding of the complexity of biological systems (Tadmor and Tidor, 2005). A good illustration of this phenomenon is the recent editorial of Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, a scientific journal whose focus was on classic sub-areas of ethology, the evolution of behaviour and its functional significance, and is now seeking submissions from the full range of neuroscientific disciplines aiming at illuminating the neural or cognitive mechanisms underlying behaviour (Ketterson, 2006). A number of factors including the shift from acute to chronic conditions due to medical progress and ageing of the population, persistence of health disparities, new public challenges and emerging infectious diseases resulting from rapid changes in lifestyle and environment, have led to the rapidly escalating cost of health care and are major drivers of the need for interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience, especially for those programmes that have the potential to translate laboratory discoveries into new treatment for patients (Zerhouni, 2005, 2006). Studies of the central nervous system have thus become a critical health issue leading to the involvement of more medical fields in neuroscience, including neurology and psychiatry, whose goal is the understanding and treatment of pathological brain processes, whilst the rapid development of pharmacotherapy for mental diseases from the middle of the 20th century has shifted the focus of many behavioural neuroscientists from the basic understanding of behavioural processes to the use of behavioural parameters to identify the therapeutic potential of drugs. The present chapter examines the need for interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience and its application to Alzheimer’s research as a critical illustration of the challenges faced by using this approach.

The need for interdisciplinary Alzheimer’s research Alzheimer’s disease in brief Alzheimer’s disease is the most prevalent senile dementia currently affecting approximately 400,000 people over the age of 60 in the UK (5% over 65 142

Interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience and 25% over 85), costing £11 billion a year (Alzheimer’s society, 2007). Given the increase in life expectancy, this number is estimated to quadruple over the next 40 years. This will have a disastrous economic impact as there is currently no treatment available to stop the neurodegenerative process. Indeed, Alzheimer’s disease is characterized by two abnormal structures called plaques and tangles whose accumulation damages and kills nerve cells (Wenk, 2003). Plaques build up between nerve cells. They contain deposits of a protein fragment called beta-amyloid that is normally found in a soluble form in the healthy brain. Tangles form inside dying cells. Tangles are twisted fibres of another protein called tau and referred to as tau pathology. The accumulation of these markers with time leads to a total disruption of the communication between cells, severe brain atrophy and to a progressive deterioration of cognitive function that culminates into the death of the patients after 6 to 8 years. Cognitive changes start with the loss of recent (episodic) memories (Backman et al., 2001) and gradually affect all cognitive domains together with non-cognitive symptoms such as anxiety, sleeplessness or agitation (Cummings and McPherson, 2001). At present, managing Alzheimer’s disease usually involves palliative medications to control behavioural symptoms and ease the suffering of the patients. These are, however, incapable of delaying disease progression. They do not target the underlying neuropathological processes, which are far from being understood.

Why traditional disciplinary research cannot help to cure Alzheimer’s disease Alzheimer’s disease is a typical example of a new public health challenge deriving from changes in environmental conditions and for which traditional disciplinary research has so far failed. Indeed, the ageing of the population is a recent phenomenon due to the major improvement of living conditions from the end of the 19th century, leading to a substantial increase in the mean life-span from 35 to 80 years (Viidik, 1999). Thus, just over a hundred years ago, in 1906, a German doctor, Alois Alzheimer, discovered this senile dementia by identifying two major abnormalities in the brain tissue of a lady who died of a mental disease unusual at the time. These were abnormal clumps (now called amyloid plaques) and tangled bundles of fibres (now called neurofibrillary tangles), which are still today considered as the only valid signatures of Alzheimer’s disease (Moller and Graeber, 1998). Whilst currently about 15% of the population of developed countries is aged over 65, this proportion is expected to reach 20% by 2030 and to increase from 6.9 to 12% worldwide (Kinsella and Velkoff, 2001). Age-related disorders which were very rare have now rapidly evolved into being the major concern of modern societies and 143

M-C. Pardon the development of effective treatment for these conditions constitutes an unprecedented research challenge. There are several reasons why interdisciplinary research appears as the only strategy for the future treatment of Alzheimer’s disease. This vast and complex problem comprises a number of interconnected sets of issues ultimately leading to inappropriate treatment strategies. These include the lack of knowledge of the causes of the disease, of the underlying mechanisms, of valid pre-mortem diagnostic tools and of suitable animal models (Figure 1). Given their multifaceted nature, these issues cannot be understood using insights from one discipline alone, thus requiring interactive expertise spread across different disciplines. Causes Unknown

Disease mechanisms Unknown Observation of final markers

Late

Late

inappropriate

inaccurate

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Figure 1. The complex problem of developing effective treatment for Alzheimer’s disease. A set of interconnected issues at multiple levels leads to a cycle whereby the lack of knowledge of the etiology of Alzheimer’s disease limits our understanding of the underlying pathological process, the development of effective treatment and of diagnostic tools, which itself negatively impact on the identification of causal factors. The first major issue is the limited knowledge of the causes of Alzheimer’s disease beside age, which is an uncontrollable factor. The aetiology of this debilitating disorder is believed to be multifactorial. In about 5% of the cases, Alzheimer’s disease is familial and due to a mutation to one of three 144

Interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience identified genes (amyloid precursor protein (APP), presenilin (PS) 1 or 2) causing early onset of the disease (before the age of 65). By contrast, there is only one confirmed genetic risk for the frequent late-onset sporadic form of Alzheimer’s disease and belief that it results from many interactions between genetic and environmental factors (Rocchi et al., 2003). The symptoms and neurological changes, however, are identical in both forms, although the different origin suggests that there may not be a single underlying pathological mechanism. Research has so far focused on the amyloid cascade hypothesis, whereby altered processing of amyloid leads to its accumulation in the form of insoluble deposits and initiates a cascade of events culminating in the deterioration of brain function (Hardy and Allsop, 1991). This hypothesis, however, is far from being fully proven (Hardy, 2006), thus stressing the need to apprehend the question of the pathological processes from different angles. In this respect, the study of the role of environmental factors in the progression of Alzheimer’s disease, which has so far been neglected, may help identifying new key pathological targets and to develop preventive behavioural interventions, through the involvement of epidemiologists, psychologists and behavioural neuroscientists. A second set of issues arises from poor diagnosis. Alzheimer’s disease is only one of many forms of senile dementia which differ by their underlying mechanisms and there is currently no pre-mortem diagnostic tool allowing differentiating them with certainty (Mendez, 2006). A diagnosis of possible or probable Alzheimer’s disease is performed on the basis of a general health survey, cognitive assessment and some other non specific medical tests, but it can only be validated post-mortem by the presence of plaques and tangles in brain tissue. Thus, whenever targeted treatments will become available, it will be very difficult to ensure that the patients receive the drug appropriate to their condition, which limits the efficacy of treatment strategies. In addition, such diagnosis of probable Alzheimer’s disease can only be made during advanced stages of the disease, when it is too late for administrating treatments with the potential to delay disease progress because of the extensive neuronal death at the time. Thus, beyond the development of non-invasive diagnostic tools for Alzheimer’s disease, it is essential to identify biomarkers sensitive enough to predict conversion of mild cognitively impaired subjects to Alzheimer’s disease, and to allow monitoring the disease progress under different treatment conditions (DeKosky and Marek, 2003). This issue of diagnosis cannot be addressed adequately without integrated collaborations from experts and methods from different disciplines. 145

M-C. Pardon For instance, the rapid development of brain imaging techniques is a great promise for detection and monitoring of chronic conditions. The coordinated work of neurologists with physicists, cognitivists and biologists will allow establishing MRI markers of neurological hallmarks of Alzheimer’s disease sensitive to the progression of cognitive changes. Lots of efforts have been made recently to image amyloid deposits, as this marker is present in animal models of the disease, and this led to trials in human patients (Rowe et al., 2007). Since the causing role of amyloid in the disease process is yet to be proven, a better understanding of the disease process is also essential to the development of adequate diagnosis tools. Finally, another major blockade to the improvement of therapeutic strategies is the lack of an appropriate animal model, which limits the identification of new therapeutic targets. To date, the only available models are genetically modified animals. Most of them over-express APP and/or PS1 to model the familial form of Alzheimer’s disease (5% of the cases) but they are incomplete; they solely recapitulate the age-dependent amyloid deposition and cognitive dysfunction, but not the tau pathology and the neurodegeneration (Schwab et al., 2004). Most of the main features of Alzheimer’s disease have been reproduced only once recently by combining a mutation of tau protein (proline-to-leucine mutation at codon 301, a genetic risk for fronto-temporal dementia) to existing APP/ PS1 models (Oddo et al., 2003). Induction of Alzheimer’s-like pathology by this mean, however, does not model the aetiology of the human condition, and therefore little can be expected for the understanding of the disease process. In my opinion, this unconditional use of genetic manipulation to model nearly every pathological condition has become a key issue in biomedical neuroscience. The technique of knocking-down or overexpressing genes is well mastered, but in many cases, such as sporadic Alzheimer’s disease, genetic risks factors do not play a major role. Further understanding of the disease is thus, to some extent, dependent on innovative approaches to mimic the inducing conditions for Alzheimer’s disease in animals, by bringing together clinicians, epidemiologists and behavioural neuroscientists. To summarise, not knowing the causes of Alzheimer’s disease critically limits the understanding of the mechanisms underlying its progression, which in turn limits the identification of potential therapeutic targets and results in late, inaccurate diagnosis. Altogether, this leads to an inability to cure the disease or even to develop novel treatment options. At the preclinical level, the problem is complicated by the lack of an appropriate animal model, able to recapitulate many of the symptoms and neurological changes seen in Alzheimer’s disease and allowing novel hypotheses to be 146

Interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience tested. The lack of knowledge of the causes and pathological mechanisms also limits the development of such a model. Epidemiology

Genetics

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Figure 2. Diagram illustrating how integrated expertise through interdisciplinary research programmes can help solving the problem of treatment of Alzheimer’s disease. In this context, excessive specialisations will very unlikely lead to some success due to the multiplicity of interacting factors involved in the problem of treatment for Alzheimer’s disease (Figure 1). This question needs to be tackled from various angles and methods through integrated research that can account for the interplay of many factors across traditional disciplines (Figure 2). The involvement of essential disciplinary expertise and the integration and synthesis of the findings via interdisplinary research programmes is likely to result in major advances for the basic understanding of Alzheimer’s disease, other dementias of ageing, and the ageing brain as well as the development of drug and behavioural interventions for treating these diseases, preventing their onset and progression, and maintaining health.

An interdisciplinary research into the role of stress in the early development of Alzheimer’s disease Description of the work Over the past few years, I have developed a new interdisciplinary research programme that aims to better understand the role of stress in the progression of amyloid deposition and related symptoms in a genetic mouse model of Alzheimer’s disease. Indeed, recent human epidemiological studies 147

M-C. Pardon have reported a greater frequency of chronic stressful events prior to the onset of Alzheimer’s disease (Clement et al., 2003; Mejia et al., 2003). Susceptibility to stress is also associated with a doubled risk of later developing Alzheimer’s disease (Mejia et al., 2003; Wilson et al., 2006) and correlates with the level of episodic memory impairment during the disease (Wilson et al., 2004). Furthermore, environmental manipulations known to reduce the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease, such as exercise, improve coping with stress in humans (Unger et al., 1997). This suggests a role for stress-responsive systems in the development of Alzheimer’s disease, corresponding with emerging evidence from animal studies (for review (Pardon, 2007; Pardon and Rattray, 2008)). By bringing together clinical and non-clinical experts in highly regarded interdisciplinary areas of neuroscience research we have started to investigate the role of stress in the early development of Alzheimer’s disease at the level of the whole animal, by looking at brain-behaviour interactions. This pre-clinical interdisciplinary study combining behavioural, histopathological, and molecular approaches has so far demonstrated that repeated exposure to a mild stressor (unfamiliar cage) at a pre-pathological age partially improved the progression of pathological markers in a double transgenic APP/PS1 mouse model of Alzheimer’s disease. Indeed, we found that 5 weeks of exposure to repeated novel cage stress from adulthood prevented the onset of a short-term memory deficit, which in human Alzheimer’s patients is the first sign of cognitive deterioration, and attenuated accumulation of the main hallmark of pathology (e.g. amyloid) in the brain, without affecting the age-related increase in regional brain endocannabinoid levels (Pardon et al., 2007), suggesting that endocannabinoid signalling does not participate in novel-cage-induced improvement of early Alzheimer’s-like changes. Our ongoing work aims at identifying non-invasive (MRI) markers of stress-induced improvement of amyloid and cognitive changes in the mouse model which can be translated to humans for early detection and monitoring of Alzheimer’s pathology. Overall, these studies and ongoing work allow identification at the whole animal level of changes specific to the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease and markers of disease progression which are sensitive to environmental influences. This work may lead to the identification of novel potential therapeutic targets for the cognitive deterioration in human Alzheimer’s disease. Further work will apply pharmacological manipulations and genetic tools (gene profiling, stem cell research) to identify the underlying mechanisms involved so that the work in the transgenic mouse can be translated to the human situation in collaboration with clinical expertise. This unique inter-disciplinary approach is essential for the understanding of complex normal and pathological processes and will have a major 148

Interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience clinical impact on human health by providing novel insights into the understanding and treatment of brain disorders. Challenges to interdisciplinary collaborations and lessons learned Theoretically, the main advantages of interdisciplinary research include the gain in research quality, in depth and breadth, and in innovation by combining complementary individual expertises, thinking outside the ‘box’ and constituting a new methodological framework. In practice, this is difficult to achieve, particularly because of the tradition of having a single principal investigator per research programme. This unique principal investigator thus needs to have extremely strong leadership skills to motivate all collaborators in investing lots of efforts and resources into the project, but in reality, the collaborators have their own priorities within their own disciplines. As a consequence, the research is likely to gain in breadth, through the use of methods across different disciplines, but not in-depth as the investment of multiple principal investigators expert in different facets of a common question, is essential to the finding of innovating solutions. Interdisciplinary projects are thus often seen as lacking rigour and synthesis, an issue currently being recognised by funding bodies. For example, the National Institute of Health, the main funding agency for US biomedical research, initiated in 2006 a pilot scheme using multiple principal investigators on selected programme grants (National Institutes of Health (NIH), 2006). Clearly, successful interdisciplinarity is not dissociable from traditional disciplinary research, but complementary by the integration of disparate disciplinary expertise. At present, many interdisciplinary projects are built around graduate students (Tadmor and Tidor, 2005). To my experience, integrating graduate students in interdisciplinary projects certainly helps the completion of experiments and the development of new methodologies at the interface of different disciplines. The current graduate education, however, does not prepare students for interdisciplinary research (Golde and Gallagher, 1999). Immersion into intensive research experience can effectively qualify students to tackle interdisciplinary research questions on their own, providing that they can fully integrate into several research groups and learn how each one thinks and approaches problems (Tadmor and Tidor, 2005), but very few have the necessary knowledge and intellectual maturity to be capable of analysing, evaluating and synthesising information from multiple sources. Therefore, the students often lack expertise in their research question, although the experience of interdisciplinary research provides them with a range of transferable skills and diversifies their potential career paths in the sciences. 149

M-C. Pardon The question of the choice of collaborators is fundamental for successful interdisciplinary research programmes. As a principal investigator, I particularly enjoy the intellectual stimulation of having to learn and appreciate differing perspectives and methods, the opportunity to look across different disciplines and to develop a more comprehensive picture of the research problem. I perceive interdisciplinarity as a state of mind that all collaborators should have. For instance, engaging in an interdisciplinary collaboration for methodological benefits will fail without such a meeting of minds. Indeed, the necessary innovation and progress only arise if experts from the different disciplines can reflect on each other’s findings to create new knowledge in their own discipline. This openness to interdisciplinary research is essential to overcome the very common practical difficulties in organizing meetings, developing a common language and agreement for the best research strategy, which is likely to vary across disciplines, and ways of looking at problems from a perspective different from our own discipline. Interdisciplinary researchers are often confronted with difficulties in their career progression and success in obtaining funding. This was rather an advantage to me for obtaining a secure position due to the strong commitment of the University of Nottingham to develop translational interdisciplinary research. Along these lines, the interdisciplinary nature of my work helps to obtain further internal support through a range of pilot/strategic grant schemes, to establish the success of this approach. By contrast, interdisciplinarity is a major limitation to my ability to secure external funding and the source of non-consensual reviews, ranging from highly enthusiastic to strong recommendations to focus on my own area of expertise, via negative comments arising from the lack of knowledge of reviewers on some aspects of the project, in spite of the strong demands of the major funding bodies in Biomedical Neuroscience for interdisciplinary research programmes. This has led me to reduce the number of disciplines involved in grant applications, with some success, but with the ultimate goal of convincing potential funders of the feasibility and benefits of future larger interdisciplinary programmes.

Conclusions The accelerating need to increase our basic understanding of the complexity of biological systems and of bridging gaps between fundamental research and clinical care are the major drivers of interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience. By integrating the analytical strengths of separate scientific disciplines, we can broaden the scope of investigation into biomedical problems, and as such give rise to unexpected insights, that 150

Interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience will lead to better health care. To date, interdisciplinary research appears as the only strategy able to solve unprecedented research challenges such as the treatment of AD, but is still difficult to achieve, due to a range of institutional and practical barriers. To attain this goal, it is essential to develop an interdisciplinary culture that will change the way funding bodies, graduate schools and scientists think and act, without dismissing traditional disciplinary research which is critical to interdisciplinary success.

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M-C. Pardon Moller, H.J., and Graeber, M.B. (1998). The case described by Alois Alzheimer in 1911. Historical and conceptual perspectives based on the clinical record and neurohistological sections. European Archives of Psychiatry and Clinical Neuroscience, 248, 111-122. National Institutes of Health (2006). Multiple principal investigators website. Available online at http://grants.nih.gov/grants/multi_pi/ (Accessed September 2008). Oddo, S., Caccamo, A., Shepherd, J.D., Murphy, M.P., Golde, T.E., Kayed, R., Metherate, R., Mattson, M.P., Akbari, Y., and LaFerla, F.M. (2003). Triple-transgenic model of Alzheimer’s disease with plaques and tangles: intracellular Abeta and synaptic dysfunction. Neuron, 39, 409-421. Pardon, M.C. (2007). Stress and ageing interactions: A paradox in the context of shared etiological and physiopathological processes. Brain Research Reviews, 54, 251-273. Pardon, M.C., and Rattray, I. (2008). What do we know about the role of stress on ageing and the progression of age-related neurodegenerative disorders? Neuroscience and Biobehavioural Reviews, 32(6), 1103-1120. Pardon, M.C., Sarmad, S., Rattray, I., Bates, T.E., Scullion, G.A., Marsden, C.A., Barrett, D.A., Lowe, J., and Kendall, D.A. (2007). Repeated novel cage exposure-induced improvement of early Alzheimer’slike cognitive and amyloid changes in TASTPM mice is unrelated to changes in brain endocannabinoids levels. Neurobiology of Aging: doi: 10.1016/neurobiolaging.2007.10.002. Rocchi, A., Pellegrini, S., Siciliano, G., and Murri, L. (2003). Causative and susceptibility genes for Alzheimer’s disease: a review. Brain Research Bulletin, 61, 1-24. Rowe, C.C., Ng, S., Ackermann, U., Gong, S.J., Pike, K., Savage, G., Cowie, T.F., Dickinson, K.L., Maruff, P., Darby, D., Smith, C., Woodward, M., Merory, J., Tochon-Danguy, H., O’Keefe, G., Klunk, W.E., Mathis, C.A., Price, J.C., Masters, C.L., and Villemagne, V.L. (2007). Imaging betaamyloid burden in aging and dementia. Neurology, 68, 1718-1725. Schwab, C., Hosokawa, M., and McGeer, P.L. (2004). Transgenic mice overexpressing amyloid beta protein are an incomplete model of Alzheimer disease. Experimental Neurology, 188, 52-64. Tadmor, B., and Tidor, B. (2005). Interdisciplinary research and education at the biology-engineering-computer science interface: a perspective. Drug Discovery Today, 10,1183-1189. Unger, J.B., Johnson, C.A., and Marks, G. (1997). Functional decline in the elderly: evidence for direct and stress-buffering protective effects of social interactions and physical activity. Annals of Behavioural Medicine, 19, 152-160. 152

Interdisciplinary research in biomedical neuroscience Viidik, A. (1999). The biological aging is our inescapable fate--but can we modify it? Zeitschrift für Gerontologie und Geriatrie, 32, 384-389. Wenk, G.L. (2003). Neuropathologic changes in Alzheimer‘s disease. J Clin Psychiatry, 64, 9, 7-10. Wilson, R.S., Arnold, S.E., Schneider, J.A., Kelly, J.F., Tang, Y., and Bennett, D.A. (2006). Chronic psychological distress and risk of Alzheimer‘s disease in old age. Neuroepidemiology, 27, 143-153. Wilson, R.S., Fleischman, D.A., Myers, R.A., Bennett, D.A., Bienias, J.L., Gilley, D.W., and Evans, D.A. (2004). Premorbid proneness to distress and episodic memory impairment in Alzheimer’s disease. Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry, 75, 191-195. Zerhouni, E.A. (2005). US biomedical research: basic, translational, and clinical sciences. Journal of the American Medical Association, 294, 1352-1358. Zerhouni, E.A. (2006). Clinical research at a crossroads: the NIH roadmap. Journal of Investigative Medicine, 54, 171-173.

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Cross-disciplinary practice: applications to health care

Cross-disciplinary practice Applications to Health Care Zoe Stamataki Collaborative practice in health care refers to the Medical and Allied health professionals working together for a common goal, to improve patient outcomes, taking into account the needs of patients and their families. Subsequent tensions and power relationships between professionals, managers and consumers, affect a cross-disciplinary collaboration. This chapter examines the literature on the collaboration across different disciplines in health care, its importance and the challenges faced by those health care professionals who are dealing directly with patient care.

Defining multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary Health Care Health care professionals from a wide range of disciplines encounter opportunities to engage in cross-disciplinary, cross-professional practice, education and research. Collaboration in health care is not only encouraged by government policies and initiatives, but is also assumed to be an effective solution to many health care problems including the requirements for costeffective quality care. Current health care trends increase the demands for proposals directed towards multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research and practice (Lindeke and Block, 1998; Bishop, 2006). However, it is useful to examine some specifics and distinguish the ways in which these three models work. The term interdisciplinary practice is often associated with multidisciplinary or even transdisciplinary practice. Carrier and Kendall (1995; as cited in Barr, 1997) offer an exclusive distinction between the multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary teams in health care. According to them multidisciplinary work is ‘a cooperative enterprise in which traditional forms and divisions of professional knowledge are retained’ (Barr, 1997: p. 1005). In contrast, interdisciplinary work ‘implies a willingness to share and indeed give up exclusive claims to specialised knowledge and authority, if the needs of clients can be met more effectively by other professional groups’ (Barr, 1997: p. 1005). By this, it is meant that multidisciplinary care involves the sequential provision of discipline specific care by multiple providers, while interdisciplinary care involves the coordination, joint decision making, shared responsibility and shared authority (Lindeke and Block, 1998). 155

Z. Stamataki Therefore, multidisciplinary health care involves disciplines that treat patients independently and then share the information with each other, while interdisciplinary collaboration involves disciplines ‘bringing together’ their knowledge in an independent manner, but planning the care jointly (McCallin, 2001). Thus the purpose of the interdisciplinary group is to accomplish something that is too complex to be accomplished by one discipline alone. The increasing complexity of knowledge and skills results in increasing specialization within health care professions. While in the past the decisions and goals in health care were basically decided by medical personnel, the increasing complexity within health care requires the collaboration between specialists to optimise patient care (McCloskey and Maas, 1998). In addition, transdisciplinary teams involve specialists from different disciplines, whose roles are blurred as their professional roles overlap. Each team member must become sufficiently familiar with the concepts, approaches and frameworks of the other members, in order to be able to assume significant portions of the others’ roles (Hall and Weaver, 2001). Nowotny (2005) suggests that to practise in a transdisciplinary way requires time and patience to understand the language of the other relevant disciplines and to integrate a perspective to form a common goal.

Applications to Health care Service Given the necessity of collaboration in health care, regulatory policy documents have called for flexible collaborative partnerships that enable teams to meet specialist patients’ needs (DOH, 2000, 2001). Particular to nursing practice, Clause 4 of the NMC Code of Professional Conduct (Nursing and Midwifery Council, 2004) requires that nurses, midwives or specialist community public health nurses ‘… work cooperatively within teams and to respect the skills, expertise and contributions of their colleagues. They must treat them fairly and without discrimination’ (p. 7-8). Clause 8 of the NMC highlights that nurses ‘... must work with other members of the team to promote health care environments that are conducive to safe, therapeutic and ethical practice ...’ (p. 11). Both these statements reinforce the need for collaboration between nurses and other health professionals. Within health care practice, it is encouraged that traditional professional working boundaries should no longer exist, to enable the health care teams to deliver patient focused care. Consequently, today’s health care system identifies that better patient outcomes can be achieved by what is called interdisciplinary collaboration. This is an approach to bring together 156

Cross-disciplinary practice: applications to health care the different ‘stakeholders’ to solve complex health care delivery problems with an emphasis on providing efficient and quality service. The complex health care needs of patients, their families and the wider population in general means that one health discipline cannot operate in isolation from other disciplines. The role of the doctor and the nurse has long been recognised, but the role of other health care professionals or semiprofessionals is fundamental to the delivery of quality health care too. A strong health care service team is composed of various disciplines (multidisciplinary) with overlapping interests from different fields of science to work as one (interdisciplinary) (Bishop, 2006). Such a team can include nurses, physicians, pharmacists, social scientists, statisticians, biomedics, radiographers and so on. Each member of this team brings its own expertise to the field, which is necessary for the delivery of patient care. Not only that, the limited availability of hospital beds have shortened hospital stays, which in turn has increased the need for day-case and community treatment. At a policy level in the UK the NHS and Community Care Act was introduced to develop comprehensive services and increase the cost effectiveness, which required greater coordination of available services (DOH, 1990). This initiative changed the work of both the hospital and the community sectors, with major implications for the role of the different professionals in both settings (Boaden and Leaviss, 2000). For example, nurses and allied health care professionals practising at the hospital (occupational therapists, physiotherapists, dieticians etc.) deal with day-to-day patient care and monitoring, while working in collaboration with the physicians and the diagnostics (biomedics, radiographers etc.) who diagnose and plan treatment options. All these different disciplines are working closely with the primary sector, the community and social services for the smooth transition of the patient back home. Informally, all those professionals must communicate with one another in a timely manner regarding any change in the patients’ status. For example, the dietician must be informed of any changes in the appetite and the speech therapist of any swallowing difficulties, who in turn must inform the dietician. Decreased mobility should be reported to the physiotherapist and occupational therapist to provide the appropriate equipment at the hospital and home. The Social Worker needs to be informed of any changes in behaviour or any psychosocial needs of the patient. The doctor is routinely consulted for the patients’ medical needs, while the nursing staff implements the care and coordinates communication between the different professionals. Some may call these activities multiprofessional to avoid the confusion that arises when ‘discipline’ is used synonymously with ‘speciality’ within a given profession (Wilcock and Headrick, 2005). 157

Z. Stamataki This example suggests that effective group dynamics play an important role in the promotion of interdisciplinary collaboration. A concept analysis of the term ‘collaboration’ suggests that effective communication is a critical antecedent to collaboration and enables respect, sharing and trust. It is through communication that members of the team contribute to the planning, goal setting, assessment and evaluation of clinical outcomes (Heneman et al., 1995). Nelson et al. (2002) use the concept of macro-micro system to describe the health care organisations operating under different disciplines. According to this theory the health care system is composed of front line clinical microsystems, an overarching macrosystem and the patient population. The microsystems are composed of a group of people who work together to provide care for a population of patients. They are the essential building blocks of the health care system and contribute significantly to the outcomes seen. The macrosystems are composed of the microsystems and share the same goals. This approach can be linked to Schmitt’s (1991) earlier work on teams. Schmitt sorts the interdisciplinary health team literature into three different levels according to the linkage between the micro- and macrosystem. The first level includes a small group of people representing different disciplines, who share responsibility for the plan and care delivery of a specific cohort of patients. The second level is the unit-level microsystem, in which there is a mixture of staff involved with a different population of patients. The third level includes all the institutional policies that support the staff either from the first or second level. Schmitt introduces the concepts of team work and collaboration between these levels of relations falling between the macro- and micro-systems. Questions can then be raised regarding the effect of this collaboration on care delivery outcomes. An example of Schmitt’s (1991) and later Nelson et al.’s (2002) work is a study carried out in a hospital’s intensive care unit to measure the effect of collaboration in the risk adjusted unit mortality (Nembhard et al., 2007). Collaboration in this study was referred to front line staff sharing decision making authority, information and coordinating activities with their managers. It was found that staff participation and coordination had a beneficial effect on the organisational performance of the unit. The effects of participation were contingent on the type of participation. Participation in daily unit management had no effect on unit mortality, while participation in process improvement was positively referred to improvement in unit mortality. The implications of these findings for organisational learning, process improvement and resource management are substantial. These findings illustrate that shared decision-making and respectful collaboration 158

Cross-disciplinary practice: applications to health care are vital to enabling improvement in health-care organizations. They also highlight that involvement of front line staff in process improvement may be an effective strategy for other service organizations that face staff resistance to new routines.

Challenges and effects of collaboration across disciplines Collaboration is an important concept related to interdisciplinary practice. Dede (1996) identifies three components for a successful collaborative environment. These are the ‘social network capital’ which is referred to as an instant web of contacts with useful skills, the ‘knowledge capital’ which is a personal, distributed knowledge with just in-time answers to immediate questions and the ‘communion’, which refers to the psychological support from people who share common goals. Similarly, it has been highlighted that ‘a common objective, different professional contributions and a system of communication’ are important for inter-professional practice (Kane, 1975). However, to achieve cooperation and interdependence, teamwork and collaboration has to be worked out by the individual staff members who have a personal investment in the team’s success (McCallin, 2001). In practice, efforts to integrate patient care through collaboration of different services have been challenged by professional and organisational systems. Each discipline has its own values, approaches to problem solving and mechanisms for information exchange (Nembhard et al., 2007). While some teams appear to be interdisciplinary, others are in fact working ‘separately but in parallel’. They are characterised by different referral routes, little case relocation among team members and separate case recording systems (Barr, 1997). Organisations in any case have their own priorities that may minimise the demands for referrals, especially when different staff have their own caseload. In respect of that, Braye and Preston-Shoot (1995) highlight a number of difficulties with multidisciplinary teams including the coordination during hospital discharge, the exchange of information among team members of the primary, secondary and tertiary care and conflicts over demarcation of roles and care planning responsibilities. A review of the literature reveals that the collaborative environment has not as yet been fully achieved within health care practice. Role definition and power relationships based on traditional and historical boundaries continue to exist (Coombs, 2003). Despite that the evidence of mutually supportive relationships among different disciplines in health care is scarce, the antagonism between medical monopoly and control is well documented (Coombs and Ersser, 2004; McCallin, 2001; Fox, 1993). 159

Z. Stamataki These studies demonstrate that power and authority have traditionally been used to preserve the dominance of the medical profession in health care decision making over the other team members. Berwick (1996) argues that medical ‘single mindedness’ and monopoly are contrary to the concepts of collectivity and collaboration. However, inequalities of power may also be evident between junior and senior staff within the same discipline. Communication failures can emerge from junior staff being reluctant to communicate openly with senior staff members, because of their fear of either to appear incompetent, or of being rejected (Reader et al., 2007). This has fundamental ramifications for the quality of team decision making and the effectiveness of interprofessional working. It has also been suggested that collaboration is rarely used when there is a wide difference of power in the groups involved (McCloskey and Maas, 1998). Feiger and Schmitt (1979) examined the relationship between hierarchy and patient outcomes in long term care settings. They found that better outcomes were perfectly correlated with less hierarchy in the interaction patterns of team members. Moreover, one of the most difficult problems encountered in interdisciplinary practice is the perception and understanding of the disciplinary terminologies and language. For example, for the medics, the term interdisciplinary practice may mean collaboration among medical specialists, like cardiologists, surgeons and so on, rather than among diverse disciplines such as nurses or pharmacists (Bishop, 2006). Interpretation of different terminologies is influenced by personal and professional values, experience, knowledge and skills. Other commonly used words and phrases such as empowerment, collaboration, advocacy, or patient centred care can be interpreted differently by different team members. The confusion comes to light when it becomes necessary to take complex decisions about patient care (Barr, 1997). Health care professionals attempting to collaborate in a complex environment are often in conflict with other team members who share different values and paradigms. This can lead to problems when planning person centred care. For example, medics tend to use the patho-physiologic paradigm, social workers tend to use the individualistic paradigm, while nurses take a holistic approach, taking into account patients’ and their families’ wishes. Effective interdisciplinary collaboration and sharing information taking into account different values and paradigms would result in comprehensive, co-ordinated care (Lindeke and Block, 1998). One major cause for the problems examined is the structure of the current educational system, which may isolate health professionals, encouraging 160

Cross-disciplinary practice: applications to health care them to pursue their fields separately from related disciplines. Many researchers have concluded that separate disciplinary education does not foster inter-professional practice. Instead, it creates a culture in which professional differences are maximised and mutual professional awareness is less likely (Boaden and Leaviss, 2000; McCallin, 2001). In an ethnographic study with physiotherapists, Hilton (1995) found that poor understanding of roles, skills and expectations within an interprofessional environment causes team conflict and subsequent failure. Several authors (Hall and Weaver, 2001; Rodehorst et al., 2005) suggest that learning to work in an interdisciplinary way should occur at an early stage in the education of the health care professional. This is an ongoing challenge for university faculties and educators, given the extensive amount of time, dedication and skill to implement successfully this kind of programme. It is now widely supported that lack of collaboration amongst health care providers may lead to negative patient outcomes, while there is evidence to show that inter-professional work affects patient outcomes positively (Lindeke and Block, 1998). Regardless of the barriers described, the advantages of cross-disciplinary work outweigh the challenges. Barr (1997) argues that the most important criterion in evaluating the success of an interdisciplinary collaboration is the improvement in the number of achieved patient outcomes. Indeed a prospective, correlational study by Baggs et al. (1999) in three intensive care units (ICUs), examined the relationship between collaboration and patient outcomes, using self-report instruments. It was found that nurses’, but not physicians’, perceptions of collaboration were significantly linked with the reduction in risk-adjusted mortality and readmission in the ICU. The support was found both in the association between nurses’ reports of collaboration and patient outcome and in the unit-level associations between collaboration and patient outcome risk. Another qualitative study compared the perceptions of the process of nurse-physician collaboration in ten intensive care units (Baggs and Schmitt, 1997). The major outcomes of working together were described as improving patient care, job satisfaction and controlling costs. Collaboration was also found to create a more intellectually challenging experience in terms of information exchange and learning. The positive effects of interdisciplinary collaboration were highlighted by the establishment of an innovative interdisciplinary project by Uhlig et al. (2002). A team based, collaborative rounds process in the USA, at the 161

Z. Stamataki Concord Hospital cardiac surgery unit, the Concord Collaborative Care Model, involved the use of a structured communications protocol on a daily basis at each patients’ bedside. The entire health care team involving doctors, nurses, a physiotherapist, an occupational therapist, a pharmacist, a diabetic specialist, a social worker, an office and clinical care coordinator met at the same time each day to share information and develop a plan of care for each patient. The patient and the family members were also encouraged to be active participants in that process. According to the authors, mortality rates have declined significantly since the introduction of this project, and the level of satisfaction with the care delivery process among patients, families and health care professionals have increased. While there is much rhetoric on how to set up teams and manage them, research addressing how interdisciplinary health care teams manage their concerns and work in practice is scarce. One answer to that can be given by Bennett-Emslie and McIntosh’s (1995) study, which reviewed 14 general practices using interviews with general practitioners, health visitors and health workers in the UK. The frequency of team meetings was found to be the single most important mechanism for the promotion of collaboration within their teams. Health care professionals increased their awareness of the range of services available to the patients. A key issue arising in the study is that the greater the opportunity for communication, the better the interprofessional collaboration and outcomes are.

Conclusions As clinicians face the complexities of current patient care, there is an increasing need for cross-disciplinary collaboration. This has contributed to the increasing awareness that cross-disciplinary practice may minimise costs by reducing service duplication and unnecessary interventions. Professionals from different disciplines answer the call by working together to optimise patient care, by forming multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary or transdisciplinary teams. Collaboration among different health care professionals aids better execution of tasks to improve patients’ outcomes, team members’ job satisfaction and organisational performance. Lack of collaboration between health care teams may play a central role in the quality of patient care, patient and health care professional dissatisfaction. Overall, interdisciplinary collaboration leads to joint communication and decision making amongst practitioners, to satisfy the patients’ wellness and illness needs, while respecting the unique qualities and abilities of each of the professionals involved (Henneman et al., 1995). 162

Cross-disciplinary practice: applications to health care It has been suggested that educational programmes and experiential learning in multidisciplinary settings can develop qualities among team members and enhance their communication skills, co-ordination, cohesion and information sharing (Boaden and Leaviss, 2000). I would argue that this approach must be extended and shared with the other members of the health care team, to create a culture of inclusiveness and acknowledgment of the contribution of all. This is a complex process that requires competence, confidence, commitment, respect and trust, not only from health care professionals, but academics too. I would argue - based on the key arguments made in this chapter - that interdisciplinary collaboration without effective teamwork, communication and shared decision making is not possible. It is required that many practitioners at all levels within the NHS develop teamwork skills both within their era of expertise, but also in handling many boundaries at which their work is affected by others in the service. Many approaches are currently under way to understand and meet the challenges of interdisciplinary work within the NHS. These tend to focus on team processes rather than on team context (Boaden and Leaviss, 2000). A new emphasis on context will require a new approach at the undergraduate, postgraduate and continuing professional development level. However, to foster optimal team functioning and communication it is essential to understand the mechanisms and factors that contribute to optimum care delivery outcomes. Despite the plethora of literature on interdisciplinary collaboration and teamwork, many questions still remain unanswered. More research is needed to provide evidence grounded in the practice of the processes and interactions teams use as they work and interact together in the current context of health care. Exploration of team members’ communication patterns during collaboration and teamwork may be beneficial in understanding the dynamics of the interdisciplinary team. What constitutes effective team performance, how it is created and nurtured and how it directly or indirectly influences patient outcomes, still remains to be answered. Last but not least, an understanding of collaborative practice seems essential to inform evidence based curricula.

References Baggs, J.G., and Schmitt, M.H. (1997). Nurses’ and Resident Physicians’ Perceptions of the Process of Collaboration in an MICU. Research in Nursing and Health, 20, 71-80. Baggs, J.G., Schmitt, M.J., Mushlin, A.I., Mitchell, P.H., Eldredge, D.H., Oakes, D., and Hutson, A.D. (1999). Association between nurse163

Z. Stamataki physician collaboration and patient outcomes in three intensive care units. Critical Care Medicine, 27(9), 1991-1998. Barr, O. (1997). Interdisciplinary teamwork: consideration of the challenges. British Journal of Nursing, 6(17), 1005-1010. Bennett-Emslie, and G., McIntosh, J. (1995). Promoting collaboration in the primary care team – the role of the practice meeting. Journal of Interprofessional Care, 9(3), 251-256. Berwick, D.M. (1996). Ideas for medical education. Academic Medicine, 71(9), 972. Bishop, H. (2006). Interdisciplinary research: The role of nursing education. Journal of Professional Nursing, 22(5), 266-269. Boaden, N., and Leaviss, J. (2000). Putting teamwork in context. Medical Education, 34, 921-927. Braye, S., and Preston-Shoot, M. (1995). Empowering practice in social care. Buckingham: Open University Press. Coombs, M. (2003). Power and conflict in intensive care clinical decision making. Intensive and Critical Care Nursing, 19(3), 125-135. Coombs, M., and Ersser, S.J. (2004). Medical hegemony in decisionmaking - a barrier to interdisciplinary working in intensive care? Journal of Advanced Nursing, 46(3), 245-252. Dede, C. (1996). The evolution of distance education: Emerging technologies and distributed learning. The American Journal of Distance Education, 10(2), 4-36. Department of Health (1990). NHS and community care act. London: HMSO. Department of Health (2000). Comprehensive critical care: A review of adult critical care services. London: Department of Health. Department of Health (2001). The nursing contribution to the provision of comprehensive critical care for adults: A strategic programme of action. London: Department of Health. Feiger, S.M., and Schmitt, M.H. (1979). Collegiallity in interdisciplinary health teams: Its measurement and its effects. Social Science and Medicine, 13(A), 217-229. Hall, P., and Weaver, L. (2001). Interdisciplinary education and teamwork: a long and winding road. Medical Education, 35, 867-875. Henneman, E., Lee, J.L., and Cohen, J. (1995). Collaboration: a concept analysis. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 21(1), 103-109. Hilton, R.W. (1995). Fragmentation within interprofessional work: A result of isolationism in health care professional education and the preparation of students to function only in the confines of their own disciplines. Journal of Interprofessional Care, 9(1), 33-40. Kane, R. (1975). Interprofessional teamwork. Manpower Monograph No. 8. New York: Syracuse University School of Social Work. 164

Cross-disciplinary practice: applications to health care Lindeke, L.L., and Block, D.E. (1998). Maintaining professional integrity in the midst of interdisciplinary collaboration. Nursing Outlook, 46, 213-218. Mccallin, A. (2001). Interdisciplinary practice – a matter of teamwork: An integrated literature review. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 10(4), 419-428. McCIoskey, J.V., and Maas, M. (1998). Interdisciplinary Team: The Nursing Perspective Is Essential. Nursing Outlook, 46, 157-163. Nelson, E.C., Batalden, P.B., Huber, T.P., Mohr, J.J., Godfrey, M.M., Headrick, L.A., and Wasson, J.H. (2002). Microsystems in health care: Part 1. Learning from high performing front-line clinical units. Joint Commission Journal on Quality Improvement, 28, 472-493. Nembhard, I.M., Tucker, A.L., Horbar, J.D., and Carpenter J.H. (2007). Improving patient outcomes: the effects of staff participation and collaboration in health care. Harvard Business School. Available online at http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/5738.html (Accessed December 2007). Nursing and Midwifery Council (2004). The NMC code of professional conduct: standards for conduct, performance and ethics. Available online at http://www.nmc-uk.org/aSection.aspx?SectionID=45 (Accessed February 2008). Reader, T.W., Flin, R., Mearns, K., and Cuthbertson, B.H. (2007). Interdisciplinary communication in the intensive care unit. British Journal of Anaesthesia, February, 1-6. Rodehorst, T.K., Wilhelm, S.L., and Jensen, L. (2005). Use of Interdisciplinary Simulation to Understand Perceptions of Team Members’ Roles. Journal of Professional Nursing, 21(3), 159-166. Schmitt, M.H. (2001). Collaboration improves the quality of care: Mmethodological challenges and evidence from the U.S. health care research. Journal of Interprofessional Care, 15, 47-66. Uhlig, P.N., Brown, J., Nason, A.K., Camelio A., and Kendall, E. (2002). System innovation: Concord Hospital. Joint Commission Journal on Quality Improvement, 28, 666-672. Wilcock, P., and Headrick, L. (2005). Interprofessional learning for the improvement of health care: Why bother? Journal of Interprofessional Care, 14, 111-117.

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The legal method reconsidered

The legal method reconsidered Contextual legal research from an interdisciplinary perspective – towards developing a new paradigm Ubaldus R.M.Th. de Vries and Lyana M.A. Francot This chapter argues for a re-evaluation of the legal method in the Netherlands. The legal method, based on case study, causes the study of law to be a practice-embedded discipline and those engaged in the study (and practice) of law to remain locked within the confines of a discipline that does not allow for an alternative or external view of how problems may be resolved. This chapter addresses the need to introduce a contextual perspective into (Dutch) legal research, which necessitates the incorporation of an interdisciplinary approach. In other words, to understand law fully and to understand the problems modern law is facing demands an understanding of society on a socio-theoretical level. We believe social theory to be a fruitful discipline for approaching the contextual study of law. By way of excursus, this chapter seeks to illustrate how law and social theory could be integrated. It does so by pointing to the school of thought of reflexive modernization in contemporary social theory. We consider this reflexive view to be characteristic of the new modernity. The new modernity is to be interpreted as the stage of the process of modernization that follows the so-called first modernity. In this new stage, we are confronted with the (negative) consequences of the successes of the first modernity. A reflexive view demands a changed frame of reference towards the achievements of the first modernity and a reevaluation of its foundations, including those of law.

Introduction The debate in the Netherlands on what good legal research entails, starts from the notion, rightly or wrongly, whether the study of law belongs within academia. Part of the allegation is that legal research suffers from a weak scientific method (Stolker, 2003). Although much can be said about the validity of the claim that legal research may not be a scientific endeavour (Francot and De Vries, 2006), another aspect of legal research is analysed and criticized in this chapter. It contends that the weakness of legal research lies in its focus on practice. It follows practice. This has much to do with the problem-solving potential of law as well as how law is studied. 167

U.R.M.Th. de Vries and L.M.A. Francot Legal research (as well as legal teaching) follows the case study method, or problem method, and takes the judge as its role model, confining the study of solutions to existing law, that is: case law and legislation. Law is thus presented as being an exclusive problem-solving entity, to which legal researchers succumb too often. The result is that legal research too suffers many blind spots, such as the failure to recognize that law itself generates conflicts (Luhman, 2003),1 and is lacking context: the lack of attention given to structural changes in society, such as political, economical or cultural changes, as well as to developments in other disciplines. It also ignores alternative, extra-legal, solutions of problems. We do not refer to forms of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) here, but more generally to how societies cope with developments that threaten social cohesion and order in many different ways. Law’s problem-solving potential Central to law is its problem-solving potential. The base line level on which law is studied is by reference to facts and incidents, where legal researchers can report on recent judgements. This is not only the case in civil law, but also in common law (Sugerman, 1986). Another, higher level is where these incidents are abstracted to the level of structures. Thus, solving a case concerning discriminatory treatment of women in the workplace is placed within the framework of equal treatment of women and men. At these levels, we see the huge differentiation of legal research, where researchers each have their specialised area of interest. It is reflected in the study of law and the curriculum. We commonly refer to studying law in the plural. In Dutch, we often refer to rechten or laws. Indeed, an LL.B or LL.M stands for the bachelor or masters of laws. It used to imply the study of secular and canonical law. The latter is no longer part of the curriculum. But the name though, gains new relevance, implying the study of private and public law and their subdivisions: studying the curriculum of most law degrees, we see that students are required to study the law of obligations, the law of contracts, company law, constitutional law, administrative law, criminal law, procedural law, labour law, etc. They never seem to study law, except, perhaps, as part of an introductory course on positive law. However, we argue that there are at least two more levels upon which law can be studied to truly understand its problem-solving potential (and take Luhman states on p. 139 that ‚Das Ergebnis ist, daß das Recht nicht nur Konflikte bereinigt, sondern auch Konflikte erzeugt; denn mit Berufung auf das Recht kann man dann auch Zumutungen ablehnen und sozialen Pressionen widerstehen‘. In English: ‘The result is that law not only solves conflicts but also generates conflicts; that with the appeal on law one can reject claims and resist social pressure’ (authors’ translation).

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The legal method reconsidered into account its problem-generating potential). At this level, the third level, the study of law requires insight into law as a system and is theoretical by nature. Here law is asked the question, as a system, how it, for example, can guarantee freedom and security for its citizens. This level is located in the domain of legal theory and jurisprudence. The fourth level requires a contextual perspective on law as a subsystem of society. Indeed, at this level we uncover that what academic lawyers always have presupposed but without really studying it: the unity of law. This is understandable as lawyers adopt an internal perspective, understanding law from within the system. Typical for this perspective is that it does not question the unity of law itself: within this perspective we all seem to understand what law is and what it does (Brouwer, 2000). It is not up to law to doubt its own unity, as this would cause an identity crisis and possible chaos (Luhman, 1988). Nevertheless, this does not mean that we should take this unity for granted in researching law. And the analysis of the unity of law requires an external point of view. It necessitates an analysis of the social environment of law enabling reflection on the relevance of law for this particular society: Does law meet the societal demands and what are its effects on society? This level demands an external perspective, and by necessity, an interdisciplinary approach, allowing for the incorporation of other domains of knowledge into the study of law.

The focus on practice Before we enter into a more detailed explanation of the added value of a contextual perspective using an interdisciplinary approach, the current didactic of legal education must be analysed, as this didactic will prove to be insightful on how legal research is carried out as well. The point of departure is that law is taught, studied and researched in an isolated as well as in a differentiated way. We seem to ignore too often that law as a system is embedded in the environment it seeks to serve and of which it is an integral part. But what is it that binds these differentiated areas together? At the same time, we present the system of law as making an exclusivity claim as a problem-solving entity, which blinds us to alternatives. It is this aspect that requires further analysis. This analysis is based on Vranken (2005), who in a recent study points to a number of false presumptions which law suffers from. Practice-embedded study Like other disciplines, the discipline of law employs a particular frame of reference or, a paradigm. This frame of reference is considered to be all169

U.R.M.Th. de Vries and L.M.A. Francot conclusive. According to Vranken, this frame of reference is made up of legislation and case law (the sources of law) and takes the judge as a focal point. It makes law a practice-embedded discipline to which theory is subordinated. It does not allow for what can be termed the ‘independent’ study of law. Working within any frame of reference carries the risk of a tunnel vision, blinding the eye to alternatives as to how, in this case, law may be employed to maximize its problem-solving potential. Vranken is in particular critical about how the legal frame of reference remains closed and exclusive through the manner in which the study and practice of law is approached. This is visible in typical traits, or skills, which are presented as self-evident and are presumed to set lawyers apart as experts. Vranken points out that a more reflexive attitude towards these traits would befit modern lawyers. Being reflexive means to Vranken acknowledging that these traits or skills radically cut off other modes of enquiry and argumentation in the resolution of disputes or understanding potential problem-causing developments. They have an isolating effect, preventing alternatives to flourish. Four characteristics are relevant, which are here categorized into two categories – the case study method and the use of legal language. The case-study method The case-study method reflects the practice-embeddedness of law. Lawyers use a case-study method in the study and practice of law. Thus, law is studied through cases in which students familiarize themselves with the law. Students are presented with a set of facts from which they are asked to distil a legal question, which they are, subsequently, asked to resolve by reference to existing law (legislation and case law), which is explained in text books. The method is continued in (or is a result of) practice. There, practitioners look at a fresh set of facts by reference to a previous, similar, set of facts. The judge adopts a similar approach by reference to the system of precedence2. This approach, Vranken says, has a limiting effect on students, as it is devoid of any reflection and the study of methodology. It prevents students from accessing other domains of knowledge and how these may help to understand the context of problems and these problems themselves. Inherent to this method is its focus on the past, i.e. in a historical locus where similar sets of facts and the applicable law are located. The frame of reference of legislation and case law forces him or her to study the Although the Netherlands is a civil law country, legislation and legal concepts enshrined therein are interpreted on the basis of case law that enjoys authoritative status.

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The legal method reconsidered legislative history of the rule, past cases and commentary thereupon. Indeed, lawyers apply the past to solve present problems also with an aim to anticipate future ones. The lawyer is ‘essentially conservative’ (Vranken, 2005; Kronman, 1995)3. He or she is chained to the past and any change is incremental: lawyers must put a new problem within the existing presupposed historical framework as a point of departure towards a possible solution. Vranken argues that this fixation on the past limits developing an open mind about the best approach to problems and how such an approach may be brought within, or change, the frame of reference. How lawyers argue: the use of legal language The second category of traits that defines the lawyers’ relationship with the frame of reference refers to how it allows them (or rather forces them) to disguise political choices in legal language. Lawyers think immediately in legal categories and translate the problem to fit the frame of reference. Lawyers never question what the case is really about (at least not in the exercise of their profession). Usually, this is not necessary; the legal dispute and the resulting question of law do not need to be lifted to a higher level of abstraction. However, in those situations where there is something new or unprecedented at stake, the usual mode of thought and argumentation – to present solutions as the result of the application and interpretation of legislation and case law – leads to complex and meaningless formulas. Vranken suggests that particularly in judge-made law, there are two levels of argumentation. The first level is techno-legal in nature and camouflages the second level – what is really at stake – in legal formulas such as ‘fair and reasonableness’, good faith, etc. Vranken illustrates this by reference to three examples, all three decisions of the Dutch Supreme Court on civil liability4. In all three cases, explanations of causation, duty of care and burden of proof camouflage the true discussion: the (un)desirability of (extending) liability. In other words, what the courts wish for, is presented as what is legally possible whereas the possibility is not at all a clear-cut case within the frame of reference. As a result, one merely discusses the meaning and scope of a particular case, rather than the problem that lies at the basis of the case5. Indeed, Kronman’s view is illustrative of the exclusivity claim law pretends to have. The cases are discussed in Vranken (2005): Johanna case (HR 6 May 1999, NJ 1999, 564), Krüter case (HR 6 June 2003, NJ 2003, 504) and The recalcitrant horse case (HR 27 April 2001, NJ 2002, 54). See also Francot and De Vries (2006) 5 Ideally, the study of law would be structured along the line theory-practice-theory, introducing multidisciplinarity before entering practice, and finishing with a reflexive, theoretical approach towards practice.

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U.R.M.Th. de Vries and L.M.A. Francot Another aspect of how lawyers argue is their attitude toward the factual basis of their arguments (rather than the facts of the case): lawyers tend not to question the validity or truthfulness of facts that underscore their arguments. Vranken suggests that a thorough investigation into the validity of such facts is beneficial to the validity and the legitimacy of legal arguments and judicial decisions (even though it could upset the frame of reference, which relies on unspoken implied factual truths)6. The presumptuousness of factual validity demands attention and daring to ask the right questions and to search in those areas where solutions may be found, appealing, thus, to an interdisciplinary approach regarding the evaluation of facts and factual claims. The legal paradigm This short sketch of Vranken’s analysis can lead to formulate, tentatively and in the briefest of terms, the prevailing legal paradigm. The formulation is based on the Kuhnian structure (Kuhn, 1995). The legal paradigm entails as much a theoretical element as well as a practical one. Important here is the practical element: the tools used. Four can be distinguished: observation, analysis, argumentation and interpretation. Applied to the legal paradigm, it can be said to be centred on the past. It is made up out of observation of past events (a set of facts or a judicial decision), which is subjected to analysis from within the framework of legislation and case law, allowing for argumentation of relevant positions for which discrete legislation and case law provide the instruments. The analysis is aimed at the deconstruction of facts, leading to selection, allowing for the reconstruction of these facts in such a way that the conflict becomes legally relevant or manageable. It is important what questions are asked, how they are asked and how the answers are to be interpreted.

Crossing boundaries The emphasis on practice and the traits that explain the exclusiveness of the frame of reference, or better: the legal paradigm, has implications for theory and the academic study of law. Theory is subordinated to practice, as theory too looks at the judge as role model, according to Vranken. Hence, it takes existing law as its point of departure. ‘A science at the See: Vranken (2005) p. 48-53. Vranken discusses this by reference to a comparative analysis of two English cases: Yorkshire ripper case (Hill v. The Chief Constable of West Yorkshire [1989] 1 AC 53) and Capital and Counties and Digital Equipment v. Hampshire County Council [1997] QB 1004). See also Francot and De Vries (2006).

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The legal method reconsidered service of practice, in which the judge is the role model, befits it to adopt the methods of the judge’ (Vranken, 1995: p. 148)7. Thus, legal science too, adopts a case-study method, geared towards the resolution of conflicts similar to how a judge resolves such conflicts, and binds itself by current law. Once theory emancipates itself from the bonds of practice, the study of law may follow. The end-result should be a theory-embedded study of law, allowing an ‘independent’ study of law and its context, by introducing an interdisciplinary approach. One way to get towards a more theory-embedded study of law lies in legal development itself. Vranken describes this development as a move away from a ‘doctrinal classification’ approach towards the idea of ‘contextualism’ (Vranken, 1995: p. 105; Collins, 1999). Central to this idea is ‘the recognition or, if you like, the insight, that phenomena can exclusively be understood if placed in the context of the circumstances of the case or from the perspective from which they are approached’ (Vranken, 1995: p. 106) 8. It causes facts and rules to fuse into one and illustrates a move in law towards balancing interests rather than applying law on the basis of legal positions (e.g. Hol and Loth, 2004). Vranken observes the idea of contextualism at three different levels. Relevant here is that the claim to legitimacy of a rule rests on more than only one internal legal perspective; it can, indeed must, be viewed from many different perspectives that lie outside the internal frame of reference and demand knowledge other than solely legal knowledge. As context is boundless, the question is how to deal with it. An interdisciplinary approach ‘is almost a self-evident result of contextualism’ (Vranken, 1995: p. 119), in both practice and legal research. At the most basic level, it suggests that words, concepts and rules have more than one meaning, bringing to an end an exclusively grammatical or literal approach to legal interpretation. At the second level, it introduces modes of interpretation that lie outside the framework of positive law, such as effectiveness and practical relevance. In respect of practice, multidisciplinarity suggests that lawyers should be receptive of other ways to resolve conflicts. Vranken places particular emphasis on mediation, hailed as an alternative to the judicial process hampered by its own frame of reference and skills. Although he welcomes this development, he warns that a multidisciplinary approach towards resolving conflicts, such as mediation, should not be solely an illustration of the handicaps and limitations of law and the judicial process, as mediation creates its own frame of reference and tunnel vision. Authors’ translation Authors’ translation

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U.R.M.Th. de Vries and L.M.A. Francot It is the theory of law, then, that should also be reflexive on these alternatives. The task is to disclose the blind spots of law and the judicial process, as well as the blind spots of the alternatives. To do so means that the theory itself must adopt a multidisciplinary perspective. It demands stepping out of the internal frame of reference and be open to other domains of knowledge that may enlighten theoretical critique.

Law in context: Reflexive modernization or what social theory has to offer The missing link in Vranken’s analysis is that he does not embed the study of law in a wider context. We argue that Vranken maintains an internal perspective, which suggests that although he looks at law as a system, he does not look at it in the wider context of society. He remains on the third level – the level of law as a system9, and indeed he makes an important contribution here. But in the absence of a wider societal context, the fourth level remains implicit. Not until we are at the fourth level are we able to study the position and social effects and consequences of law as a system and how it operates. The fourth level, therefore, requires in our view the study of, especially, social theory to allow us to elicit the central features of law as a system. It introduces an external perspective on law while maintaining the benefits of an internal perspective of the third level. Understood in this manner, the study of law requires reflexivity, i.e. the study of law from an external perspective with an aim to increase our understanding of law through an understanding of society. This external perspective – social theory – allows us to gain a theoretical insight of society, which helps us to explain and understand societal developments and hence, the demands or requirements that society asks from law and lawyers. We illustrate this based on the example of risk society in the following paragraphs. Excursus: the risk society and its consequences A way to observe and describe the unity of the law could be located in the determination of the function or functions that the law fulfils on behalf of society10. This requires however an understanding of society and raises questions such as: See above: ‘Law’s problem-solving potential’. Notwithstanding the fact that we do not adopt a pure systems-theoretical approach in the excursus, some systems-theoretical tools and approaches cannot be avoided, like for instance the understanding of ‘function’: every functional subsystem (law, politics, economics, etc.) fulfils a function on behalf of society. In social systems theory, law however does not derive its unity from its function.

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The legal method reconsidered What kind of society are we dealing with? What is its core problem that defines its identity? After having defined the identity-constituting problem the function or functions of law can be fully mapped out. One approach, attracting a lot of attention and inducing discussions, is the concept of ‘risk society’. In 1986, German sociologist and social theorist, Ulrich Beck introduced the concept of risk society in Risikogesellschaft – Auf dem Weg in eine andere Moderne. Beck describes modern Western societies at the threshold of a new modernity, being in a rather painful transition from the industrial society to a risk society. Whereas the industrial society revolved around the problem of distribution of wealth and welfare, brought about by the process of modernization, risk society has to deal with unforeseen and unwanted risks and dangers, as side effects of that same process of modernization. Like industrial society, Beck also casts the problem of risk society (primarily) in terms of distribution: how to distribute these modern risks? He states: How can the risks and hazards systematically produced as part of modernization be prevented, minimized, dramatized, or channeled? Where they do finally see the light of day in the shape of ‘latent side effects’, how can they be limited and distributed away so that they neither hamper the modernization process nor exceed the limits of that which is ‘tolerable’- ecologically, medically, psychologically and socially? (Beck, 1992: p. 19) The formulation of the problem in terms of distribution reveals Beck’s consideration that modern risks, as unwanted products of modernization, cannot be eradicated without abandoning the benefits brought about by modernization. This pinpoints one of the major problems modern society has to deal with. Hence, a function of law resides in contributing to the solution, i.e. the distribution of modern risks11. As such, the legal system is, however, not (yet) equipped to regulate the distribution of modern risks. Modern risks (both potential and manifested risks, i.e. disasters) become legally relevant when formulated in terms of responsibilities and liabilities. Consequently, the unity of law (within this perspective) resides in the function of distributing these responsibilities and liabilities by means of rules. The concrete formulation of these rules might and will differ according to the specific field of law.

Conclusions: Incorporating an interdisciplinary approach This chapter has focused on interdisciplinary research in the study of law. We propose that the study of law benefits from incorporating in It goes without say that this approach highlights one specific aspect of law, and does not exclude other interpretations of the function of law.

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U.R.M.Th. de Vries and L.M.A. Francot its field of research other domains of knowledge that help to develop understanding the context of those problems that law seeks to, and can address. Interdisciplinary research implies, from this perspective, the incorporation of other domains of knowledge into the study of law. Such an approach ties in with the nature of second modernity, which departs from a functional differentiated view of society towards a more integrated view. Citing Kadinsky, Beck refers to this as ‘the “age of and” destroying and replacing the “age of either-or”’ (Beck, 1997: p. 3). From our perspective, as philosophers of law, our focus in this article was on introducing an interdisciplinary approach on the fourth level upon which law can be studied. At this level, this is concerned with the study of law within its environment, i.e. the system of society. The task is to make explicit the relationship between law and society, which demands in our view a theoretical perspective, allowing academic lawyers, as well as students, to expose them to other branches of knowledge, such as social theory, but also philosophy, economics, political science, history, etc. At the same time, this interdisciplinary approach is not limited to the fourth level alone. It can make a valuable contribution to understanding the operation of law on all four levels. Thus, at the first level, that of incidents, these can be better understood when their causes are identified: why would a person start a wrongful life claim, why does one seek a right to euthanasia, to mention some obvious examples. Is it enough for lawyers to merely argue the legal question irrespective of why such claims are formulated in the first place? The same is true on the second level. Here we look at structural changes and how law responds to them: drafting solutions to, for example the problem of immigration, cannot be properly understood without studying why immigration takes place and how it differs from other types of immigration in the past. What does it mean for law as a system when society seems to undergo structural change: does it allow for re-evaluating law’s guiding principles such as freedom, equality, independence, etc.? At each level, incorporating an interdisciplinary perspective allows for a reflexive view on the function and limitations of areas of law and legal concepts. But these cannot be properly understood without understanding the unity of law and this demands the understanding of society as a system in itself, which helps articulating the meaning and place of societal developments on a higher level of abstraction. The challenge for legal research is how to make this approach a structural feature. We suggest that there are certain ways that this could be explored through. For example, it is no longer uncommon to enlist academics with 176

The legal method reconsidered a different background, such as psychology, philosophy and sociology, within law departments, allowing for a more direct exchange of ideas and perspectives. The study of criminal law is illustrative, which has clearly seen an interdisciplinary development, with the introduction of subspecialisms, such as criminology and forensic psychiatry. The most important direction, probably, lies in education (Francot and De Vries, 2006), and to take up the challenge to change the law curriculum radically by introducing knowledge from other disciplines. This could be done by implementing (mandatory) courses in the curriculum or organising law courses in such a way that allows for an interdisciplinary approach, introducing new literature, organising guest lectures, etc. An alternative is to demand students to explore a different field of study and set them the task to report on how this has changed their perspective on law. This could be introduced as a ‘minor’ in the curriculum (a ‘minor’ is a related set of courses on a particular theme or in a particular discipline). One last word: so far, the discussion has been a one-sided affair, with a focus on the incorporation of social theory into legal research as an expression of interdisciplinary research. This does not mean that legal research cannot also make a contribution. Integrative research has a number of benefits. For lawyers these benefits include being exposed to insights from other disciplines to strengthen law’s problem-solving potential, allowing them to cooperate on the formulation of solutions. (It would lead to a multidisciplinary approach in practice: different professionals seeking solutions for problems and conflicts). As far as research is concerned, integrating or incorporating other domains of knowledge with the domain of legal knowledge may lead to the development of a new discipline of knowledge. The added benefit for such an integrative approach to the academic or scientific endeavour – which unifies us – does not lie in the factual results of legal research (in respect of law’s problem-solving potential at the different levels), but lies in the insights gained from the development of a new interdisciplinary paradigm. Whether this is possible and how this is achieved depends on the tunnel vision and frames of reference in all the disciplines involved and how these tunnel visions are addressed.

References Beck, U (1986). Risikogesellschaft – Auf dem Weg in eine andere Moderne. Frankfurt am Main: Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp. (Translated into English: Beck, U. (1992). Risk society – Towards a new modernity. London: Sage). Beck, U. (1997) The reinvention of politics – Rethinking modernity in the global social order. London: Polity. 177

U.R.M.Th. de Vries and L.M.A. Francot Brouwer, P.W. (2000). Kenmerken van recht [Characteristics of law]. Nijmegen: Ars Aequi Libri. Collins, H. (1999). Regulating contracts. Oxford: Oxford University Press,. Francot, L.M.A., and de Vries, U.R.M.Th. (2006). Legal education reenchanted? European Journal of Legal Education, 3, 3-20. Hol, A., and Loth, M. (2004). Reshaping justice. Maastricht: Shaker Publishing. Kronman, A.T. (1995). The lost lawyer – Failing ideals of the legal profession. Harvard, Mass: Belknapp Press/Harvard University Press. Kuhn, T.S. (1996). The structure of scientific revolutions (3rd Ed). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Luhman, N. (1988). Die Einheit des Rechtssystems [The unity of the legal system]. In: G. Teubner (Ed), Autopoietic law: A new approach to law and society. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter. Luhman, N. (1994). Das Recht der Gesellschaft [The law of society]. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp. Stolker, C.J.J.M. (2003). Ja, geleerd zijn jullie wel! Over de status van de rechtswetenschap [Yeah, learned you are! About the status of legal science]. Nederlands Juristenblad, 78, 766-778. Sugerman, D. (1986). Legal theory, the common law mind and the making of the textbook tradition. In: W Twining (Ed), Legal theory and the common law. New York: Basil Blackwell Press. Vranken, J.B.M. (2005). Mr C Asser’s handleiding tot de beoefening van het Nederlands burgerlijk recht – Algemeen Deel: een vervolg. Deventer: Kluwer (Translated into English: Vranken, J. (2006). Exploring the jurist’s frame of mind: Constraints and preconceptions in civil law argumentation. Deventer: Kluwer Law International).

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Confronting internal and external problems of cross-, inter-, and multi-disciplinarity

Confronting internal and external problems of cross-, inter-, and multi-disciplinarity researching cyber conflict and global politics Athina Karatzogianni Interdisciplinary research is one type of research that is nowadays frequently recognised as one to be encouraged, and indeed is one of the types of research that research-funding institutions indicate as preferred areas of research. At the same time, practitioners of such research find many obstacles to their career development and advancement, frequently stepping into fields that are hermetically closed to the idea of multidisciplinarity, interdisciplinarity or crossdisciplinarity. In an era when the disciplinary boundaries are no longer clear cut, and where interconnectivities and feedback loops in many fields inevitably exist both theoretically and methodologically, it is worth asking why the academic establishment insists on keeping certain disciplines exclusive, while others embrace more of a ‘renaissance’ thinking on modern epistemology. In other words, it is urgent to discuss the politics of interdisciplinarity. This paper defines types of research and then discusses two groups of issues: (a) philosophical, logical, ontological, epistemological, and methodological issues, which are more internal to research and reflect our theorisation of the world; (b) the historical, sociopolitical, educational and administrative issues surrounding such attempts, which are more external to research, but will inevitably influence our conduct as researchers. Lastly, some ways these problems can be confronted are put forward in direct relation to the author’s own research experience.

Interdisciplinarity, crossdisciplinarity, and multidisciplinarity: What’s in a name? What is meant by interdisciplinarity? In what forms is interdisciplinary work to be distinguished? What is to be expected from interdisciplinary projects in both research and education? Why should one engage in interdisciplinary efforts? What is the origin of this relatively new phenomenon? What are the effects this movement is likely to have on the organization and administration of the university? (Kockelmans, 1979). 179

A. Karatzogianni The questions posed by Kockelmans back in 1979 and his assertion that ‘there is not common agreement even about the most basic problems’ (ibid, viii) continue to have resonance today, almost thirty years later. According to Ratcliffe writing back in 1975 ‘a crossdisciplinary course is defined as a course of study concerned with the solution of existing crossdisciplinary problems, and a mission orientated or problem solving approach to teaching is appropriate’ (Ratcliffe, 1975). In this case, the crossdisciplinary nature of the problem creates the necessity to react in a crossdisciplinary approach for study and teaching. To continue, Wilkinson et al. define it as ‘parallel but independent lines of research in two disciplines are brought together to highlight similarities, bring a crossdisciplinary discourse that would benefit both’ (Wilkinson et al., 1996). In this case ‘independent’ lines of research find a common language. Finally, Lemon talks of common conceptual frameworks, so that communication is smoother: A key feature of cross-disciplinary work, and particularly that which is issue orientated and crosses between policy, academic research and stakeholder involvement is the need for common conceptual frameworks. These frameworks should provide the foundation for communication between agencies while avoiding what is a misguided search for consensus. (Lemon, 2002) From these three definitions of ‘crossdisciplinary research’, we get slightly different understandings of what it is or should be. In the first one, the problem creates the research, in the second, independent disciplines find a common discourse, while in the third, different stakeholders find common conceptual frameworks to enhance communication. My own understanding is that in crossdisciplinarity there is dialogue across disciplines, not always creating a common conceptual framework or common discourse, and not always being triggered by a crossdisciplinary problem. On the other hand, in interdisciplinary research the connectivities between disciplines run deeper, common discourses and frameworks are produced and are triggered by a problem common to both disciplines. Lastly, when we talk of multidisciplinarity, it simply means that more than two disciplines are involved in these processes, which operate on a deeper level (interdisciplinary) or a more shallow level (crossdisciplinary). In essence, ‘interdisciplinarity to have any intellectual or academic value, must mean more than just talking to each other across disciplines’ (Hale, 2007). Having defined the different types of research this way, I would like to follow now Kockelmans and focus briefly on the broad spectrum across which 180

Confronting internal and external problems of cross-, inter-, and multi-disciplinarity investigations about interdisciplinarity range: ‘logical, epistemological, methodological, ontological, historical, socio-political, philosophical and educational, administrative issues’ (Kockelmans, 1979). It would be then far easier to demonstrate ways my own research has attempted to overcome some of these issues. Philosophical (logical, ontological), epistemological, and methodological issues As different disciplines are grounded in diverse philosophies, ontologies, epistemologies and methodologies, and each discipline is broken down into more and more specializations, it is often argued, that it is impossible for a single individual to achieve genuine competence of their own expertise, let alone the whole discipline they are working at, and then from there to engage productively with other disciplines. Kockelmans identifies those on the one side of the debate who argue that what can be achieved instead is ‘a comprehensive and integrated multiscience’. Kockelmans points to the difficulty of one scientist being able to know the developments in other disciplines, as well as dealing with different units of analysis, as ‘findings from one discipline need to be adapted and then incorporated into those of another discipline, then the methods and findings can act as a check on the validity of their generalizations’ (Kockelmans, 1979). Similarly, there is Lemon complaining about one of the methodological problems involved: ‘Firstly there were too few clear and grounded examples and secondly there was inadequate insight provided about how the frameworks could be “operationalised” within the research process’ (Lemon, 2002). In theories of knowledge management (KM), the sharing of knowledge between actors having different scientific perspectives, Lemon argues, has received little attention in relation to multidisciplinary problems. In their own words: In such projects, the actors are academics, the knowledge content is diverse and shaped (and often confined) by scientific disciplines, whereas strategies to cross disciplinary boundaries seem to be lacking. These projects face the challenge of overcoming disciplinary and theoretical differences in order to reap the benefits of crossdisciplinary inquiry. (Lemon, 2002) I would argue that complex problems create the necessity for multidisciplinary approaches, and that never in scientific revolutions and paradigm shifts, the philosophical, epistemological or methodological differences acted as a deterrent to using different lenses, and creating new lenses through which to look at novel phenomena. This is in fact 181

A. Karatzogianni how human knowledge has moved forward. Needless to say, we are at a transition period in the global system and scientific paradigm shifts are likely to become the norm rather than the exception. Take for example the highly popular and topical study of ‘globalization’. It is discussed next to culture in Sociology, next to the multinational corporation in Economics, next to the biosphere in Biology, next to World Systems in History, etc. (See Clark’s 2002 Global Awareness: Thinking systematically about the world). In fact globalization is discussed in classrooms and funded, researched and theorised, across disciplines all over the world. Clark who offers his own multidisciplinary approach, which he calls the Global System Paradigm (GPS), incorporating thinking on complexity, small world phenomena and network theory among others, writes: The advantages of general systems thinking become apparent whenever we meet a novel problem or question. If a specialist in a particular field, say economics, confronts a problem from a quite different field, say biology, he or she will first have to master the vocabulary and concepts of biology before making advances toward understanding and solving the problem. The general systems thinker, however, can begin to grasp the problem from biology right away because he or she can apply the important fundamental principles of systems operations to the issue or question at hand. In this way the GPS equips us to grasp quickly the nature of a particular global problem, for example, the AIDS pandemic, even if we do not know much about AIDS per se. (Clark, 2002: p. 53-54) In fact, it is not the ‘internal’ issues to research, but the ‘external’, the historical, socio-political, educational and administrative issues that we need to turn to, as major obstacles to the types of research we are discussing. Historical, socio-political, educational and administrative issues In theory, all scholars and scientists are devoted to the abstract truth and tell the story as it really is. They fear no social pressures. They take no cognizance of pressures, financial or political, to amend their results or their report of results. It is a nice fairy tale, but anyone who has frequented a university or a research institution for any length of time and still believes this is consciously or subconsciously naïve. The material pressures are enormous, the career pressures almost as great, and the political pressures always available if others do not work. It is not that there are not Galileos around (…But dissent is courageous even in the most liberal of states…). One could easily explain why these four myths – the free market, the 182

Confronting internal and external problems of cross-, inter-, and multi-disciplinarity sovereign states, the equal rights of all citizens, and the value-neutral scholar/scientist — are necessary to the functioning of the modern worldsystem, why they are so loudly propagated and so widely believed (at least at a surface level) (Wallerstein, 2003: p. 22; author’s emphasis in italics) Wallerstein’s understanding of what is at stake here in his ‘Intellectuals in an Age of Transition’ (2003) is a good place to start discussing issues that are either connected to the agent or the structure, and why not, à la Giddens, the structurations and relationships between the two, constraining this type of research, which are essentially outside the research issues involved. At the level of the individual, a change in paradigm or having to tolerate meddling with one’s own discipline can be a traumatic experience: Kuhn makes it clear that most people will resist adopting a new paradigm, likely expending considerable psychic energy in doing so. “The transfer of allegiance from paradigm to paradigm is a conversion experience that cannot be forced”, he writes. But why should this be so? At the level of the individual, the problem is one of identity. To a certain degree, all of us shape our vision of our own identities around a paradigm’s central premises and values; to cast off that paradigm and embrace a new one means a change in identity as well. To many, such a change may be as traumatic as say, a new religion or national citizenship. (Clark, 2002: p. 39-40) And on a structural level, things do not fare much better: At the level of institutions, more material interests are at stake. Budgets and personal decisions are made on the basis of a paradigm’s description of problems to be solved and how solutions are to be sought. To introduce a challenging paradigm means the relocation of funds and bureaucratic power. Those already entrenched will resist efforts by the advocates of the new paradigm to unseat them and reallocate resources. (Clark, 2002: p. 39-40) We have witnessed this in relation to the paradigm shift with complexity and chaos theory in the positivistic sciences. It comes as no surprise that there is a fear of the unknown, to the extent that some academics complain that new paradigms find resistance from staff and students, are boycotted, not funded, not published or fail immediately to acquire a concrete discipline status, while others point to the danger of embracing new interdisciplinarity with open arms. As Hale (2002) warns, disciplines are characterised by key players, key debates, key journals etc. which are underpinned by power relationships, and she warns: 183

A. Karatzogianni So, as academics we need to bear in mind the potential dangers of embracing the new interdisciplinarity with open arms. On the other hand, if writers like Baetens are correct, in identifying the new impetus for interdisciplinarity as being driven by managerial and financial rather than academic and intellectual concerns, there is little that we at the end can do about it, and we will have to adapt to working within the new paradigm and doing our best to mitigate its worst effects. (Hale, 2007) Perhaps, this fear is directly related to institutional attempts at training interdisciplinary individuals. Kockelmans warns us that in our modern world there is no longer a room for such a Leonardesque aspiration, as these attempts produce shallowness and a lowest common denominator breadth is developed. He thinks that scientific knowledge and competence cannot be found in single individuals, so that ‘now it becomes clear that the locus of knowledge is shifting from individuals to groups’ (Kockelmans, 1979). Finally, it is vital to accept Kockelmans’s assertion that disciplines cannot develop without crossborrowing, and that interdisciplinary approaches to education promote integration of knowledge, freedom of enquiry, and intellectual curiosity. We should also accept that extensive reforms are needed to deal with the following: the limitations found in the medieval origins and the blind spots in the administrative arrangements of the contemporary educational system; the serious intellectual and social discontinuities caused by ‘ethnocentrism and in-group partisanship in the internal and external relations between academic disciplines, university departments, and scientific organizations and institutions’ which ‘leads to a redundant piling up of highly similar specialities, while leaving great interdisciplinary gaps’ (Kockelmans, 1979); and resolve practical matters by organizing and integrating knowledge along different lines. Only then, we as academics can move beyond the external problems of interdisciplinarity and concentrate on the real ones, which is really what we are interested in, in the first place.

Confronting issues, deepening research levels, and juggling multidisciplinarity: Expanding research on cyberconflict For my doctoral work The Politics of Cyberconflict (2006), I argued that it was necessary to engage with theories and methodologies belonging to a variety of disciplines and their respective literatures, in order to explain the phenomenon of ‘cyberconflict’1 (i.e. conflict in computer mediated For more on this definition see http://www.p2pfoundation.net/Cyberconflict

1

184

Confronting internal and external problems of cross-, inter-, and multi-disciplinarity environments). Identifying the different elements from these disciplines to create an integrated theoretical framework caused an avalanche of problems, some internal and some external to the research. Nevertheless, to this date, The Politics of Cyberconflict is the first and only book in this area, while a Cyber Conflict Studies Association was established in the U.S. in 2003. A further edited volume of colleagues doing similar research was published in 2008 (Karatzogianni, 2008). On the internal level (philosophical, epistemological, and methodological issues), the initial empirical observation and subsequent analysis identified in terms of politics, two types of cyberconflict: one involving ethnoreligious groups engaging in hacking, propaganda, recruitment, for example the transfer of ‘real conflicts’, such as the Israeli-Palestinian one to the internet, and another type involving socio-political groups such as the antiglobalization movements or the anti-war protests of 2003 (Karatzogianni 2004a; 2004b; 2005). This crude initial categorization led to the use of social movement theory/resource mobilization and media theory (to engage with the new media element) for socio-political cyberconflicts and conflict theory/analysis and media theory for ethnoreligious cyberconflicts. At the same time, as the environment of cyberconflict involved an understanding of how the internet works, there was need to engage with internet security, cyberculture (including postmodern theorising), while including notions of information warfare and the revolution in military affairs. This amounted to diverse sets of literature in disciplinary subareas, and consistently meddling in other academic turfs rather than my own, which was at the time International Relations. At this theoretical level, the research was multidisciplinary. In terms of political philosophy, the research embraced the openness of networks, rhizomatic structures and movements and their revolutionary potential in relation to hierarchies (for example see Deleuze and Guattari, 1987). Methodologically, it involved critical discourse analysis and survey of opinion and content, pointing more to a ‘qualitative’ approach, using tools that only some of the disciplines had in common. In the methodological sense then, the research was mostly, but not always (for example internet security methods were not used) interdisciplinary. As research progressed confronting the problem of identifying the right units of analysis, the right theoretical elements from the other disciplines and so on, I found that presenting work on diverse and specialist conferences and talking to experts particular to the specific area I was developing was the answer to the theoretical problems, and often to methodological ones too. For example, I attended conferences on Information warfare and Security, Social Movements/Alternative Futures/Popular protest, Conflict Research, Politics and International Relations (IR), Interdisciplinary panels on specific conflicts, Global Communications Research and later Globalization, Small 185

A. Karatzogianni states and Virtual states. Engaging with specialists from these subareas and discussing other case studies relating to their disciplines, ensured that the application of these theories to my own case studies was as valid as possible. In terms of the external problems (historical, socio-political, educational and administrative issues) I had to constantly justify the need for a framework and the use of the different theories to research panels and upgrade panels and other PhD colleagues in my Politics and International Relations department at the University of Nottingham, which was a great exercise (apart from the rare feeling that other people found my research mumbo jumbo). In administrative terms, the viva examination had an IR specialist as an internal, and a communications specialist as an external examination. The differences of philosophical, political and methodological approaches between the external and myself (for instance the more classic approach to communication and my more postmodernist position in relation to the internet) caused some serious problems, but eventually enhanced the quality of the work. On a less serious level, but very important nonetheless as the subject was fairly new, it was very hard to find material and inter-library loans helped to address the lack of literature being locally available, as well as using online journals. In educational terms, I was teaching Global Politics and Political Theory mostly, not directly relevant to the research. In career terms, the term ‘academic orphan’ came to mind, as International Relations saw me as Communications, Communications as Defence Studies, and Defence Studies probably as too political. That meant that I was applying for posts in all areas, and research in the IR field as well to ensure I stayed in that game too. After a year’s post at the Global Communications department at the American University in Paris (there besides media, teaching a course for their Politics department), I returned to the UK as a Lecturer in Media, Culture and Society at Hull.

Conclusions Currently, I am expanding the cyberconflict model to include cultural and socioeconomic cyberconflicts, by looking at small states, minorities, ‘wanna be’ states and their representations in cyberspace and also peer-to-peer networks and alternative politico-economic models (see Karatzogianni, 2008). These case studies will also be used in Power, Resistance and Conflict in the Contemporary World co-authored with Andrew Robinson (forthcoming 2009), where we are exploring the effects of the internet and of networked organizational forms for social movements, international relations and theorizing the current situation. Using the theories of Gramsci, Zizek, Deleuze/Guattari, Hardt/Negri and 186

Confronting internal and external problems of cross-, inter-, and multi-disciplinarity Baudrillard, by nature a multidisciplinary reading, we are developing a theory to account for changes in the nature of war, politics and resistance, with particular reference to foreign policy, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and peripheral resistances to U.S. hegemony. We seek to reinterpret World Systems, reading the world system as an arborescent assemblage and attempting to understand resistance and opposition movements in terms of a combination of networked rhizomes and the assertion of reactive ethnoreligious identities. Many times in the last eight years, I have complained2 and cried in the face of others commenting that ‘Others tried and failed - what makes you think you can pull this off?’ Then I realised despite the inevitable problems outlined in this paper, that multidisciplinarity bears the most beautiful fruits of them all, and however media and politics students fight in my modules over if this is too media or too politics, I always wink at the part of reality that promises me even more of this, if I am brave enough to confront these challenges head on. And as my colleague and friend Petros Ioannidis signs his emails: ‘It is not because things are difficult that we dare not to venture ... It is because we dare not to venture that things seem difficult ...’ (Ovidio, 43 BC – 17 AD).

References Barker, P. (2007). Music. In: J. Canning (Ed), Disciplines in dialogue: Disciplinary perspectives on interdisciplinary teaching and learning. Southampton, UK: The Higher Education Academy, Interdisciplinary Teaching and Learning Group. Becher, T. (1989). Academic tribes and territories: Intellectual enquiry and the culture of disciplines. Buckingham: Open University Press. Bentley, S. (2007). English. In: J. Canning (Ed), Disciplines in dialogue: Disciplinary perspectives on interdisciplinary teaching and learning. Location: The Higher Education Academy, Interdisciplinary Teaching and Learning Group. Bogad, L., Cook, J.S., Darcy, M.G., Donnell Johnson, J., Patterson, S.K., and Tillotson, M.E. (2007). Finding our way as WAC-y women: Writing practice and other collegial endeavors. Available online at http://wac. colostate.edu/atd/articles/bogadetal2007.cfm (Accessed April 2008). Canning, J. (2007). Disciplines in dialogue: Disciplinary perspectives on interdisciplinary teaching and learning. Southampton, UK: The Higher Education Academy, Interdisciplinary Teaching and Learning Group. For a personal account of this asp?BookID=385&AuthorID=134

2

see

http://rccs.usfca.edu/bookinfo.

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A. Karatzogianni Clark, R.P. (2002). Global awareness: Thinking systematically about the world. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield. Deleuze, G., and Guattari, F. (1987). A thousand plateaus. London: Athlone Press. Fazackerley, A. (20 May 2004). Staff at risk in the RAE run up. Times Higher Education Supplement. Gibson, J. (2005). Two types of interdisciplinarity. The Higher Education Academy English subject Newsletter 8 Online. Available online at http:// www.english.heacademy.ac.uk/explore/publications/newsletters/ newsissue8/gibson.htm (Accessed March 2008). Hale, S. (2007). Politics. In: J.Canning (Ed), Disciplines in dialogue: Disciplinary perspectives on interdisciplinary teaching and learning. Southampton, UK: The Higher Education Academy, Interdisciplinary Teaching and Learning Group. Karatzogianni, A. (2004a). The politics of cyberconflict. Journal of Politics, 24, 46-55. Karatzogianni, A. (2004b). The Impact of the Internet during the Iraq war on the peace movement, war coverage and war-related cyberattacks. Cultural Technology and Policy Journal, 1. Also translated and serialized by the author in Greek for the weekly political magazine Politika Themata, Athens, during December 2005. Karatzogianni, A. (2005). Social movement theory and sociopolitical cyberconflicts. In: C. Barker and M. Tyldesley (Eds), Proceedings of the 10th international conference on alternative futures and popular protest. Manchester: Manchester Metropolitan University. Karatzogianni, A. (2006). The politics of cyberconflict. London: Routledge Research on Internet and Society, Routledge. Karatzogianni, A. (2008). Cyber conflict and global politics. London: Contemporary Security Studies, Routledge. Karatzogianni, A., and Robinson, A. (forthcoming 2009). Power, resistance and conflict in the contemporary world. London: Routledge Advanced Series in International Relations and Global Politics, Routledge. Kockelmans, J. (1979). Interdisciplinarity and higher education. Pennsylvania: The Pennsylvania State University Press, University Park. Lemon, M. (2002). Re-visiting Montpellier: The utility of crossdisciplinary conceptualisations. Available online at http://www.aquadapt.net/pdf/ Lemon_-_Revisiting_Montpellier.pdf (Accessed March 2008). Ratcliffe, G. (1975). Crossdiciplinary courses for polytechniques. Physics Education, Issue, Pages. Seibt, J. (2003). Process theories: Crossdisciplinary studies in dynamic categories. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Wallerstein, I. (2003). Intellectuals in an age of transition. In: W.A. Dunaway (Ed), Emerging issues in the 21st Century world-system, 188

Confronting internal and external problems of cross-, inter-, and multi-disciplinarity Volume II: New theoretical directions for 21st Century world-system. Westport, CT: Greenwood. Wilkinson, K.M., Dube, W.V., and McIlvane, W.J. (1996). Crossdisciplinary perspective on studies of rapid word mapping in psycholinguistics and behavior analysis. Developmental Review, 16, 125-148.

189

A. Karatzogianni

190

Index

Index

A adaptation 129, 130, 131, 133, 137 administrative 94, 168, 179, 181, 182, 184, 186 ambiguity 30 architecture 59, 21, 59, 104, 109, 119, 109, 110, 111, 115, 119, 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 134, 136 assimilation 6, 119, 120, 123, 127 authentic interdisciplinary problems 25, 27, 33

B barriers to learning 89, 90, 92, 95, 96, 97 Beck 175, 176 biological systems 6, 141, 142, 150 brain 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 20, 21, 22, 23, 141, 142, 143, 145, 146, 147, 148, 152

C case study method 168, 170 challenges 3, 5, 7, 13, 19, 21, 89, 106, 107, 109, 142, 151, 155, 161, 163, 187 cognitive sciences 5, 9, 10, 11, 14, 15, 16, 18, 21, 22, 23 collaboration 10, 14, 76, 15, 18, 19, 21, 22, 141, 76, 77, 137, 148, 155, 150, 156, 157, 158, 159, 160, 161, 162, 163 collaborative learning 25 communication 2, 3, 5, 19, 29, 30, 69, 75, 76, 90, 91, 92, 94, 98, 129, 131, 143, 157, 158, 159, 162, 163, 180, 186 computer-based assessment 6, 57, 68 conceptual change 25, 28, 32, 33 consciousness raising 57 conservation 119, 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126, 127 content 11, 32, 61, 73, 74, 79, 181, 185 Content and Language Integrated Learning 6, 73 convergence 10, 20, 21 cross-disciplinarity 179 culture 33, 90, 93, 94, 96, 129, 131, 133, 135, 136, 137, 141, 151, 161, 163, 182 cyberconflict 184, 185, 186 191

Index

D design 30, 59, 64, 68, 103, 104, 105, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113, 115 diagram editor 61 disciplinary research 1, 7, 9, 10, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 26, 33, 57, 89, 98, 130, 141, 143, 149, 151

E education 9, 10, 74, 58, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 20, 22, 23, 77, 78, 73, 78, 81, 21, 89, 90, 91, 94, 97, 98, 103, 105, 107, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113, 114, 115, 152, 155, 161, 164, 177, 179, 184 emergence 2, 9, 10, 13, 20, 121 epistemology 13, 179 extension 2, 64, 67, 126

F feedback 30, 58, 59, 60, 62, 63, 64, 67, 68, 69, 77, 179 formative assessment 57, 58, 59, 62, 63, 67, 68 free-response 58, 59, 68

G generational differences 91, 97 global 13, 107, 114, 115, 177, 182 goals 18, 22, 23, 79, 94, 156, 158, 159 graduate education 149

H health care 6, 141, 142, 151, 155, 156, 157, 158, 159, 161, 162, 163 heritage 94, 119, 123, 126

I Ingarden 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126 integration 2, 3, 21, 57, 78, 80, 93, 103, 130, 142, 147, 149, 184 interdisciplinarity 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 30, 33, 57, 68, 69, 120, 126, 137, 149, 150, 179, 180, 181, 183, 184 interdisciplinary 73, 57, 25, 104, 74, 27, 28, 30, 110, 32, 33, 34, 114, 68, 69, 119, 141, 129, 130, 142, 130, 123, 127, 120, 68, 33, 62, 16, 12, 141, 142, 144, 147, 148, 149, 150, 155, 156, 157, 158, 159, 160, 161, 162, 163, 167, 169, 172, 173, 175, 176, 177, 179, 180, 184, 185 intergenerational learning 6, 89, 91, 92, 93, 95, 97 intertextuality 130 192

Index

L language 6, 13, 22, 25, 26, 69, 73, 74, 78, 79, 80, 129, 150, 156, 160, 170, 171, 180 language learning 73, 74 Learning sciences 20 legal education 169 legal paradigm 172

M media 6, 29, 129, 130, 131, 137, 185, 186, 187 methodology 23, 25, 26, 27, 28, 32, 57, 74, 109, 120, 170 multi-disciplinarity 30, 32, 179, 187 multi-disciplinary 29, 89, 181, 182 music 129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134

N neuroscience 12, 15, 16, 17, 21, 141, 142, 146, 148, 150

O object-orientated framework 61 ontology 119, 120 organisational learning 94, 96, 158

P parents 78, 80, 81, 92, 105, 113 participation 32, 103, 104, 109, 111, 112, 113, 114, 115, 127, 158 phenomenology 6, 119, 121, 128 philosophy 5, 6, 9, 10, 119, 176, 177, 185 policy 2, 9, 80, 96, 103, 107, 108, 109, 110, 112, 114, 156, 157, 180, 187 politics 6, 174, 177, 179, 185, 187 power relationships 155, 159, 183

Q quotation 129, 130, 131, 133, 134, 136, 137

R recognition 12, 14, 15, 19, 20, 22, 173 reflexivity 174 reverse mentoring 89, 90, 91, 92, 96, 99 risk society 174, 175 193

Index

S school managers 73 schools 18, 19, 28, 33, 73, 74, 78, 79, 80, 103, 104, 105, 106, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113, 114, 115, 151 Science Technology & Society (STS) 27 semiotics 16, 130 significance 123, 137, 142 social memory 125 social theory 167, 174, 176, 177 space 32, 110, 121, 126, 131 stakeholder 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 81, 180 student experience 62 sustainability 79, 103, 104, 107, 109, 110

T tacit and explicit knowledge 90 teamwork 92, 159, 163 the visual arts 129, 131, 132, 133 transcription 6, 129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137 transdisciplinarity 3, 6 transdisciplinary 2, 6, 137, 155, 156, 162

V vocabulary 182 Vranken 169, 170, 171, 172, 173, 174

194

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