Sites for Power and Knowledge? Towards a critique of the virtual university

Newman, Rhona; Johnson, Fred A.

doi:10.1080/01425699995515

Cited by 24 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…Whereas it can be argued that developing technological skills is a prerequisite to using ICT for more diverse learning outcomes, what form this learning will then take appears to have been given very little consideration above and beyond workplace orientated 'key skills'. Indeed, as Newman and Johnson (1999) assert, to assume that all aspects of learning can be delivered via ICT exhibits a 'naïve empiricism' towards the diverse nature of lifelong education.…”

Section: Re-examining New Labour's Policy Rationalesmentioning

confidence: 99%

‘E-stablishing’ an Inclusive Society? Technology, Social Exclusion and UK Government Policy Making

Selwyn¹

2002

J. Soc. Pol.

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In many industrialised countries information and communication technology (ICT) is now being seen as a ready means through which governments can address issues of social exclusion. Indeed, in the UK this perspective has been quickly translated into a multi-billion pound policy agenda aimed at using ICT for socially inclusive purposes. Yet, beyond rhetorical concerns over bridging the perceived ‘digital divide’ and alleviating disparities between the information ‘rich’ and ‘poor’, little critical consideration has been given to how technology is being used by governments to achieve socially inclusive aims. This paper therefore examines the UK government’s ICT-based social policy drive through official documentation, policy statements and political discourse – considering the ‘problems’ that it sets out to address, the substance of the policies, and the perceived rationales and benefits for doing so. Having explored the official construction of these policies, the paper then examines how well founded this policy framework is in terms of achieving its stated aims of widening access to ICT and effectively facilitating ‘social inclusion’. The paper concludes by developing a critical perspective of such ICT policies which reveals deeper economic rationales informing this ostensibly ‘social’ policy programme.

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Section: Re-examining New Labour's Policy Rationalesmentioning

confidence: 99%

‘E-stablishing’ an Inclusive Society? Technology, Social Exclusion and UK Government Policy Making

Selwyn¹

2002

J. Soc. Pol.

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“…In the university education sphere, most discussions around the introduction of new online education delivery technologies tend to be framed in terms of the utility of software programs for increasing the effectiveness of modes of teaching delivery and/or the quality of the pedagogical experience for both the lecturer and the student (Garson 2000;Laurillard 1993;Newman and Johnson 1999;Shields 2000). Such approaches to the issue of the implementation of information and communication technologies (ICTs) within universities overlook the potential of such technologies to qualitatively alter the methods of articulation between the lecturer, the student and the university.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Translating an Eletronic Panopticon Educational technology and the re-articulation of lecturer-student relations in online learning

Kitto

2003

Information, Communication & Society

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A b s t r a c tAround the world universities are currently in the midst of an online learning revolution. Australia is no exception, with new online learning software packages being used throughout the country at various levels of implementation. This paper reports on research conducted at a regional campus in Australia, which is trialing an online educational software package. Using Foucault's writing on disciplinary techniques and the panopticon as a diagram of power in tandem with the translation approach outlined within Actor-Network Theory (ANT), this paper demonstrates how certain functions within an educational software package act interdependently as an electronic disciplinary technique that renders the student as an object, making them knowable to the lecturer and the university. This technologically-mediated objectification of the student enables lecturers to act upon the actions of the student at-a-distance, and thus carries the effects of disciplinary power to them in new ways. The subsequent analysis shows how the introduction of online technology into university education serves to produce multiple translations of disciplinary and counter-disciplinary practices between lecturers and students. The success or failure of the lecturer's attempts to translate the actions of the students through the educational technology was not necessarily related to any intentional resistance by the students. Instead, the production of multiple learning practices produced in association with the online technology served to exacerbate the ambivalent and ambiguous subject positions inhabited by the students. This affected the students' translation of the lecturer's course instructions, resulting in some students engaging in questionable pedagogical practices. K e y w o r d s

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“…Whereas it can be argued that developing technological skills is a prerequisite to using ICT for more diverse learning outcomes, what form this learning will then take appears to have been given very little consideration above and beyond workplace orientated ' key skills' . Indeed, as Newman and Johnson (1999) assert, to assume that all aspects of learning can be delivered via ICT exhibits a ' naṏve empiricism' towards the diverse nature of lifelong education.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

The role of the 'technical fix' in UK lifelong education policy

Selwyn¹,

Gorard²,

Williams³

2001

Int. J. Lifelong Educ.

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The integral place of information and communications technology (ICT) in UK lifelong education has been established by a series of technology-based initiatives introduced by the New Labour government since 1997. Initiatives such as the University for Industry, learndirect, People's Network and National Grid for Learning are being implemented as part of a coherent lifelong education policy-agenda fundamentally based upon the use of ICT. Yet, beneath the political enthusiasm for technology-based education, the role of ICT in lifelong learning remains largely unexamined and unproblematized, with many policy-makers and educationalists content to view technology as providing a 'technical fix' for many of education' s problems. From this background, the present paper provides a critical perspective on the technological foundations of the UK government's lifelong education agenda. In particular, it examines the nature and form of the policies that have been introduced and then contrasts them with the rhetorical claims that are being made by government and other official actors. In this way the paper discusses how such policies continue to be shaped within a restrictive technocratic and determinist discourse of the 'technical fix', thus conforming to traditional narratives of society and technology. The paper then goes on to explore how such construction juxtaposes social and economic elements of the policy-drive and threatens, ultimately, to restrict the eventual educational effectiveness of these 'new' lifelong learning initiatives.

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Sites for Power and Knowledge? Towards a critique of the virtual university

Cited by 24 publications

References 9 publications

‘E-stablishing’ an Inclusive Society? Technology, Social Exclusion and UK Government Policy Making

‘E-stablishing’ an Inclusive Society? Technology, Social Exclusion and UK Government Policy Making

Translating an Eletronic Panopticon Educational technology and the re-articulation of lecturer-student relations in online learning

The role of the 'technical fix' in UK lifelong education policy

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