Session Information
13 SES 10 B, Parallel Paper Session
Parallel Paper Session
Contribution
In this paper I elaborate a philosophical perspective on the shift that is currently taking place from traditional forms of teaching and learning to digital forms. My starting point is a Foucaultian framework, or more adequately put, I try to bring together two authors who develop critically and each in their own way a Foucaultian perspective, and who offer interesting ideas for coming to terms with the (digital) age we live in. This concerns more precisely the work of Giorgio Agamben and Bernard Stiegler. It is however rather uncommon to read these two philosophers together (with the notable exception of the work of de Boever, 2010) and this is especially true for the sphere of philosophy and theory of education. I argue though that both perspectives might inform and complement one another, and that the joining of these two approaches offers a promising philosophical framework to think and discuss issues connected to the digitization of education that is taking place today, and more precisely the possibilities and limitations that come along with this evolution.
Both Agamben and Stiegler try to think through Foucault’s basic idea that we should not take subjectivity as a starting point, but rather as a construction, dependent upon historically contingent conditions. Stiegler (1994) elaborates this idea in a radical technocentric way, meaning that for him the invention and use of particular technologies account for what we, as human beings, are. Hence, he holds a plea to take into consideration the role that concrete material tools (e.g. a pen or a keyboard), and related practices (e.g. writing or typing ) play for subject-constitution. From this it follows, so Stiegler (2008) claims, that the very possibility to be attentive for something (the world, the other, a subject matter) is not something that is given as such, but has to be supported and shaped by particular technologies, and especially by practices such as writing and reading that are typically part of schooling regimes. This approach grants interesting perspectives to look at the meaning of (formal) education, viz. in terms of concrete technologies of attention. At the same time, Stiegler’s considerations are critical to the massive introduction of new information and communication technologies, because this evolution allows so called ‘program industries’ to capture attention, bringing about a process of desubjectification. His criticism is however not inspired by a Luddite nostalgia. Fundamentally, Stiegler is precisely looking for an alternative use of existing technologies (an educational use, i.e. a use that forms, rather than captures attention). Stiegler however never succeeds in making clear what this alternative consists in.
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Agamben, G. (2005). The Coming Community (M. Hardt, Trans.). Mineapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Agamben, G. (2007). Profanations (J. Fort, Trans.). New York: Zone Books. Agamben, G. (2009).What is an Apparatus? (D. Kishik & S. Pedatella, Trans.). Stanford: Stanford University Press. De Boever, A (2010). The Allegory of the Cage: Foucault, Agamben, and the Enlightenment, Foucault Studies 10, 7-22. Prozorov, S. (2010) Why Giorgio Agamben is an optimist, Philosophy Social Criticism 36 (9), 1053-1073. Stiegler, B. (1994). La technique et le temps. Tome I: La faute d’Épiméthée. Paris: Galilée. Stiegler, B. (2008). Prendre soin de la jeunesse et des générations. Paris: Flammarion.
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