New Directions in Rhizomatic Learning (Routledge Research in Education) [1 ed.] 9781032453088, 9781032453095, 9781003376378, 1032453087

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Routledge Research in Education

NEW DIRECTIONS IN RHIZOMATIC LEARNING FROM POSTSTRUCTURAL THINKING TO NOMADIC PEDAGOGY Edited by Myint Swe Khine

New Directions in Rhizomatic Learning

Drawing on the theories and philosophies of Deleuze and Guattari, this edited collection explores the concept of rhizomatic learning and consolidates recent explorations in theory building and multidisciplinary research to identify new directions in the field. Knowledge transfer is no longer a fixed process. Rhizomatic learning posits that learning is a continuous, dynamic process, making connections, using multiple paths, without beginnings, and ending in a nomadic style. The chapters in this book examine these notions and how they intersect with a contemporary and future global society. Tracking the development of the field from postructuralist thinking to nomadic pedagogy, this book goes beyond philosophy to examine rhizomatic learning within the real world of education. It highlights innovative methods, frameworks, and controversies, as well as creative and unique approaches to both the theory and practice of rhizomatic learning. Bringing together international contributors to provide new insights into pedagogy for 21st-century learning, this book will be of interest to academics, researchers, and postgraduate students in education and adjacent fields. Myint Swe Khine holds master’s degrees in education from the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, USA, and the University of Surrey, Guildford, UK, and a Doctor of Education from Curtin University, Australia. He worked at the National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, and was a Professor at Emirates College for Advanced Education in the United Arab Emirates. Dr. Khine currently teaches at Curtin University, Australia. He is a member of the Editorial Advisory Board of international academic journals and has published several edited books. One of the books, Large Scale School Reform and Social Capital Building, was published by Routledge in 2013.

Routledge Research in Education

This series aims to present the latest research from right across the field of education. It is not confined to any particular area or school of thought and seeks to provide coverage of a broad range of topics, theories and issues from around the world. The Role of Metaphor and Symbol in Motivating Primary School Children Elizabeth Ashton Plurilingual Pedagogy in the Arabian Peninsula Transforming and Empowering Students and Teachers Edited by Daniela Coelho and Telma Gharibian Steinhagen Theoretical and Historical Evolutions of Self-Directed Learning The Case for Learner-Led Education Caleb Collier Learning as Interactivity, Movement, Growth and Becoming, Volume 1 Ecologies of Learning in Higher Education Edited by Mark E. King and Paul J. Thibault The New Publicness of Education Democratic Possibilities After the Critique of Neo-Liberalism Edited by Carl Anders Säfström and Gert Biesta New Directions in Rhizomatic Learning From Poststructural Thinking to Nomadic Pedagogy Edited by Myint Swe Khine For more information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com/RoutledgeResearch-in-Education/book-series/SE0393

New Directions in Rhizomatic Learning From Poststructural Thinking to Nomadic Pedagogy Edited by Myint Swe Khine

First published 2023 by Routledge 4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2023 selection and editorial matter, Myint Swe Khine; individual chapters, the contributors The right of Myint Swe Khine to be identified as the author of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN: 978-1-032-45308-8 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-032-45309-5 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-37637-8 (ebk) DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378 Typeset in Galliard by KnowledgeWorks Global Ltd.

Contents

List of figuresvii List of tablesviii List of contributorsix Foreword xiv PART I

Introduction

1

1 Explorations in learning and rhizome metaphor

3

MYINT SWE KHINE

PART II

Theoretical foundations and rhizomatic perspective of learning

7

2 What should we be teaching if Google gives the answer before we have even finished typing the question?

9

JOHANNES CRONJÉ

3 Rhizomatic teacher development in the context of the ecological university

26

IAN M. KINCHIN

4 Rhizomatic learning: A critical appraisal from the perspective of cultural-historical theory

41

ILIAS KARASAVVIDIS

5 Rhizome learning: A catalyst for a new social contract EBBA OSSIANNILSSON

65

vi  Contents

6 Semiosis, hybridity and the mediated mind

80

LEE HAZELDINE AND ARON SPALL

7 Rhizomes, nomads, and complexity: A new relational pedagogy for the era of networks, social media, and artificial intelligence

98

ALEXIOS BRAILAS

PART III

Pedagogical approaches and rhizomatic learning in action

117

8 Rhizomatic learning systems and precision language education: A perfect match

119

ANDREW-PETER LIAN AND PUNYATHON SANGARUN

9 Rhizomatic pedagogy in higher education: A comparative analysis

142

SUZAN KOSEOGLU AND ARAS BOZKURT

10 Enabling rhizomatic collaborations: Social and technical factors that impact agile thinking and learning

158

APOSTOLOS KOUTROPOULOS

11 The rhizomatic learning process of educational commons

179

YANNIS PECHTELIDIS, SILIA RADITSA, SOFIA SARAKENIDOU, AND SASA DIMITRIADOU

12 Changing the image of thought: Rhizomatic learning and human-nature relationships in the Anthropocene

198

JONAS MIKAELS

13 Rhizomatic learning and the problematic field of ideas

210

RODRIGO BARBOSA MUGNAI LOPES

Index

223

Figures

2.1 2.2 3.1 3.2 3.3 4.1 6.1 7.1

7.2 7.3 7.4 7.5 8.1 8.2 8.3

Integrating direct instruction and constructivist learning18 The Cynefin framework18 Concept map of the main ideas presented in this chapter29 Three interconnected adaptive cycles representing plateaus in academic development30 Images of the structure of the rhizome36 The main components of an activity system48 Peirce’s triadic sign model85 “Pando (Latin for I spread out) is a clonal colony of an individual male quaking aspen determined to be a single living organism by identical genetic markers and assumed to have one massive underground root system”99 A networked conception of learning100 Graph produced by Google N-grams viewer101 Rhizomatic vs hierarchical pedagogy110 The rhizome as a multicolour dialogue, a process of co-development111 Fragment of a rhizomatic system123 Principles of the rhizome133 The relevance of the rhizome to teaching and learning134

Tables

2.1 2.2 2.3 9.1 9.2

Developing a collectionist curation strategy16 Example of an asset collection strategy framework19 Rhizonomic questions for ANT22 Emerging topics addressed during Rhizo14 and Rhizo15144 Example for Postgraduate Certificate community contributions144

Contributors

Aras Bozkurt is a researcher and faculty member in the Department of Distance Education, Open Education Faculty at Anadolu University, Turkey. He holds MA and PhD degrees in distance education. Dr. Bozkurt conducts empirical studies on distance education, open and distance learning, online learning, networked learning, and educational technology to which he applies various critical theories, such as connectivism, rhizomatic learning, and heutagogy. He is also interested in emerging research paradigms, including social network analysis, sentiment analysis, and data mining. He shares his views on his Twitter feed @arasbozkurt. Alexios Brailas (PhD) currently works at the Department of Psychology, Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences, where he teaches courses on Qualitative research methods, Systems thinking and practice, and Psychology of social media. He is also adjunct faculty at the Hellenic Open University and the European University of Cyprus. Research interests include, among others: personal and group development, empowerment and resilience in complex techno-social systems; rhizomatic learning, experiential learning, learning communities, reflective practice and peer-to-peer learning networks; evidence-based group work and community interventions; community digital storytelling; action research and community-based participatory research. Alexios is a licensed psychologist and a certified group psychotherapist (European Association for Psychotherapy) and an adult educator. Johannes Cronjé is a professor of digital teaching and learning in the Department of Information Technology at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology. Prior to that, he was the dean of Informatics and Design. He has supervised more than 140 masters’ and doctoral students and published more than 65 peer-reviewed papers. He is a sought-after international keynote speaker and has been a visiting professor at seven universities internationally. Sasa Dimitriadou is a preschool teacher and a team facilitator following the method of non-directive intervention. She works at the self-organized Institute for Theory and Practice of Libertarian Education, and her research interests lie in libertarian education, childhood studies, history, and the sociology of education.

x  Contributors Lee Hazeldine is a research fellow and senior lecturer in education at Canterbury Christ Church University, UK. He has a PhD in Philosophy and has over 20 years of experience working in education. Lee has previously worked as a learning consultant, providing guidance on effective teaching practices to a variety of educational professionals. He has published on a variety of subjects and has particular expertise in art education and technology-based learning. Danah Henriksen is an associate professor of Leadership & Innovation at Arizona State University. Her research focuses on creativity in education, and she is an associate editor of the journal Education Policy Analysis Archives. Her work is published in peer-reviewed journals like Teachers College Record, Educational Technology & Society, and Review of Research in Education, and practitioner venues like Educational Leadership or Kappan. She has been co-chair of the Creativity SIG for the Society of Information Technology in education, and creativity working group leader for EDUsummIT – a UNESCO-supported global education consortium. She is co-chair of the Dissertation in Practice SIG for the Carnegie Project in the education doctorate. http://danah-henriksen.com Ilias Karasavvidis is an assistant professor of learning with ICT in the Department of Preschool Education at the University of Thessaly, Greece. He is the head of the Science and Technology Laboratory in the same department. He holds a PhD in educational technology from the University of Twente, an MEd in Educational Technology, and an honors degree in teacher education from the University of Crete. He has authored several international and national publications that cover various topics related to supporting learning with technology. His current research interests include digital media, serious games design and development, machine learning, and preservice/in-service teacher ICT training. Myint Swe Khine holds master’s degrees in education from the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, USA, and the University of Surrey, Guildford. UK, and a Doctor of Education from Curtin University, Australia. He was the professor and chair of the Assessment and Evaluation Centre at the Emirates College of Advanced Education in the United Arab Emirates. He currently teaches at Curtin University, Australia. Dr. Khine has edited several books and published in international refereed academic journals. A recent volume, Handbook of Research on Teacher Education: Innovations and Practices in Asia, was published by Springer in 2022. Ian M. Kinchin is a professor of higher education at the Surrey Institute of Education at the University of Surrey, where he is engaged in the professional development of university teachers. Ian has published research in the fields of zoology, science education, and academic development. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Biology and a senior fellow of the Higher Education Academy. Ian has a PhD in science education and a DLitt in higher education. His current research focuses on the development of the ecological university.

Contributors xi Suzan Koseoglu is a Lecturer in Higher Education Teaching and Learning at the University of Greenwich (UK). Suzan has been involved in faculty development for more than 10  years in different institutions including the University of Minnesota, Goldsmiths University of London, and University of Greenwich. At Greenwich, Suzan is the university lead for pedagogic research and teaches courses on higher education pedagogy for academic staff and postgraduate students. Her research explores the intersection of open online learning and ethical and inclusive approaches to education. Apostolos Koutropoulos (AK) is the online program manager for the applied linguistics master of arts programme at the University of Massachusetts Boston. AK is also a lecturer for the Instructional Design Master of education programme where he teaches courses in instructional design, educational technology, eLearning, and online learning. In addition to teaching graduate courses in instructional design, AK also leads online faculty development workshops. AK has earned an EdD in distance education from Athabasca University, as well as a BA in computer science, an MBA with a focus on human resources, an MSc in information technology, an MA in applied linguistics, and an MEd in instructional design from UMass Boston. Andrew-Peter Lian is currently a professor of foreign language studies at Suranaree University of Technology, Thailand; professor of postgraduate studies in English language education at Ho Chi Minh City Open University, Vietnam; professor emeritus of languages and second language education at University of Canberra, Australia. He is also president of AsiaCALL, the Asia Association of Computer-Assisted Language-Learning as well as president of the International Conference on TESOL and education, both research and professional associations focusing on second/foreign language learning in Asian contexts with the use of technology where appropriate. Prior to these appointments, he was professor and chair of the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures at Western Illinois University in the United States and had been professor of humanities and director of the centre for the study of languages at Rice University, Houston, TX, USA, as well as professor and head of the School of Languages and International Education at the University of Canberra in Australia. He has held further professorial appointments and has been head of department at two other universities in Australia (James Cook University and Bond University). He is on the editorial board of several international journals. His current research interests include rhizomatic learning systems, precision language education, neurolinguistics, and technology-enhanced language learning. Jonas Mikaels is an associate professor of outdoor and environmental education at the Swedish School of Sport and Health Sciences (GIH). His research interests include examining human-nature relations through posthuman theorizing. One of his most recent publications employs a relational materialist approach as a way of challenging dominant taken-for-granted ways of seeing

xii  Contributors and knowing the world towards providing new possibilities of embodied relations to place(s). He designs and teaches on many undergraduate and postgraduate courses in outdoor studies and is interested in pedagogic practice. He is a keen skier, kitesurfer, and yogi. Punya Mishra is an associate dean of scholarship & innovation at the Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College at ASU, where he leads a range of initiatives that provide a future-forward approach to educational research. He is internationally recognized for his work in technology integration; the role of creativity and aesthetics in learning; and the application of designbased approaches to educational innovation. He ranks among the top 2% of scientists worldwide and the top 100 scholars who have the biggest influence on educational practice and policy. He is a TED-Ed educator, an engaging public speaker, and an accomplished visual artist and poet. Rodrigo Barbosa Mugnai Lopes graduated in philosophy from Universidade do Sagrado Coração, a master’s in philosophy from São Paulo State University (Unesp), School of Philosophy and Sciences, in research areas of logic, epistemology, and philosophy of science, doctor in education from São Paulo State University (Unesp), School of Philosophy and Sciences, Brazil. He carried out a sandwich doctorate research internship in philosophy at the Département de Philosophie, Université Paris 8. He was also a visiting professor (postdoctoral) at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, assistant professor at São Paulo State University (Unesp), School of Technology and Sciences, Brazil. Ebba Ossiannilsson, Sweden, is an independent researcher, expert, consultant, quality auditor, and influencer in the fields of open, flexible online, and distance learning (OFDL) and the “new normal.” Her focus is on quality, innovation, leadership, and personalized learning. She works primarily at the strategic and policy levels, both nationally and internationally, and with key international organizations. She is committed to promoting and improving OFDL in the context of SDG4 and the future of education. She is a guest editor of several special issues and a member of the editorial boards of several academic journals. She is regularly engaged as a keynote speaker. She has received several international fellowships. Yannis Pechtelidis currently serves as an associate professor in the sociology of education at the Department of Early Childhood Education at the University of Thessaly in Greece. His research engages with the educational commons, childhood, and youth from sociological and philosophical perspectives. He is a member of the European Sociological Association (ESA), European Research Network for Sociology of Education, European Research Network for Sociology of Childhood, and International Discourse Analysis Network. He has coordinated several research projects (SMOOTH-H2020, https://smooth-ecs.eu/). He published in major journals and is the author of several books.

Contributors xiii Silia Raditsa is a PhD candidate at the University of Thessaly. Her research interests lie in libertarian educational commons, environmental education, pedagogical documentation, and early childhood. Punyathon Sangarun is currently an associate professor in the School of Education at Vongchavalitkul University, Thailand. Prior to that, she worked in the School of Foreign Languages at Suranaree University of Technology, Thailand. Her research interest includes second language acquisition, task-based language learning, precision language education, and technology-enhanced language learning. Sofia Sarakenidou is a preschool teacher and psychologist. She is also a certified Montessori educator and she works at the self-organized Institute for Theory and Practice of Libertarian Education. Aron Spall is a senior lecturer in media arts and communications at Sheffield Hallam University, UK. He has developed and taught curricula in higher and further education since 2005, having previously taught at University for the Creative Arts, Surrey. He has a master’s degree in fine art from the University of Portsmouth. His PhD investigates how emerging digital ecologies affect the processing, practicing, and archiving of individual, social, and cultural memory, with a particular focus on Deleuzian concepts of multiplicity and difference. Recently exhibited work include Speculative Memory Renders: Archive and Interact at S1 Artspace, Sheffield, and “The Image that appears once and for all in the instant of its alienation” at Stour Gallery, London.

Foreword

We have always been rhizomatic A ‘rhizome’ refers to a deeply interconnected branching network. Within the field of biology, the term denotes plant anatomy – a creeping rootstalk or a horizontal underground plant stem that can produce the shoot and root systems of a new plant (Britannica, n.d.). But rhizomes also metaphorically point to the nature of knowledge itself, as Deleuze and Guattari (1980) used the term in regard to knowledge as a nonlinear network that connects any point to any other point. In speaking of rhizomatic networks, they speak to connections between chains of signs and symbols implicated in meaning making, organizations of power, and conditions surrounding the arts, sciences, and social struggles. While this use of the term is relatively recent, the idea behind it is not, especially when we view knowledge as networked ideas that connect and interconnect through a complex and unordered array of nodes and links. The rhizome has no beginning or end and no point of origin. Just as knowledge has no singular beginning, end, or absolute centre point or origin. Even before the philosophical concept of rhizomes emerged, human knowledge was not vertically oriented in top-down linear chains – although it was often mischaracterized as linear within traditional views of education and pedagogy. In reality, knowledge has always been inextricably messy, complex, lateral, creeping, uncontrolled, and unbounded. It can produce new systems of knowledge, much as a creeping rootstalk can produce systems of new plants. Knowledge lives and breathes in the material, social, and cultural world among networks of ideas, people, elements, and circumstances. Thus, knowledge is often instantiated in particular tools, technologies, and artefacts; and these tools, technologies and artefacts, in turn, influence how we think about, articulate, and disseminate knowledge. Consider a classic form of knowledge dissemination – the book. The book has often been understood as a concrete, linear, and stable form of knowledge presentation. As the central form of knowledge over a majority of recent human history, the book has influenced a traditional perception of knowledge as concrete, linear, and stable. Yet, the rhizomatic nature of knowledge has always pushed against the constraints of the book. Dictionaries and encyclopedias are old forms of rhizomatic texts. One could even argue that supposedly linear texts have rhizomatic properties, like footnotes,

Foreword xv endnotes, and indices. There is the Talmud, with its heavy use of annotations and nested commentary; or there are Indian epics and story collections (such as the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, Kathasaritsagara, and the Panchatantra), with their structure of nested stories, revealing ancient prototypes of hypertexts within a narrative framework. Contemporary authors have also used rhizomatic ideas to structure plots and narratives. The Library of Babel, a short story by Jorge Luis Borges, is a multilayered parable about our attempt to make sense of the universe and a vision of a rhizomatic world (Borges, 1964). Hopscotch, a novel by Julio Cortazar (1966), as a book, though outwardly conventional, can be read in any sequence whatsoever. Milorad Pavic’s, The Dictionary of the Khazars, published in two volumes (which differ from each other just in one paragraph), presents material to readers in a non-linear manner, allowing (or forcing) them to construct their own narrative (Pavic, 1988). Members of Oulipo (a French literary society dedicated to experimental writing) have developed various books and poems that have strong rhizomatic properties. Raymond Queaneau’s, A Story as You Like It, is a good example (Queaneau, 1986), which in its own way foreshadowed the Choose Your Own Adventure young adult fiction book series popularized in the 1980s (Jamison, 2022). Interactive texts also became popular in the 1980s with the publication of this series of books. Outside of literature, people have noticed the rhizomatic nature of Wittegenstein’s Philosophical Investigations (Wittgenstein, 1973). At heart, rhizomatic texts point to a paradigm shift, away from conceptual schemes based on “center, margin, hierarchy, and linearity,” towards acknowledging “multilinearity, nodes, links and networks.” Before written language and texts came along, oral culture generally governed the production and spread of knowledge – where the telling of stories, and spread of information, was typically multi-nodal and spread like root systems throughout cultures and networks, in fluidly unsystematic ways. Knowledge within traditional texts often has often been shoehorned into seemingly linear structures, to accommodate the word-to-word, page-to-page, chapter-to-chapter, flow of ideas in a book, article, or other form of text. Yet, some of the rhizomatic features or instances of texts that we noted show how knowledge has often strained at the seams of textual structures – seeking ways to slip the structure, move around in it, and make new connections or leaps. As newer networked technologies and phenomena like the internet have emerged, knowledge has found new ways to sprawl, connect, and network itself rhizomatically. Fundamentally, the Internet and its hypertexts are almost “embarrassing literal embodiments” (Landow, 1992) of certain crucial aspects of rhizomatic texts, specifically those relating to intertextuality, narrative, creativity, and complicating the power, roles, and functions of readers and writers. When we suggest that knowledge has always been rhizomatic, our point is not there is nothing new under the sun – but rather that the metaphor of the rhizome has always been implicitly present in the nature of knowledge as an unending network of connections and interconnections. It is a powerful metaphor, and new tools and digital technologies have affordances that allow rapid,

xvi  Foreword networked, and often sprawling uninhibited communication that embodies the metaphor more powerfully than many pre-digital tools could. This has itself led to global cultural shifts in societies and new perceptions of knowledge. The chapters in this book speak to this new perception or reconception of knowledge, and how it intersects with the direction and future of contemporary global society. These chapters examine the rhizomatic nature of knowledge and learning in powerful and (appropriately) branching ways, befitting the uncentred emerging global order that knowledge exists within. Across a range of chapters and connection points, the authors look at the theoretical foundations of the rhizome, examining its epistemic roots and meanings, and contextualizing the rhizome in the shifting landscape of our world, and in our use of language, tools, and technologies. Importantly, they consider the meaning of a rhizomatic view of knowledge within education and learning – what it means for certain education contexts, curricula, learning ecologies, and instantiations of technologies or technological constructs like social media, artificial intelligence, predictive technologies, and others. This book offers a thoughtfully developed understanding of rhizomatic thinking and knowledge – not as a philosophical abstraction, but within the living breathing world of learning and education – showing how it opens possibilities for seeing new connectivities, relationalities, and a more organic, ecological, and future-oriented perspective on learning and knowledge. Danah Henriksen and Punya Mishra

References Borges, J. L. (1962). The library of Babel. In Labyrinths: Selected stories and other writings (pp. 51–58). New Directions. Britannica (n.d.). Rhizome. In Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved November 3, 2022, from https://www.britannica.com/science/rhizome Cortazar, J. (1966). Hopscotch. Random House. Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F. (1980). A thousand plateaus: Capitalism and schizophrenia (Vol. 2) (Brian Massumi, Trans.). Athlone. Jamison, L. (2022). The enduring allure of choose your own adventure books. New Yorker. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/09/19/the-enduring-allure-ofchoose-your-own-adventure-books Landow, G. P. (1992). Hypertext: The convergence of contemporary critical theory and technology. Johns Hopkins. Pavic, M. (1988). Dictionary of the Khazars: A lexicon novel in 100,000 words. Knopf. Queaneau, R. (1986). A story as you like it. In W. F. Motte (Ed.). Oulipo: A primer of potential literature. University of Nebraska Press. Wittgenstein, L. (1973). Philosophical investigations (3rd Ed.). Prentice Hall.

Part I

Introduction

1

Explorations in learning and rhizome metaphor Myint Swe Khine

Introduction Educators are witnessing profound changes in the way learning takes place among learners in increasingly interconnected environments. Knowledge transfer is no longer a fixed process but somewhat divergent, decentred, and non-linear. Rooted in the work of poststructural philosophers Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari (1987), the rhizome metaphor is applicable to teaching and learning in many different ways. The term rhizomatic learning refers to pedagogical approaches that characterized learning as a dynamic process, making connections, using multiple paths, without beginnings and ends akin to travelling nomads. The chapters in this book provide perspectives and approaches theorized by Deleuze and Guattari. This book has been divided into three parts. After the introduction in Part I, Part II covers theoretical foundations and a rhizome perspective of learning, and the chapters in Part III present pedagogical approaches and rhizomatic learning in action.

Theoretical foundations and rhizome perspective of learning Cronjé in Chapter 2 draws on his extensive experience in digital and networked teaching and learning and discussed a post-humanist approach and poststructural concept to teaching and learning in a rhizomatic world. In doing so, the author identified six characteristics of the rhizome: connectedness, heterogeneity, multiplicity, asignifying rupture, cartography, and decalcomania, postulated by Deleuze and Guattari (1987). The author then elucidates each of the elements of rhizome theory and how these elements offer design principles for learning. In this chapter, Cronjé proposed a model for interpreting post-human teaching and learning, in which elements of rhizome and Actor Network Theory intersect. Ian Kinchin examined the ecological development of university teachers with the rhizomatic lens in Chapter 3. He noted that the professional development of teaching staff has been simplistic and linear and proposed a rhizomatic development to exploit the adoption of several ecological principles. The author introduced Deleuze and Guattari’s philosophical thoughts such as becoming, DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378-2

4  Myint Swe Khine assemblage, plateau, territorializing, and deterritorializing in concept mapping that highlights the important aspects of teacher development. He concluded that the work of Deleuze and Guattari will continue to evolve and others adopt and adapt the ideas to suit the new context and enrich the new disciplinary areas. In Chapter 4, Karasavvidis analyses the concept of rhizomatic learning from a cultural-historical perspective, and its contemporary derivatives such as activity theory, situated cognition, and distributed cognition. The author noted that when Deleuze and Guattari introduced the concept of the rhizome, they did not explicitly set out to address rhizomatic learning by itself. By citing the literature, he also cautioned that it is difficult to apply the rhizomatic framework to education and rhizomatic concept cannot be lightly used in the education process. The author describes the similarity between cultural-historical theory and rhizomatic thinking and its principles. The author discussed the pros and cons of rhizomatic learning in this chapter. Ebba Ossiannilsson in Chapter 5 draws the reader’s attention to the ‘next normal’ caused by globalization, demographic changes, rapid technological development, digital transformation, and the recent pandemic in daily life. The author noted that learning has taken new directions, dimensions, and value to greater equity, accessibility, and collaboration. The author believes that Deleuze and Guattari’s concept of rhizomatic learning is one of the most appropriate approaches to learning in the future that characterizes constant change. In this conceptual chapter, the author presents a rhizomatic learning approach to implementing better and more equitable education programs. In Chapter 6, Lee Hazeldine and Spall from Canterbury Christ Church University explored the concept of Edusemiotics as an effective approach to learning, by perceiving learning as semiosis. According to the authors, rhizomatic learning recognizes that learning is a complex process of sense-making and perceives learning as a decentred, hybrid, and diagrammatic process, rather than a linear and convergent one. They further explain the implications of the concept and the process of semiosis for rhizomatic learning. In another chapter (Chapter 7) Alexios Brailas suggested a new relational pedagogy for a networked environment where social media and artificial intelligence play a key role. In this context, the author highlighted the need for a different conception of education that shifts the focus from the consumption of disembodied knowledge to the catalysation of personal and collective development. In this chapter, Brailas proposed a new nomadic pedagogy for the twenty-first century which embraces the development of learning rhizome and self-organization of the events.

Pedagogical approaches and rhizomatic learning in action The chapters in this section describe findings from recent research studies to examine the efficacy of rhizomatic learning. In Chapter 8, Lian and Sangarun gave an account of the rhizomatic learning system and precision language education. The chapter begins by discussing the rhizomatic learning systems as openness, lack of prescription, and responsiveness to students’ needs. Similar

Explorations in learning and rhizome metaphor 5 to the nature of the rhizome, rhizomatic learning does not contain a predetermined syllabus and activities apart from setting objectives. The authors considered precision language education as an extension of the rhizomatic paradigm and presented two scenarios in language learning. The authors demonstrated the strong connection and coherence between rhizomatic learning and precision language education. The chapter concluded with a remark indicating that rhizomatic environments are not new and that the world is rhizomatic by nature. Koseoglu and Bozkurt observed that rhizomatic learning does not always align with a formal higher education structure. Approaches and delivery in higher education are sometimes rigid, apply prescribed learning, and are structured in a non-linear mode. In this chapter (Chapter 9), the authors discussed their experience of implementing rhizomatic learning in formal higher education contexts. Using the reflective case studies, the authors urged that rhizomatic learning in higher education should be considered in relation to three levels of education – the macro context of the institution, the meso context of the classroom ecology, and the micro context of the individual learner. Their studies lead to the questions such as in the rhizomatic learning environment to what extent does the learner feel the excitement, and does the student find inspiration from others and feel supported in their learning journey? The authors highlighted the importance of teachers’ facilitation for inclusive participation in rhizomatic learning. According to Koutropoulos, rhizomatic learning is a type of pedagogy that places relationships at the centre of learning. In Chapter 10, the author shared a retrospective account of collaborations during the two Rhizomatic Learning Massive Open Online Courses, named RhizoMOOC. The collaborations are viewed through social and technical lenses that influenced how members interacted with each other during these courses and how learners connected and interacted with each other. The author further discussed the group dynamic and group roles in collaborative activities, called rhizocollabs (rhizomatic style of collaboration) that links to the connectivist approach. It was noted that rhizocollabs facilitate connecting, collaborating, learning, and enjoying the process. The author suggests the exploration of rhizocollabs that emerged from RhizoMOOC. Pechtelidis and his colleagues Raditsa, Sarakenidou, and Dimitriadou attempted to explore the construction of knowledge and the development of the rhizomatic learning process in Chapter 11. This chapter focuses on how children learn in a specialized community known as Little Tree. The Little Tree is a self-organized pedagogical venture that operates under the values of libertarian and experience-based learning. The authors present a case study that deals with the learning process and learning events with children using the tool of pedagogical documentation. The pedagogical documentation approach can function as a tool for creating a critical and reflective collective practice. The chapter concluded with the findings and noted that learning activity does not develop linearly, progressively, and predictably from one step to another, but proceeds as a rhizome in unpredictable directions.

6  Myint Swe Khine In Chapter 12, Jonas Mikaels noted that working with DeleuzoGuattarian concepts in education research is about changing the image of thought and shared some of his ideas concerning rhizomatic teaching and learning. The chapter begins by analysing Deleuze and Guattari’s concept of rhizome and discusses rhizomatic teaching and learning practices in education. The author provides examples of his own teaching practice and three case studies that apply the rhizomatic learning approach. The first case study was underpinned by a placeresponsive pedagogy, and the second case study was underpinned by exploring human-nature relationships. The third case study focuses on guided discovery to create a rhizomatic learning environment that fosters learners’ autonomy, curiosity, and critical thinking. In the last chapter (Chapter 13) Rodrigo Barbosa Mugnai Lopes examined and noted that rhizomatic learning is a problematic field of idea. His philosophical approach to analysing the notion of rhizomatic learning referred to thinkers like Foucault, and Heidegger, and the other philosophical projects of Deleuze and Guattari.

Conclusion The authors in this book shared their insightful account of Deleuze and Guattari’s concept of rhizome and its applications in teaching and learning. The chapters also address pivotal questions of what engagement with rhizomatic learning offer to educators, how rhizomatic learning changes our thinking, in which way rhizomatic learning transforms modern teaching methods, and how educators implement a rhizomatic learning approach in practice. In particular, this book documents the recent development and new directions in theoretical and practical aspects of rhizomatic learning. This book will not have materialized without the firm commitment, passionate interest, and valuable contributions of the authors who agreed to participate in this project. All credits go to the international scholars who have generously shared their thought-provoking ideas, and creative and unique approaches. The book offers outstanding and exemplary works, highlighting the change in basic assumptions, frameworks, controversies, and theoretical and practical aspects of rhizomatic learning. This book will add to our understanding and conceptualizing of learning and its complexities.

References Cormier, D. (2008). Rhizomatic education: Community as curriculum. Innovate: Journal of Online Education, 4(5). Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F. (1987). A thousand plateaus: Capitalism and schizophrenia. University of Minnesota Press.

Part II

Theoretical foundations and rhizomatic perspective of learning

2

What should we be teaching if Google gives the answer before we have even finished typing the question? Johannes Cronjé

Introduction The seamless integration of people and machines characterizes our posthuman condition. In a world where Google supplies the answers before we have finished asking the question, we need to wonder what is left to teach. The ubiquity of technology has moved the locus of learning from between our ears to between ourselves. It is not just individuals who learn, it is the whole system of human and non-human actors which is constantly growing and learning. This chapter will show how rhizome theory relates to the posthuman condition as a philosophical background to educational technology, to the Cynefin framework of knowledge management, and actor network theory (ANT) as a methodological approach.

The posthuman condition Once upon a time people believed that nature and natural forces controlled our existence. They would make sacrifices to whirlpools, rivers or even the sun and moon to appease them and win their favour. In time the emphasis shifted do many gods and then one, who controlled the whole world. Then, during the Renaissance the emphasis shifted to humanism. In the early 1900s, Maslow, Rogers, Bugental and others promoted humanistic education, which advocated a holistic approach (Aloni, 2011). However, with the rise of the machines in the late 20th century, it became clear that humans alone were no longer in charge. Hassan Ihab pointed out that “Humanism may be coming to an end as humanism transforms itself into something one must helplessly call posthumanism” (Hassan, 1977, p. 843). The world was ruled by a humans and machines in a combination known as the cyborg. Then in 2019 a virus emerged that almost instantaneously ruled over the world with one simple commandment: Thou shalt stay away from one another lest I kill just enough of you to scare the living daylights out of thee. What followed was a game of “rock, paper, scissors” where the humans used the machines to outwit the virus, while the machines used their algorithms to influence human behaviour. Rosi Braidotti recognizes the interplay between humans, machines and nature in her “Theoretical Framework for the Critical Posthumanities” (Braidotti, 2019) DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378-4

10  Johannes Cronjé and sees the emergence of an intelligent, self-organizing matter. Schatzki (2012) distinguishes between a kind of posthumanism that emphasizes the role of nonhuman agents such as computers, animals, plants and other things and a kind that prioritizes practices, rather than people. Posthumanism relegates humans back to being just another species, rather than the dominant one, and recognizes the fallibility of human intelligence. For educational technologists the fallibility of human intelligence and the selforganizing nature or matter has far-reaching implications. Where the assumption has previously been that there is a stable knowledge base out there and it was our job to facilitate the acquisition of that knowledge, there is now a distinct shift towards uncertainty. We find ourselves in a second childhood where, once again, we must make sense of an ever-changing world. The ideal state has moved from belief in the truth to scepticism. The development of critical thinking skills has never been more important. In this hyper-connected world where people are almost inseparable from their devices, and the devices are connected to all other devices, there is a shift from proof to evidence, from triangulation to crystallization. The convergence between humans and non-humans and the focus on practices rather than people have flattened the traditional hierarchies and levelled the playing field The World Is Flat (Friedman, 2006). The flattening of hierarchies has led to a revisiting of the traditional of hierarchies. Deleuze and Guattari (1987) reject the branching tree structure in favour of the ever-interconnected rhizome.

Rhizomatic learning There are as many different definitions of learning as there are practitioners of learning technology. The simplest one that I have come across says: “Learning is being able to do something afterwards that you could not do before”. This definition resonates with Kirkpatrick’s (1954) second level of evaluation, which amounts to determining the difference in knowledge before and after training. The problem with the definition, though, is that it does not take note of any cognitive shift in the brain. Consider the example of a driver with very little sense of direction, who gets lost easily and often arrives at a destination late. The driver now downloads a navigation programme onto their phone and suddenly arrives at every destination in time and relaxed. Before downloading the programme the driver could not find their way, after downloading it, they could. The driver can do something afterwards that they could not do before, but the intervention was not learning, it was a job-aid. The question becomes: What learning has taken place? Perhaps the question should rather be: Who has learnt? Drawing form posthuman philosophy, one could argue that it is the intelligent self-organizing matter (Braidotti, 2019) that has learnt. The navigation programme has one more user to provide it with data and learns more about traffic patterns. Other road users learn about delays or obstacles along the way. The whole system has become just a little cleverer. The rhizome has developed another node. A rhizome is an underground stem that connects numerous lateral shoots and roots. Typical examples include the ginger plant and the mushroom. In using

What should we be teaching 11 the rhizome as the metaphor for their theory, Deleuze and Guattari (1987) identify six principles of the rhizome. These are connection and heterogeneity, multiplicity, asignifying rupture, cartography and decalcomania. These elements of rhizome theory offer us valuable design principles for learning in the posthuman condition. Connection Technology connects everything to everything else. This accelerated communication has been termed hyperconnectivity and is characterized by six attributes (Fredette et al., 2012): always on, readily accessible, information rich, interactive, about people and machines and always recording. The very act of taking a digital photograph and uploading it to the cloud effectively connects that object to the Internet of Things where it can be found at any time (always on) various image search and reverse image search algorithms make it easy to find (readily accessible). Digital cameras add layers of metadata such as location and time to photographs. Social media sites allow users to add annotations (information rich). Users create links from their photographs to those of others. The annotations could be factual or emotive. The links could join similar or contrasting objects (interactive) and so connections are established between devices, the cloud, people, photographs, and the photographed objects (about people and machines). The connections that are made are usually permanent, unless deliberately broken and deleted (always recording). At a deeper level knowledge is also connected. The traditional divisions between subjects such as mathematics, physics and even languages are artificial. Learners may struggle more with the language in which a mathematics problem is formulated than with the calculation to solve it. A rhizomatic learning design would take note of the connections between knowledge objects and encourage learners to fine even more connections between things that are either similar or different. Heterogeneity Connectedness, by its very definition, implies heterogeneity. Things must be different to be connected. Even if identical things are connected, they must be two different, identical things. In teaching and learning there are many instances of difference. Once we design for differences between learners, we speak of individualization. If we design in such a way that differences between learners are specifically accommodated, we speak of universal design. Pedagogically difference is often used as a teaching method when we specifically teach learners how one aspect differs from another – the difference between an insect and an arachnid, for instance. To make our subject matter interesting we must emphasize another form of difference. What makes our learning materials different from any of the other materials that are available to our learners? Why should they choose ours? From

12  Johannes Cronjé marketing we can consider the concept of a unique selling point – that which makes the product different. In the same way that connectedness requires heterogeneity, so heterogeneity creates multiplicity since if there are different versions, there must be many versions. Multiplicity For rhizomatic learning the multiple becomes the unit. There are multiple ways of knowing. There are multiple knowledges. There are multiple perspectives. There are multiple pedagogies. Some of these multiples matter, and some don’t. As educational technologists we know that we must accommodate many different delivery platforms. Our learners may view the work on a multitude of devices, such as desktop, laptop, tabled and phone. Their devices work on a multitude of operating systems, Windows, MacOS, IOS, Android and Linux. Adaptive design is the norm and not a nice-to-have. The multiplicity also extends to learners’ abilities, both cognitive and physical. It is necessary to determine learners’ level of prior knowledge to pitch our material at the correct level, but it is also necessary to consider alternative access for students with visual or auditory challenges. It is therefore necessary to design for the multiple as if it is a unit. Happily we know from Tom Russel’s No Significant Difference Phenomenon (1999) that, if you control for all the variables, then there will be no significant difference in students’s learning gains, no matter what medium you choose. Since the difference in medium does not influence learning (Clark, 1994) we may consider other variables. Does one medium allow better access to learners in remote areas? Is a certain medium cheaper, or does it require less bandwidth? How easy is it to update materials using a particular medium? Do learners enjoy one medium more than another? Do some types of knowledge require a certain medium (Kozma, 1994)? The implication of the no significant difference phenomenon extends to learning style and to instructors. Much research was conducted in the 1990s in adapting learning materials to suit learners’ learning styles. Nevertheless, in a major review of the literature it was concluded that “there is no adequate evidence base to justify incorporating learning-styles assessments into general educational practice” (Pashler et al., 2008, p. 105). As far as instructors go there is a great deal of evidence that there is no relationship between how good or bad an instructor rates in student evaluations, but that such evaluations discriminate against female instructors (Boring et al., 2016; Ferber & Huber, 1975; Keng, 2020). We therefore have to find other ways of measuring the ability of our instructors. Asignifying rupture The easiest way to make a multiple of a rhizome is to break an existing rhizome into two. Thus there are two new rhizomes – the rhizome can’t really be

What should we be teaching 13 broken, just divided. Its networked nature makes it possible that, when one path is blocked, the rhizome develops in another. There are at least three implications for educational technology – teaching metaphor, transfer of learning and multiple pathways. From a design perspective, asignifying rupture allows for the use of metaphor in helping learners make sense of their learning experience (Cronjé, 2001). When teaching and learning is taken online the participants tend to disappear (Cronjé & Clarke, 1999). In teaching a completely online class one is not sure if learners are present. Moreover, learners themselves are not aware of those around them, and so a disconnectedness and a loneliness can set in. Here is where metaphor becomes useful (Cronjé, 1997, 2001). It is then that one can break off a piece of knowledge from the radio. In a radio drama, when two characters are talking, the second one needs to be identified. This is done both by way of vocal noises, such as uh, um, maybe a sigh or even the clearing of a throat. To make it more vivid the director could add the clinking of teacups to show that another person is present. In teaching and learning we create the presence of the rest of the class by groupwork or even just by having an online discussion forum run parallel to the class. For the lecturer to keep track of students, we use a device carried over from military operations, called scheduled check-in. Students may be required to report on their progress on a regular basis so that the instructor knows that they are there. Too often knowledge is taught in discrete silos. Vectors may be taught in mathematics and physics by two different teachers in two different school years without the one acknowledging the other. In multilingual countries poetic devices such as rhyme, rhythm, assonance and alliteration are taught discretely in each of the languages taught – again without recognition to the other context within which it was taught. More concerningly very little time is spent on transferring knowledge into the practical world. Transfer is defined as seeing something that was learnt in one context as relevant in another, applying what was learnt in one context in another and applying knowledge from an old context to a new one (Thomas et al., 1992). Transfer is essential in teaching and learning since by its very purpose learning should be useful outside the classroom or wherever learning took place. Transfer can either enhance (positive transfer) or undermine (negative transfer) subsequent performance. Near transfer is transfer to closely related context, while far transfer occurs in contexts that are quite different from the original. Transfer does not occur automatically, and far transfer in particular, as Thorndike reported as early in 1901, is often hard to achieve (Thorndike, 1913). Low-road transfer occurs when well-rehearsed procedures are triggered by similar circumstances, while high-road transfer involves a deliberate search for connection (Perkins & Salomon, 1992). There are five conditions of transfer: thorough and diverse practice, explicit abstraction, active self-monitoring, arousing of mindfulness and using a metaphor or analogy (Perkins & Salomon, 1992, p. 7). As a result of asignifying rupture, learning pathways develop because “Since learners have unique knowledge structures based upon their experiences and

14  Johannes Cronjé abilities, the ways that they choose to access, interact, and interrelate messages in interactive courseware also vary” (Jih, 1996, p. 367). Learning analytics allow us to adapt our e-learning offerings to address diverse learning needs (Mavroudi et al., 2018). Three elements can be adapted: content, support and presentation (Vandewaetere et al., 2011). Cartography Since a rhizome is essentially a network of almost infinite links, it holds that these can be mapped. A map is a two-dimensional projection of a set of relationships. When discussing cartography, knowledge maps come to mind, the most wellknown Tony Buzan’s (2004) concept of mind maps. These are very useful for giving students a holistic, visual overview of the subject matter. Unfortunately, however, many instructors ask learners to develop a mind map straight out of the textbook. This means they put the topic in the centre and the headings of the chapters and subheadings on the various arms. This is not a map. It is a tracing. For a mind map to function well for each individual learner, they must create their own maps. I found it useful to ask learners to put themselves in the centre of the map and then to link to important concepts from the learning material as those concepts relate to them. Moreover, in the context of lifelong learning in a digitally enabled world each learner is by definitions creating their own map – a chart of all their learning. Contemporary social media sites such as LinkedIn allow users to record all their formal and informal learning and, in that way, to turn individual learning experiences into intellectual capital. Decalcomania Decalcomania is the process by which designs are transferred from paper to porcelain or glass. Alternatively it also refers to an artistic technique whereby ink or paint is pressed between two pieces of paper thus creating a butterfly-like effect. Decalcomania is characterized by almost endlessly repeating patterns, sometimes fractal by nature. The iterative nature of much of our learning designs, whereby we revisit themes again and again, each time at a deeper level, leads to such designs. In a way, though decalcomania is the aim of instruction – creating in the learner the ability to recognize patterns and thereby predicting the outcomes of the processes with which they are involved. In summary then, in a mature system, where the users have become oblivious to the technology, there arises a new exploratory phase, in which there are endless new possibilities, which are, essentially, just new iterations of previous patterns that endlessly repeat. Lifelong learners recognize these patterns as they develop their own individual cartographies of learning. They do so by asignifying rupture as they break off pieces of the rhizome and repurpose them for a multiplicity of new environments and uses. Each of the new uses is heterogeneous – different from the previous, yet endlessly connected – and

What should we be teaching 15 thus grows a continuous rhizome of learning complete with network of actors and actions.

Collectionism as an asset-based approach to rhizomatic learning Rhizomatic learning changes our thinking in a positive direction to move from a deficit-based curriculum design model to an asset-based one. Despite all the connections of the rhizome demonstrated above, our approach to teaching and learning still follows a deficit-based model (Orr & Cleveland-Innes, 2015), which assumes that learners “lack” something, and it is the teacher’s job to supply the missing knowledge, skills or attitudes. This is evident from the face that curriculum design models (Branch & Kopcha, 2014) usually start with a needs analysis that happens at the beginning of the process. The focus on needs downplays opportunity. Strength-based learning strategies significantly outperform deficit-based strategies to improve the efforts and intentions of students (Hiemstra & Van Yperen, 2015; López, 2017) The popular educational system of classroom-based batch processing exacerbates the problem. Learners are subjected to a one-size-fits-all treatment. They are then given a standardized, across-the-board uniform assessment. Teacher education follows much the same system, so that they are prepared for what they are likely to find once they enter the classroom. The problem is that this production line model of teaching and learning, derived from the first industrial revolution, is not appropriate and efficient in a posthuman world, where, particularly since the disruption of COVID-19, people are less and less likely to converge in one space to perform their work. This section proposes a system where learners collect and curate learning assets in constructing their own knowledge framework, much as a Pokémon-Go player collects Pokémon and the items required to increase the strength and numbers of the collection. As the collection grows the player reaches higher levels, improves in strength and capability, but at the same time the game gets harder to play. I call this approach Collectionism (Cronjé, 2016). Where Seymour Papert (1993) coined the term Constructionism to describe a method for constructivist learning, we link our term to a collectivist, rather than an individualist approach (Triandis, 2018). A collectionist approach moves away from curriculum development to collection development. In the same way as a librarian is the curator of a library (Agee, 2019) a collectionist approach requires every learner to be a curator of their own knowledge objects. Curation of knowledge, skills and attitudinal assets will be a scaffolded process with instructional designers or educators curating materials, while at the same time teaching learners how to obtain, develop and curate their own assets. The process would be similar to the development of any collection, which is well described by the Southern Ontario Library Service (Golden & Malcolm, 2009). They propose an eight-step process for developing a collection plan (Table 2.1).

16  Johannes Cronjé Table 2.1  Developing a collectionist curation strategy Library collection plan

Collectionist curation strategy

Step 1 – Examine the community Step 2 – R  eview of present users and their interests Step 3 – Write a collection policy Step 4 – Assess the present library collection Step 5 – Write collection statements Step 6 – C  reate long-term strategies and annual plans Step 7 – Develop a budget Step 8 – Write weeding guidelines

Analyse the learning community Determine the current strengths and weaknesses of the learners Develop an asset framework Assess the learners’ current assets Develop asset collection strategies Develop asset verification strategies Set timelines Create guidelines for retirement of assets

Source: Adapted from Golden and Malcolm (2009, pp. 7–8).

Analyse the learning community Given the nature of rhizomatic learning discussed above, every member of the learning community is connected to every other one. Knowledge, skills and attitudes exist inside and between people, animals and objects. It is the job of the facilitator of learning to create an atmosphere in which people want to learn. The purpose of this phase is to determine who can learn what from whom. How does the community self-regulate? How do they use other human and nonhuman actors, such as their electronic devices, guide dogs, laboratory animals, chemicals, etc. Determine the current strengths and weaknesses of the learners This analysis is not about what learners can do; it is about how they come to being able to do it. Do they have access to learning materials? Do they have disabilities? Do they have “superpowers”. This step varies from a needs analysis in that it also analyses the strengths. Moreover, the analysis of strengths also helps in developing cooperative learning strategies where those who are good at certain things can assist those who are not. In this way everyone benefits from the strengths of members, while the weaknesses are overcome by teamwork. Develop an asset framework An asset framework marks the parameters of both the physical and knowledge assets of learners and how these are related. By physical assets I mean both tangible and intangible assets that learners can own. These could be digital documents, video clips, mobile devices, vehicles, sound files, books, etc. Knowledge assets would be the cognitive, affective and psychomotor skills that learners already have. These assets could be classified on a range from forbidden to essential. The asset framework is essentially a policy statement about which assets may be pre-requisites or co-requisites for other assets. The framework should

What should we be teaching 17 also have criteria for the exclusion of assets. A typical example here would be that mobile devices might be forbidden while learners do tasks that require high levels of concentration. Knowledge assets may also be forbidden – the ability to bully, for instance, could be regarded as an undesirable asset, as would be fake news or disinformation – unless, for instance fake news or disinformation form the subject of study for a class in journalism. The asset framework will set out the conditions for including and excluding assets. Assess the learners’ current assets This step equates to the traditional pretest. However, it goes much further in that it covers all assets. In a rhizomatic, posthuman world we know that the multiple is the unit. We need to know what technology learners have or do not have. Since there are multiple ways to make materials available it must be possible to match the medium and the technology. Learners who have long commutes and have access to mobile devices may benefit from podcasts. Learners who drive to class may benefit from audio on their way. It is also important, however, to assess learners’ knowledge assets. In traditional teaching and learning everything is put in the curriculum just-in-case, meaning that some learners have their time wasted by being “taught” stuff they already know. Develop asset collection strategies People come to knowledge through various routes. There is planned instruction and serendipitous learning. There is direct instruction and constructivist learning. There is synchronous and a-synchronous teaching and learning. There is face-to-face and distance learning. All have their advantages and disadvantages. All have their pre-requisites and conditions. Collectively these could also fall under the term blended learning. In developing a cartography of asset collection strategies, one might use a matrix that plots direct instruction against constructivist learning and presents four quadrants of learning as I have been suggesting for some time now (Cronjé, 2000, 2006, 2020, 2021). Instead of plotting direct instruction as a direct opposite of constructivist learning the two could be plotted on a matrix that runs from zero to 100% instruction on one axis, and zero to 100% construction on the other, as is shown in Figure 2.1. In Figure 2.1 the Immersion quadrant the learner is immersed in the deep end. There are no clear behaviourist objectives, or contiguous stimulus and response. Neither is there a constructivist outcome, scaffolding, prompting and fading. It may seem that learning does not happen in these conditions, yet it is the place of trial and error, experience and informal learning. It is how we learn to walk and to talk. The Injection quadrant is named trying to inject knowledge directly into the head of the learner through drill and practice. It is efficient and its aim is automaticity (Bloom, 1986). The Construction quadrant where learners construct their own meaning through constructing artefacts (Papert, 1993). The Integration

18  Johannes Cronjé

Figure 2.1  I ntegrating direct instruction and constructivist learning (Cronjé, 2000, 2006, 2020, 2021)

quadrant is high in both behaviourism and constructivism simultaneously. It is where relentless drill and practice integrates with a constructed understanding of the deeper meaning of what is being learnt, such as playing the piano or dancing. The model maps onto Kurtz and Snowden’s (2003) similar four-quadrant Cynefin framework of knowledge domains (Figure 2.2). The Chaos quadrant has

Figure 2.2  The Cynefin framework (Kurtz & Snowden, 2003)

What should we be teaching 19 Table 2.2  Example of an asset collection strategy framework Context (Kurtz & Snowden)

Paradigm (Cronje)

Known

Injection

Complex

Construction

Knowable

Integration

Chaos

Immersion

Methods

Technologies

Lecture Reading Tutorial Drill Construction Buzz group Essay Storytelling

Zoom lecture Book, e-book or PDF YouTube Video Drill software (e.g. Duolingo) Open-ended learning environments Construction kits and tools (Lego, Robots, etc.) Spreadsheets Games, physical and digital Discussion tools: WhatsApp, Telegram

Puzzle Quiz Discussion Debate Experience Field trip Apprenticeship

Blogs Logbooks Assessment tools

no perceivable cause-and-effect relationships and knowledge is stabilized by acting, sensing and responding. This maps quadrant where the learner is immersed into a chaotic, unpredictable learning environment. Known cause-and-effect relationships are repeatable and knowledge can be Injected through direct instruction. Complex knowledge is acquired through constructing complex adaptive systems. The Knowable quadrant is the one where through analytical, systems thinking the learner must sense, analyse and respond. By requiring declarative existing knowledge, and a response to analysed new knowledge. The knowable quadrant maps onto the Integration quadrant. Combining the two models allows us to create a decision framework for the acquisition of assets as is shown in Table 2.2. Develop asset verification strategies Asset verification strategies go beyond mere testing or assessment. This calls for a holistic evaluation of learners in their environment. The key lies in authenticity and validity. There is an obsession with preventing cheating during exams. Teachers complain that students Google the answers. My response to this is that if a student can Google the answer, you are asking the wrong question. A good example of a non-invasive asset verification strategy is that of a mobile app that assesses how good a driver is. The device runs in the background of the mobile device while you are driving. It monitors a number of key indicators: fast acceleration, harsh braking, fast cornering, exceeding the speed limit and unusual movement of the device. From this data it produces a graph that can be compared with the results of other road users and a picture emerges how good a driver you are compared to all the other drivers on the system. Not only can

20  Johannes Cronjé this data be useful for insurance companies in determining rates, it will also tell if the usual driver is not the one driving the car and flag it as potentially stolen. Through Bluetooth connectivity it might even be able to tell if it is in the same car or a different one. The challenge is to develop such verification strategies for skills other than good driving. In contemporary learning management systems analytics are developed such as time-on-task, frequency of logging in, what time learners log in, how early or late they submit assignments, etc. All these are indicators of conscientiousness and in time will give access to more than just the final grade of a student. Set timelines In the spirit of the adage that time is money we replace the librarian’s budget with a learner’s timeline. Anywhere any time learning can easily become nowhere never learning. It is therefore necessary to develop timelines. There are start times, there are reporting times and there are deadlines. Then there are final deadlines. One should also consider the value of synchronous and asynchronous learning. Synchronous learning, where all the participants of the learning process attend at the same time, is useful for immediate feedback and for creating a lively, motivating environment. Asynchronous learning is useful when deep, uninterrupted concentration is required. Create guidelines for the retirement of assets Both physical and knowledge assets age. My favourite story of irrelevant knowledge was when early in 1994 a fellow teaching student did a demonstration lesson in Geography and taught the class that South Africa had four provinces. When one of his learners exclaimed that her father had told her that after the April elections next month, we would have nine provinces. The teacher responded that that was true, but it was not in the syllabus. They had to learn about the four. There is an asset that should have been retired. It also happens, in various disciplines that formulas or techniques that are taught at lower levels have to be un-learnt when students are ready to work with more complicated realities. Physical assets may have to be retired when they are no longer useful. Books filled with logarithmic tables, slide rules, overhead projectors and 35-mm colour slides all come to mind. Once all the assets have been collected and curated, one might want to know how they all work together in a rhizomatic format. A useful way to describe and study such networks of assets may be through ANT.

Actor network theory Although ANT is not widely used in education (Fenwick & Edwards, 2012) it holds a lot of promise for educational technology, particularly from a posthuman

What should we be teaching 21 perspective. In a typical posthuman twist, proponents of ANT are loath to call it a theory at all. Rather they see it as an approach to a phenomenon. ANT allows us to ask questions such as: • • •

What kinds of connections and associations are created among things? What kinds and qualities of networks do these connections produce? What purposes do these networks serve?

This section will cover the essentials of ANT, which is the study of constantly shifting networks of relationships. For ANT nothing exists outside of these relationships. The actors to which ANT refers can be both human and non-human, and the relationships between them are material and semiotic. Material relationships refer to physical relationships, while semiotic relationships relate to meaning. Humans and non-humans can have equal status. It is this socioconstructivist understanding of the coexistence of people and things that makes ANT a useful tool for instructional technologists, as it allows us to investigate how our tools shape our actions and our actions shape our tools. Actors or actants can act for themselves or can have activity assigned to them. Thus, a rock blocking a road, can be an actor, with the blocking being the activity. All actors are equal before the network is applied. An actor can also be a collection of smaller actors. For instance, a computer can be an actor, but it consists of various other actors, the keyboard, the mouse, the screen, the processor, etc. Once they form a part of the network, relationships develop that can increase or decrease the relevant importance of the actor or actant. The network to which ANT refers is very similar to the rhizome of Deleuze and Guattari. It does not necessarily have to resemble a network but can refer to any set of relationships. Networks are essentially transient and grow and shrink, appear and disappear depending on the situation. Relations in a network are not passive structural positions but are actively performed to bring the network into existence. If the performance stops, the network disappears. The network functions by a process known as translation. Translation comprises four stages, problematization, interessement, enrollment and mobilization. Problematization is where the actors’ importance to the network is established. Interessement is the establishment of the positions that the actors hold in the network, while enrollment is the assignment of the roles that they will play. Finally mobilization refers to the activities that the network performs in its functioning. Communication in the network occurs through the passing of a token, or a quasi-object from actor to actor. The tokens could be electricity, which keeps the computers going, email messages that contain information or even written language which conveys meaning. Such communication occurs through intermediaries or mediators. An intermediary does not affect the message, while a mediator multiplies the difference created by the message.

22  Johannes Cronjé

Synthesis: a model for interpreting posthuman teaching and learning Now that we have touched briefly, and simply, on three of the most complex theoretical and philosophical constructs in current thinking about teaching and learning, I propose a model that will assist with the development of research questions and the interpretation of networked teaching and learning with machines. The proposal is a matrix that plots rhizome theory on the vertical axis and ANT on the horizontal, while the questions for analysis appear in the cells thus created. Table 2.3 provides a suggested framework of concepts and questions that educators can use in developing a cartography of an invisible learning system that is undergoing innovation. The questions are by no means exhaustive but serve as a suggestion of how a research model could be constructed. The model contains all the elements of the rhizome and the major elements of ANT. Of course Table 2.3  Rhizonomic questions for ANT Actors and actants Connection

Relationships

Translations

Who are the What are the How do the actors and relationships connections how are they between the come about connected? connected through actors? translation?

Heterogeneity What are the differences between the actors?

How does heterogeneity impact the relationships?

What differences occur during the various phases of translation?

How do the What multiples multiple can be actors identified perform in the as a unit? relationships? Asignifying How does the How do rupture network relationships grow? break up and reform? Cartography Where are the How can the relationships actors and be plotted or actants mapped? positioned physically and semantically? Decalcomania What iterative What variety in relationships patterns develops over emerge? time?

How do the translations contribute to make the multiple actors a unit? What ruptures take place during the translations?

Multiplicity

What are the progressions in the development of the cartography? How do translations iterate?

Tokens and mediators What tokens connect the actors and what is the multiplying effect of the mediators? What are the differences between the various tokens and mediators? To what extent do the multiple tokens and mediators form a unit? How are the various tokens and mediators related? What paths do the tokens travel through the mediators? What are the patterns of use of tokens and mediators?

What should we be teaching 23 smaller research projects can be conducted by working only in a specific row or a specific column of the model. In this chapter I have argued that, with technology becoming invisible, the division between the learner and the technology disappears and they form a new unit – a cyborg. The cyborg forms the basis of the posthuman who no longer functions in the traditional tree-like hierarchies of the modernists, but rather in a never-ending rhizome. The rhizome connects an infinite set of physical and knowledge assets that must be acquired, managed and retired. This network of connected assets corresponds closely with the network in ANT, and thus ANT provides us with a useful set of questions to develop a cartography of a posthuman learning intervention. So the answer to the question in the title, is: What we should be teaching, is how to collect and curate knowledge assets. What do to with what you found on Google.

References Agee, S. (2019). Curate a digital collection for all learners. Knowledge Quest, 48(2), 107–108. Aloni, N. (2011). Humanistic education. In Education and humanism (pp. 35–46). Springer. Bloom, B. S. 1986. Automaticity: ‘The hands and feet of genius’. Educational Leadership, 43(5), 70–77. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ334212. Boring, A., Ottoboni, K., & Stark, P. B. (2016). Student evaluations of teaching are not only unreliable, they are significantly biased against female instructors. Impact of Social Sciences Blog. http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2016/02/04/ student-evaluations-of-teaching-gender-bias Braidotti, R. (2019). A theoretical framework for the critical posthumanities. Theory, Culture and Society, 36(6), 31–61. https://doi.org/10.1177/0263276418771486 Branch, R. M., & Kopcha, T. J. (2014). Instructional design models. In Handbook of research on educational communications and technology (pp. 77–87). Springer. Buzan, T. (2004). Mind maps at work. Thorsons. Clark, R. E. (1994). Media will never influence learning. Educational Technology Research and Development, 42(2), 21–29. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02299088 Cronjé, J. C. (1997). Interactive internet: Using the internet to facilitate co-operative distance learning. South African Journal of Higher Education, 11(2), 149–156. Cronjé, J. C. 2000. Paradigms lost: Towards integrating objectivism and constructivism. ITForum. 16 December 2015. Cronjé, J. C. (2001). Metaphors and models in internet-based learning. Computers and Education, 37(3–4). https://doi.org/10.1016/S0360-1315(01)00049-5 Cronjé, J. C. 2006. Paradigms regained : Toward integrating objectivism and constructivism in instructional design and the learning sciences. Educational Technology Research and Development, 54(4), 387–416. https://link.springer. com/article/10.1007/s11423-006-9605-1. Cronjé, J. C. 2020. Towards a new definition of blended learning. Electronic Journal of e-Learning, 18(2), 114–121. https://academic-publishing.org/index.php/ejel/ article/view/1896.

24  Johannes Cronjé Cronjé, J. C. 2021. Blending Behaviourism and Constructivism : A Case Study in Support of a New Definition of Blended Learning. Progressio: South African Journal for Open and Distance Learning Practice, 41(1), 1–19. https://doi.org/ 10.25159/2663-5895/8314. Cronjé, J. C. (2016). Collectionism as an approach to Instructional Design. Johannes Cronje Blogspot. http://johannescronje.blogspot.com/2016/08/collectionism-asapproach-to.html Cronjé, J. C., & Clarke, P. (1999). Teaching “Teaching on the internet” on the internet. South African Journal of Higher Education, 13(11999), 213–226. Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F. (1987). A thousand plateaus: Capitalism and schizophrenia. Athlone Press. Fenwick, T., & Edwards, R. (2012). Researching education through actor-network theory. John Wiley & Sons. Ferber, M. A., & Huber, J. A. (1975). Sex of student and instructor: A study of student bias. American Journal of Sociology, 80(4), 949–963. Fredette, J., Marom, R., Steiner, K., & Witters, L. (2012). The promise and peril of hyperconnectivity for organizations and societies. The Global Information Technology Report, 113–119. Friedman, T. L. (2006). The world is flat [updated and expanded]: A brief history of the twenty-first century. Macmillan. Golden, H., & Malcolm, P. (2009). A guide to developing a collection plan. Southern Ontario Library. Hassan, I. (1977). Prometheus as performer: Toward a posthumanist culture? The Georgia Review, 31(4), 830–850. Hiemstra, D., & Van Yperen, N. W. (2015). The effects of strength-based versus deficit-based self-regulated learning strategies on students’ effort intentions. Motivation and Emotion, 39(5), 656–668. Jih, H. J. (1996). The impact of learners’ pathways on learning performance in multimedia computer aided learning. Journal of Network and Computer Applications, 19(4), 367–380. Keng, S.-H. (2020). Gender bias and statistical discrimination against female instructors in student evaluations of teaching. Labour Economics, 66, 101889. Kirkpatrick, D. L. (1954). Evaluating human relations programs for industrial foremen and supervisors. University of Wisconsin–Madison. Kozma, R. B. (1994). Will media influence learning? Reframing the debate. Educational Technology Research and Development, 42(2), 7–19. https://doi.org/10.1007/ BF02299087 Kurtz, C. F., & Snowden, D. J. 2003. The new dynamics of strategy: Sense-making in a complex and complicated world. IBM Systems Journal, 42(3), 462–483. http://vdc.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Sense-making-in-a-complexand-complicated-world.pdf López, F. A. (2017). Altering the trajectory of the self-fulfilling prophecy: Assetbased pedagogy and classroom dynamics. Journal of Teacher Education, 68(2), 193–212. Mavroudi, A., Giannakos, M., & Krogstie, J. (2018). Supporting adaptive learning pathways through the use of learning analytics: Developments, challenges and future opportunities. Interactive Learning Environments, 26(2), 206–220. https://doi.org/10.1080/10494820.2017.1292531

What should we be teaching 25 Orr, T., & Cleveland-Innes, M. (2015). Appreciative leadership: Supporting education innovation. The International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, 16(4), 235–241. Papert, S. (1993). The children’s machine: Rethinking school in the age of the computer. Basic Books. Pashler, H., McDaniel, M., Rohrer, D., & Bjork, R. (2008). Learning styles concepts and evidence. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 9(3), 105–119. Perkins, D. N., & Salomon, G. (1992). Transfer of learning. International Encyclopedia of Education, 2, 6452–6457. Russell, T. L. (1999). The no significant difference phenomenon: A comparative research annotated bibliography on technology for distance education: As reported in 355 research reports, summaries and papers. North Carolina State University. Schatzki, T. R. (2012). A primer on practices: Theory and research. In Practice-based education (pp. 13–26). Brill. Thomas, R., Anderson, L., & Getahun, L. (1992). Teaching for transfer of learning (No. ED352469). ERIC. Thorndike, E. L. (1913). The influence of improvement in one mental function upon the efficiency of other functions. Routledge. Triandis, H. C. (2018). Individualism and collectivism. Routledge. Vandewaetere, M., Desmet, P., & Clarebout, G. (2011). The contribution of learner characteristics in the development of computer-based adaptive learning environments. Computers in Human Behavior, 27(1), 118–130.

3

Rhizomatic teacher development in the context of the ecological university Ian M. Kinchin

Introduction Within the context of the neoliberal Western university, teacher development has been treated in the same linear, reductive manner as everything else – as typified by the management slogan, ‘you said, we did’, that exemplifies a simplistic cause-and-effect relationship between two isolated elements. This is based on the same premise that suggests novice teachers can simply be told how to teach over the course of a few workshops that will immediately translate into a better learning experience for their students, as evidenced by higher grades and improved student satisfaction ratings. Within the context of the ecological university, the professional development of teaching staff needs to be reconceptualized. The simplistic notion that ‘best practice’ can be transferred from one cohort of teachers to the next is optimistic at best. A more nuanced and ecologically literate approach needs to be taken that acknowledges the complexity of the teaching assemblage and its role within the wider university ecosystem. This requires teachers to develop a deep understanding of themselves and the ecosystem in which they work and to acknowledge that they are an integral part of their world – not exterior observers of it. This goes deeper than simply learning a particular set of functional skills or being able to demonstrate a series of competencies by rote (Davis, 2010), that is, they need to recognize themselves as a functional part of the institutional natural history (Kinchin, 2022c). One of the problems that has hindered the ecological development of university teachers has been created by the entrenched adoption of linear stage models of expertise that have dominated the literature over the past few decades (e.g. Benner, 1984; Dreyfus & Dreyfus, 1986). While the transition from novice to expert provides an uncomplicated narrative that can be widely appreciated, it over-simplifies and underplays the complex environment in which such expertise has to develop. The problems created by the linearity of these models have been critiqued by Kinchin and Cabot (2010). In addition, the novice-to-expert stage model emphasizes a philosophy of being, such that colleagues who have progressed up the developmental ladder may feel that undertaking continuing professional development (as is common in many professional communities of practice) is not necessary for them once they feel they have had ‘expert status’ conferred DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378-5

Rhizomatic teacher development 27 upon them (for example by gaining a PGCert or FHEA). This philosophy of being needs to be challenged by an eco-philosophy of becoming (sensu Deleuze & Guattari, 1987) that better accommodates the evolving context of teaching. This builds on Cristancho and Fenwick’s (2015) depiction of professional becoming and revises our perception of university teachers from the static portrayal of experts, towards a more dynamic view in which ‘becoming is a continuous emergent condition. It is often a process of struggle, and is always interminably linked to its environs and relationships’ (Cristancho & Fenwick, 2015, p. 128). A further impediment to escape from the commodifying managerial frame for the development of university teachers is our predisposition for paying greater attention to things rather than to the relations between things, as highlighted by Sidorkin and Kulakov (2015). Those authors describe how people have no statistical sensory organ and are often blind to large amounts of data that surround us unless we have an appropriate frame or a tool to focus on key relationships and to pull them clear from the ‘background noise’. Without a tool to highlight the links between important elements, we are prone to seeing regularities where there are none, giving way to teaching folklore and conspiracy theories to explain away our perceptions. The university-as-ecosystem concept may sharpen our observations and offer a frame for their evaluation. As such this may help to overcome the four invisible barriers to educational development highlighted by Sidorkin and Kulakov (2015): 1 Non-dissemination of best practices – teaching is still often a solitary activity with teachers reluctant to share their innovations with their peers, often incorrectly assuming that no one else would be interested in their classroom innovations. It has been my experience as a teacher-developer that while many colleagues exhibit the courage to teach (sensu Palmer, 2017), they often lack the courage to advertise their teaching to their peers. An ecophilosophy of becoming gives greater purpose to the sharing of innovative practice and the overall development of the teaching ecology. 2 Minimal effect sizes – there are generally no ‘breakthrough’ methods. When examining the extensive research literature, it is clear that most successful classroom innovations generate only an incremental improvement in student performance. Authors often tentatively present their data with the caveat that their innovation is not a panacea for all the ills of the classroom. Where stability is often perceived to be the dominant state of being (e.g. Schön, 1971), investment in new practices may be seen as wasting energy that could be spent elsewhere to maintain this and avoid disruptive change. 3 The dynamic conservatism of educational institutions – adopting innovations that require no change. It seems that university managers are often keen to herald innovation within their institutions, but equally seem cautious about anything that might upset the status quo (Ansell et al., 2015). As a result, meaningful change is often difficult to initiate and slow to develop past any sort of pilot project.

28 Ian M. Kinchin 4 Contextual complexity – research into teaching is often small scale and localized. As a result, it is difficult to generalize across institutions, or even across disciplines within the same institutions. As a result, much educational research tries to bracket out the context in an attempt to enhance the generalizability of findings. However, the consequence of this contextindependent approach to research is that it can be disregarded with the phrase, ‘yes, but it wouldn’t work like that here’. The complexity of the context needs to be acknowledged so it may offer greater ecological validity. The acknowledgement of complexity (as described by Molina-Motos, 2019) is one of the central ideas within the ecological approach to teaching and teacher development. In addition, appreciation of the connections between ideas is crucial if the notion of the ecological university is to makes any impact on teacher development. Connections between the main ideas presented within this chapter are summarized in Figure 3.1.

The ecological university The idea of the ‘ecological university’ is underpinned by the fundamental assumption that: The use of ecology as a root metaphor … foregrounds the relational and interdependent nature of our existence as cultural and biological beings … [it] foregrounds relationships, continuities, non-linear patterns of change, and a basic design principle of Nature that favors diversity. (Bowers, 2002, p. 29) Development from the much-derided neoliberal industrial model of education (e.g. Bottrell & Manathunga, 2019; Giroux, 2010) towards an ecological university (Stratford, 2015) requires five fundamental moves, summarized here as: •

•

•

• •

Active construction of an institutional natural history that provides a rich description of the setting and the lives of the people who study and work there (Kinchin, 2022c) Exploration of the range of narrative ecologies within the institution (as explored by Gabriel, 2016) and the ways in which dominant narratives and counter-narratives interact to develop a rich diversity of professional assets Increasing the value placed on post-abyssal thinking (sensu Santos, 2014) so that ‘academic’ knowledge is complemented by other cultural knowledges to create a more inclusive, epistemologically plural environment Development of ecological leadership so that the isolated, heroic leader is replaced with a leadership model where leaders are part of the ecosystem Development of sustainable pedagogies that promote a philosophy of eco-social justice (Bowers, 2002; Misiaszek, 2021)

Rhizomatic teacher development 29

Figure 3.1  Concept map of the main ideas presented in this chapter

30  Ian M. Kinchin Within such an ecological perspective, ecosystem maintenance can be viewed through the lens offered by the adaptive cycle (Holling, 2001) that summarizes the sequence of stabilizing and destabilizing processes that maintain ecosystems. An individual teacher can be considered a complex adaptive system that navigates around an adaptive cycle over a period of time. Each cycle passes repeatedly through four phases: growth, conservation, release, and reorganization. The growth phase is a period when professional resources are plentiful and those teachers who are able, act quickly to take advantage of potential opportunities to develop their practice. The conservation phase is a relatively stable period where teaching practices can become well rehearsed and teachers can become routinized. The release phase is when the functions of a system collapse and capital and connections bound up in a system are made available. Finally, the reorganization phase is when the available capital (human, social, cultural, environmental, financial, etc.) and connections these elements are exposed to new innovations and are reconfigured. The cycle and its four phases can be used as a lens to describe and understand the non-linear professional development of university teachers. Building on the structure of three cycles used by Randle et al. (2015), Kinchin (2022b) hypothesizes three separate but interconnected adaptive cycles to help understand the professional development of university teachers. These are an adaptive cycle of dependence, a transitory adaptive cycle, and an adaptive cycle of independence (Figure 3.2).

Figure 3.2  T hree interconnected adaptive cycles representing plateaus in academic development: A = cycle of dependence; B = transitory cycle; C = cycle of independence

Rhizomatic teacher development 31 Novice academics are initially dependent upon their managers and mentors to help them navigate the tensions of working in higher education and to manage the demands that are placed upon them. The pressure to fit-in with the dominant culture will often drive the actions of newly appointed university teachers, leading many colleagues to adopt short-term survival strategies. The ever-increasing negative consequences of the adaptive cycle of dependence are described by Randle et al. (2015, p. 85), where a ‘rigidity trap’ ties up teachers’ resources and prevents them from adapting more positive behaviours that could move the teacher away from dependence. The rigidity trap in academic practice can be observed when academics engage in activities that run contrary to the available evidence about good practice and may even be in conflict with the beliefs of the individual academic. However, academics can often feel trapped and locked-in to certain practices and may lack the resources or professional agency to break free and allow their practice to be guided by their values. With support from their peers, along with time to reflect on their practice, teachers can progress towards a transitory adaptive cycle. The transitory cycle is described by Randle et al. (2015) as occurring when important controlling variables within the individual’s life undergo some form of change, and the elimination of previous system structures becomes necessary. Tensions that impede the elimination of unhelpful practices can be a source of pedagogic frailty. To engage in this cycle, there has to be a shift in internal capital, which may include a stronger sense of self and a clearer professional identity that offers greater professional agency. This needs to be supported by opportunities for critical reflection. The individual’s development at this stage relies heavily upon there being some perception of coherence across the institution (Kinchin, 2022c). In other words, there needs to be a collective consciousness and a shared set of professional values. The cycle of independence can be observed when the individual academic seeks to maximize the ecological resilience (sensu Holling, 1996) of their practice. Ecological resilience is less about survival in a hostile environment (i.e. coping with adversity) and more about manipulating the environment so that it becomes more livable (Säfström, 2018). This third cycle is a more ecologically resilient system than the preceding two cycles and not only tolerates but thrives on uncertainty and diversity as part of a process of professional becoming (Strom & Martin, 2017). This contrasts with the engineering resilience (described by Holling, 1996) that assumes the existence of a stable end state of being rather than a dynamic state of becoming. Rather than accepting reductive linear models of development that suggest a simplistic transition from novice to expert, we need to embrace the inherent complexity of rhizomatic development and exploit the adoption of a number of ecological principles to illustrate a navigable pathway through the complexity. In this the teacher is seen to develop across adaptive cycles. These cycles represent developmental plateaus of increasing professional independence that are reactive to deterritorializing and reterritorializing factors in the environment.

Territorialization of the discourse The tendency of neoliberal management systems to favour territorialization by accepting the status quo leads to the inhibition of development (described in

32  Ian M. Kinchin the ecological literature as rigidity gaps) within the adaptive cycles. The rhizomatic lens offers an alternative to the predominantly linear thought processes, described as ‘tree thinking’ or ‘arborescent thinking’ that has driven higher education along a detrimental, neoliberal route and generated a blinkered view of what is possible. The linear neoliberal trajectory has been observed to be ‘detracting from the knowledge project that was once the central function of universities’ (Charteris et al., 2016, p. 32), by providing simplistic ‘causal relations that policymakers and others have assumed exist between students and test, teaching and learning’ (Strom & Martin, 2017, p. 5). The rhizomatic exploration of the assets for learning in the salutogenic university (Kinchin, 2022a) seeks to cultivate ‘brave spaces’ to engage in challenging dialogues (sensu Arao & Clemens, 2013) and generate alternatives to the dominant managerial culture of Higher Education. Whereas linearity maintains the status quo by looking for ‘themes’ or ‘sameness’ (e.g. Mazzei, 2016), the rhizome encourages the destabilizing examination of difference and an ecological focus on diversity. The image of the rhizome has not yet undergone cartographic analysis of knowledge despite what appears to be obvious overlaps as described by Ruitenberg (2007, pp. 17–18): Because of their multiple connections, rhizomatic knowledge structures are difficult to represent in traditional, more linear text. Cartographically, however these multiple connections can both be represented and questioned. When one attempts to map rhizomatic processes or texts, one may discover other nodes and connections not previously realized. This process of uncovering new connections can be stimulated by the mapping of elements that contribute to pedagogic frailty.

Mapping pedagogic frailty I have previously described the emergence of the model of pedagogic frailty as a ‘fortuitous confluence of personal and professional experiences’, developed over a period of several years from work undertaken to develop a new MA in Higher Education alongside my professional role as an academic developer that involves listening to colleagues’ anxieties and observing their teaching and the tensions within the teaching environment. This was linked to a personal exploration of the literature on clinical frailty (explored in Kinchin, 2020). The pedagogic frailty model links four dimensions that seem to represent the major sources of tension for colleagues engaged in teaching at university: •

•

The focus of the teaching discourse and whether it concentrates on the mechanisms and regulations that govern teaching or on the underpinning theories and values that direct our personal perspectives The degree of authenticity within teaching and assessment practices, and the alignment of the pedagogy with the nature of the discipline

Rhizomatic teacher development 33 • •

The nature of the research-teaching nexus and how this is made explicit in our teaching The degree to which teachers perceive their proximity to and influence on the decision-making processes and management of teaching

Nuanced analyses of these dimensions have been achieved through the application of concept mapping (Novak, 2010) to chart the relationships between concepts within these knowledge structures (Kinchin & Winstone, 2018). The philosophy underpinning the description of pedagogic frailty focused on the mapping of ethical pathways for forming relationships across the university community, based on trust, respect, consent, and accountability, rather than methods that might be seen simply as extraction of data. These narratives are viewed as nomadic elements, using the principles of cartography (Sermijn et al., 2008, p. 644), which: implies that we can compare narrative selfhood with a dynamic map of narrations (and not with a tracing of reality), a map that is always open and always changing. The narrations someone tells about herself or himself are never complete; they form an ongoing process of co-construction and co-reconstruction. As a researcher, one can thus never have a view on the complete map of one’s participant, seeing that this map is co-constructed, multiple, and constantly changing. We can only explore several temporal regions and paths knowing that we are taking part in the exploration. While I have accessed the evidence for pedagogic frailty through dialogue with individual academics, the term ‘frailty’ is applied to the ecosystem in which the individuals are working (department or institution) and not a description of an individual’s attributes, strengths, or weaknesses. A focus on pedagogic frailty offers a form of teacher development described by Amundsen and Wilson (2012) as having a discipline focus. According to Amundsen and Wilson (2012, p. 98), discipline-based academic development is based on a series of assumptions: •

•

• •

teaching is different (at least in part) in different disciplines because the structure of knowledge is different, and this is often evident in the signature pedagogies (Shulman, 2005) that have evolved within the disciplines. academics identify best with their own disciplinary culture, knowledge and practices and, therefore, disciplinary understanding is the foundation on which to build pedagogical knowledge, and may have difficulties in recognizing knowledge that comes from different epistemological frames (Skopec et al., 2021). activities are focused on scholarly discussion among colleagues that are not linked to academic appraisal processes and are non-judgmental. assessment of impact is informal through participation in discussions, reflection, the generation of portfolios and on-going teaching projects.

34  Ian M. Kinchin •

•

it draws on relevant literature, especially discipline-based understanding – reflecting Ausubel’s principle that the only starting place for further learning is what the learner already knows (Ausubel, 2000) action research or inquiry focus: individuals or groups of academics pursue topics of interest.

Mapping to open up the terrain The visualization of knowledge using concept mapping (Novak, 2010) has been used extensively to record what has already been learnt, with a focus on ‘accepted’ or ‘curriculum’ knowledge. However, it is being used increasingly as a tool to chart ways towards novel understanding (Kinchin, 2014) and the relationships between different knowledge (Kinchin et al., 2019). Rather than seeing concept mapping as a tool to record what is already known, the tool offers a method for the exploration of pedagogic frailty to identify possible trajectories of teacher development and to gain access to the ‘yet-to-be-known’ (sensu Bernstein, 2000), such that: Mapping existing terrain also allows otherwise unknown features to come to the surface. In this way, concept mapping may not only be a way of visualising existing theory to enable verification and dialogue, but it may also help new theoretical perspectives to emerge. This is often as a result of identifying links between ideas that had not been previously made, or by viewing known links from a different perspective. (Kinchin, 2016, p. 88) The limits of static representations (such as concept maps) have to be acknowledged, but they offer a Deleuzian ‘tracing’ that academics can overlay onto their own developing ‘map’ of professional practice (i.e. ‘a map of still-always-in-motion becoming’, Clark/Keefe, 2014, p. 115). It should also be noted here that a concept map does not need to be comprehensive in order to be of value – it does not need to include every possible concept or every possible link in order to highlight key points of interest. Whether one starts from a structuralist or a post-structuralist perspective, there seems to be agreement that when trying to convey complex information the most detailed image is not necessarily the best. Zdebik (2019, p. 41) states that from a Deleuzian perspective, ‘the tracing does not reproduce, repeat, or copy a map; instead, it selects, isolates, restricts part of the map’. A parallel view is expressed by Hine (2013, p. 1162), that, ‘representations in science are inherently selective, showing particular aspects of the phenomenon being studied, for specific purposes’, with ‘distracting noise’ deliberately excluded from the final drawing. Therefore, the approach to capturing data within concept maps to highlight important aspects of teacher development was based on a set of similar assumptions to that articulated by Oancea et al. (2017, p. 306), where the emphasis is on: the qualitative construction and interpretations of these networks by the participants. The critical filter for inclusion in the map of a particular element of the network was the extent to which the participant judged it as

Rhizomatic teacher development 35 relevant to their own interpretation and articulation of cultural value processes and outcomes. The concept map is, therefore, just a tool to help communicate a complex idea, and to support development of personal professional narratives, or dialogues with peers. This places colleagues as ‘nomadic subjects’ (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987), as they are perpetually in motion, in transition, and in relation, which shifts our analysis from the fixity of being, to the dynamic narratives of becoming in higher education (Guyotte et al., 2021). Harris (2016, p. 230) considers the use of concept maps as a way to produce concrete visualizations of rhizomatic assemblages, noting that, ‘concept maps can themselves be seen as figures cut from or sliced through a more complex rhizomatic multiplicity as a cross section’. Concept maps should, therefore, not be viewed as simple summary diagrams (representations of ‘being’) but as tools in the exploration of the relationship between ideas that are represented and as a stimulus for dialogue – offering dynamic constructs rather than static representations and a way to think about ‘becoming’. Concept mapping has had a long and rigorous development as a tool to support learning (e.g. Novak & Cañas, 2006, 2007), but only in recent years has the focus of concept mapping studies been the values that underpin teaching rather than simply the organization of content to be taught (e.g. Greene et al., 2013; Lygo-Baker et al., 2008; McNaughton et al., 2016). Maps provide an artefact to aid examination of beliefs and allow personal, private views to be externalized for analysis and/or discussion. As explained by Wilson et al. (2016, p. 1154): Concept mapping is a medium through which people come to understand more about an event and about themselves. This change of self, re-shapes the meaning of the phenomenon that is being studied, and offers the participants an opportunity to ‘re-see’ the significance the experience and the mapping process offer them. Through this process of ‘re-seeing,’ participants develop an artistic expression of self-discovery (the concept map) and their voice resonates on both an individual and a social level. And so the mapping of pedagogic frailty offers a flexible method for initiating a dialogue about teacher development without dictating any particular trajectory for teacher development and embeds the discussion within the wider teaching ecosystem of the university.

In conclusion Whilst some authors appear to suggest that the rhizome has no structure, I would refine this by saying that the rhizome has no immediately discernible structure in terms of its gross morphology. However, if we look at a biological rhizome (that provided the original inspiration for Deleuze and Guattari), we have to say that the perception of structure depends on the level of resolution and on the instruments used to make observations. The photomicrograph of a biological rhizome in Figure 3.3 clearly shows that, at the vascular level, the

36  Ian M. Kinchin

Figure 3.3  Images of the structure of the rhizome. (Left) A micrograph transverse section through a fern rhizome to illustrate the distribution of tissues through the structure (photomicrograph by author). (Right) A longitudinal section through a ginger rhizome to show the interconnecting tubes of the vascular tissue (redrawn and simplified from Bell, 1980)

rhizome exhibits an obvious structure when viewed in cross section. There are evidently tissues that are explicit representations of a sense of order among the cells. Shaw (2015, p. 158) concludes that rhizomes are ‘the ever braiding, sinuous paths which avoid the peaks and the troughs of climax or conflict, instead constantly vibrating and negotiating in the middle through continued change’. These ‘braiding, sinuous paths’ are highlighted by the patterns of vascular tissue that can be observed within the rhizome tissue. By analogy, the concept map may be considered as a view of a section of the rhizome at the ‘vascular level’ (e.g. Bell, 1980). In Deleuzian terms (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987), this representation may be considered as a tracing of the rhizome – the microscope slide has been fixed and stained to provide a static representation of the internal structure (Figure 3.3). This structure will change over time. Cells will divide and multiply and tissues will mature. Materials may be deposited and incursions by pathogens or herbivores will impact upon the structures observed. But static representations (such as that offered in Figure 3.3) are still of value to the biologist trying to ascertain the physiological processes within the biological rhizome. Similarly, concept maps are valuable in determining the workings of the conceptual rhizome by offering an imperfect window into its workings. However, it is important to realize that a concept map offers a snap-shot of a ‘work in progress’ and that a similar map drawn at a later stage will inevitably be different in detail. In addition to the fluidity of concept maps, concepts such as ‘the rhizome’ and ‘the plateau’ are not static, and my interpretations of these concepts will have been coloured by my previous knowledge as well

Rhizomatic teacher development 37 as my motives for employing these analogies. Shaw (2015) has described how the concepts of the plateau and the rhizome have travelled from the work of Bateson (1972) to the work of Deleuze and Guattari (1987) and in doing so have evolved – and will continue to do so as others adopt and adapt the ideas to suit new contexts and to enrich new disciplinary areas. This needs to be acknowledged, as does the fact that teachers (and teacher developers) from different disciplinary areas will be working within different epistemological frameworks. Teacher development needs to demonstrate an awareness of this plurality of views and to acknowledge that qualitative and postqualitative academics that may be increasingly guided by feminist and ecological social imaginaries of knowledge-making may be working with academics who aim to enact social change while still relying on well-established positivist, representational epistemologies. Therefore, the contemporary teacher educator needs to exhibit epistemological pluralism and (as described by Doucet, 2021) to develop ways to move between different social imaginaries of knowledge-making to accommodate broadly positivist-informed epistemologies alongside ecological and relational social imaginaries of knowledge-making. This requires repeated movements across the epistemological abyss (championed by Santos, 2014). While this may present a challenge to academics, it is not impossible, and academics may even view the removal of epistemological blinkers as empowering (e.g. Kinchin & Thumser, 2021), and they may be helped in this endeavour by presenting the complexity of knowledges through discipline-appropriate lenses (Kinchin & Correia, 2021) to help overcome the issues of ‘epistemic fragility’ (Skopec et al., 2021). The complexity and the uncertainty inherent in this professional journey make it one worth taking, rather than the stale notion of the linear pathway that has already been well trodden by others.

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38  Ian M. Kinchin Bernstein, B. (2000). Pedagogy, symbolic control and identity. Rowman & Littlefield. Bottrell, D., & Manathunga, C. (Eds.) (2019). Resisting neoliberalism in higher education volume 1: Seeing through the cracks. Palgrave Critical University Studies. Bowers, C. A. (2002). Toward an eco-justice pedagogy. Environmental Education Research, 8(1), 21–34. Charteris, J., Gannon, S., Mayes, E., Nye, A., & Stephenson, L. (2016). The emotional knots of academicity: A collective biography of academic subjectivities and spaces. Higher Education Research & Development, 35(1), 31–44. Clark/Keefe, K. (2014). Becoming artist, becoming educated, becoming undone: Toward a nomadic perspective of college student identity development. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 27(1), 110–134. Cristancho, S., & Fenwick, T. (2015). Mapping a surgeon’s becoming with Deleuze. Medical Humanities, 41(2), 128–135. Davis, H. (2010). Other-centredness as a leadership attribute: From ego to eco centricity. Journal of Spirituality, Leadership and Management, 4(1), 43–52. Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F. (1987). A thousand plateaus: Capitalism and schizophrenia. Continuum. Doucet, A. (2021). What does Rachel Carson have to do with family sociology and family policies? Ecological imaginaries, relational ontologies, and crossing social imaginaries. Families, Relationships and Societies, 10(1), 11–31. Dreyfus, H. L., & Dreyfus, S. E. (1986). Mind over machine: The power of human intuition and expertise in the era of the computer. The Free Press. Gabriel, Y. (2016). Narrative ecologies and the role of counter-narratives: The case of nostalgic stories and conspiracy theories. In S. Frandsen, T. Kuhn, & M. W. Lundholt (Eds.), Counter-narratives and organization (pp. 208–226). Routledge. Giroux, H. (2010). Neoliberalism’s war on higher education. Haymarket Books. Greene, B. A., Lubin, I. A., Slater, J. L., & Walden, S. E. (2013). Mapping changes in science teachers’ content knowledge: Concept maps and authentic professional development. Journal of Science Education and Technology, 22(3), 287–299. Guyotte, K. W., Flint, M. A., & Latopolski, K. S. (2021). Cartographies of belonging: Mapping nomadic narratives of first-year students. Critical Studies in Education, 62(5), 543–558. Harris, D. (2016). Rhizomatic education and Deleuzian theory. Open Learning: The Journal of Open, Distance and e-Learning, 31(3), 219–232. Hine, C. (2013). The emergent qualities of digital specimen images in biology. Information, Communication & Society, 16(7), 1157–1175. Holling, C. S. (1996). Engineering resilience vs. ecological resilience. In P. C. Schultze (Ed.), Engineering within ecological constraints (pp. 31–43). National Academy Press. Holling, C. S. (2001). Understanding the complexity of economic, ecological, and social systems. Ecosystems, 4, 390–405. Kinchin, I. M. (2014). Concept mapping as a learning tool in higher education: A critical analysis of recent reviews. The Journal of Continuing Higher Education, 62(1), 39–49. Kinchin, I. M. (2016). Visualising powerful knowledge to develop the expert student: A knowledge structures perspective on teaching and learning at university. Sense Publishers. Kinchin, I. M. (2020) Concept mapping and pedagogic health in higher education (a rhizomatic exploration in eight plateaus) [DLitt thesis, University of Surrey].

Rhizomatic teacher development 39 https://openresearch.surrey.ac.uk/esploro/outputs/doctoral/Concept-mappingand-pedagogic-health-in-higher-education-a-rhizomatic-exploration-in-eightplateaus/99545423202346 Kinchin, I. M. (2022c). Exploring dynamic processes within the ecological university: A focus on the adaptive cycle. Oxford Review of Education, 48(5), 675–692. https://doi.org/10.1080/03054985.2021.2007866 Kinchin, I. M. (2022a). Care as a threshold concept for teaching in the salutogenic university. Teaching in Higher Education, 27(2), 171–184. Kinchin, I. M. (2022b). An ecological lens on the professional development of university teachers. Teaching in Higher Education. https://doi.org/10.1080/13562 517.2021.2021394 Kinchin, I. M., & Cabot, L. B. (2010). Reconsidering the dimensions of expertise: From linear stages towards dual processing. London Review of Education, 8(2), 153–166. Kinchin, I. M., & Correia, P. R. M. (2021). Visualizing the complexity of knowledges to support the professional development of university teaching. Knowledge, 1(1), 52–60. Kinchin, I. M., Möllits, A., & Reiska, P. (2019). Uncovering types of knowledge in concept maps. Education Sciences, 9(2), 131. Kinchin, I. M., & Thumser, A. E. (2021). Mapping the ‘becoming-integrated-academic’: An autoethnographic case study of professional becoming in the biosciences. Journal of Biological Education. https://doi.org/10.1080/00219266.2 021.1941191 Kinchin, I. M., & Winstone, N. E. (Eds.) (2018). Exploring pedagogic frailty and resilience: Case studies of academic narrative. Brill. Lygo-Baker, S., Kingston, E., & Hay, D. B. (2008). Uncovering the diversity of teachers’ understanding of their role: The importance of individual values. The International Journal of Learning, 15(5), 245–253. Mazzei, L. A. (2016). Voice without a subject. Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies, 16(2), 151–161. McNaughton, S., Barrow, M., Bagg, W., & Frielick, S. (2016). Capturing the integration of practice-based learning with beliefs, values and attitudes using modified concept mapping. Journal of Medical Education and Curricular Development, 3, 17–24. Misiaszek, G. W. (2021). Ecopedagogy: Critical environmental teaching for planetary justice and global sustainable development. Bloomsbury. Molina-Motos, D. (2019). Ecophilosophical principles for an ecocentric environmental education. Education Sciences, 9(1), 37. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci9010037 Novak, J. D. (2010). Learning, creating, and using knowledge: Concept maps as facilitative tools in schools and corporations (2nd ed.). Routledge. Novak, J. D., & Cañas, A. J. (2006). The origins of concept maps and the continuing evolution of the tool. Information Visualization Journal, 5(3), 175–184. Novak, J. D., & Cañas, A. J. (2007). Theoretical origins of concept maps, how to construct them, and uses in education. Reflecting Education, 3(1), 29–42. Oancea, A., Florez Petour, T., & Atkinson, J. (2017). Qualitative network analysis tools for the configurative articulation of cultural value and impact from research. Research Evaluation, 26(4), 302–315. Palmer, P. J. (2017). The courage to teach: Exploring the inner landscape of a teacher’s life. John Wiley & Sons.

40  Ian M. Kinchin Randle, J. M., Stroink, M. L., & Nelson, C. H. (2015). Addiction and the adaptive cycle: A new focus. Addiction Research & Theory, 23(1), 81–88. Ruitenberg, C. W. (2007). Here be dragons: Exploring cartography in educational theory and research. Complicity: An International Journal of Complexity in Education, 4, 7–24. Säfström, C. A. (2018). Liveable life, educational theory and the imperative of constant change. European Educational Research Journal, 17(5), 621–630. Santos, B. de S. (2014). Epistemologies of the South: Justice against epistemicide. Routledge. Schön, D. A. (1971). Beyond the stable state: Public and private learning in a changing society. Temple Smith. Sermijn, J., Devlieger, P., & Loots, G. (2008). The narrative construction of the self: Selfhood as a rhizomatic story. Qualitative Inquiry, 14(4), 632–650. Shaw, R. (2015). Bringing Deleuze and Guattari down to earth through Gregory Bateson: Plateaus, rhizomes and ecosophical subjectivity. Theory, Culture & Society, 32(7–8), 151–171. Shulman, L. S. (2005). Signature pedagogies in the professions. Daedalus, 134(3), 52–59. Sidorkin, A. M., & Kulakov, A. M. (2015). The problem of the invisible in education. Journal of Siberian Federal University. Humanities & Social Sciences, 11(8), 2632–2637. Skopec, M., Fyfe, M., Issa, H., Ippolito, K., Anderson, M., & Harris, M. (2021). Decolonization in a higher education STEMM institution – is ‘epistemic fragility’ a barrier? London Review of Education, 19(1), 1–21. Stratford, R. (2015). What is the ecological university and why is it a significant challenge for higher education policy and practice? PESA-Philosophy of Education Society of Australasia, ANCU. https://www.academia.edu/19661131 Strom, K. J., & Martin, A. D. (2017). Becoming-teacher: A rhizomatic look at firstyear teaching. Sense. Wilson, J., Mandich, A., & Magalhães, L. (2016). Concept mapping: A dynamic, individualized and qualitative method for eliciting meaning. Qualitative Health Research, 26(8), 1151–1161. Zdebik, J. (2019). Deleuze and the map-image: Aesthetics, information, code and digital art. Bloomsbury.

4

Rhizomatic learning A critical appraisal from the perspective of cultural-historical theory Ilias Karasavvidis

Introduction We form a rhizome with our viruses, or rather our viruses cause us to form a rhizome with other animals. (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p. 10) I cannot help but note how timely and ironic this quote is in terms of how Deleuze and Guattari describe the symbiotic relation of the human species with viruses. This is because I am writing this chapter in the midst of an ongoing pandemic, as I am slowly recovering from a very serious COVID-19 infection. Considering that the focus of this volume is on learning rather than viruses, I will limit myself to a discussion of rhizomatic learning (RL). My main aim in this work is to offer a critical appraisal of the concept of RL vis-à-vis Cultural-Historical Theory (CHT). In particular, my goals are to: (a) provide a concise introduction to the core concepts of the rhizomatic framework, (b) identify similarities and differences between RL and CHT, illustrating the parallels with rhizomatic concepts, (c) consider applications of rhizomatic scholarship in the literature, and (d) identify what I perceive to be as the potential and limitations of RL. Right from the start, I need to point out that I will single out some of the concepts that I see as fundamental in the philosophical framework that Deleuze and Guattari have introduced in their work “A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia” (ATP). I will not be attempting a critique of RL on a philosophical level. Nor will I be offering an authoritative view of the concepts put forward in ATP. Instead, I will be presenting my own idiosyncratic interpretation of their ideas and filter them through the lens of CHT and offspring: Situated Cognition, Distributed Cognition, and Communities of Practice (CoPs). The readers are strongly advised to treat this appraisal as neither unbiased nor objective. On the one hand, I have been using CHT in my own research for more than two decades. My research interests centre on learning with technology and I have employed CHT as a main theoretical framework in my work. Thus, the fact that I am heavily biased towards CHT is inescapable. DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378-6

42  Ilias Karasavvidis On the other hand, RL is based on the theory of Deleuze and Guattari, which is philosophical in nature. By all accounts, the framework Deleuze and Guattari proposed appears to be a rather complex and demanding one (Drummond, 2005; Harris, 2016). It should be noted that – to the best of my knowledge – Deleuze and Guattari did not explicitly set out to address RL per se. They introduced the concept of the rhizome and their framework is neither an educational nor a psychological one. Consequently, any application of the rhizomatic ideas to other fields such as education necessarily entails some form of translation and simplification. Also, comparing and contrasting the rhizomatic framework to other frameworks (which is the main goal of this work) involves some form of reduction and decontextualization. The problem is that such translation and reduction processes are not straightforward. For instance, Harris (2016) illustrated how difficult it is to apply the rhizomatic framework to education in a principled manner, specifically in a way that does not denature or distort the original ideas by Deleuze and Guattari. Additionally, Mackness et al. (2016) also noted that the rhizomatic concepts cannot be lightly invoked, suggesting that a serious conceptual treatment of the rhizome would be called for if we are to exploit its potential. Therefore, the readers should keep in mind that rhizomatic ideas may or may not have direct applications to educational settings, much less to conceptualizations of learning.

Rhizome – The wisdom of the plants Arborescent thought Before I take up the concept of rhizome I will briefly situate the post-structural framework that Deleuze and Guattari developed because I consider it to be an essential prerequisite to understanding their approach. Deleuze and Guattari were not satisfied with the dualistic thinking that had shaped western thought since the dawn of time. The primary motivation behind their work was the formation of a framework that would help overcome dualisms. More specifically, Deleuze and Guattari objected to the logic of the tree as the image of thought that had come to dominate western culture (de Beistegui, 2018). They considered the tree to be the dominant representation of thought and knowledge in general. This image of thought comprises treelike structures, which are hierarchical and structured. As a structure, the tree typically moves from the least differentiated to the most differentiated, commonly through binary splits. A prototypical example of this would perhaps be the concept of a binary digit in Computer Science. A bit is the smallest unit of information that is used to distinguish between two states, signifying a binary split (e.g. two voltage levels). Deleuze and Guattari noted that western thought has privileged the tree as a knowledge metaphor, essentially rendering it the dominant paradigm. This metaphor of knowledge as a tree can be traced back to Descartes (Ariew, 1992).

Rhizomatic learning 43 To use their own terminology, what a tree does is “territorialize”, namely provide a structure, which in turn leads to a hierarchical organization or form. As a fundamental arborescent structure, the tree has a clear beginning and end. It is stable, static, linear, and fixed. The branching that is indicative of trees implies the same general logic, reflecting a structure that is further differentiated and split into (at least) two sub-branches. Given that all sub-branches stem from the same branch they are of the same logic (i.e. nature or essence). Consequently, the branches are not heterogeneous enough. For Deleuze and Guattari a tree represents a structure that is authoritative, stable, settled, institutionalized, canonical, homogenized, and normalized. In their view, the problem with the arborescent image of thought is that it leads to ossified forms of knowledge. This ossification is reflected in whatever is standardized and formalized, turned into routines, algorithms, rules, laws, and all forms of conventions. The centrality of the concept of the tree, which reflects an arborescent image of knowledge, is what led Deleuze and Guattari to propose an alternative biological metaphor: the rhizome (de Beistegui, 2018). Rhizomatic thought According to the Wikipedia definition, “a rhizome…is a modified subterranean plant stem that sends out roots and shoots from its nodes” (Rhizome, 2022). As opposed to trees, the rhizome expands through the creation of shoots in every possible direction. This rhizomatic metaphor helps mitigate the arborescent image of thought as the connections are not hierarchical but non-linear and chaotic. In the conceptualization advanced by Deleuze and Guattari (1987), a rhizome comprises tubers that spread in all directions, forming constellations of elements that are not necessarily homogeneous: There are no points or positions in a rhizome, such as those found in a structure, tree, or root. There are only lines. (p. 8) What typifies rhizomes is motion. To consider a Math analogy, points in a Cartesian plane can represent fixed positions (e.g. leaves), while the rhizomes can be seen as the vectors, which indicate movement from one point to the other. It is worth stressing that while the primary notion of rhizomes is inspired by plants, Deleuze and Guattari give examples of rhizomes that are not limited to plants, extending to animal rhizomes and even hybrid ones. For instance, they discuss various examples of plant, animal and hybrid rhizomes such as a burrow, ants, and wasp and orchid. Deleuze and Guattari list six main core principles of rhizomes that capture the essence of their approach. These include connection, heterogeneity, multiplicity, rupture, cartography, and decalcomania. I will be introducing them in batches, following their order of presentation in ATP.

44  Ilias Karasavvidis Connection and heterogeneity As a networked structure, connections between the constitutive elements in a rhizome are its most defining property. As Deleuze and Guattari (1987) argue any point of a rhizome can be connected to anything other, and must be. (p. 7) As opposed to trees that are linear structures, where every node has at most one neighbour of higher order, a rhizome is a flat structure which is characterized by interconnections. In such a structure, any node can be connected to any other node without any constraints. While the tree is a strictly linear hierarchical structure, the rhizome is a non-linear, non-hierarchical one. Regarding heterogeneity, the elements that make up an assemblage are not of the same type, i.e. some are human agents, but others are non-human, leading to complex configurations. The resulting assemblage is made from different entities: … different regimes of signs but also states of things of differing status….A rhizome ceaselessly establishes connections between semiotic chains, organizations of power, and circumstances relative to the arts, sciences, and social struggles. A semiotic chain is like a tuber agglomerating very diverse acts, not only linguistic, but also perceptive, mimetic, gestural, and cognitive. (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p. 7) As an assemblage, the elements that comprise the rhizome are ontologically different. In the prototypical example Deleuze and Guattari give, they discuss the heterogeneity of language (cf citing Weinreich “an essentially heterogeneous reality”, p. 7) but they generalize the argument to any other nodes or elements in a network. Multiplicities What characterizes a rhizome is the multitude of different connections that can be made among its elements. Deleuze and Guattari introduce the concept of multiplicity to challenge the unity as a defining feature of arborescent structures. They consider the connections that are formed between the elements of a rhizome as multidimensional. Hence, they treat these connections as multiplicities rather than unities. Multiplicities denote differentiations, which is what defines rhizomes. On the other hand, unity is what characterizes arborescent structures, where a root is split into radicles following a binary logic. Unity operates in an empty dimension while multiplicities are flat, filling all their dimensions. As Deleuze and Guattari (1987) argue, the multiple connections that exist among the various nodes in a rhizome render any concept of unity problematic: There is no unity to serve as a pivot in the object, or to divide in the subject. There is not even the unity to abort in the object or “return” in the

Rhizomatic learning 45 subject. A multiplicity has neither subject nor object, only determinations, magnitudes, and dimensions that cannot increase in number without the multiplicity changing in nature (p. 8) Asignifying rupture The concept of rupture indicates some sort of break of existing structures. A rhizome might break but it will not cease expansion, be it along existing lines or new ones. Deleuze and Guattari describe rhizomes as comprising two sets of lines. First, it comprises lines along which it is structured and territorialized. Second, it comprises lines along which it breaks the existing structures, deterritorializing them. Whenever lines of flight expand beyond current structures, i.e. becoming lines of flight, rupture occurs. Deleuze and Guattari (1987) describe rupture as the process through which territorialization, deterritorialization, and reterritorialization occur: a becoming-wasp of the orchid and a becoming-orchid of the wasp. Each of these becomings brings about the deterritorialization of one term and the reterritorialization of the other; the two becomings interlink and form relays in a circulation of intensities pushing the deterritorialization ever further. (p. 10) Cartography and decalcomania According to Deleuze and Guattari, the tree corresponds to the tracing while the rhizome to the map. More specifically, they consider tracing to be static, fixed, ready-made, and reproductive in nature. As a representation, the tree provides a hierarchical ordering of the tracings that are available. Essentially, Deleuze and Guattari suggest that tracings could be seen as the leaves of the tree and their positions can be followed backwards from the leaf, to the branch, and then on to the trunk and eventually the root. On the other hand, a rhizome is a map rather than a tracing. A map is a constitutive part of the rhizome in that it does not reproduce existing tracings, it is fluid: The map is open and connectable in all of its dimensions; it is detachable, reversible, susceptible to constant modification. It can be torn, reversed, adapted to any kind of mounting, reworked by an individual, group, or social formation. (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p. 12) As opposed to the tracing, which is fixed, a map is modifiable, susceptible to multiple readings and interpretations. Deleuze and Guattari point out that while the tracing always represents the “same”, a map has multiple entryways. They argue that – compared to tracing – a map is a more flexible representation

46  Ilias Karasavvidis because it is more productive in nature. In principle, many different map-tracing combinations are possible. As they note the tracing translates a map into an image, crystallizing it in some form. Therefore, the tracing transforms a map into a tree-like structure, giving it roots and radicles, enforcing a structure in whatever it tries to imitate. Deleuze and Guattari (1987) point out that the tracing creates a model of what it supposedly represents, ending up reproducing itself instead of the thing it should be representing. The tracing arborifies the map, essentially ending the rhizome: Once a rhizome has been obstructed, arborified, it’s all over (p. 14) …. it is tracings that must be put on the map, not the opposite. (p. 21) In addition to the six core principles outlined above, Deleuze and Guattari introduced several other auxiliary concepts such as assemblage, nomad, lines of flight, becoming, and being in the middle. Given that the whole philosophical framework put forward by Deleuze and Guattari is rich and complex, a comprehensive presentation is beyond the scope of this work. I have only provided a brief outline based on my own interpretation of the ideas in ATP. For more detailed introduction to their work the readers are advised to refer to the excellent and more authoritative sources that are available (Holland, 2013; Robinson, 2009; Somers-Hall et al., 2018).

A CHT perspective on RL In this section I will trace what I see as parallels between the rhizomatic framework with CHT. I need to stress that I will be making the simplistic assumption that CHT and offspring constitute a coherent and unified framework, which is not the case (e.g. Elhammoumi, 2001). For a comprehensive overview of the CHT and related frameworks the readers should refer to more authoritative sources (Dafermos, 2018; Valsiner & Rosa, 2018; Van der Veer, 2014; Van der Veer & Valsiner, 1991; Veresov, 1999). Rhizome as a unit In my view, the greatest similarity that exists between the two frameworks is related to the unit of analysis. The problem of the proper unit of analysis for examining cognitive development has puzzled researchers for more than a century. Most learning conceptualizations approach cognitive development in individualistic terms (e.g. Behaviourism, Piagetian theory, Cognitive Psychology). As a consequence, such individualistic conceptions of learning have dominated. For most of the 20th century the focus has been on the sole individual, learning has been seen as an individual issue, and cognitive functions have been examined on an individual level.

Rhizomatic learning 47 One of the main contributions of CHT has been the redefinition of the unit of analysis. CHT and its offspring conceptualize learning in drastically different terms, broadening the focus beyond the individual. As opposed to other conceptualizations of learning in which the sole, unaided individual is the focus of cognitive development, in CHT social others (peers, parents, teachers, etc.) play a major role in cognitive functioning and learning is conceptualized in social terms. There is an individual moment in learning but learning is treated as being social through and through. On the one hand, the pioneers of CHT considered cognition as something that extends beyond the skin. For instance, Luria (1979) acknowledged that: we needed…to step outside the organism to discover the sources of specifically human forms of psychological activity. (p. 43) Along the same lines, Vygotsky proposed that all mediated psychological functions are higher psychological functions and originate in social interaction. The general genetic law of cultural development introduces a way of viewing thinking on the intermental plane, as something that extends beyond the individual, involving interrelations between individuals. According to Vygotsky (1978): every function in the child’s cultural development appears twice: first, on the social level, and later, on the individual level; first between people (interpsychological), and then inside the child (intrapsychological). This applies equally to voluntary attention, to logical memory, and to the formation of concepts. All the higher functions originate as actual relations between human individuals. (p. 57) Thus, higher mental functions are manifested between people before they are seen at an individual level. The main implication of this position is that to understand individual mental functioning and human cognition we need to move beyond the isolated individual and begin the tracing between individuals and the overall social environments. Considering that Bakhtin’s dialogical framework has also been linked to Vygotsky’s (Wertsch, 1991, 1998), I will also simplistically treat Bakhtin’s ideas as akin to CHT. In particular, regarding the genesis of cognitive development, Bakhtin (1986) considered that the shaping of individual consciousness as arising from social and communicative processes. As he argued: Everything that pertains to me enters my consciousness, beginning with my name, from the external world through the mouths of others (my mother, and so forth)…I realize myself initially through others: from them I receive words, forms, and tonalities for the formation of my initial idea of myself….

48  Ilias Karasavvidis Just as the body is formed initially in the mother’s womb (body), a person’s consciousness awakens wrapped in another’s consciousness. (p. 138) On the other hand, recent reformulations of CHT, such as sociocultural psychology and Cultural-Historical Activity Theory (CHAT), have adopted and extended Vygotsky’s seminal ideas. In terms of socio-cultural psychology, Wertsch (1991, 1998, 2002) elaborated Vygotsky’s ideas on mediation and proposed a unit of analysis that shifts the focus from the sole, isolated individual to the mediated action and the artefacts employed. Specifically, Wertsch (1991) argued that a more appropriate unit of analysis is mediated action and in particular “individual(s)-acting-with-mediational means” (p. 12). To emphasize the bond that exists between agent and mediational means, Wertsch considered this unit of analysis as irreducible. The major tenet of sociocultural psychology is that mediated action is inextricably linked to the cultural, historical, and institutional settings in which it emerges. Consequently, the focus is on the study of mental functioning as it unfolds in cultural, historical, and institutional contexts. The CHAT framework has been introduced by Engestrom (1999, 2014), Cole and Engestrom (1993), and Cole (1996). Engestrom (1999, 2014) has elaborated and expanded Leont’ev’s (1978, 1981a, 1981b) Activity Theory, which drew on Vygotsky’s ideas about mediation. The building blocks of what is called an activity system in CHAT are presented in Figure 4.1. The starting point for CHAT has been the basic mediational triangle that includes subject, object, and mediational means. This triangle was further enriched with the addition of other elements such as rules, community, and division of labour. In a way that is analogous to Wertsch’s conceptualization of the unit of analysis, CHAT attempts to capture not only the isolated individual but also the broader context within which the individual operates. Thus, one of the

Figure 4.1  The main components of an activity system

Rhizomatic learning 49 main advantages of CHAT is that it helps overcome the limitations of the exclusive focus on the individual as the unit of analysis. The collective pursuit of an object reframes the individual and places them within the concrete cultural and historical context in which the activity is carried out. This focus on an activity system highlights not only the individual agent but also the mediational means used, the social others that are also participating in the activity, the conventions adopted by the community, the division of labour, and, overall, the whole social structure in which the individual operates. This unified conceptualization of subject, object, mediational artefacts, social others, and conventions enables a holistic view of the social setting. What both Vygotsky’s original ideas and their contemporary reconceptualizations indicate is a broadening of focus: the individual is seen in context and in process, interacting with social others and mediational artefacts, conceptual or material. In my view, this movement beyond the individual to the social context within which the individual functions fully corresponds to the notion of rhizome. More specifically, the rhizome can be seen as a graph, namely a fundamental Computer Science data structure, whose vertices are connected through edges. Hence, the rhizome primes relations between the nodes in the network, which is equivalent to the focus on the social interaction and its defining influence on human mental functioning. As Deleuze and Guattari (1987) characteristically noted: A rhizome has no beginning or end; it is always in the middle, between things, interbeing, intermezzo (p. 25) Connection The second striking similarity between CHT and rhizomatic thinking is related to the principle of connection. Considering the structure of a rhizome, it is the connections that capture its very essence. What matters is not the nodes on their own but their associations because a node is essentially defined in terms of its interconnections with other nodes. I argue that this principle also applies to CHT because it heavily draws on interactions, which in turn presuppose connections. In a sense, social interaction can be treated as the equivalent to the principle of connection that Deleuze and Guattari proposed. In CHT the importance of social interaction can be illustrated in several ways. First, sociogenesis has its origins in social interaction. The following example Vygotsky (1987) gives vividly illustrates internalized social relationships: When the school child solves a problem at home on the basis of a model he has been shown in class, he continues to act in collaboration though at the moment the teacher is not standing near him. From a psychological perspective, the solution of the second at home problem is similar to this solution of

50  Ilias Karasavvidis a problem at home. It is a solution accomplished with the teacher’s help. This help – this aspect of collaboration – is invisibly present. It is contained in what looks from the outside like the child’s independent solution of the problem. (p. 216) Vygotsky (1960/1981b) argued that even solitary thinking is inherently social in nature: Even when we turn to mental processes, their nature remains quasi-social. In their own private sphere, human beings retain the functions of social interaction. (p. 164) Bakhtin’s dialogical ideas can also be seen as analogous to the principle of connection. For Bakhtin (1986), individual consciousness is shaped by social interaction: thought itself … is born and shaped in the process of interaction and struggle with others’ thought, and this cannot but be reflected in the forms that verbally express our thoughts as well. (p. 92) Second, humans connect through language, which for Vygotsky was the “tool of tools”. In particular, he paid attention to the use of signs for the development of thinking. At first, he considered how the use of signs enables communication with others. Then, he examined how signs help communicating with oneself (i.e. inner speech) and controlling oneself. Humans make connections through language. In particular, Bakhtin (1986) argued that “words belong to nobody” yet our speech “is filled with other’s words” (p. 89). We are not the creators of the words we use to communicate. Instead, these words are given to us by others. Neither do we as speakers assign meanings to words: these meanings are also passed to us by others. As Bakhtin put it, the word is half someone else’s. Words are filled with the meanings of others, reflecting what he called the voices of others, i.e. the speaking consciousness (Wertsch, 1991). Bakhtin considered how human speech is organized in utterances, which are the real unit of speech communication. As he noted, utterances always express a point of view and are always related to other utterances. Therefore, utterances are dialogically related to one another. For Bakhtin (1986), understanding is responsive and dialogic in nature. Hence, the comprehension of an utterance always entails that the listener takes an active and responsive attitude towards it: To see and comprehend the author of a work means to see and comprehend another, alien consciousness and its world, that is, another subject (‘Du’)…. Understanding is always dialogic to some degree. (p. 111)

Rhizomatic learning 51 As the above account indicates, social interaction is the cornerstone of CHT. If we treat connection as reflecting social interaction, it would be hard to miss the similarities between the two frameworks. In the rhizomatic framework, the nodes reach out and connect with other nodes or anything in the network. Analogously, in CHT, there is no “isolated” individual: all members are connected in multiple ways. Much like rhizomes involve making connections, in CHT all human psychological processes have cultural origins and originate in social interaction. CHT approaches the problem of cognitive development through the study of social interaction. Heterogeneity As Deleuze and Guattari argue, the elements that make up the rhizomatic network may be ontologically different. Hence, as a network, a rhizome comprises both human and non-human nodes. Both human (animate) and non-human (inanimate) elements are involved in the creation of rhizomes. In my view this principle has striking parallels with two main concepts in CHT. First, it is highly correlated with mediation, which Vygotsky considered to be a defining feature of his approach. More specifically, he made a distinction between natural (biological) evolution and cultural-historical evolution. Drawing on earlier work, he proposed a similarity between material and cultural tools (Van der Veer & Valsiner, 1991). Marx and Engels had proposed that human activity is mediated by material tools. Vygotsky extended this argument further to psychological activity, noting that: the invention and use of signs as auxiliary means of solving a given psychological problem…is analogous to the invention and use of tools in one psychological respect. The sign acts as an instrument of psychological activity in a manner analogous to the role of a tool in labor. (Vygotsky, 1978, p. 52) Vygotsky called these auxiliary means psychological tools, which include: language; various systems for counting; mnemonic techniques; algebraic symbol systems; works of art; writing; schemes, diagrams, maps and mechanical drawings; all sorts of conventional signs (Vygotsky, 1960/1981a, p. 137) As Vygotsky noted, when signs are used in a psychological process such as memory (e.g. writing a note), the psychological process becomes extra-cortical. This is because this psychological process extends beyond the physical confines of the body: to remember a list of facts one simply needs to read a note rather than recall them from memory. Second, the principle of heterogeneity is also highly correlated with a CHT offspring: Distributed Cognition. More specifically, the notion that cognition is

52  Ilias Karasavvidis distributed gained prominence in early 1990s (Resnick et al., 1991; Salomon, 1993). This framework challenges the notion of cognition as residing in the mind of the individual, moving the boundaries beyond the head. Pea (1993) identified two major dimensions of distribution: social and material. The former refers to the distribution of cognition over social others who are used as cognitive resources in the process of carrying out a task. The latter refers to all sorts of material and conceptual artefacts that encapsulate cognition and are utilized in the process of solving a task. Interestingly, researchers working outside CHT have also come to similar conclusions about the distribution of cognition. In particular, the notion that cognition is distributed is widely adopted in a subfield of Cognitive Science: Distributed Cognition. Traditionally, Cognitive Science has treated cognition as something being “in the head”, namely a property of the individual mind. In Cognitive Science the sole individual is seen as bearing all intelligence, as the locus of control of cognition. However, Distributed Cognition posits that it is impossible to understand the properties of individual cognition through focusing on individual cognition. Instead, to understand cognition one would need to examine the whole environment within which the individual functions. The offloading of computational burden to either the environment or specially designed artefacts has been examined both theoretically (Clark, 1997) and empirically (Hutchins, 1995a, 1995b, 2010). Overall, there is a remarkable similarity between the principle of heterogeneity and the concepts of mediation and distribution of cognition. Given the connections that characterize rhizomes as much as human communities, both CHT and rhizomatic thinking seem to emphasize that these connections involve people as much as artefacts. Multipliticy The principle of multiplicity challenges the notion of the individual as onedimensional, well-defined, and static entity. Each individual can be described in multiple dimensions depending on the contexts within which they participate and the connections they form with social others and material artefacts in these contexts. In my view, there are at two major resemblances between the principle of multiplicity and constructs from the CHT. First, multiplicity is related to the CoP framework. Based off of CHT and other fields, Lave and Wenger introduced the framework of CoP (Wenger, 1999; Wenger & Snyder, 2000; Wenger et al., 2002). The drive behind CoP reflected the desire to describe the social nature that is characteristic of human learning. Essentially, a community of practice can be described as a social learning system. CoP traces learning not in the head but in the relations that an individual develops with the social world in which they participate. What is typical of these relations is that they are participatory in nature (Wenger, 2010). A CoP is meant to facilitate sharing, developing, reflecting, and learning together. On the one hand, in a CoP the participants interact, build relationships and bond with others, engage in common pursuits, and learn together. Essentially,

Rhizomatic learning 53 communities are about connections as in principle each member of the community can access every other member. Effective CoPs seek to facilitate maximum connectivity and interaction between the members. In fact, both the frequency and the quality of connections are critical success factors for a CoP. On the other hand, a CoP collects, develops, and curates resources for the benefit of its members. What matters in a CoP is engagement with other members of the community as well as with the resources that the community has compiled. Effective CoPs are characterized by sharing ideas and knowledge, resources and techniques, tricks, and lessons learned. If a member of the community learns something then, potentially, this piece of information is accessible to all the other members of the community. Furthermore, this piece of information can be crystalized as an artefact in some form and become available to all community members. Second, the principle of multiplicity is related to the Situated cognition framework. Owing to the heavy influence of CHT, the notion of cognition as situated appeared in the 1980s. Cognition is viewed not as a property of the individual mind but as an emergent feature of the interaction between the individual and the surrounding context (Lave, 1988; Rogoff & Lave, 1984). This framework emphasizes the essential importance of context for cognition. More specifically, the context is not something simply given or trivial, such as a background variable. Instead, it is a constitutive element of cognition, which is intertwined with the context in which it is actualized (Brown et al., 1989; Rogoff, 1990). This framework views cognition as socially situated in the contexts and activities where it is realized. Hence, cognition is considered as an emergent property bound to a context rather than an abstract, decontextualized, and crystallized feature of the individual mind. Empirical evidence indicated that cognition is closely intertwined with context (Lave, 1988; Lave & Wenger, 1991; Rogoff, 1990; Suchman, 1987). For instance the work of Lave (1988) demonstrated marked differences in terms of how people solved structurally identical tasks in different contexts. Thus, context was not a trivial variable that could be conveniently ignored but an essentially constitutive feature of cognition. The ideas from the two frameworks that were mentioned above, CoP and Situated Cognition, have an affinity with the principle of multiplicity. Much like the connections in a rhizome, the connections with a CoP are constitutive of the community. An isolated individual in pursuit of knowledge in a given domain is less privileged compared to an individual who is a member of a thriving CoP: more access to learning opportunities, increased access to knowledge resources, improved mentoring opportunities, and better chances of obtaining guidance when seeking help. To a large extent, the quality of relations that are formed between the members in the process of interaction are constitutive of the knowledge, skill, and identity of the practitioner. On the other hand, cognition is not a fixed property attributed to the individual mind: it is an emergent property that characterizes a person’s interaction with the environment, in situ, in the process of pursuing a goal. As the research evidence indicates, the context is not a trivial, background variable that can be conveniently ignored or taken for granted. Instead, cognition is bound to the contexts within which it is applied.

54  Ilias Karasavvidis Asignifying rupture According to Deleuze and Guattari, the principle of rupture denotes instances where an existing structure breaks down. Rupture occurs when the lines that territorialize a rhizome become lines of flight and extend beyond an existing structure, thereby breaking it. CHAT is the framework that comes to mind when viewing rupture through the lens of CHT. Given that CHAT has already been introduced above, I will simply limit myself to underscoring the parallels with the concept of rupture. One of the main advantages of the CHAT framework is that it is ideal for examining tensions. More specifically, the comprehensive mapping of human activity (see triangles) enables the study of inconsistencies, friction, and generally speaking any forms of conflict. As CHAT is based on Marxist theory, the idea of tensions stems from the fundamental concept of contraction (Engeström, 2014). Tensions can be manifested in many guises such as difficulties, troubles, problems, frictions, disturbance, conflict, and – generally – as any negative reactions associated with any of the components of an activity system or their interrelations. Two types of tensions are typically identified within CHAT: on the one hand, tensions that take place between the components of activity systems, such as tensions between mediational tools and rules, and on the other hand, tensions can also emerge within the components of activity systems, for instance tensions within the object of activity (such as object duality) (Engeström, 1999, 2014). As a rule, tensions result in unstable activity systems, which in turn suggests that difficulties arise in the collectively pursued object of activity. The instability caused by tensions might lead to smoothing out and adaptations, eventually causing the reconfiguration of activity systems (Engeström, 2014; Engeström & Sannino, 2010). In my view, the idea of tension or contradiction is fully aligned with the concept of rupture as described by Deleuze and Guattari. Tensions can be seen as fully analogous to the ruptures that occur in the process of expansion. Tensions also characterize activity systems especially in the process of expansion, when interfacing with other activity systems, or in the case of innovations. Much like Deleuze and Guattari note that rhizomes recover after ruptures upon reaching an obstacle, activity systems are also reconfigured when tensions are resolved. In such cases the contradictions are smoothed out and are either eventually absorbed or remain latent and subdued. In terms of the rhizomatic framework, innovations or changes could be seen as corresponding to lines of flight, tensions as amounting to deterritorialization while the resolution of tensions could be seen as instances of reterritorialization.

Cartography The principle of decalcomania could be read as the equivalent to the notion of artefacts, material and conceptual. As discussed above, both CHT and Distributed Cognition emphasize the importance of artefacts for cognitive development. Artefacts are mediational means that encapsulate knowledge, modes of thinking,

Rhizomatic learning 55 algorithms, rules, and conventions of various types (Pea, 1993). Artefacts, be it conceptual or material, function as cognitive tools and embody cognition as they share some of the cognitive labour involved in task execution (Hutchins, 2010). Material and conceptual artefacts reify knowledge and crystallize former forms of thinking and actions. In rhizomatic terminology, Deleuze and Guattari seem to make the same argument when illustrating how artefacts ossify knowledge. Decalcomania I take the principle of cartography to refer to the need to move beyond the artefact (as a tracing) and consider the processes of artefact creation and use. This would correspond to the actual situated practices (Lave, 1988; Rogoff & Lave, 1984) and denote the map. A cartographic approach to artefacts would reveal the drives behind their introduction, shed light on the forces that led to their development, foreground the practices in which artefact creation took place, consider the processes through which artefacts were crystallized, and study the associated decision-making that resulted to the conventions that were related in the artefacts. From a CHT perspective, Vygotsky’s original ideas about the development of higher psychological process as much as sociocultural psychology, CHAT, Situated Cognition, and Distributed Cognition constitute frameworks that provide such situational maps. What these frameworks appear to have in common is an emphasis on the processes of artefact creation (e.g. creation of signs, material and conceptual artefacts) and use on various levels.

Rhizome-inspired scholarship In this section I will briefly examine studies that employ the rhizomatic ideas in the field of education where rhizomatic conceptions of learning appear to be gaining popularity. A bibliographic search in Google Scholar using the terms “rhizomatic learning” and “rhizomatic education” returned thousands of entries pertaining to rhizomes. What this picture clearly indicates is an increased interest in the rhizomatic philosophy. Interestingly enough, the bibliographic search in this area showed that some publications have received a large number of citations – for instance Cormier’s (2008) paper “Rhizomatic education: Community as curriculum” has more than 500 cites. Based on my reading of these studies, I have four points to make. First, the rhizomatic ideas appear to have been adopted to varying degrees in several areas of education like higher education (Brailas, 2020; Grellier, 2013), MOOCs (Mackness et al., 2016), video gaming (Sanford et al., 2011), science learning (Murakami & Siegel, 2018), sustainability (Le Grange, 2011), curriculum design (Chan, 2010), and teaching practices (Hordvik et al., 2019, 2020; Scanlon et al., 2022; Sherman & Teemant, 2021; Strom, 2015). This picture suggests that the rhizomatic framework has a wide range of applications in various educational subfields. Second, some of the principles and concepts of Rhizomes appear to have attracted more attention than others, e.g. rhizome (Grellier, 2013; Harris, 2016;

56  Ilias Karasavvidis Murakami & Siegel, 2018), assemblage (de Freitas, 2012; Hordvik et al., 2019, 2020; Scanlon et al., 2022; Strom, 2015), lines of flight (Chan, 2011; Strom & Martin, 2015), and rupture (Ko & Bal, 2019). This pattern of use indicates that certain rhizomatic constructs are more directly usable for educational purposes. Third, in some cases, the application could be viewed as highly productive, yielding substantial insights (e.g. de Freitas, 2012; Hordvik et al., 2019, 2020; Murakami & Siegel, 2018; Sanford et al., 2011; Strom, 2016). However, in other cases, I would tend to view the application as rather tangential (e.g. Bozkurt & Keefer, 2018). Last, the analyses provided by the authors in rhizomatic studies are genuinely interesting and insightful, reflecting a fresh take on the problems under investigation. For example, compared to traditional approaches to classroom learning, the concept of assemblage as a configuration of teachers, students, resources, physical spaces, and discourses (e.g. de Freitas, 2012; Hordvik et al., 2019) provides a new lens for looking at classroom learning. I have singled out a few publications that are particularly interesting in terms of how they apply RL in educational contexts. There are two major issues that I would like to discuss regarding the rhizomatic applications to the field of education. First, some of the arguments made are indicative of extreme relativism. For instance, Cormier (2008) finds the traditional, expert-based model of knowledge problematic and proposes to foreground community and social learning instead. According to this proposal, the community should replace the curriculum in the sense that the people should negotiate and rework what is useful to them. In the rhizomatic model of learning Cormier describes, the curriculum is not defined by experts: “the rhizomatic model dispenses the need for external validation of knowledge” (p. 4). The bottom-line of this argument is that “the community acts as the curriculum” (p. 3). In my view such postmodern assertions questioning knowledge and expertise might be understandable in certain settings such as self-organized CoP (Wenger, 1999; Wenger et al., 2002). However, I would seriously question their application elsewhere, where participants need to master a certain body of knowledge, develop specific skills, and familiarize with well-defined procedures and practices. When the mastery of disciplinary knowledge and practices is at stake, a rhizomatic approach looks highly questionable. Incidentally, Drummond (2005) pointed out that the term “discipline” itself is indicative of arboreal thinking. Hence, rhizomatic approaches might just not be compatible with the study of learning in scientific disciplines, which is dominant in both K-12 and higher education and characterizes formal learning settings. Second, rhizomatic scholarship has addressed research questions that are also examined by CHT. More specifically, the research focus of some studies is on tensions, friction, and contradictions, which are also typically studied by researchers in the CHAT tradition. For instance, the auto-ethnographic account of learning in higher education by Grellier (2013) has many parallels with CHAT. Focusing on the university physical facilities, her description reveals the misalignments and frictions of the various agents involved (students and tutors) on a number

Rhizomatic learning 57 of levels. Mackness et al. (2016) also discuss the tensions that emerged in the context of a MOOC that aimed to introduce RL. The frictions one undergraduate student experienced in a sustainable agriculture course in his interactions with the course content, the course instructor, and the researcher are explored in Murakami and Siegel (2018). Hordvik et al. (2019, 2020) used a rhizomatic approach to examine preservice teachers’ school placement experiences. Similarly, in their studies of teacher and teaching experiences, Strom and Martin (2015) as well as Storm (2015) talk explicitly about tensions and conflict that arise due to the mismatch between constructivist-based preservice training and dominant teaching practices. Undoubtedly, all the aforementioned studies tackle the respective research questions in a holistic manner, making novel and astute contributions. Yet, having conducted similar studies of innovation myself using CHAT as a theoretical framework (Karasavvidis, 2009; Karasavvidis & Kollias, 2017), I find it tempting to note that CHAT could have been an equally valid – if not richer – framework for addressing the same research questions, yielding potentially different but equally profound insights. It should also be noted that Ko and Bal (2019) proposed to combine the rhizomatic and CHAT frameworks, a suggestion that I find very appealing. For instance, it would be intriguing to see whether the potentially different insights that can be gained from CHAT and rhizomatic approaches could lead to convergent perspectives. Final thoughts/appraisal In this section I will provide an outline of what I perceive to be the pros and cons of a rhizomatic conceptualization of learning vis-à-vis CHT. Potential/strengths The concept of the rhizome privileges a systemic view of a social setting, as a network of interconnected nodes that involve both humans and nonhumans. It represents the exact opposite of structure and arborescent thinking. It emphasizes interaction, non-linear and non-hierarchical connections between the nodes, fluid and creative exchange of information between any two nodes, a tendency to expand and form new connections in non-predefined manner, and the potential to overcome ruptures through ceaseless expansion in all directions. On the one hand, the rhizome is very appealing for conceptualizing learning in informal settings, such as learning communities and CoP. In my view, it is particularly promising for studying all sorts of interactions and loosely structured pursuits, especially in the context of open-ended tasks. In such settings the pursuits are not characterized by a single, well-defined, one-dimensional solution or outcome. Thus, I can see the rhizomatic framework as providing a comprehensive set of principles for conceptualizing learning in loosely structured settings.

58  Ilias Karasavvidis Let us take my elder 14-year-old son as an example. John has been an avid Minecraft player for about three years. Though he had been interested in the game before the COVID-19 pandemic, the consecutive lockdowns did nothing but help foster a complete addiction to the game. John has developed his expertise by devoting hundreds of hours on playing the game. In addition to game playing, he has also spent countless hours with his buddies on various collective pursuits involving planning, experimentation, and reflection. Playing Minecraft started out as a solo activity but was quickly transformed into a social, multidimensional one. He has been seeking and establishing connections with other like-minded players and all sorts of resources, from game manuals to YouTube videos featuring gameplay. He has established a rich assemblage of players and resources, moving fluidly between the nodes, returning to the same nodes time and again, constantly framing and reframing his current state of knowledge and skills, negotiating and renegotiating meanings, creating partnerships and funds of knowledge, drawing on others to develop his own expertise but also openly sharing his own expertise, refining his knowledge and honing his skills, establishing and redefining his identity as a devoted and accomplished Minecraft player. The rhizomatic framework could provide a unique perspective on analysing how John navigates the complex real and virtual environments and networks that define his Minecraft gaming practices. It is important to note that in such environments there is no given agenda of what is there to do or learn: John can make all such decisions pertaining to what, how, and when. Also, in such settings the full initiative lies with the individuals: John can decide which goals to set and how to pursue them. Moreover, there is no predetermined path of action: John can undertake whatever pleases or intrigues him in the order that he sees fit. With the exception of a loose etiquette, these environments are hardly characterized by any constraints. Essentially, John reaches out and connects with the game community and resources, forming an ever-expanding, multi-dimensional and multi-layer rhizome. From my perspective, when such settings and practices are in focus, rhizomatic conceptions could provide unique insights in terms of agency, connections, becoming, intermezzo, assemblage, territorialization, and deterritorialization. This argument can extend to the myriads of real, virtual, or hybrid communities that are self-organized and self-serving. On the other hand, I think that the rhizomatic framework is ideal for studying power relations. In fields where the focus is on challenging power and authority in all their forms and manifestations, the rhizomatic framework may constitute a powerful conceptual alternative (e.g. Ko & Bal, 2019). Interestingly, unlike the study of learning, the rhizomatic framework could be employed for the study of power and authority in all settings, both formal and informal ones. Limitations/weaknesses Granted that the rhizomatic framework is a philosophical one, it would be unfair to judge it as deficient for educational purposes such as for studying development and designing learning.

Rhizomatic learning 59 In my opinion, the framework cannot directly provide a set of guidelines for designing learning or organizing instruction in formal settings. The closest design example I encountered in the literature was a Community Massive Open Online Course (cMOOC) that aimed to introduce RL itself, Rhizo14 (Mackness et al., 2016) and Rhizo15 (Harris, 2016). These two courses adopted Cormier’s (2008) approach to rhizomatic education. The findings indicate many contradictions that surfaced throughout the course in terms of objectives, definitions, and learning trajectories. For instance, Mackness et al. (2016) discuss how the lack of specific course objectives was highly problematic for some of the participants in Rhizo14. Harris (2016) also details several challenges and limitations that characterized Rhizo15 (e.g. learning paradox). In my view, the rhizomatic framework is also non-optimal as a conceptual tool for studying learning in formal educational settings. In such settings that are heavily structured and highly organized, there is a given curriculum, representing the body of knowledge that learners need to master. Typically, human knowledge is organized in disciplines within which it is further structured in branches, which are then divided into topics, which in turn comprise concepts. For instance, the first ten chapters of the most outstanding introductory Physics text of the 20th century (Halliday et al., 2013) include the following topics: measurement, motion along a straight line, vectors, motion in two and three dimensions, force and motion (I and II), kinetic energy and work, potential energy and conservation of energy, centre of mass and linear momentum, and rotation. Each topic is further structured around a set of key concepts that are combined in specific ways to provide definitions, illustrations, examples, and sample problems with worked-out solutions. As a rule, human knowledge is encoded in books that are used as learning materials. The teachers’ primary role is to facilitate learners’ acquisition of this body of knowledge. Lastly, testing and exams are heavily employed to sanction learner performance, leading to grades and certifications. As a rule, institutionalized forms of schooling are characterized by prescribed curricula, mandated tests, and a host of established conventions and procedures. Essentially, such organizations are the embodiment of what Deleuze and Guattari call arboreal structures. Considering that – by definition – all disciplinary knowledge reflects an arborescent organization, one of the greatest challenges that I can see is how to reconcile the disciplinary knowledge perspective with the rhizomatic one. In light of this, I think that rhizomatic notions might not be directly applicable to settings where there is any form of standardization (i.e. curriculum) and accreditation (exams and certifications) involved. Needless to say that a notable exception to this would be cases where the actual interest is in breaking the canon, i.e. subvert this standardization itself. Another important limitation of the rhizomatic framework is that it lacks is a rich conceptual vocabulary for describing the complex issues specifically related to development and, subsequently, learning. My interpretation is that there is a lack of focus on constructs such as consciousness, signs and signification, language, and thought processes. In particular, I find it hard to picture how the rhizomatic

60  Ilias Karasavvidis thinking can inform the study of learning on a microgenetic level. For instance, take a Mathematics class in which students are taught how to solve quadratic equations or a Physics class where the instruction focuses on how to compute the instantaneous velocity of an object. I truly wonder what a microgenetic study of learning in either class would involve in rhizomatic terms. To the best of my knowledge, the studies that are published in the literature do not commonly tackle learning on a microgenetic level. Neither do they examine issues of development and learning. By comparison, CHT provides a very elaborate and comprehensive framework for identifying and describing learning and teaching on the microgenetic level but also on other broader levels. Therefore, CHT offers a more detailed set of concepts, namely vocabulary and language, to account for learning. Unlike the rhizomatic theory, however, CHT and offspring were specifically meant to provide theoretical models of development and learning. Finally, I need to stress that I am not implying that it is impossible to employ Deleuze and Guattari’s ideas to approach issues of development and their application to learning and instruction. What I am saying, however, is that educational researchers will need to draw on the original rhizomatic framework off of which to derive other constructs that are potentially more applicable to learning issues. In my view, this is a prerequisite to refining and developing the rhizomatic framework so as to render it more applicable to educational settings where development and learning take centre stage.

Conclusion We’re tired of trees. We should stop believing in trees, roots, and radicles. They’ve made us suffer too much. All of arborescent culture is founded on them, from biology to linguistics. Nothing is beautiful or loving or political aside from underground stems and aerial roots, adventitious growths and rhizomes. (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p. 15) As this quote indicates, Deleuze and Guattari objected to the centrality of the concept of the tree as a foundation of knowledge. The rhizomatic framework they put forward aimed to critique traditional philosophy and provide a post-structural alternative. In this work I have reviewed the main principles of rhizomes, traced parallels with CHT, considered studies that apply the rhizomatic ideas to the field of education, and outlined what I perceive to be as the pros and cons of the rhizomatic framework. I will conclude this critical appraisal of rhizomatic thinking by addressing two main questions. Does the rhizomatic framework provide a new, ground-breaking, generalpurpose conceptual tool that can enable us reconceptualize formal education so as to improve it? In my view, it does not for two main reasons. First, I find it difficult to see how rhizomatic constructs could be used for a microgenetic analysis of learning in formal settings. Second, the rhizomatic framework does not suffice for theorizing development and the subsequent processes of learning and

Rhizomatic learning 61 instruction. Therefore, the framework is very lacking in these two respects. The fact is that CHT and offspring constitute a more fined-grained approach for studying development and learning. Does the rhizomatic framework provide us with a conceptual tool that could be used to conceptualize education in specific settings? In my view it does. There is a niche in which the rhizomatic framework can offer new insights and unique ways of understanding human practices. The rhizomatic metaphor is more suitable for certain types of settings, in which the focus is more on power and authority, marginalized and voiceless individuals. I think that the rhizomatic ideas are better suited for examining flat structures, namely systems and settings that are characterized by a non-linear and non-hierarchical organization. Through the juxtaposition of the two frameworks, rhizomatic thinking and CHT, I have attempted to open a dialogue between the two perspectives. On the one hand, I have demonstrated that the six core rhizomatic principles have some striking parallels with CHT. On the other hand, no compatibility between the two frameworks should be assumed as the philosophical foundations are entirely different: CHT is based on dialectics while rhizomatic thinking on post-structuralism. Thus, regardless of any similarities, I would consider the two frameworks as incommensurable (Kuhn, 1970). Overall, considering the promising examples of rhizomatic scholarship (e.g. de Freitas, 2012; Hordvik et al., 2019, 2020; Murakami & Siegel, 2018; Strom, 2016), Ι will be really looking forward to see how future studies might capture learning in rhizomatic terms.

Acknowledgements I am truly indebted to Manolis Dafermos and Alex Brailas for their critical reading of the manuscript and their helpful suggestions and comments. I would also like to thank Professor Myint Swe Khine for the invitation to contribute to this volume and also for his generous support.

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64  Ilias Karasavvidis Scanlon, D., MacPhail, A., & Calderón, A. (2022). A rhizomatic exploration of a professional development non-linear approach to learning and teaching: Two teachers’ learning journeys in ‘becoming different’. Teaching and Teacher Education, 115, 103730. Sherman, B., & Teemant, A. (2021). Unravelling effective professional development: A rhizomatic inquiry into coaching and the active ingredients of teacher learning. Professional Development in Education, 47(2–3), 363–376. https://doi.org/ 10.1080/19415257.2020.1825511 Somers-Hall, H., Bell, J. A., & Williams, J. (Eds.) (2018). A thousand plateaus and philosophy. Edinburgh University Press. Strom, K. (2015). Teaching-assemblages: Negotiating learning and practice in the first year of teaching. Journal of Teacher Education, 66(4), 321–333. https://doi. org/10.1177/0022487115589990 Strom, K., & Martin, A. D. (2015). Pursuing lines of flight: Enacting equity-based preservice teacher learning in first-year teaching. Policy Futures in Education, 14(2), 252–273. Suchman, L. A. (1987). Plans and situated actions: The problem of human-machine communication. Cambridge University Press. Valsiner, J., & Rosa, A. (Eds.). (2018). The Cambridge handbook of sociocultural psychology (2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press. Van der Veer, R. (2014). Lev Vygotsky. Bloomsbury Publishing. Van der Veer, R., & Valsiner, J. (1991). Understanding Vygotsky: A quest for synthesis. Blackwell. Veresov, N. (1999). Undiscovered Vygotsky: Etudes on the pre-history of culturalhistorical psychology. Lang. Vygotsky, L. S. (1960/1981a). The instrumental method in psychology. In J. V. Wertsch (Ed. & Trans.), The concept of activity in Soviet psychology (pp. 134–143). M.E. Sharpe. Vygotsky, L. S. (1960/1981b). The genesis of higher mental functions. In J. V. Wertsch (Ed. & Trans.), The concept of activity in Soviet psychology (pp. 144–188). M.E. Sharpe. Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes. In M. Cole, V. John-Steiner, S. Scribner & E. Souberman (Eds. & Trans.). Harvard University Press. Vygotsky, L. S. (1987). The collected works of L.S. Vygotsky (Vol. 1). In R.S. Reefer, & A.S. Carton (Eds.); N. Manic (Trans.), Problems of general psychology. Plenum Press. Wenger, E. (1999). Communities of practice: Learning, meaning, and identity. Cambridge University Press. Wenger, E. (2010). Communities of practice and social learning systems: The career of a concept. In C. Blackmore (Ed.), Social learning systems and communities of practice (pp. 179–198). Springer. Wenger, E., McDermott, R., & Snyder, W. M. (2002). Cultivating communities of practice: A guide to managing knowledge. Harvard Business School Press. Wenger, E., & Snyder, W. M. (2000). Communities of practice: The organizational frontier. Harvard Business Review, 78(1), 139–145. Wertsch, J. V. (1991). Voices of the mind. A sociocultural approach to mediated action. Harverster-Wheatsheaf. Wertsch, J. V. (1998). Mind as action. Oxford University Press. Wertsch, J. V. (2002). Voices of collective remembering. Cambridge University Press.

5

Rhizome learning A catalyst for a new social contract Ebba Ossiannilsson

Introduction In the face of global challenges, such as globalization, demographic change, increasing technological development, and digital transformation, agility, resilience, and flexibility will characterize the so-called “next normal.” Global futurists, such as The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the World Bank, the World Economic Forum, the Global Education Innovation Institute, and hundrED, have predicted that in the future, fundamental systemic changes will occur in education and learning, and a new social contract for education will emerge. Lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic have confirmed worldwide that learning is much more than content delivery. Learning happens everywhere, at all times, in all places, and in all forms, through a variety of media in the currently universally networked world (Bozkurt et al., 2020). Learning has also taken new directions, dimensions, and values, in addition to greater equity, accessibility, inclusion, socialization, collaboration, well-being, and diversity in a variety of contexts. Deleuze and Guattari’s (1987) concept of rhizomatic learning is therefore one of the most appropriate approaches to learning in a future that will be based on a new social contract in which constant change is considered the norm. Both concepts, rhizomatic learning and seamless learning, assume that learning flows in continuous, dynamic processes that make connections, use multiple pathways, and neither begin nor end. Furthermore, learning is culturally and socially contextualized, integrated, relevant, curated, and without boundaries. This conceptual chapter presents a theoretical approach to implementing a better, more equitable life for all. Following this brief introduction, the research questions are presented, and the methodology is described. The theoretical approach in this conceptual chapter is then discussed. A discussion follows, and a conclusion and recommendation are presented.

DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378-7

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Research questions This theoretical conceptual chapter focuses on rhizome learning as the catalyst for a new social contract. The following research questions (RQ) were formulated: RQ1: What fundamental systemic changes will occur in a new social contract regarding the future of education and learning? RQ2: How can rhizome learning be a catalyst for a new social contract?

Methodology This theoretical conceptual chapter is based on a qualitative research methodology similar to interpretivism and descriptivism (Creswell & Creswell, 2018; Miles & Huberman, 1994). This chapter aims to provide an overview of the current discourse on an emerging new social contract for education. It uses the principles of empiricism and provides a primarily inductive argument. This research approach was chosen because the research field is subject to not only constant change but also rapid change. Therefore, it was deemed not useful to consider various descriptors as fixed and stable measurable values that could be measured objectively over time. Instead, the meanings of these descriptors change over time. This chapter includes a systematic review of the literature, including official reports from major international organizations in the field. The review was conducted systematically to examine the processes of information gathering, assessment, and data analysis in previous studies in the literature. The author selected examples from ongoing international discourse on the challenges and future of education, drawing primarily on official international sources. The report is based on the author’s previous and current research and experience as well as perspectives gained over 20 years.

Theoretical approach The theoretical approach used in this chapter includes a systematic review of the literature, including official reports from major international organizations in the field. Examples of the ongoing international discourse on the challenges and future of education were selected from official international sources, which are analyzed and summarized below. The main sources were UNESCO’s initiatives, The “Futures” of Education and Learning, Learning to Become, and the subsequent report, “Reimagining Our Futures Together: A New Social Contract for Education.” In addition, Deleuze and Guattari’s (1987) concept of rhizomatic learning and seamless learning provided a useful framework because both were considered catalysts in “Reimagining Our Futures Together: A New Social Contract for Education.” The lessons learned from the global pandemic outbreak of COVID-19 in 2022 include the recognition that well-being is critical not only to education and learning but also to quality.

Rhizome learning

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UNESCO and the new social contract The UNESCO initiative (UNESCO, 2019) on the “futures” of education, which resulted in the report, “Reimagining our Futures Together: A New Social Contract for Education,” looked ahead to 2050 and asked the following questions about education: (i) What should we keep? (ii) What should we abandon? (iii) What needs to be creatively reinvented? In their global report on the future of education, “A New Social Contract for Education” (UNESCO, 2022), they proposed answers to these three essential questions. More than one million people participated in the global consultation process, which led to their long-awaited flagship publication, calling for the comprehensive transformation of education to address past injustices and improve our capacity to act together to ensure a more sustainable and equitable future. The report was the result of two years of work by an international commission aimed at sparking a global debate and movement to promote a new social contract for education. In their report on global consultation, UNESCO (2022) argued that our world is at a turning point. It is already well known that knowledge and learning are the foundations of renewal and change. However, because of global inequalities and the urgent need to rethink why, how, what, where, and when we learn, education has not yet delivered its promise to help us build a peaceful, just, and sustainable future. In our pursuit of growth and development, we have overexploited our natural environment and threatened our own existence. Today, high standards of living are in stark contrast to widening inequalities. An increasing number of people are getting involved in public life, but the fabric of civil society and democracy is fraying in many places around the world. Rapid technological change has transformed many aspects of our lives. However, these innovations have not been sufficiently focused on equity, inclusion, and democratic participation. Therefore, it is necessary to rethink education. Furthermore, UNESCO (2022) has argued that education can be considered in terms of a social contract, that is, an implicit agreement among members of a society to work together for a common benefit. A social contract is more than a transaction, as it reflects norms, obligations, and principles that are both formally legislated and culturally embedded. The starting point is a shared vision of the purpose of public education. In the 20th century, public education was focused on supporting national citizenship and development efforts through compulsory education for children and youth. Today, however, because the future of humanity and our planet are at serious risk, we urgently need to reinvent education to address these common challenges. A new social contract for education must unite us in a collective effort to provide the knowledge and innovation necessary to shape a sustainable and peaceful future for all based on social, economic, and environmental justice. The new social contract must build on the general principles of human rights – inclusion, equality, cooperation, solidarity, collective responsibility, and interconnectedness – and be guided by the following two basic principles: •

Ensure the right to quality education throughout human lives. It must also include the right to information, culture, and science, as well as the right to

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access and contribute to knowledge communities and collective knowledge resources of humanity that have accumulated over generations and are constantly changing. Strengthen education as a public common. As a shared social endeavor, education creates a common purpose and enables individuals and communities to flourish together. The new social contract for education must not only ensure public funding for education but also include a society-wide commitment to engage all people in public discussions about education.

These foundational principles build on what humanity has achieved through education thus far. They will ensure that as we move towards 2050 and beyond, education will empower future generations to reimagine their future and renew their world. UNESCO (2022) has argued that it is time to move away from the imposition of universal models and redesign schools, including their architecture, spaces, times, schedules, and the division of students into different groups. At all times and spaces of learning, we must move away from the notion that education occurs primarily in schools and at a particular age. Instead, we must welcome and expand educational opportunities everywhere and for everyone. UNESCO has emphasized that we face a serious choice: either continue on the present unsustainable path or radically change direction. Forging a new social contract for education is a critical step towards reshaping our future together. Rhizome theory The rhizome theory developed by Deleuze and Guattari (1987) offers new insights into the phenomenon of learning. A rhizome is a term used in poststructuralism to describe the philosophical concept that in a nonlinear network, every point is connected to every other point. Deleuze and Guattari used the term in their book A Thousand Plateaus (1987), the original title of which is Mille Plateaux, to refer to networks that establish “connections between semiotic chains, organizations of power, and circumstances relating to the arts, sciences, and social struggles” without apparent order or coherence. Deleuze referred to it as an extension of his concept of an “image of thought,” which he had previously discussed in Difference and Repetition (Deleuze, 1968). The concept has been described as a mental picture based on the botanical rhizome, which consists of multiplicities (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987). The concept also refers to theory and research that allow for multiple nonhierarchical entry and exit points in the representation and interpretation of data. The concept was derived from the biological rhizome, which refers to the root systems of certain plants. These plants are usually difficult to eradicate because the root system persists even when the plant is removed. The system can grow in different directions, whereas an ordinary tree root branches out at the ends and returns everything to the stem root. Deleuze and Guattari 1987) used the term figuratively to refer to organizational patterns of people, ideas, and books.

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The rhizome represents a nonhierarchical structure of concepts, spreading in all directions and inviting a variety of uses, re-functions, and inoculations. The terms rhizome and rhizomatic have been used to describe both a theory and research that allow for multiple nonhierarchical entry and exit points in the representation and interpretation of data. Deleuze and Guattari (1987) contrasted these terms to a tree-like conception of knowledge that operates in dualistic categories and binary choices. A rhizome operates in horizontal and cross-species connections, while a tree-like model operates in vertical and linear connections. As a model of cultural development, the rhizome resists the organizational structure of the tree root system, which maps causality along chronological lines and seeks the origins of things, focusing on their culmination or completion. In contrast, a rhizome ceaselessly makes connections between semiotic chains, organizations of power, and circumstances in relation to the arts, sciences, and societies. A rhizome has no beginning and no end; it is always in the middle, between, and in between. In this model, culture spreads like the surface of a body of water towards available spaces, or it seeps through cracks and crevices into new spaces, undermining what stands in its way. Deleuze and Guattari (1987) outlined the concept as being based on principles of connection and heterogeneity, which means that any point on a rhizome can be connected to any other point. The metaphor illustrates that connections seek their own lines, and starting points are in the middle and seek the periphery, similar to the theories of connectivism and collaboration and the concept of serendipity (Ossiannilsson, 2012). There is not a universal view but a network of partial perspectives and a multiplicity of dimensions. There is no privileged access point, and the network is always open to change. Therefore, rhizome theory is a useful framework for understanding self-directed learning. Cormier (2008) pointed out that the pace of technological change has challenged historical notions of what counts as knowledge. He described an alternative to the traditional notion of knowledge. Instead of the expert-centered pedagogical cycle of planning and publishing, Cormier proposed a rhizomatic model of learning. In the rhizomatic model, knowledge is negotiated, and learning is both a social and a personal knowledge-building process with changing goals and constantly negotiated premises. The rhizome metaphor, which represents a critical leap in coming to terms with the loss of a canon with which knowledge can be compared, judged, and evaluated, offers a model that is particularly well suited to disciplines in transition and where the canon is fluid, and knowledge is a moving target. In addition, Cormier is a strong proponent of a curriculum that encompasses rhizomatic education and community. Rhizomatic learning includes a variety of pedagogical practices based on the work of Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari (Cormier, 2008; Ossiannilsson, 2012). Originally explored as the application of poststructural thinking to education, it has recently been identified as a methodology for network-based education. The antithesis to formal, structured learning in traditional education, the self-directed learning path, has quickly become familiar to learners in the digital age (Giger, 2010; Ossiannilsson, 2012) and therefore applies to e-learning,

70  Ebba Ossiannilsson online learning, and net-based learning as well. The openness of learning, extended learning environments, and expanded learning spaces is unpredictable, so rhizome-like learning must be considered to pave the way to the future. Ossiannilsson (2012) argued that rhizome theory was introduced in the context of benchmarking e-learning in higher education. Although this theory was not developed in the context of e-learning and open learning, it is still relevant in these contexts. According to Ossiannilsson, the theory, which applies to open education, connectivity, and cultural diversity, provides new insights and offers other dimensions for understanding the online phenomenon. In addition, she argued that the concept has implications for learning, because power has shifted to the individual learner rather than to the organization or faculty. Based on this understanding, the role of learners is clarified, and the emphasis shifts from content to users. Ossiannilsson (2012) further argued that rhizome theory is relevant for understanding quality processes in education, as educational scenarios have changed under the new paradigm of learning and openness. The rhizome concept also offers a new way of understanding an emerging paradigm of quality because it accounts for continuous change in a broad, extended environment (Ossiannilsson, 2012). Rhizome theory includes the concepts of assemblage and becoming, which are related to the theory of connectivism (Siemens, 2004), which emphasizes open, boundaryless education and learning (Jaldemark, 2010; Ossiannilsson, 2012). As mentioned earlier, the UNESCO initiative on the future of education and the subsequent new social contract (UNESCO, 2019, 2022) advocate for the concept of learning to become; that is, learners can become what they want to become, according to their potential, abilities, and motivations. Accordingly, Ossiannilsson (2012) argued that the work of Deleuze and Guattari (1987) has led to a new understanding of the phenomenon of quality in open online learning. Rhizome theory is also relevant to connectivity and the cultivation of cultures. This theory has become a starting point for a contemporary understanding of digital identity that is consistent with cartographic or map-like metaphors (Giger, 2010; Grellier, 2013; Ossiannilsson, 2012, 2018, 2021a, 2021b). Serendipity The concept of serendipity is related to rhizome theory (Ossiannilsson, 2012). Serendipity has been defined as the occurrence and development of events by chance in a fortunate or advantageous manner (Oxford Dictionaries, 2018). Serendipity refers to the phenomenon of unexpectedly encountering valuable or pleasurable things, such as by pure chance rather than careful research, which turns out to be a valuable finding. Serendipity is an unplanned serendipitous discovery (Oxford Dictionaries, 2018). Serendipity is common in the history of product invention and scientific discovery (Vuong, Quan-Hoang, 2022). Serendipity is also considered a possible principle of design for online activities that present a wide range of information and viewpoints rather than just confirming a user’s opinion.

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The desire to explore, satisfy curiosity, and make connections in digital networks has led to an epistemology based on a process of serendipity (Ossiannilsson, 2012, cited in Giger, 2010), in which unexpected findings lead to new connections and new insights that are often never ending. However, the concept has nothing to do with chance or coincidence. Serendipity has to do with paying attention and wholeness, not reductionism. According to Giger (2010), the concept can be considered a link between digital and nondigital lives. Following the discussion of connectivism (Siemens, 2004, it is necessary to consider the transition from analog learning to digital learning, in which education is somewhere in between. This transition involves new aspects of people’s daily lives. For example, fundamental values, assessments, and principles have serious implications for the increasing power of individuals, which also affects society. The ability to influence and be influenced in a global arena radically changes former ways of looking at knowledge (Ossiannilsson, 2012). Seamless learning Another concept related to the rhizome paradigm is seamless learning, which means bridging private and public learning spaces where learning occurs through both individual and collective efforts over time and in different contexts (e.g., inside and outside school, formal and informal environments, physical and virtual reality or cyberspace). Hambrock et al. (2020, n.p.) defined seamless learning as follows: “[S]seamless learning is when a person experiences a continuity of learning and intentionally bridges multiple learning efforts across a combination of places, times, technologies, or social environments.” The promise of this “continuity” lies in potential learning gains, such as increased retention, transfer, support for acquiring (complex) skills, increased academic performance and motivation, awareness, and change in perception(s), increased sense of self-efficacy, and potential organizational gains (e.g., increased efficiency and time spent learning). Hambrock et al. (2023) proposed the seamless learning experience design framework (SLED). Five main concepts were identified as part of the SLED framework, each of which included detailed themes. The concept of seamless learning includes pedagogical approaches that are considered part of a seamless learning experience (Wong et al., 2015). Wong et al. (2015) defined ten dimensions of mobile seamless learning (MSL): (1) both informal and formal instruction; (2) social and individual instruction; (3) cross-location; (4) cross-time; (5) access to knowledge/ resources anywhere; (6) both digital and physical worlds; (7) combined use of different types of devices; (8) switching between different tasks; (9) knowledge synthesis; and (10) diverse models of pedagogical activities. According to Yetik et al. (2020), seamless learning is a form of learning in which the learning process can continue regardless of location using technology,

72  Ebba Ossiannilsson depending on learning needs and readiness. Seamless learning environments are spaces that can be accessed via mobile or stationary devices, regardless of time or location, and they are equipped with technology to meet learning needs. As technology advances, seamless learning environments have become increasingly popular. In this context, the design of environments suitable for seamless open and distance learning (ODL) is critical. Ossiannilsson (2021a, 2021b) argued that seamless learning is a relatively new approach to implementing learning and provides a seamless transition between different learning tasks. It is a form of mobile learning that focuses on eliminating seams (i.e., gaps) within and between contexts, places, devices, systems, learning tasks, learning environments, and so on. The seamless integration of learning experiences can occur across multiple dimensions, including formal and informal learning contexts, individuals and societies, and the physical world and cyberspace. Moreover, seamless learning is a continuum of learning across multiple contexts through networked personal computing devices. It integrates learning experiences across multiple dimensions, including formal and informal learning, individual and social contexts, and the physical world and cyberspace. Seamless learning allows individuals to continue learning outside the physical classroom. Seamless learning is embedded in both opening up education and open education. It is ubiquitous, taking place in a variety of spaces, times, modes, paths, and ways. Inamorato dos Santos et al. (2016, p. 11) defined open education as follows: [It is] a way of carrying out education, often using digital technologies. Its aim is to widen access and participation to everyone by removing barriers and making learning accessible, abundant, and customizable for all. It offers multiple ways of teaching and learning, building, and sharing knowledge. It also provides a variety of access routes to formal and nonformal education and connects the two. Ossiannilsson (2021a, 2021b) argued that expanding access to higher education is high on the global agenda, not only in education but also in employment opportunities, entrepreneurship, and innovation in the labor market. Open education for all learners is crucial to maximizing the impact of education on society and ensuring its success and sustainability. Opening up education requires a shift in thinking that prioritizes flexible growth instead of rigid traditions. Improving the quality of open education requires a systems-based approach that includes the integration of digitization and technology in both management and leadership. An open pedagogical approach, or a self-directed approach, is also critical to promoting openness in both education and culture. The new normal The global COVID-19 pandemic has served to expose inequalities in the way we live, learn, and work. Worldwide, many people are still isolated and feel excluded for many reasons. To move forward, there is a need to recognize and promote

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equity, diversity, and inclusion through understanding and actions (Stracke et al., 2022a, 2022b), and that they are valued inside and outside educational institutions and their workplaces. Collaboration, glocalization (i.e., think globally but act locally), and personalization, as well as well-being, have become dimensions of quality-related matters in the post-pandemic era. Furthermore, it is crucial to prioritize the perspectives of people in an even process instead of products and systems. However, regarding the fourth industrial revolution, Schwab (2017) argued that we are on the cusp of a technological revolution that will fundamentally change the way we live, work, perform, collaborate, communicate, and interact with each other. It will certainly also change the ways in which we learn. In its scale, scope, and complexity, this upheaval will surpass anything humanity has experienced previously. It is not yet known how this radical shift will unfold, but one thing is clear: the response to it must be integrated and comprehensive, involving all actors in the global community, from the public and private sectors to academia and civil society. The fourth industrial revolution was built on the third (i.e., digital) revolution, which has been underway since the middle of the last century. It is characterized by a fusion of technologies that blur the boundaries between the physical, digital, and biological spheres. There are three reasons that today’s upheavals are not an extension of the third industrial revolution, but rather herald the arrival of a fourth and distinct revolution: speed, scale, and systemic impact. The speed of current breakthroughs has no historical precedent. Compared with previous industrial revolutions, the fourth is evolving exponentially rather than linearly. Moreover, it is transforming industries in many countries. The breadth and depth of these changes herald the transformation of entire production, management, and government systems (Schwab, 2017). Schwab argued that this revolution differs from all previous ones in terms of scale, scope, and complexity. Marked by a series of new technologies that merge the physical, digital, and biological worlds, developments continue to affect all disciplines, economies, industries, and governments and even challenge notions of what it means to be human. In particular, Schwab (2017, n.p.) called on leaders and citizens to “work together to create a future that benefits everyone by putting people first, empowering them, and always remembering that all these new technologies are firstly tools made by people for people.” Moreover, learning how humanity can benefit from this revolution while overcoming its challenges is the central goal. The UNESCO Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) (UNESCO, 2016), particularly SDG 4, are dedicated to education and education for all by 2030. They advocate that the dimensions of accessibility, equity, justice, quality, lifelong learning, diversity, and inclusion are critical to achieving SDG 4 for democracy, human rights, social justice, and liberation, ensuring that no one is left behind, including groups and individuals already at risk, and participating in a democratic society. Lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic included already-known limitations, gaps, and barriers to individuals and systems. Vulnerable individuals and

74  Ebba Ossiannilsson groups have become even more vulnerable and exposed. However, during the pandemic and in the post-pandemic era, those obvious shortcomings and problems must be given the highest priority, and solutions at all levels – meta, macro, meso, micro, and nano – must be found in order to reach SDG 4 and begin the new social contract (UNESCO, 2021a).

Discussion For this theoretical conceptual chapter, which focuses on rhizome learning as a catalyst for the new social contract, two research questions were formulated: (1) What kind of fundamental systemic changes will occur in the predicted new social contract for the future of education and learning? (2) How can rhizome learning be a catalyst for the new social contract? Regarding the first research question, the review of the literature by the major international organizations, the United Nations (n.d[a]; n.d[b]), UNESCO (2016, 2019, 2021a, 2021b, 2022), OECD (2022), World Economic Forum (2016), the European Commission (2022a–2022c), and recognized academic scholars, revealed an obvious need for a so-called new normal, a need for fundamental systemic change, and a need for a new social contract with respect to education and learning. Learning is ubiquitous and takes place constantly, by and through everyone, in a variety of contexts and media, including platforms. The term lifelong learning has become commonplace. Moreover, lifelong learning not only happens after a “normal” education, such as bachelor’s, master’s, or doctoral degrees, but also begins in early childhood. In the context of lifelong learning, learning itself has reached new dimensions and levels everywhere, including in the workplace. Most important is learning to learn using a critical and curious approach, with an awareness of both globalization and local action, and vice versa, in order to take local challenges and dilemmas to another level and potentially internationalize them. The ultimate 21st-century skill is the ability to be a lifelong learner. Therefore, rhizomatic learning is crucial. According to UNESCO and the new social contract, in a post-pandemic period in which the new normal or the next normal have been newly interpreted, the pre-pandemic normal no longer exists. It has become obvious that what is normal for one is not normal for others, personally, systemically, or contextually. A new social contract is based on a variety of scenarios that address critical values related to life, learning, education, equity, quality, equality, lifelong learning, accessibility, human rights, liberation, and social justice. A new social contract not only includes openness, collaboration, and internationalization but also focuses on the personal level and individualization. Learning involves learning to become, which is addressed by the Futures of Education initiative (UNESCO). As mentioned earlier, the term “future” has been pluralized because a new social contract must acknowledge the potential for several “futures” on both systemic and individual levels. Inamorato dos Santos et al. (2016) argued that open education has advantages for the content dimension. Learners can access course materials and

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knowledge without prior permission and at no cost (except Internet connections) and learn when it is personally convenient. Universities can see the types of course materials that other universities use for particular topics. They can also learn about pedagogies that support teaching methods that would otherwise be limited to officially registered learners in a classroom or dependent on passwords to private virtual learning environments. Open education allows universities to collaborate openly in sharing and creating educational materials. The content available in Open Educational Resources (OER) lowers the barriers to reusing and adapting materials (UNESCO, 2019, 2021a, 2021b). These advantages contribute to the “openness” of education, enabling it to reach new audiences. Openness also allows for new teaching and learning methods and increased flexibility in how and when educational materials and lessons are accessed. If institutions want to take full advantage of educational openness, they should align their strategies with efforts to modernize higher education. These strategies should be open to new audiences and practices, and they should allow institutions to qualify for inter-institutional collaboration at the regional and cross-border levels. At the heart of education is the task of making the knowledge, practices, and opportunities of higher education accessible to learners locally and globally to better educate them and advance scholarship. Open education is best suited to this task because of its strong learnercentered focus on both distance learners who are not formally enrolled in a higher education institution and learners who take courses on a physical campus or online. Developing an open education strategy for a higher education institution or, better yet, redesigning a current higher education strategy to incorporate open education into becoming a more open institution is an important step on the path to the modernization of higher education. Opening education provides opportunities for all stakeholders (Inamorato dos Santos et al., 2016; UNESCO, 2019). The concept of “openness” in contemporary open education continues to evolve, assuming different meanings in diverse contexts and discourses (Inamorato dos Santos et al., 2016). Traditionally, according to a model adopted by open universities in the late 1960s, “open” means open access and easier access to study. This “classical” conception of openness does not cover all the aspects that openness encompasses today, such as free access, free choice of starting times, and global availability. Over time, the concept of openness has evolved to include the open availability of content and resources, largely because of advances in digital technologies used for educational purposes. The Cape Town Open Education Declaration (2017) emphasized that open education is not limited to “open educational resources.” It also relies on open technologies to facilitate collaborative and flexible learning and the open sharing of teaching practices so that teachers can benefit from the best ideas of their colleagues. It may also include new approaches to assessment, accreditation, and collaborative learning. At the societal level, there is a trend towards openness, such as through open government, where public records are open to public inspection, and individuals have access to information that was previously available to only a few. In education, openness includes transparency,

76  Ebba Ossiannilsson accessibility, equity, and the reduction or elimination of barriers at all levels within an institution, including research, teaching, and learning. The second research question is, “How can rhizome learning be a catalyst for the new social contract?” The concept of serendipity must be applied to promote agility in seamless learning environments, content perspectives, and methods. In her previous publications, the author has advocated for a rhizomatic approach to learning because learning is ubiquitous (Ossiannilsson, 2012, 2018, 2021a, 2021b). Similar to Cormier (2008), she has argued that society should be the curriculum for at least four reasons: (1) learning is pervasive; (2) open learning requires open attitudes and approaches to learning; (3) when society is curricula, learning environments, and delivery are more authentic, which promotes motivations for learning; and (4) we live in a rapidly changing world where facts, figures, and content need to be reconsidered, redefined, contextualized, adapted, and predicted. Deleuze and Guattari’s (1987) concept of rhizomatic learning will probably be the most relevant approach in the future, where change will be the normal. In the rhizome metaphor proposed by philosopher Gilles Deleuze and psychoanalyst Félix Guattari (1987), structures are nonhierarchical and open. Rhizomatic analysis is increasingly being used in educational research to challenge traditional power structures, to give voices to the previously unheard, and to address issues in messy but authentic ways. In rhizomatic mapping, a series of points are presented that complement, shape, and disrupt each other, and readers are encouraged to draw their own connecting lines across the gaps between them. Thus, there is a strong case for advocating for and introducing rhizome learning as a catalyst for the new social contract.

Conclusion and recommendations This theoretical conceptual chapter on rhizome learning as a catalyst for the new social contract has addressed theoretical approaches to learning in an era of constant change. Deleuze and Guattari’s (1987) concept of rhizomatic learning was analyzed related to the foundation of global challenges addressed by leading international organizations. Global research in the field has shown that systemic change is needed to enable a new social contract of education and learning to reach everyone, not leave anyone aside, and achieve UNESCO’s sustainability goals for 2030 and in the future. Scholars have also proposed a new paradigm for learning. Deleuze and Guattari’s (1987) rhizome theory and concept are highly concerned with essential questions that arise regarding a collaborative communal and individual path of learning to become what one can become and what one is capable of becoming. Essential questions that arise can be phrased in terms of the six names of the elephant child’s best friends: why, what, when, where, by, and for whom? Learning today must be agile, serendipitous, and rhizome-like because content is everywhere, and networks are predominant. Rhizome theory and the rhizome concept are potentially the most relevant approaches in a future in which change will be the norm.

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This study has potential limitations. For example, other sources and methods could have been used. However, as the author stated in the introduction, this desktop study has addressed a theoretical approach to concept development based on a review of the literature by internationally leading organizations and recognized scholars in the field. This study was also based on the author’s experience and previous research on the new social contract and rhizome learning and theory. In summary, this study has addressed the following themes: (i) learning today must be agile, serendipitous, and rhizome-like; (ii) a future in which constant change is the norm; (iii) the ultimate 21st-century skill is the ability to be a lifelong learner; and (iv) an argument for a new social contract.

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UNESCO. (2019). Recommendation on open educational resources (OER). http:// portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-URL_ID=49556&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_ SECTION=201.html UNESCO. (2021a). Open educational resources. https://en.unesco.org/themes/ building-knowledge-societies/oer/recommendation UNESCO. (2021b). OER dynamic coalition. https://en.unesco.org/themes/buildingknowledge-societies/oer/dynamic-coalition UNESCO. (2022). Reimagine our futures together. A new social contract for education. UNESCO. https://en.unesco.org/futuresofeducation/ United Nations. (n.d.[a]). The 17th goals. https://sdgs.un.org/goals United Nations. (n.d.[b]). Universal Declaration of Human Rights. https://www. un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights Vuong, Q.-H. (2022). A new theory of serendipity: Nature, emergence and mechanism. Walter de Gruyter GmbH. Wong, L. H., Milrad, M., & Specht, M. (2015). Seamless Learning in the Age of Mobile Connectivity: Seamless Learning in the Age of Mobile Connectivity. https:// doi.org/10.1007/978-981-287-113-8 World Economic Forum. (2016). Mastering the fourth Industrial revolution. Switzerland. Yetik, E., Ozdamar, N., & Bozkurt, A. (2020). Seamless learning design criteria in the context of open and distance learning. In G. Durak & S. Çankaya (Eds.), Managing and designing online courses in ubiquitous learning environments (pp. 106–127). IGI Global. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335676306_ Seamless_Learning_Design_Criteria_in_the_Context_of_Open_and_Distance_ Learning. https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-5225-9779-7.ch006

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Semiosis, hybridity and the mediated mind Lee Hazeldine and Aron Spall

Introduction Rhizomatic learning poses a challenge to traditional modes of thinking by encouraging students to adopt an unrestricted, creative and hybrid approach to learning (Cormier, 2008). Unlike traditional approaches to learning that appeal to reified, self-present knowledge, rhizomatic learning advocates the making of new learning connections, concepts and meanings outside prescribed realms of knowledge. Rhizomatic learning is perceived as being increasingly compatible with the needs of a contemporary globalized digital society in which we are moving from an ‘age of enlightenment’, with its discrete silos of thought, to an ‘age of entanglement’ (Oxman, 2016) in which knowledge moves beyond boundaries, becoming entangled in new transdisciplinary ways when faced with rapidly changing contexts and intersections within the world. Such an approach to education requires new means and methods to understand decentred, divergent and hybrid learning beyond traditional pedagogic accounts that continue to view students as passive disembodied rationalities. By perceiving learning as semiosis, edusemiotics might provide such a means and method. Edusemiotics conceives meaning making as constituted through the mediation of difference within signs in a continuous process in which new knowledge is created without resorting to established conceptual frameworks. As such, it provides a strategy to equip learners with a sense of agency in both knowledge creation and self-transformation which are essential for living and learning within an increasingly hybrid and transdisciplinary age; this is especially pertinent within digital environments in which there is increasing emphasis on diversity, autonomy, openness and connectivity (Downes, 2012, p. 85).

The future of knowledge Much of traditional liberal education has been determined by the Cartesian Cogito and has consequently tended to view students as disembodied rationalities – this can be perceived as reflecting a broader distinction between mind/body and subject/object within western thought. From Plato to modernity a ‘metaphysical duality existing between the mind and the natural world’ (Bulle, 2017, p. 258) was prevalent and posited notions of the immaterial substance of the DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378-8

Semiosis, hybridity and the mediated mind 81 soul/mind, similar to that of the immutable world of Ideas or intelligible Forms (ibid), in contrast to the derivative and ever-changing differences within the material world; accordingly, because the mind was perceived as bringing humankind closer to the divine, it was this mind-body dualism that was at the basis of pedagogical models developed. The knowledge taught and the approaches used within these models were intended to increase students’ abilities to approach given truths and to train their minds in connection with dominant epistemological assumptions. Such orderly frameworks of knowledge arguably concur with the development of standardized curriculum models throughout the industrial age, in which schools were ‘created in the image of industrialism [… based] on the principles of the assembly line and the efficient division of labour’ (Robinson, 2010, p. 230). Stiegler (1998) argues that humanity is always already mediated by technics and that technics provide us with the modes and means of representation that define knowledge and subjectivity at any historical point; as such, the subject/ object dichotomy that underlies humanist notions within traditional liberal education is undermined. From this perspective, any division between the human and the non-human is contingent on external forms of representation that disrupt any foundational substance upon which such a binary relies; our sense of subjectivity then is not defined by a soul or consciousness, but is given through a history of technics: human subjectivity is not exceptional because of spirit, essence or divine investment, but because we incorporate the world into our bodies – the reason we can think the way we do is because the non-human world has already cleared a space for us to think. If our notions of knowledge and subjectivity are always already mediated by an external realm of signifiers, then any transcendent appeal to self-present consciousness and understanding becomes redundant; education would therefore need to rethink itself anew if learning is to be understood as our potential to forge connections and negotiate significations within an ever-changing external world. Moreover, the seismic challenges of digital/technological disruption and socio-political change within contemporary society has led to much debate about the changing nature, value and application of knowledge within the 21st century. Traditional dualistic and industrial models of education have been increasingly perceived as anachronistic by failing to reflect the current status of knowledge, whilst also hampering the development of students’ creativity, curiosity and critical insight. In recent decades, Platonic logocentric assumptions in dualistic thought, with their appeal to self-present truths, have been challenged in favour of an ontology of difference in which identity is perceived as a product of relationality without essence or fixed meaning (Deleuze & Guattari, 1994; Derrida, 1978, 2012; Lyotard, 1988); in this context, knowledge has been relegated from truth-claims to notions of ‘performativity’ within a post-industrial society (Lyotard, 1984). From this perspective, the use and application of knowledge becomes less about ‘simple and durable “truths”’ and more about our ability to ‘manage complex and rapidly changing environments’ (Downes, 2012). In the digital age there is the assumption that education’s ‘roots as “factory-school

82  Lee Hazeldine and Aron Spall model” […] are no longer capable of meeting the needs of today’s society [… therefore, there is an] appeal to systemic change – from hierarchical control to flexible and adaptive networked models’ (Siemens, 2008, p. 8). As such, traditional education is increasingly viewed as incongruous as we shift from ‘an economy based on physical inputs –land, capital, and labor – to an economy based on intellectual inputs, or human creativity’ (Florida, 2006, p. 22). This move towards dynamic and decentred rhizomatic knowledge challenges established representational epistemologies with their convergent pathways and appeals to fixed self-present knowledge. In an age characterized by constant flux and change, education is increasingly perceived as serving the wider purpose of enabling citizens to handle an ‘uncertain state of being [and assisting] in living purposively amid [this uncertainty]’ (Barnett, 2004, p. 72). This role for education corresponds with wider international ambitions articulated by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), where ‘future-ready students will need both broad and specialized knowledge’ (OECD 2018, p. 4) in which to think effectively across disciplinary boundaries and ‘connect the dots’ within a rapidly changing, transdisciplinary and interconnected world. Despite an increasing focus on the need for transdisciplinary thinking and creativity, old habits prove resilient; there remains a strong current of educational practice tied to traditional dualistic and industrial models. A culture of entrenched compartmentalization within both schools and universities persists that often encourages both teachers and students to pursue learning through prescribed knowledge content and the lens of single epistemological viewpoints (Bernstein, 2000); such compartmentalization both legitimates and defines not only the disciplinary boundaries of curricular knowledge, but also what it is to be an educated person within this system (ibid). This siloed approach negates difference, relationality and the opportunity to call on other disciplines in the construction of knowledge. A current example of this continued tendency would be ‘knowledge-rich’ curriculums that focus on prescribed content within strict disciplinary boundaries. Principally influenced by E.D. Hirsch’s theory of core knowledge, this unapologetically conservative approach advocates the learning of established literary canons and knowledge (certain facts, ideas and knowledge) in which to ingrain the ‘best’ of our culture within students; it is argued that this approach allows students to communicate successfully within society and, subsequently, develop the skills needed to operate effectively as citizens (Hirsch, 1987, 2007). Critics of ‘knowledge-rich’ curriculums highlight how they risk restricting knowledge within the boundaries of an established monoculture that lacks diversity and, at worst, reduces learning to a superficial list of information that does not develop students’ capacity for higher-level thinking (Morgan, 2022). Another example is Direct Instruction (DI); this approach advocates a hierarchical teacher-led form of teaching via repetition and rote learning (Bardash, 2012; Engelmann & Becker, 2022). DI has been criticized due to a perception that its strict scripted procedures limit both student and teacher creativity (Hattie, 2009, pp. 206–207); it has also been criticized for its lack of sensitivity to the many diverse cultural contexts of students (Ryder et al., 2006).

Semiosis, hybridity and the mediated mind 83 Arguably, a more relevant approach to education that reflects the changing nature of contemporary society (one that facilitates creativity and rhizomatic open-ended transdisciplinary thinking, whilst providing purpose, value, insight and agency for students) would perceive knowledge as ‘neither a representation of something more “real” than itself, nor an “object” that can be transferred from one place to the next […rather it is to be understood as emerging] as we, as human beings, participate in the world’ (Osberg & Biesta, 2008, p. 313). The developing field of edusemiotics might provide such an approach as it problematizes the prevalent role of formal instruction and does not aim to attain finite and indubitable knowledge. Edusemiotics demands a continuous engagement with signs through open-ended practical inquiry in which to enrich experience with meaning and significance; as such, it intends to provide a ‘novel open-ended foundation for knowledge which is always already of the nature of a process […within the] unpredictable circumstances of lived experience’ (Deely & Semetsky, 2017, p. 216).

Edusemiotics and learning Edusemiotics challenges modernity’s dominant theories of learning; informed by Cartesian dualist notions of mind/body, these theories have a tendency to view students as disembodied rationalities. According to Siemens: [a] central tenet of most learning theories is that learning occurs inside a person. Even social constructivist views, which hold that learning is a socially enacted process, promote the principality of the individual (and her/his physical presence – i.e. brain-based) in learning. These theories do not address learning that occurs outside of people (Siemens, 2005, p. 5) From the point of view of edusemiotics, when ‘mind and matter are thought of as fundamentally distinct, learning is reified and mystified’ (Olteanu & Campbell, 2018, p. 247). Edusemiotics differs from traditional approaches to teaching that tend to be highly didactic and content-centred, as well as progressive approaches that tend to be learner-centred or process-centred. According to Stables (2010), highly didactic, content-centred education erroneously divorces content from process and assumes, despite differences, there is a mutual relationship of meaning between student and teachers. Processcentred approaches are often perceived as relying on a ‘decontextualised view of process that does not relate to cultural practices’ (ibid, p. 29), whereas learnercentred approaches have a tendency to view the learner as a given ‘rather than an identity in flux and under construction’ (ibid). In contrast, edusemiotics, as a sign-mediated approach to learning, negates an underlying view of learning as occurring through a reified disembodied mind; this approach perceives learning as a semiotic process that has the advantages of being both activity-centred and learner-aware.

84  Lee Hazeldine and Aron Spall Rather than perceiving education as a Cartesian dyadic relation between a knowing mind and known objects, edusemiotics views all life and learning as a semiotic process in which meaning is always already mediated in a triadic relationship – this process negates the notions of learning as either a mind dependent reality or a mind-independent reality. The term semiotics is defined as the science of signs. Edusemiotics is a neologism coined by Danesi (2010) that emphasizes the semiotic processes inherent to learning. The notion was created to distinguish semiotics as education (edusemiotics) from the mere use of semiotics as a pedagogic tool that remains within the boundaries of conventional approaches to learning. As a theory, edusemiotics conceives all meaning making, whether conscious or unconscious, to be a process of semiosis: the notion that all human experience, without exception, is marked and proceeds by signs and signals. Modern semiotics is largely influenced by two theorists: Ferdinand de Saussure and Charles Sanders Peirce. Saussure’s conception of semiology focuses on the role and function of linguistic and textual signs in the generation of meaning; it is this model of semiotics that mostly informed 20th-century Structuralist theory, to be found, for example, in the work of Claude LeviStrauss, Lacan, Althusser and key works by Roland Barthes. In contrast, Peirce’s notion of semiotics goes beyond text and verbal utterances and has a broader conception that incorporates three types of signs: (a) icons, signs that convey an object by way of similarity or analogy (photographs and realist paintings are examples); (b) indices, signs which basically point to an object, often through causation, and cannot exist without the presence of the signified (smoke is an index of fire, dark clouds are an index of rain, a footprint is an index of a foot); (c) symbols, signs which represent an object through arbitrary convention (language, text and numbers are good examples) (Peirce, 1991, pp. 239–240). It is Peirce’s broader, ubiquitous conception of signs that informs edusemiotics, as it accounts for meaning making across all realms of lived experience. For Peirce a sign means ‘anything which conveys any definite notion of an object in any way’ (Peirce, 1931, p. 540). Peircean semiotics is defined by semiosis, a process that underlies edusemiotics as a theory of learning. Semiosis as a concept describes the dynamic process of meaning generation through signs; it involves a ‘continuous interpretation of signs, ensuring a string of representations as the growth of [meaning]’ (Quay, 2017, p. 84). Unlike dualist propositional thinking, semiosis occurs through a triadic relationship of sign-object-interpretant (Figure 6.1). For Peirce, a sign can be anything that ‘stands for something else, its object, in such a relation so as to generate another sign, called […] an interpretant’ (Semetsky, 2014, p. 3). A sign, then, represents the object understood in a particular way, this understanding being the interpretant. The action of this triadic relationship is simultaneous and should not be understood as a series of separate steps. In other words, an ‘interpretant is the interpretation that goes hand in hand with the immediacy of semiosis – sign-representing-object – in living experience’ (Quay Op Cit, p. 85). The role of the interpretant means that the ‘action of signs is […] always mediated […] The sign not only stands for something

Semiosis, hybridity and the mediated mind 85

Figure 6.1  Peirce’s triadic sign model

other than itself, but it does so for some third’ (Deely & Semetsky, 2017, p. 210). This process of mediation means that understanding cannot be reduced to a direct relation between a sign and its object that leaves no room for a sign’s potential or future meaning. The triadic nature of semiosis is characterized by the included middle, in contrast to the logic of the excluded middle prevalent in dualistic propositional thinking. The logic of the excluded middle postulates the rule of non-contradiction, of ‘either/or’ – if something is A, it cannot also be NOT A; the rule of this logic also states that if a state A and not-A exist, a state T cannot exist which is simultaneously A and not-A. In contrast, semiosis follows the logic of the included middle which operates as a mediating third, the interpretant, that perceives signs as relational entities that indicate ‘something other than itself which is not immediately apparent’ (Semetsky Op Cit, p. 4). This notion of sign meaning constituted by dynamic mediated relations, the included middle, avoids the dualistic EITHER/OR in favour of the conjunction AND (A AND B) which provides a logic of multiplicities that goes beyond the reductive logic of identity to be found in dualist thinking. As such, learning as a process of semiosis within the world always comprises of ‘a series of interpretants which can be always further interpreted […] therefore replacing a single truth […] with a wealth of multiple and potentially unlimited, meanings embedded in the dynamics of the evolution of signs’ (ibid, pp. 4–5). One of the consequences of perceiving meaning making as a relational act as we participate in a world of signs is that it forefronts the notion of abduction; whereas deduction and induction involve a logics of justification, abduction involves a ‘creative logic of discovery […] whereby new ideas are seized upon’ (Deely & Semetsky Op Cit, p. 216). With regard to inference, deduction takes a top down approach by exploring the necessary consequences of a rule; induction goes in the opposite direction and starts from the ground up by having a theory in mind and then seeking confirmation across cases. In contrast, abduction does not start with

86  Lee Hazeldine and Aron Spall explanations but instead links things together to generate an order/meaning that fits the surprising facts – in this sense, abduction is the beginning of theory building. As such, semiosis is a learning process that involves the ‘growth and the evolution of consciousness as the function of engaging with, and learning from, signs situated in life’ (ibid, p. 216). The triadic nature of signs led to Peirce’s classifying them in terms of categories of Firstness, Secondness and Thirdness: First is the conception of being pure sense, existing independent of anything else; second is the conception of being relative to, the conception of reaction with, something else; third is the conception of mediation, whereby first and second are brought into relation (Peirce, 1991, pp. 188–189) – mediation ensures the included middle that constitutes a relation between what would have otherwise remained two distinct differences. Importantly, the notion of Firstness, Secondness and Thirdness allows semiosis to go beyond an anthropocentric perspective within dualist accounts of learning which is premised upon the human mind’s capacity for language. As Stables (2010) points out, ‘firstly, there is an assumption that only humans are, and can be, sign users, just as only human communication can properly be understood as “language”; secondly, and by implication, sign use is an aspect of mind (as opposed to “body”), and only human beings have minds’ (p. 22). Edusemiotics challenges this assumption, claiming that learning processes occur more broadly in nature and that learning is not fundamentally a linguistic articulation but is, more generally, a meaning making that occurs through semiosis (Olteanu & Campbell, 2018, p. 248). Following the notion of firstness, our awareness and understanding can be perceived as being dependent upon sensations that precede concept formation and language. From initially proceeding from a notion of firstness, it can be argued that both animals and humans are subject to the process of semiosis and that no strict distinction exists between them in this regard. For all animals, including humans, to sense is to enter into a relationship between things – there is no situation in which a sign-relation is not at work. As Sebeok (2001) indicates, ‘the phenomenon that distinguishes life forms from inanimate objects is semiosis. This can be defined simply as the instinctive capacity of all living organisms to produce and understand signs’ (p. 3). To further this point, Sebeok states: All organisms communicate by use of models (Umwelts, or self-worlds, each according to its species-specific sense organs), from the simplest representations of maneuvers of approach and withdrawal to the most sophisticated cosmic theories of Newton and Einstein. (Sebeok, 2001, p. 23) If semiosis characterizes biological life, then learning can be perceived as being both continuous in the biological realm and part of an evolutionary Darwinian view in which humans, like other animals, are environmentally dependent organisms and subject to adaptation. This leads to the valuable insight that when education follows convergent models of learning and knowledge, they

Semiosis, hybridity and the mediated mind 87 risk failing to fulfil the fundamental role of learning as a process of adaptation – learning cannot be achieved by an analytic Cartesian mind that observes the world from which it is detached, but by a ‘semiotic consciousness that constructs an expanded field of meanings informed by lived experience’ (Deely & Semetsky Op Cit, p. 214). As Olteanu and Campbell (2018) highlights, ‘when educational institutions obstruct rather than facilitate the capacities of individuals or groups to develop more complex and insightful models of reality, these institutions contradict the rationale for which they emerged’ (p. 253). Given this anti-anthropocentric viewpoint which highlights the embodied and sensory foundations of learning, it becomes apparent that other modes of meaning making should be given greater consideration beyond the prioritization of language and linguistics within the dualist account. Peirce’s triad of sign types – icon–index–symbol – allows us to move away from traditional symbolic (language) accounts of learning to ‘recognize more fully the embodied and sensory foundations of indexicality […] and iconicity’ (ibid, pp. 254–255). As Stables indicates, such a move would highlight the importance of learning in realms other than those which prioritize mind-language, for ‘physical education is concerned largely with “training the body” while other forms of education also involve elements of non-conscious physical response, including all forms of education in the arts’ (Stables Op Cit, p. 22). In summary, understanding semiosis as a process in which meaning is generated through the mediation of difference inherent to the interpretation of signs is to position relationality itself as an ontological ground for learning. As such, edusemiotics disrupts notions of self-present substance dualism (this is this, because it is not that) within traditional education and, in contrast, perceives perpetual becoming (this is always becoming that) as characteristic of the learning process instead. Such a process is perceived as continuous with the biological realm of adaptation and recognizes the importance of sensation to learning beyond mind-language forms of conscious rationality. Such a view of learning has important implications for education in this constantly changing, interconnected and transdisciplinary digital age.

Implications for rhizomatic learning and education The notion of the included middle within edusemiotics has a clear affinity with a Deleuzean differential ontology which provides the epistemological foundations for rhizomatic learning. According to Deleuze, the conjunction AND is ‘the path of all relations, which makes relations shoot outside their terms’ (Deleuze & Parnet, 1987, p. 57). What follows is an exploration of the implications of edusemiotics, and the process of semiosis, for rhizomatic learning and education. Rhizomatic learning recognizes that learning is a complex process of sensemaking that makes creative connections across traditional boundaries to which each learner brings their own context and has their own needs. It poses a challenge to traditional modes of thinking by encouraging students to adopt an unrestricted and creative approach to learning. Rhizomatic learning perceives

88  Lee Hazeldine and Aron Spall learning as a decentred, hybrid and diagrammatic process, rather than a linear and convergent one (Cormier, 2008). The approach endorses the making of new learning connections outside the prescribed trajectory that often defines a convergent, hierarchical and dualistic relationship to knowledge that, as we have seen, is increasingly incompatible with the needs of a contemporary globalized society. First popularized by Deleuze and Guattari in A Thousand Plateaus (2005), the rhizome is a botanical metaphor used to convey emergent decentred production of thought beyond self-present identity thinking. As a biological form, a rhizome constantly territorializes and deterritorializes without any established organizing centre; as Deleuze and Guattari points out, the rhizome operates by variation, expansion, conquest, capture, offshoots […it] is an acentered, nonhierarchical, nonsignifying system without a General and without an organizing memory or central automaton. (Deleuze & Guattari, 2005, p. 21) The rhizome therefore provides an effective metaphor for the decentred, networked generation of knowledge advocated for within contemporary society, regardless of whether this manifests itself within a transdisciplinary physical classroom or within an online learning environment. From a rhizomatic viewpoint, ‘knowledge can only be negotiated, and the contextual, collaborative learning experience […] is a social as well as a personal knowledge-creation process with mutable goals and constantly negotiated premises’ (Cormier, 2008, p. 3). As highlighted, edusemiotics advocates a meditated approach to learning in which knowledge is created through the interpretation of signs; the role of the interpretant in semiosis ensures that the construction of meaning is always contextual, subject to negotiation, and not prescribed in advance. As such, an edusemiotic approach to education fosters an emergent environment in which new rhizomatic networks and assemblages of knowledge can be created, depending on the given relations, individuals and subjects involved; as such, the approach generates ‘singular processes of learning’ (Deleuze, 1994). Semiosis as a meaning-making process transforms learners into active participants in the creation and interpretation of signs, therefore facilitating the emergence of new concepts and meanings that generate new rhizomatic, hybrid understandings and, ultimately, new ways of living; such active interpretation transcends the notion of learners as passive observers within traditional forms of education that often reduces learning to mere social reproduction, whereas learning is at its ‘most exciting [when] it refers to something that at least feels new for the individual’ (Stables, 2010, p. 27). One of the advantages of an edusemiotic approach to rhizomatic learning is that it gives students a sense of agency over their own learning. By facilitating an approach in which students become active interpreters of signs and participants in learning, edusemiotics provides a learning experience in which they can recognize how their own individual and collaborative actions contribute simultaneously to their own self-development and mastery of understanding; importantly, it also makes them conscious of the value of both

Semiosis, hybridity and the mediated mind 89 the process and product upon the learning journey (ibid, p. 29). As edusemiotics perceives sign-laden learning environments as interpretative communities, it also provides a means by which to value and comprehend the relationship between the unique learner and the wider learning community. By understanding that each learner has a previous semiotic conditioning that they bring to the context of any current semiotic interpretation, the learning community is encouraged to both appreciate, comprehend and value the unique differences of meaning that any learning situation can generate; it also teaches students to balance, appreciate and respect other learning identities in relation to their own. From the viewpoint of Deleuze and rhizomatic learning, learning is perceived as a disruptive encounter and not an act of recognition or recollection that is often found in traditional dualistic models of education. For Deleuze, learning occurs when confronted with the virtual – the virtual is the potentiality that exists within signs prior to becoming signifieds that can be understood and represented within our habits of thought. During the learning process, such virtual signs ‘cause problems through their disorientating shock, forcing thought to deal with experiences that disrupt the common coordinated functioning of the senses and faculties’ (Bogue, 2004, p. 337). Given this perspective, rhizomatic learning perceives understanding to be the product of an encounter in which the learner interacts with signs and considers them in relation to particular situations and cultural contexts – learning is therefore a process in which we interpret and move with signs within the world until we significantly understand their potential for action therein. For Deleuze, our immersion amongst virtual signs allows us to ‘make, remake and unmake […our] concepts along a moving horizon, from an always decentered center, from an always displaced periphery which repeats and differentiates them’ (Deleuze, 1994, pp. xx–xxi). This notion of learning has an affinity with epistemologies of emergence in education in that they call for a switch in focus from ‘questions about presentation and representation and towards questions about engagement and response’ (Osberg et al., 2008, p. 213). Edusemiotics contributes towards a pedagogy of emergence because semiosis provides both the means and method by which learning through disruptive encounters can be understood. By understanding education to be an apprenticeship in and amongst signs, edusemiotics allows students to engage in abductive enquiries of relationality where the outcome of problems cannot be set out in advance; the disruptive encounters, provocations and dilemmas faced in a learning situation (whether in the classroom, an online learning environment or in the wider world) give rise to new meanings that are often contrary to prescribed outcomes and the expectations of standardized testing in traditional education – as such, edusemiotics can be perceived as providing a novel open-ended relationship to knowledge; importantly, such a relationship instils a sense and appreciation, in both student and teacher, that a learning outcome in response to an encounter is subject to variability and cannot be fully known and played out in advance. Rhizomatic learning implies a specific notion of the subject and their position within the process of learning, as well as the role played by interacting with

90  Lee Hazeldine and Aron Spall others. Whereas contemporary notions of Growth Mindsets (Dweck, 2006) and metacognition within education (Berthold et al., 2007; Hacker et al., 2009; Hattie, 2009) rightly focus on the need for learners to become active reflective agents within the learning process, these visible learning approaches often produce learning identities tied to the realm of prescribed outcomes and curricula (Osberg & Biesta, 2008); in contrast, edusemiotics provides a tangible strategy to unleash the creative learning potential of learners beyond established criteria and identity. From the point of view of rhizomatic learning, there is a risk that the traditional learning subject is reproduced which is ill equipped to face the current dilemmas within a 21st-century transdisciplinary world, as Deleuze (1988) warns, ‘we continue to produce ourselves as a subject on the basis of old modes which do not correspond to our problems’ (p. 107). For Deleuze and Guattari, the subject is an assemblage, a haecceity, constituted by a series of intensities that are constantly subject to change and transformation – the term haecceity is used to indicate this individuated specificity: You are longitude and latitude, a set of speeds and slownesses between unformed particles, a set of nonsubjectified affects […] It should not be thought that a haecceity consists simply of a décor or a backdrop that situates subjects […] It is the entire assemblage in its individuated aggregate that is a haecceity. (Deleuze & Guattari, 2005, p. 262) From this perspective then, there is no such thing as the self-contained subject in learning; as St. Pierre (2004) points out, the humanist mind/body subject of learning is a fiction and the Cartesian Cogito does not exist. Rather, we are the sum of specific flows of intensities and potentialities always in flux – the subject is transformed by whichever specific rhizomatic assemblage it finds itself in within the world; the subject is therefore always mediated and in a process of becoming. The notion of the subject as a point within a rhizomatic assemblage has clear implications for education. From the viewpoint of rhizomatic learning, both teacher and student are immersed within a decentred network of relations that affects the potentiality of both, rendering traditional hierarchal and linear relations to signs and subjectivities obsolete. The act of semiosis provides the means by which to understand meaning making as a mediated act of becoming within a rhizomatic world in which we are negotiated signs ourselves – as Semetsky argues: it is the act of mediation, via the interpretant, that connects otherwise binary opposites of subject and object, mind and matter, self and other. We are signs among signs […] Hence, like every sign, we also have the potential to grow and to become ‘more fully developed’. (Semetsky, 2014, p. 5) As mutually intertwined and mediated assemblages within a learning space, the teacher and pupil are both afforded enhanced possibilities to develop new

Semiosis, hybridity and the mediated mind 91 knowledge and enhanced understandings and are themselves transformed in the process. As Stables suggests, each learning activity provides ‘both an invitation and a threat […] for the very act of presenting a new piece of information or asking someone to undertake a new activity is a way of telling them that their world is not quite as it was before’ (Stables Op Cit, p. 28). When posed with a learning problem, the teacher learns with the student with reference to mediated signs that allow both teacher and pupil to discover connections that are pertinent to their own and other’s subjective lives – in this way, learning becomes a creative act in which curiosity is nurtured and new ideas are formed. As Deely and Semetsky argue: The edusemiotic process of the evolution of signs intrinsically determines new opportunities for human development and transformative education and necessarily encompasses the future-oriented dimensions of becoming, novelty and creativity […] Edusemiotics posits a teacher and a student as one unified […] whole – a sign, a relation. They are interrelated and interdependent by virtue of being embedded in the common ‘interpretant’ comprising shared meanings. (Deely & Semetsky Op Cit, p. 216) Such rhizomatic learning spaces, in which semiosis occurs, therefore have an ethics of creativity which is committed to ‘experimentation rather than the transmission of facts or inculcation of values’ (May & Semetsky, 2008, p. 143). In this spirit, ‘the rigid classroom of old becomes a frenzied workshop of shared desires, and a playground of signs waiting to be discovered’ (Drohan, 2013, pp. 130–131). In contrast to traditional education, Deleuze highlights the transformative act of mediation performed by the role of the teacher in educative rhizomatic and semiotic environments, he states: [W]e learn nothing from those who say: ‘Do as I do’. Our only teachers are those who tell us to ‘do with me’, and are able to emit signs to be developed in heterogeneity rather than propose gestures for us to reproduce. (Deleuze, 1994, p. 23) By perceiving both subjectivity and learning as an intertwined process of creative becoming, the act of semiosis within a rhizomatic educational environment ensures that education is about positive identity development in which learning contributes to making significant events in each student’s life story (Stables Op Cit). By facilitating such environments in which curiosity, creativity and semiosis can flourish, learners are also more likely to experience a flow state in which, Csikszentmihalyi (2009) argues, optimal performance, motivation, well-being and happiness are achieved – this is because a greater sense of worthwhileness exists when engaged in tasks that involve intrinsic acts of becoming relevant to their own lives (Scherer, 2002). As we have described, by perceiving semiosis as continuous with the biological realm of adaptation, edusemiotics also provides

92  Lee Hazeldine and Aron Spall significance for the subject beyond language-based forms of learning; by understanding wider processes of life to be adaptive responses to signals, semiosis provides a greater role for sensation within learning and allows greater importance for Peircean iconic and indexical signs beyond the typical focus of symbolic language within rationality. This provides a more integrated approach to learning in which instinctual, emotional, practical and intellectual modes can be fully considered in the production of meaning; such integration problematizes the distinction between practical, intellectual and expressive modes of learning to be often found within education and avoids categorizing learner’s subjectivity into these categories – it therefore corresponds with theories of multiple intelligences (Gardner, 2000) and dual-coding (Clark & Paivio, 1991) which endorse the use of diverse modalities for learning, whilst avoiding the erroneous and reductive trap of reifying learners into categories of preferred learning styles (Pashler et al., 2008). As Stables points out: the distinctions between, say, thought and feeling are not absolute on a semiotic account, for reaction to a situation can involve physical arousal (emotion), the running through of linguistic scripts (reasoning/language) and a combination of these (feeling), yet these are all related. It is a matter of emphasis, not of dividing the curriculum so that each part deals exclusively with one aspect of human response, or even with a neatly defined combination of them. (ibid, p. 30) Notions of learning as a mediated encounter in which concepts emerge within interpretative communities have particular pertinence for 21st-century digital rhizomatic learning environments; such environments have become especially important in the post-covid era where greater emphasis has been placed on remote and asynchronous learning (Lemay et al., 2021). Each technology that transforms our mode of communication and representation also changes and mediates our relationship to knowledge and the generation of meaning. In this sense, the means by which we receive signals transforms our semiotic relationship with the world; as McLuhan (1964) indicates, the form of communication and interaction afforded by different technologies generates a ‘change of scale or pace or pattern that it introduces into human affairs’ (p. 1). If, as we have argued, all meaning is the outcome of semiosis, a process of which we are a part, then the means by which we communicate and interact with signs will also affect our identity; in this sense, our subjectivities are always a hybrid relation mediated by the types of technology we use; as Haraway famously pointed out, ‘we are all chimeras, theorized and fabricated hybrids of machine and organism […a condition that structures] any possibility of historical transformation’ (Haraway, 2016 p. 7). Concurring with Stiegler (1998), Dewar (1998) argues that our technological trajectory changes the primary epistemological ways in which we understand and acquire knowledge – we have moved from being primarily Listeners to Readers to Users. Prior to print, learning and understanding

Semiosis, hybridity and the mediated mind 93 primarily involved listening (to someone read a manuscript or give a lecture) – in such a mode, the spoken word and memorization of knowledge was paramount. In printed culture, people shifted from being listeners to being readers. Reading standardized, reproducible printed material signalled the abandonment of the principle that texts were derivative, corruptible representations of memorized spoken knowledge. In such circumstances, the role of the teacher as the progenitor of knowledge began to be demoted as learning could be undergone increasingly without their presence, privately. Finally, the connected, decentred and less-sequential nature of online digital information requires that we become more interactive users of information and knowledge – in this digital environment, the learner can access information instantaneously and enter into dialogue with others in which to generate meaning and understanding. The form and properties of digital environments require that we actively engage with knowledge rather than passively consume information. As Siemens highlights, [w]e do not consume knowledge as a passive entity that remains unchanged as it moves through our world and our work. We dance and court the knowledge of others – in ways the original creators did not intend. We make it ours, and in so doing, diminish the prominence of the originator. (Siemens, 2006, p. 7) As a consequence, students’ immersion in digital media changes their expectations and learning experience due to it being ‘based on seeking, sieving, and synthesizing, rather than on assimilating a single “validated” source of knowledge as from books, television, or […] lecture’ (Dede, 2005, p. 7). For Downes, knowledge in the digital age is both generated and distributed across a network of connections characterized by ‘diversity, autonomy, openness, and connectivity’ (Downes, 2012, p. 85). These characteristics constitute effective conditions for learning activity within a digital environment: connectivity allows connections to be made between participants and an abundance of information; diversity provides the widest possible spectrum of points of view; autonomy allows participants to recognize and generate new connections; openness allows perspectives to be entered into the system and engaged with by others. Digital learning therefore has a clear affinity with the concept of the rhizome in that it provides an open, decentred and non-linear approach to education in which new emergent meanings and connections can be made; in this sense, it is opposed to knowledge acquisition as self-present truths that have often been emphasized within traditional classroom teaching. Knowledge within digital environments is acquired by navigating a series of nodes, understood as points within an online network in which a plurality of information both intersects and branches out to generate hybrid knowledge. Accordingly, users of digital communication can become ‘nodes’ themselves, equally capable of sharing their knowledge and expertise with other individuals (Kropf, 2013, p. 13). In this regard, digital learning correlates with an edusemiotic approach to education in that students

94  Lee Hazeldine and Aron Spall and teachers enter a mutual non-hierarchical relationship to the creation and interpretation of meaning. Arguably, the notion of learners as nodes themselves within a digital network continues the trajectory of the diminishing role of the traditional teacher, their centrality in the learning process being further undermined by learners’ increasing capacity to actively make their own semiotic connections and meanings within a rhizomatic environment without the didactic interventions from an educator. Edusemiotics therefore might provide the means by which the generation of autonomous, novel and emergent knowledge through the use of digital technology can be understood.

Conclusion Traditional theories and approaches to education that foreground unmediated self-present relationships to knowledge have been found to be anachronistic by failing to reflect the changing status of knowledge in a rapidly evolving environment. A decentred rhizomatic approach to education is arguably more appropriate in that it nurtures emergent ideas, concepts and new meanings beyond fixed, established knowledge; this is achieved by appealing to students’ capacity to mediate between a variety of information and forge new connections – this capacity is increasingly important within a digital world in which citizens need to navigate, negotiate and evaluate constantly evolving information in which to tackle contemporary transdisciplinary questions and problems. Edusemiotics provides a means and method to both facilitate and understand this capacity for learning. With reference to semiosis, edusemiotics outlines how meaning is generated through the mediation of difference within signs via the role of the included middle, the interpretant; this constitutes a continuous process in which new knowledge and understanding is created without resorting to established conceptual frameworks within a metaphysics of presence. By providing the means to generate new meaning through semiosis, edusemiotics equips learners with a sense of agency and consequently provides them with an appreciation of their own active participation in the generation and interpretation of signs; it thus gives students a recognition of the importance of process within learning, as well as an awareness of their own role in self-transformation, development and knowledge creation; it therefore valorizes the unique individual learner in relation to the wider learning community. By recognizing that semiosis is continuous with the biological realm of adaptation, edusemiotics also highlights the importance of sensation beyond mind-language forms of conscious rationality, it therefore expands the notion of what it means to be a learning subject and provides a more integrated consideration of instinctual, emotional, practical and intellectual modes of knowledge within and across disciplines. In summary, edusemiotics therefore provides the means to deterritorialize knowledge and move beyond habitual patterns of thought; such a move allows new hybrid ideas to be generated that are compatible with an increasingly interconnected and transdisciplinary age.

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Semiosis, hybridity and the mediated mind 97 Scherer, M. (2002) Do students care about learning? A conversation with Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, ASCD. Retrieved October 25, 2022, from https://www.ascd. org/el/articles/do-students-care-about-learning-a-conversation-with-mihalycsikszentmihalyi Sebeok, T. A. (2001). Signs: An introduction to semiotics. University of Toronto Press. Semetsky, I. (Ed.) (2010). Semiotics education experience. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers. Semetsky, I. (2014). Taking the edusemiotic turn: A body-mind approach to education. Journal of Philosophy of Education, 48, 490–506. Siemens, G. (2005). Connectivism: A learning theory for a digital age. International Journal of Instructional Technology and Distance Learning, 2(1), 3–10. Siemens, G. (2006). Knowing knowledge. Creative Commons. Siemens, G. (2008). Learning and knowing in networks: Changing roles for educators and designers. Article presented to ITFORUM. Retrieved August 10, 2017, from http://itforum.coe.uga.edu/Paper105/Siemens.pdf St. Pierre, E. A. (2004). Deleuzian concepts for education: The subject undone. Educational Philosophy and Theory, 36(3), 283–296. Stables, A. (2010). Semiosis and the collapse of mind-body dualism: Implications for education. In I. Semetsky (Ed.), Semiotics education experience. Sense Publishers. Stiegler, B. (1998). Technics and time, 1: The fault of Epimetheus. Stanford University Press.

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Rhizomes, nomads, and complexity A new relational pedagogy for the era of networks, social media, and artificial intelligence Alexios Brailas

Introduction Nowadays information is abundant, everything is searchable on the web, and learning resources can be easily located and retrieved online. At the same time, meaningful knowledge results from the active process of filtering, comparing, integrating, and interrelating available resources, while developing new connections of meaning. Today, it becomes more and more evident we need a new conception of learning that shifts the focus from the consumption, or production, of disembodied knowledge to the catalyzation of personal and collective development through and for the formation of meaningful and transformative synergies. Participatory learning communities catalyze that kind of transformative learning. Rhizomatic learning networks, which are the focus of this chapter, are self-organized collectives able to demonstrate emergent properties like novelty and innovation. The rhizomatic conception of learning was popularized as such through the work of Deleuze and Guattari (1987) A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. Inspired by the developmental process of a botanical rhizome (Figure 7.1), in the first chapter of their book, Deleuze and Guattari develop the notion of the philosophical rhizome as an acentric multiplicity, a dynamic network of entities that is always expanding, always developing, and always in the becoming: “the rhizome pertains to a map that must be produced, constructed, a map that is always detachable, connectable, reversible, modifiable, and has multiple entryways and exits and its own lines of flight” (p. 21). The specific sociocultural context in which the rhizome idea emerged is what Manuel Castells (1996) calls the Network Society, the chronotope in Bakhtinian terms of an ever-interconnected global village, an era of exponential growth for digital networks: “while the networking form of social organization has existed in other times and spaces, the new information technology paradigm provides the material basis for its pervasive expansion throughout the entire social structure” (p. 500). The rhizomatic paradigm applied in education (re)locates learning in the web of relationships between a person and the world around them. By shifting the focus from the parts to their interrelation and interdependence, rhizomatic learning can be defined as the process of catalyzing the development of DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378-9

Rhizomes, nomads, and complexity 99

Figure 7.1  “Pando (Latin for I spread out) is a clonal colony of an individual male quaking aspen determined to be a single living organism by identical genetic markers and assumed to have one massive underground root system” Source: Pando (Tree) article, Wikipedia, CC-BY-SA-3.0. In a botanical rhizome, there is no starting or ending point, only an under-the-surface horizontal development of the interconnected root system towards all possible directions. In the case of Pando, what appear to be individual aspen trees above the surface are merely manifestations of the unique underground rhizome.

a dynamic network of knowledgeable agents, which could be human or even artificial or technobiological actors in the present day, along with their learning resources (Figure 7.2). In the words of Deleuze and Guattari (1987), a rhizome “has no beginning or end; it is always in the middle, between things, interbeing, intermezzo … Proceeding from the middle, through the middle, coming and going rather than starting and finishing” (p. 25). In such a view, learning can be understood as a non-linear dynamic process rather than an outcome, as the creative capacity of a learning rhizome to build upon existing resources and further develop, creating new connections, acquiring new nodes, and expanding even further in different directions (Brailas, 2020c). As Lu and Chang point out, knowledge is a dynamic network of interconnections without a beginning nor an end, and without a predefined pattern, “Just like a botanical rhizome such as ginger or crabgrass extends its horizontal stems and shoots from nodes” (pp. 12–13). Learning rhizomes are dynamic networks of transformative possibilities, patterns that are always moving, always rearranging, ever-expanding, always in the becoming. Nevertheless, they manage to maintain every moment their autopoietic unique structure. Castells (1996) describes vividly this dynamic, always in the becoming, nature of the networking organizational form: “Networks are open structures, able to

100  Alexios Brailas expand without limits, integrating new nodes as long as they are able to communicate within the network, namely as long as they share the same communication codes” (p. 501). Fritjof Capra points out that the network pattern is the very defining pattern of life, the way life developed and spread over the whole planet from its beginning. But this refers to the conception of a network as a dynamic process, not as a static structure, or a representational instance like in a printed map. According to Capra and Luisi (2014), the network pattern “is one of the very basic patterns of organization in all living systems. At all levels of life – from the metabolic networks of cells to the food webs of ecosystems – the components and processes of living systems are interlinked in network fashion” (p. 306). Nevertheless, it is the information and communication technologies as manifested through the rise of the Internet that made the existence of this pattern more evident than ever before. Social media intensified social interactions on a global scale making more visible the networking patterns always present in human systems (Gkini & Brailas, 2015; Koletsi et al., 2021). Google’s n-gram viewer is a tool that allows users to search for the appearances of any n-word sequences in the corpus of all digitized published books from the 1800s and onwards. As we can observe by searching for the term rhizomatic (Figure 7.3), it appears only sporadically during the 20th century, while it is increasingly used after 1980, a year that coincides with the publication of the seminal postmodernist work A Thousand Plateaus by Deleuze and Guattari.

Figure 7.2  A networked conception of learning. We could visualize a complex learning rhizome as a performative confluence of human and non-human actors that engages people, resources, processes, and contextual parameters in a transformative dance. In this view, the focus is shifted from the parts to the pattern which connects the parts; the pattern as an autopoietic process that is always in the becoming

Rhizomes, nomads, and complexity 101

Figure 7.3  Graph produced by Google N-grams viewer. The usage of the terms rhizomatic and Internet in the corpus of digitized published books

We can also observe that the use of the term rhizomatic rises in parallel with the term Internet in the published corpus digitized by Google (Figure 7.3). It is just a hypothesis, but maybe Google itself can be understood as a developing learning rhizome trying to achieve an Omega point, the ultimate noosphere in the words of Teilhard de Chardin (Zwart, 2022). In a network conception of learning, learners can be understood as autonomous, while interdependent, nomads who create and traverse their personal learning networks in their own ways in the context of a community of co-learners and in the context of a chaotic external environment of available learning resources and potential developmental pathways. The role of the educator in a rhizomatic ecology of learning is to perturbate rather, instead of directing and controlling participants, in order to facilitate the development of multiple interconnections, new (sub)networks of thinking, and alternative patterns of relating with each other, and with other available non-human nodes and learning resources in an empowering confluence, a co-evolutionary dance (Brailas, 2020c). Nevertheless, it is not the educator that actually teaches the students. The rhizome as a whole becomes an autopoietic learning process, the teaching apparatus, a multiplier of perspectives, and an amplifier of synergies: “the rhizome creates the background, the contextual validity, and the situated meaning for individual actions. By developing learning rhizomes, self-organizing confluences of human and non-human in the becoming, we participate in anotropic performative dances which help us unfold our full living potential” (Brailas, 2020c, p. 313). Confluence is a term used by Kenneth Gergen (2009) to vividly render the dynamic nature of an assemblage in the theoretical framework of Deleuze and Guattari which can refer to “machines or particular arrangements within a context for which pieces of heterogeneous human, material, and nontangible elements, conditions, or forces interact to coproduce something in the process of becoming” (Lu & Chang, 2022, p. 13).

102  Alexios Brailas

Rhizomatic learning as a process of autopoiesis In the networked socio-technological context of the second half of the 20th century, it was inevitable for scholars to be inspired by the network and rhizome concepts and use them as metaphors for learning, trying to apply them in the educational field. In Deschooling Society, Ivan Illich (1971) used the term learning webs to describe a non-hierarchical and non-bureaucratic educational system, a horizontal web-like alternative that provides “all who want to learn with access to available resources at any time in their lives; empower all who want to share what they know to find those who want to learn it from them” (p. 75). Regarding the specific use of the term rhizome/rhizomatic, in a Google Scholar search, we can trace one of the first explicit uses of the composite term rhizomatic learning back in 2003, in the PhD thesis by Harald Kraus (2003) including a section entitled “Rhizomatic Learning: An Introduction?” Kraus calls for a practical application of the rhizome conception in a pedagogy that encourages “lines of flight” instead of preventing them: “the more resources and experiences that are made available, the more chance the learner has of developing a deeper, one might say three-dimensional web of sociocultural associations” (pp. 222–223). In 2004, in the book chapter Technology-enhanced language learning environments: A rhizomatic approach, Andrew Lian describes a learning system for language learning based on postmodern thinking where the process of learning is identified as a process of meaning-making by the individual participants. The power of such an approach to learning “lies not only in each of its parts but particularly in the high level of connectivity between its parts: essentially a rhizomatic approach” (p. 1). In the modern unpredictable world, “to learn implies an act of comprehension which challenges the learner’s personal representational and logical systems … it is an act of violence (in the sense of violating the regularities inferred by the individual on the basis of the past)” (Lian, 2004, p. 3). Lian also highlights the previous work done by Petar Guberina, conceptualizing deafness not as much as a physical deficit of the individual but as having a different pattern for organizing the world in comparison to the neurotypical one. Again, there is here a shift in the focus from the qualities of the parts to the pattern which connects them in the words of Gregory Bateson (1979). In regard to this view, a characteristic example of Batesonian thought is his way of counting the fingers of a hand. Bateson did not focus on the number of the individual fingers (five units) but on the number of relationships between the thumb and the others, a kind of operational definition. Therefore, it is more meaningful to say that an individual has four pairs of fingers in each hand (Bateson, 1972). Lind (2005) highlights the importance of a rhizomatic view on children’s learning focusing on the interplay between visual, verbal, and linguistic patterns: “elements or signs that connect in an unpredictable manner characterise a rhizomatic process. This process is not ruled by a plan for definite goals” (p. 257). Irwin et al. (2006) demonstrate how rhizomatic relationalities drive knowledge development: “theory is no longer an abstract concept but rather an embodied living inquiry, an interstitial relational space for creating, teaching, learning, and

Rhizomes, nomads, and complexity 103 researching in a constant state of becoming … This means theorizing through inquiry, a process that involves an evolution of questions” (p. 71). Sharma (2006) argues that “to propose a ‘rhizomatic pedagogy’ is, in many respects, oxymoronic. The institutional hegemonies and cultural authorities operating in the university space make such an endeavour a precarious activity” (p. 214). In the same direction, Livingston (2000) develops a rhizomatic conception of the curriculum as a medium that encourages learners to produce multiple performances, so as to “affect central power mechanisms, proliferate infinite political thoughts, and shatter the concepts of classes, sexes, gender, and race … to show how everything is indeed ambiguous and what has been created by people can also be uncreated by people” (p. x). Cormier (2008), in his work Rhizomatic education: Community as curriculum, proposes a rhizomatic model of learning where curriculum “is not driven by predefined inputs from experts; it is constructed and negotiated in real time by the contributions of those engaged in the learning process. This community acts as the curriculum, spontaneously shaping, constructing, and reconstructing itself and the subject of its learning” (p. 3). Rhizomatic learning can be experienced as a process of constant adaptation, development, and growth, despite, or because of, the inevitable obstacles confronted: “The rhizomatic flow develops in an unpredictable way and progressively takes shape while continuously avoiding the obstacles it meets. Robustness epitomizes the rhizome” (Bissola et al., 2017, p. 2). Brailas et al. (2017) define rhizomatic pedagogy as an approach where “the learning of the participants depends not so much on their individual action, as on being the coevolving parts of a self-organized whole” (p. 1). Bateson (1979) long before highlighted the importance of the interrelating pattern: “Break the pattern which connects the items of learning and you necessarily destroy all quality” (p. 8). Autopoiesis, a concept initially developed by Varela and Maturana to describe biological systems and further developed by Luhman for social systems, provides a critical ground for understanding rhizomatic learning dynamics. Living systems are autopoietic in the sense that they “continually create, or recreate, themselves by transforming or replacing their components. They undergo continual structural changes while preserving their web-like patterns of organization” (Capra & Luisi, 2014, p. 316). Therefore, a learning rhizome, being as a whole a living dynamical system, would be able to produce or acquire the components it needs to sustain its development. Living systems need to be open to their environment to maintain their function. But at the same time, to preserve their boundaries, their own identity, and organizational autonomy, this openness should not be unconditional. Therefore, a learning rhizome should be operationally closed in the sense that “its self-production (autopoiesis) is a function of production rules and processes by which order and identity are maintained and which cannot be modified directly from outside” (Meyers, 2009, p. 7). A direct pedagogical consequence of the autopoietic nature of learning systems is that a teacher cannot actually “teach” anything to anyone;

104  Alexios Brailas teachers can only perturbate the learning rhizomes of their students to catalyze and facilitate their development. Capra and Luisi (2014) vividly describe this process of perturbation in the theory of autopoiesis: Living systems, then, respond to disturbances from the environment autonomously with structural changes – that is, by rearranging their patterns of connectivity. According to Maturana and Varela, we can never direct a living system; we can only disturb it. More than that, the living system not only specifies its structural changes; it also specifies which disturbances from the environment trigger them. In other words, a living system has the autonomy to decide what to notice and what will disturb it. … As a living organism goes through its individual pathway of structural changes, each of these changes corresponds to a cognitive act, which means that learning and development are merely two sides of the same coin. (p. 256) In this direction, rhizomatic learning networks can be understood as enabling constraints in the sense that Davis et al. (2015) define the term: “The phrase might at first sound like an oxymoron, but it actually refers to a necessary condition for complex emergence. Complex unities are simultaneously rule-bound (constrained) and capable of flexible, unanticipated possibilities (enabled). That is, enabling constraints define a system’s affordances” (p. 219).

Artificial intelligence, singularity, and a meta-learning ecology: The learning rhizome as an anotropic dissipative structure What is the relation among rhizomatic learning, artificial intelligence, and modern networked techno-social spaces? Humans always developed technology to survive, adapt, and evolve in the natural world (Koletsi, 2022; Koskinas, 2018). Nevertheless, today there is a fundamental shift in the qualities of technological development. Artificial intelligence brings a brand-new feature: the ability for technology to evolve and transform by itself. According to many scholars and philosophers, we are approaching a critical threshold, the so-called technological singularity point. Singularity is a term used in Physics for describing black holes in space. Close enough to a black hole there is a point where gravity becomes infinite so as even the light itself cannot escape the gravitational force. Technological singularity usually refers to the scenario in which technological advances would ultimately lead to the rise of infinite artificial intelligence through a chain reaction of self-improvement cycles, a positive feedback loop that constantly reinforces its output (Eden et al., 2012). Vinge (2013) argues that “The acceleration of technological progress has been the central feature of this century. We are on the edge of change comparable to the rise of human life on Earth” (p. 365). Technological

Rhizomes, nomads, and complexity 105 singularity right now is a thought experimentation, a logical argument, a scenario that seems plausible: An artificial intelligence that surpasses human intelligence will trigger the process of technological singularity. If human intelligence is capable of creating an artificial intelligence that surpasses its creators, then this intelligence would, in turn, be able to create an even superior next-generation intelligence. An inevitable positive feedback loop would lead to an exponential intelligence growth rate. (Brailas, 2019, p. 72) Back in 2003, an era characterized by the rise of social media, Ilya Prigogine argued that “The Internet gives us a lot of information and it leads probably to a new form of society but we don’t know what kind of society it will be” (p. 72). According to Prigogine, we were facing a critical tipping point. Modern humans have already acquired cybernetic cognitive extensions in the form of “always carrying with me” smartphones (Brailas & Tsekeris, 2014; Vakali & Brailas, 2018). If we combine the cybernetic-enhanced biological self with the rise of the network society, and the development of ubiquitous artificial intelligent actors, would it be possible for this unprecedented combination to trigger the emergence of a complex techno-social distributed intelligence? Can we think of the techno-social rhizome as a new kind of distributed brain? After all, the biological human brain is itself a vast network of interconnected neurons that is always in the becoming (through neuronal plasticity), a kind of a neuronal rhizome, an acentric multiplicity where consciousness and mind rise as emergent properties of the complex whole: “the mind is a process that emerges from the distributed nervous system extending throughout the entire body, and also from the communication patterns that occur within relationships” (Siegel, 2012, p. 3). In the middle of the 20th century, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (a paleontologist, theologian, philosopher, and catholic priest) placed a strong emphasis on the coevolution and the transformative interrelation between the biosphere and the human culture. He introduced the concept of the Omega point as an ultimate state of biocultural development for the whole universe, a state of maximum evolutionary complexity and consciousness (Teilhard de Chardin, 1947). The term Omega is symbolic as it is the last letter in the Greek alphabet and also appears in a phrase in the book of revelation to describe God: “I am the Alpha and the Omega”. So, the concept of the Omega point bears a profound teleological symbolism. Teilhard is credited with having anticipated the development of the internet, the network society, the Anthropocene, and the Gaia theory (Brailas, 2019; Zwart, 2022). Teilhard emphasized the combination of technological and biocultural evolution. He identified computers and networks as the two key ingredients for developing a kind of rhizomatic network that finally took the form of the Internet (Vidal, 2021). Teilhard further developed Vladimir Vernadsky’s concept of the noosphere and connect it with his teleological concept of the Omega point. Teilhard viewed the ultimate rise of the noosphere as a

106  Alexios Brailas kind of superorganism, the inevitable result of the accelerating human technocultural development (Vidal, 2021). Teilhard’s noosphere can be understood today as the ultimate developmental phase of the global techno-bio-cultural rhizome, a distributed superorganism in the sense of being one evolving networked whole with emergent properties: Isn’t bizarre how in just two decades we gained a new extension to ourselves, an object with which we have more skin-to-skin contact than anything or anyone else in our lives? And what will happen in the next two decades or more? Will we acquire more such extensions and become complete cyborgs, or is there another direction to go in? I already noticed that our senses are gradually being altered by technological developments. Take our sense of distance, for example; it is obvious that the physical location of our body is no longer a barrier to communicating and interacting with people from other parts of the world. Considering the speed with which the enhancement of our bodily functions is taking place, it may well lead to the complete replacement of our senses by new and advanced ones in the near future. (Vishnevskaia, 2018) In the introduction of this chapter, we defined rhizomatic learning networks as spontaneous self-organized collectives able to demonstrate emergent properties like novelty and innovation. We argued that in a rhizomatic conception of learning, learners can be understood as autonomous, while interdependent, nomads creating and traversing their personal learning networks in their own ways in the context of a community of co-learners/co-travellers and in the context of a chaotic external environment of virtually infinite available learning resources and potential pathways. We also argued that the role of the educator in a rhizomatic ecology of learning is to perturbate rather, instead of directing, participants in order to create alternative connections, new (sub)networks of thinking, and new patterns of relating with each other, and with other non-human nodes, and learning resources in an empowering confluence, a co-evolutionary dance. We continued suggesting that by developing learning rhizomes, self-organizing confluences of human and non-human in the becoming, we participate in performative dances which help us unfold our full living potential. Teilhard de Chardin (1960) noted that evolution is the “general condition to which all other theories, all hypotheses, all systems must bow and which they must satisfy henceforward if they are to be thinkable and true. Evolution is a light illuminating all facts, a curve that all lines must follow” (p. 219). What would be the effect of artificial intelligence agents entering this kind of evolutionary dance? The idea of self-organization and evolution of life itself seems to be an oxymoron in the context of an ever-entropic universe condemned to disorganization, deterioration, a thermodynamic death. Teilhard de Chardin passed away in 1955 being “exiled” by the official church in China and prohibited from publishing his work. After his death, the publication of his works inspired the world scientific community, especially in the fields of cybernetics,

Rhizomes, nomads, and complexity 107 complex systems, information theory, and Internet studies (Kreisberg, 1995). A few years later in 1977, Ilya Prigogine, a physics and chemist scientist, became a Nobel laureate for his work on dissipative structures, far from the equilibrium dynamic systems, and the irreversibility of chemical processes. Later, Prigogine developed an epistemology for complex living systems, demonstrating how life is possible in an entropic context. Living organisms sustain their structure and further develop by being open enough to dissipate their excessive entropy in the environment and taking in valuable information that allows them to selforganize and evolve (Prigogine & Stengers, 1997). “There is something special about life in general and human existence in particular … whereas the general movement in the universe is towards entropy and dissipation, life evolves in a juxtaposed direction, ascending towards complexity: life as ‘negative entropy’” (Zwart, 2022, p. 215). Anotropy, literally meaning in Greek moving (tropi) upward (ano), was a term introduced by George Vassiliou back in the 1970s to refer to negentropy, avoiding the double negative connotation in the term (Polemi-Todoulou, 2018; Vassiliou & Vassiliou, 1985). Anotropy refers to the inherent ability of living systems to self-organize and develop towards more complex forms, against entropy and the second law of thermodynamics (Brailas, 2020c). What Teilhard brought to the philosophy of science, among others, was a teleological belief in a better, more anotropic (aka negentropic) future. Teilhard argued that the ultimate evolutionary goal “is not the attainment of maximum entropy as assumed by physical science, but the attainment of maximum consciousness. Chardin maintains that the increase in entropy is just necessary payment to achieve this goal” (Gowan, 2014). In the context of the work of Teilhard de Chardin and Ilya Prigogine, learning rhizomes can be realized as social dissipative structures able to demonstrate self-organization and emergence amid an entropic, always degrading (at least in energy terms), environment. Would the introduction of artificial agents in learning rhizomes will catalyze further their developmental processes, and towards what direction? Prigogine answers: who knows? The future is not given (Prigogine, 2003). We already live in a world where technology, artificial intelligence, society, and culture create a brand new techno-social space, a unique generative combination of elements (Brailas & Tsekeris, 2014). Nevertheless, in a complex systems epistemology, life should not be considered a mechanical automaton with a predefined telos, “artificial intelligence and humans form a bio-techno-social system, and the evolution of the participating actors in this complex super-organism depends upon their individual action, as well as upon each actor being a coevolving part of a self-organized whole” (Brailas, 2019, p. 75). Ivan Illich (1971) suggests that “technology is available to develop either independence and learning or bureaucracy and teaching” (p. 77). As Julian Huxley (1960) points out, Teilhard “is able to envisage the whole of knowable reality not as a static mechanism but as a process” (p. 11). In the terms of the present work, we try to envisage pedagogy not as an attempt to convey a static body of knowledge, but as catalyzing the process of developing learning rhizomes, anotropic islands in an entropic sea, performative wholes that

108  Alexios Brailas are always in the becoming and evolving. This is about facilitating the development of learning webs in the words of Ivan Illich, learning rhizomes that allow the generation of new forms, constantly reaching out for creativity and novelty (Capra & Luisi, 2014). We build generative, meaningful processes of relating and co-creating by improvising from within the enabling relational space of a learning collective (Bava, 2020).

The call for a new pedagogy for the 21st century John Dewey (1938), in his work Experience and Education, contrasts traditional with progressive education. In traditional education, Dewey argues, “The subject- matter of education consists of bodies of information and of skills that have been worked out in the past; therefore, the chief business of the school is to transmit them to the new generation” (p. 17). As Ivan Illich (1971) points out in Deschooling Society “Everywhere the hidden curriculum of schooling initiates the citizen to the myth that bureaucracies guided by scientific knowledge are efficient and benevolent. Everywhere this same curriculum instills in the pupil the myth that increased production will provide a better life” (p. 74). This more is better, faster is better, and me first mentality (Capra, 2003) lies behind the ecological and cultural crises we face in the modern world: “an unprecedented set of challenges that cannot be addressed by any of us individually. Climate change, the overexploitation of environmental resources, financial crises, war, violence, poverty, and affronts to basic human rights and needs raise calls to action” (Brailas et al., 2017b, p. 1). Today we are faced with the so-called wicked problems which are social, cultural, ecological, or other complex challenges that are difficult to cope with and find sustainable solutions through linear, symptoms-oriented, thinking (Brailas, 2021b). Despite the ineffectiveness of linear interventions and ad hoc solutions that address only the symptoms avoiding coping with the complicity of the modern challenges, “schools are designed on the assumption that there is a secret to everything in life; that the quality of life depends on knowing that secret; that secrets can be known only in orderly successions; and that only teachers can properly reveal these secrets” (Illich, 1971, p. 76). This is a kind of utopic wishful thinking that “technology and science alone, like a new Deus ex machina, would ultimately save us from any problematic situation we would ever face, and from any possible catastrophe we would ever confront” (Brailas, 2021b, p. 1). Unfortunately, traditional educational systems promote a “thinking inside the box” mentality: students are expected to know and provide the right answers for already well-known problems. As von Foerster (1972) explains, “tests are devices to establish a measure of trivialization. A perfect score in a test is indicative of perfect trivialization: the student is completely predictable and thus can be admitted into society. He will cause neither any surprises nor any trouble” (von Foerster, 1972, p. 41). How can we prepare students to cope with unprecedented challenges? How can we prepare students to address wicked problems? How to educate for

Rhizomes, nomads, and complexity 109 sustainability and well-being? Nothing can be done for the students without the students (Hoskins, 2020). In a rhizomatic learning approach, resilience, sustainability, and innovation are not qualities of individuals but emerge through their synergies and emerge as qualities of an entire community (Brailas, 2020b). As social beings, “outside schools, the ability to work with others is critical to the strength of communities and to meeting the challenges we collectively face. Yet, in many schools, young people largely work on their own; they learn in groups but not as groups” (Robinson, 2011, p. 138). Despite today’s technological advances in communication technologies and the increased technological literacy of people, especially during the pandemic years, “we confront a world in which the world’s peoples are both closer together and further apart than ever before” (Gergen, 2020, p. 12). Education can be a starting point for initiating a change. Schools should be relational communities that create optimal conditions for learning, by supporting, facilitating, and encouraging participants in their inquiry towards personal and collective flourishing and well-being (Lewis, 2020). In an appreciative relational community, participants develop a rich set of social-emotional skills, learn to recognize diverse perspectives, and experience how different, and often competing, ideas may be turned into a process of co-creation (Brailas, 2021a). To design thriving learning communities, we first need to understand how nature sustains and promotes life itself. Studying the long history of human evolution, we realize that sustainability is not an individual attribute but an element of a whole web of relationships, as it always includes an entire community. This is the deepest lesson we are called to receive from nature. The way to sustain life is to develop and support communities (Capra, 2003). The principles for designing our future educational institutions must be in line with the organizational principles that nature evolved to develop and maintain the fabric of life. Social constructionism argues that knowledge cannot exist outside of a web of relationships and, therefore, knowledge production in a classroom is a community achievement: “learning no longer takes place in the mind of the individual learner; it is the result of relationships between teachers and learners, between learners themselves and between the classroom and its community” (Dragonas, 2020, p. 314). Consequently, education’s primary goal should be to facilitate the development of learning communities where students can engage in meaningful relational activities with their peers and the world outside (Brailas et al., 2015). Education is the process of creating opportunity webs (Illich, 1971), networks, and rhizomes. Back in 1974, Ivan Illich proposed a kind of rhizomatic learning pedagogy “where networks replace hierarchies, where interaction displaces centralized control, where the agency of learners is balanced with the expertise teachers, where complementary knowledge of peers is brought to bear, and where knowledge emerges from differentiated and distributed sources” (Cope & Kalantzis, 2022, p. 25). In this direction, the goal of a learning community should be to facilitate collaborative learning processes where gradually the students themselves, as learning nomads, lead their learning and cocreate knowledge within their networks (Figure 7.4) (Brailas et al., 2017a; Dole, 2020).

110  Alexios Brailas

Figure 7.4  R hizomatic vs hierarchical pedagogy. The potential number of relations nurtured is n(n – 1)/2 vs n – 1 in a hierarchical learning approach. For example, in a peer learning community with 10 members (where all participants are treated as active actors able to contribute to the knowledge production), all the horizontal possible connections are 45 (vs nine if one of the members assumes the absolute authority to deliver knowledge and the rest nine assume a passive/consumer role)

Regarding the role of the teacher in such rhizomatic learning ecology, we can illuminate it through the gardener metaphor. A gardener has to take care of a living ecosystem. A gardener cannot secure the flourishing of their garden, but careful gardening is usually followed by a flourishing garden. We can’t control the process, but we can attempt to create the optimal conditions for something beautiful to emerge. And this is a helpful metaphor for the teacher’s role in an anotropic pedagogy as “knowledge democracies require continuous and ongoing effort to bring about what is possible in the present moment while maintaining what is vibrant and desired” (Lewis, 2020, p. 322). Nevertheless, this is about a mutual development process, a coevolution of both the gardener and their plants (Figure 7.5). When teachers start teaching for the first time, they quickly come to realize that they change and evolve themselves along with their students. Teachers and their students form the learning rhizomes of their classes, dialogic spaces for personal and collective development. As a rhizome is always in a process of reciprocal determination with its context, education bears the potential to create bridges between people and their environments, to perturbate and gradually transform the world. In an era of increased screen time, immersion in virtual worlds, and a sedentary way of living and being (Kohorst et al., 2018), nomadic pedagogy should be an embodied pedagogy of moving and relating, an experiential learning process that locates the students and their teachers in a web of enabling relationships with each other and with the world around. We can learn things only by being embodied nomads developing and traversing our own unique learning rhizomes (Brailas, 2020a), “we can understand things only by handling them, by moving them, by moving our own body” (Clarke & Hansen, 2009, p. 31). Equilibrium exists only in action according to Simone Weil (Sharp, 1984). In the end, is there

Rhizomes, nomads, and complexity 111

Figure 7.5  The rhizome as a multicolour dialogue, a process of co-development. If we observe carefully, we can identify living forms (abstract faces of people and animals) as they emerge from this colourful rhizome. Despite the individual forms that can be spotted, there is only one rhizome in the background that at the same time gives shape and blurs those individual forms Source: Collective in-class drawing to represent the rhizome concept by students participating in the course Systems Theory, Psychology and Social Media, Panteion University, 2021–22 cohort (Image used with permission).

any form of learning that is not actually rhizomatic? Life, from the very beginning, did not take this planet by combat but by synergies (Capra, 2010), and the different other becomes a prerequisite for my own existence and development (Bakhtin, 1984), as well as for maintaining the diversity and sustainability of human communities (Lugo, 2020). Learning was always rhizomatic as “mental life is not just affected by synaptic connections in the brain, but extends beyond the skull; it is both embodied and relational” (Siegel, 2012, p. 41). However, we argue that there is something you can realize, understand, and take advantage of, only if you look at it as a living rhizome, and this is something educators should take advantage of in those turbulent times ahead.

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Rhizomes, nomads, and complexity 113 Cormier, D. (2008). Rhizomatic education: Community as curriculum. Innovate: Journal of Online Education, 4(5), Article 2. Davis, B., Sumara, D., & Luce-Kapler, R. (2015). Engaging minds: Cultures of education and practices of teaching. Routledge. Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F. (1987). A thousand plateaus: Capitalism and schizophrenia. University of Minnesota Press. Dewey, J. (1938). Experience and education. Kappa Delta Pi. Dole, D. (2020). Collaborative, appreciative, and experiential pedagogy in educational settings. In S. McNamee, M. M. Gergen, C. Camargo-Borges, & E. F. Rasera (Eds.), The Sage handbook of social constructionist practice (1st ed.). SAGE Inc. Dragonas, T. (2020). Education as relational process and practice: Introduction. In S. McNamee, M. M. Gergen, C. Camargo-Borges, & E. F. Rasera (Eds.), The Sage handbook of social constructionist practice (1st ed.). SAGE Inc. Eden, A. H., Steinhart, E., Pearce, D., & Moor, J. H. (2012). Singularity hypotheses: An overview. In A. H. Eden, J. H. Moor, J. H. Søraker, & E. Steinhart (Eds.), Singularity hypotheses: A scientific and philosophical assessment (pp. 1–12). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-32560-1_1 Gergen, K. J. (2009). Relational being: Beyond self and community. Oxford University Press. Gergen, K. J. (2020). Constructionist theory and the blossoming of practice. In S. McNamee, M. M. Gergen, C. Camargo-Borges, & E. F. Rasera (Eds.), The Sage handbook of social constructionist practice (1st ed.). SAGE Inc. Gkini, C., & Brailas, A. (2015). Visualizations of personal social networks on Facebook and community structure: An exploratory study. European Journal of Social Behaviour, 2(1), 21–30. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.237086 Gowan, J. A. (2014). Teilhard de Chardin—Prophet of the Information Age. http:// www.johnagowan.org/chardin.html Hoskins, M. L. (2020). Community building from a social constructionist lens. In S. McNamee, M. M. Gergen, C. Camargo-Borges, & E. F. Rasera (Eds.), The Sage handbook of social constructionist practice (1st ed.). SAGE Inc. Huxley, J. (1960). Introduction. In P. Teilhard de Chardin, The phenomenon of man, with an introd. By Sir Julian Huxley. Collins. Illich, I. (1971) Deschooling society. Harper & Row. Irwin, R. L., Beer, R., Springgay, S., Grauer, K., Xiong, G., & Bickel, B. (2006). The rhizomatic relations of A/r/tography. Studies in Art Education, 48(1), 70–88. https://doi.org/10.1080/00393541.2006.11650500 Kohorst, M. A., Warad, D. M., Nageswara Rao, A. A., & Rodriguez, V. (2018). Obesity, sedentary lifestyle, and video games: The new thrombophilia cocktail in adolescents. Pediatric Blood & Cancer, 65(7), e27041. https://doi.org/10.1002/ pbc.27041 Koletsi, M. (2022). Psychology and cybernetics. Homo Virtualis, 5(1), 1–11. https:// doi.org/10.12681/homvir.30312 Koletsi, M., Sfakianos, N., Papadopoulou, A., Karras, D., Vagias, G., & Koskinas, K. (2021). Virtually together: Developing a local social network for neighborhoods. Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society, 41(1), 10–19. https://doi.org/10.1177/ 02704676211009131 Koskinas, K. (2018). Editorial: Homo virtualis inaugural issue. Homo Virtualis, 1(1), 1–3. https://doi.org/10.12681/homvir.18621

114  Alexios Brailas Kraus, H. (2003). Creating histories and spaces of meaningful use: Toward a framework of foreign language teaching with an emphasis on culture, epistemology and ethical pedagogy. University of Canberra. Kreisberg, J. C. (1995, June). A globe, clothing itself with a brain. Wired. https:// www.wired.com/1995/06/teilhard/ Lewis, R. E. (2020). Lifescaping: Cultivating flourishing school cultures. In S. McNamee, M. M. Gergen, C. Camargo-Borges, & E. F. Rasera (Eds.), The Sage handbook of social constructionist practice (1st ed.). SAGE Inc. Lian, A. (2004). Technology-enhanced language-learning environments: A rhizomatic approach. In J. B. Son (Ed.), Computer-assisted language learning: Concepts, contexts and practices (pp. 1–20). iUniverse. Lind, U. (2005). Identity and power, ‘Meaning’, gender and age: Children’s creative work as a signifying practice. Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, 6(3), 256–268. https://doi.org/10.2304/ciec.2005.6.3.6 Livingston, D. R. (2000). Wondering about a future generation: A Deleuzian perspective on curriculum. [Georgia Suuthern]. https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern. edu/etd_legacy/145 Lu, L., & Chang, H.-M. (2022). Rhizomatic encounters with inter/transmedia art: a pedagogy for learning and teaching experiential contemporary art. Studies in Art Education, 63(1), 9–24. https://doi.org/10.1080/00393541.2021.2007726 Lugo, V. (2020). Relational community practices for transitional societies. In S. McNamee, M. M. Gergen, C. Camargo-Borges, & E. F. Rasera (Eds.), The Sage handbook of social constructionist practice (1st ed.). SAGE Inc. Meyers, R. A. (Ed.). (2009). Encyclopedia of complexity and systems science. Springer. Polemi-Todoulou, M. (2018). Vassiliou, George and Vasso. In J. Lebow, A. Chambers, & D. C. Breunlin (Eds.), Encyclopedia of couple and family therapy (pp. 1–5). Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-15877-8_955-1 Prigogine, I. (2003). Is future given? World Scientific. Prigogine, I., & Stengers, I. (1997). The end of certainty. Time, chaos, and the new laws of nature. Free Press. Robinson, K. (2011). Out of our minds: Learning to be creative. Wiley. Sharma, S. (2006). Teaching diversity—Im/Possible pedagogy. Policy Futures in Education, 4(2), 203–216. https://doi.org/10.2304/pfie.2006.4.2.203 Sharp, A. M. (1984). Work and education in the thought of SImone Weil. Paedagogica Historica, 24(2), 493–515. https://doi.org/10.1080/0030923840240206 Siegel, D. J. (2012). The developing mind: How relationships and the brain interact to shape who we are (2nd ed.). Guilford Press. Teilhard de Chardin, P. (1947). The Formation of the Noosphere. https://www. organism.earth/library/document/formation-of-the-noosphere Teilhard de Chardin, P. (1960). The phenomenon of man, with an introd. By Sir Julian Huxley. Collins. Vakali, E., & Brailas, A. (2018). “Me and my students’ smartphones in the classroom”: A case study using arts-based methods. Homo Virtualis, 1(1), 35–52. https://doi.org/10.12681/homvir.19070 Vassiliou, G. A., & Vassiliou, V. G. (1985). Developing jointly with the family system the therapeutic process by using analogic communication. In P. Pichot, P. Berner, R. Wolf, & K. Thau (Eds.), Psychiatry the state of the art: Volume 4. Psychotherapy and psychosomatic medicine (pp. 85–88). Springer US. https://doi. org/10.1007/978-1-4684-4697-5_15

Rhizomes, nomads, and complexity 115 Vidal, C. (2021). Pierre Teilhard de Chardin: A visionary in controversy. History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences, 43(4), 125. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40656021-00475-7 Vinge, V. (2013). Technological singularity. In M. More & N. Vita-More (Eds.), The transhumanist reader (1st ed., pp. 365–375). Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1002/ 9781118555927.ch35 Vishnevskaia, N. (2018). Omega Point [Thesis, Royal Academy of Art]. https://kabk. github.io/go-theses-18-natalia-vishnevskaia/ von Foerster, H. (1972). Perception of the future and the future of perception. Instructional Science, 1(1), 31–43. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00053969 Zwart, H. (Ed.) (2022). Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s phenomenology of the noosphere. In Continental philosophy of technoscience (Vol. 38, pp. 207–227). Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-84570-4_7

Part III

Pedagogical approaches and rhizomatic learning in action

8

Rhizomatic learning systems and precision language education A perfect match Andrew-Peter Lian and Punyathon Sangarun

Introduction This is primarily a conceptual paper that will partially retrace our journey along the rhizomatic path before engaging the topic of precision language education. Our focus on the intellectual matches our perception that, at this stage of its development, the pedagogic rhizome remains primarily concerned with the definition of high-level overarching structures rather than with issues of detail. Once these structures have reached a sufficient level of development and have been implemented more widely, they will provide successful frameworks for a more detailed activity. Although we will exemplify some of the principles of rhizomatic learning through a focus on language learning, the ideas developed here can be transferred to other contexts. Our path to the rhizome did not occur as a result of our discovery of Deleuze and Guattari (1987) followed by the pedagogic adoption of the rhizome. Instead, it emerged from separate and independent pedagogic reflection (Lian, 2000, 2004) that was discovered, post facto, to be consistent and convergent with the principles of the rhizome, hence the rhizomatic label, and its immediate incorporation into our model. In this discussion we take the view that rhizomatic learning systems are essentially individual constructions created by the learner though socially influenced, but not to be confused with David Cormier’s notion of “community as curriculum” (Cormier, 2008). The act of learning is ultimately individual though supported when needed by social systems, and knowledge does not exist outside the individual: it is always constructed internally as the result of an act of meaning-making (Lian & Sussex, 2018, pp. 41–42). In this context, the notion of curriculum is not relevant. At the end of the day, apparent contradictions are able to coexist comfortably within the rhizomatic paradigm because the essence of rhizomatic learning is characterized by openness and lack of prescription together with ultimate responsiveness to students’ real needs. Consequently, rhizomatic learning systems are dynamic, non-hierarchical, exploratory, consultative, nomadic, supportive, and, necessarily, resource-rich (both human and other resources). Currently, there are multiple convergent factors in the collective unconscious of modern society that justify the growing inclination for rhizomatic learning models and personalized DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378-11

120  Andrew-Peter Lian and Punyathon Sangarun solutions such as the quasi-automatic personalization of do-it-yourself solutions occasioned by the growth of technology and the availability of search engines such as Google (see the Google effect, Sparrow et al., 2011) and YouTube. In fact, nowadays, because of technological developments everybody expects to find or receive personalized solutions to problems and needs on a just-in-time basis (Riel, 2000), the essence of rhizomatic systems. Our conceptualization of the pedagogic basis of rhizomatic systems emerges from a profound concern with the act of learning: a fundamental human trait. It finds its source in an obvious reality of the learning process that is often unacknowledged or at least often ignored by mainstream educational practice: each person is different and, therefore, each person learns differently not only in a general sense but in every minute, precise, detail of their learning experience. In other words, learning is intensely personal. It cannot be done on your behalf by someone else and while some problems may be “shared”, their precise manifestations and their solutions are likely to vary from person to person and moment to moment. This is not to say that the issue of personalization is not widely discussed in the teaching profession – it is just not dealt with adequately. Plenty of teachers/educationists talk about personalization but implementation of personalization and responsibility for personalization is generally placed in the hands of teachers who are told that they must learn to “know” their students well so as to meet their needs by providing tailored feedback, “carefully” modifying courses and to structure all aspects of the learning experience, etc. They are the teacher, and, by definition, they are responsible for everything. The problem is that the determination of learners’ needs tends to be far too superficial, as teachers can never get to know their students to the necessary depth. They can know some things (and some will be useful), but the level of knowledge required for a genuinely personal understanding of a person’s learning needs far exceeds their capabilities (anyone’s capabilities). In effect, such an understanding would require living in the students’ minds as and when they experience problems, difficulties and needs from moment to moment. And moment to moment knowledge at such an intimate level is simply not available: we are not telepaths and cannot blend our minds with those of others and permanently monitor their activities and feelings (Star Trek-style as in the Vulcan mindmeld). Even if such blending were available, there simply would not be enough time for each teacher to monitor and attend to each student’s needs especially in today’s mass market, assuming that teachers actually did happen to have solutions for all the different needs experienced, a highly unlikely event. In this context, and despite all the good will in the world, teacher-controlled personalization is just too superficial and insufficient. From our perspective then, a pedagogic need is not something that is amenable to external observation. A pedagogic need is a feeling experienced by students when grappling with a task that they are unable to perform. It emerges from the collision between student and task – and this is something that can be experienced only by students. This reality is unacknowledged even today as much (not all) of the pedagogic effort in educational establishments continues to be expended in trying to create homogeneous learning environments

Rhizomatic learning systems and precision language education 121 for learners rather than acknowledging the fundamental lack of homogeneity of groups’ real (rather than teacher-imagined) learning needs, and welcoming, valuing and benefiting from heterogeneity. From the above it can be seen that individuals learn differently in unpredicted and unpredictable ways according to the needs of the moment, experience difficulties in accomplishing tasks that may be substantially different from those of others, with these differences not occurring uniformly even across supposedly homogeneous populations and with teachers generally unable to help at the deeply personal level typically required. The following quote from Lian (2004, p. 4) will summarize: […] “Our objective is to create facilities which make it possible for different perspectives to collide and for the participants to explore forms of legitimation in terms of which they construct and enact reality” (Lian, A. B., 2003). To be consistent with this statement, (language) learning systems need to create opportunities for collisions between individuals’ internal systems of understanding and rich language activities. Consequences of this are: a Learners’ needs, predicted, unpredicted (and unpredictable) will be made visible. These needs result from the attempts of individuals (and their individual histories) to cope with the tasks at hand. b Because needs are unpredicted, unpredictable, involving infinite combinations of mutually reinforcing modalities and thus very likely to be different from one learner to the other, it is not logically possible to offer a sequenced (or externally scaffolded) intervention strategy capable of simultaneously meeting the needs of all. Entry points to solving individual problems are likely to be different from person to person. This means that the notion of a tree-like [i.e. predetermined] structure for determining a learner’s path through a learning system is not optimal. A more interesting approach would be to try and create a learning system based on the notion of the rhizome i.e. a set of conditions which allows for multiple, non-hierarchical entry and exit points in data representation and interpretation (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, pp. 6–7). This is the very antithesis of a [pre-sequenced] tree structure. A rhizomatic structure can be thought of as a structure which contains components where each and every component is connected to each and every other component of the (living and potentially infinite) structure. In a learning structure it means that learners are able to connect from any activity or information point to any other activity or information point according to perceived need. A rhizomatic structure should not be thought of as chaotic but rather as a self-regulating structure responsive to the learners’ needs as determined by the mechanisms in place (human or otherwise) for determining such needs. The question now is: “How could the conditions above be met?”, specifically how to “create opportunities for collisions between individuals’ internal systems

122  Andrew-Peter Lian and Punyathon Sangarun of understanding and rich language activities” (Lian, 2004, p. 4). Clearly a trigger is needed. The best trigger is one that initiates the process and then allows the rhizome to perform its task as will be discussed below. We will review possible triggers and then discuss the workings of the rhizome in more detail.

Triggers Many triggers are possible. The best triggers are those that are non-directive or minimally directive. Importantly, these triggers can provide a bridge between the rhizome and traditional approaches to learning and facilitate the integration of the apparently subversive rhizome with well-established (i.e. non-subversive) processes. Examples from the language education area include project-based learning (Thomas, 2000), task-based learning (Willis, 1996) and macrosimulations (Lian & Mestre, 1985; Lian & Moore, 2014). All three are based on the notion of engaging learners in complex real-life or realistic communicative activity requiring a multitude of skills to perform and, if properly constructed, avoiding predetermined or at least over-determined syllabi. In their most valuable modes, they consist of a task definition (a “big” goal) which learners can complete using whatever means at their disposal. This is consistent with the rhizomatic paradigm and fulfils the role of trigger as defined here. Basically, the learner is given an objective or decides on their own objective and then they are tasked with achieving it using whatever means at their disposal. It is important to notice here that the rhizome can be connected to perfectly traditional language teaching approaches. It is not as far-fetched as people sometimes like to think.

Workings of the rhizome Emerging from the quote above (Lian, 2004, p. 4) is the understanding that pre-sequenced teacher-led activities for solving learners’ problems are no longer possible. Consequently, alternative support structures need to be found if learners are to be helped. These structures will necessarily be dynamic as they must vary according to circumstances. This will inevitably result in uncertainty of many kinds and both students and teachers (if any) will have to learn to live with the potential discomfort of uncertainty: the (deceptive) security of the syllabus is no longer there. The best solution to this problem appears to be to place the responsibility for learning in the hands of the learners as, arguably, they are best placed to understand and therefore to look after themselves. They can then act on their perceptions of need with whatever solutions they prefer in light of the support and other resources available (including teachers). While in a traditional class such resources are often provided in the form of textbooks (sometimes solely in the form of textbook), in a rhizomatic environment, learners can access whatever they can find and deem useful, whenever, wherever and however they wish. Typically, these resources will still include textbooks but will also include digital

Rhizomatic learning systems and precision language education 123

Figure 8.1  Fragment of a rhizomatic system

or multimodal resources, possibly organized in sophisticated, searchable, databases, as well as virtual and human networks (including teachers and other learners) and even professional and research organizations. Materials can be either specifically pedagogic (designed as learning aids) or of a more general everyday nature, e.g. Google or YouTube. They only need to be perceived as useful. No prescription in terms of access or content or approach is imposed. Students can access the help and support of their preference as when and if they require it according to their perceptions (Figure 8.1). It is entirely under their control and might perhaps be configured as shown below (where a substantial amount of explicitly pedagogic support is provided and where every node is connected to every other node).1 A concern that is often voiced with this arrangement is the general belief that students, on their own, are not able to make good pedagogic decisions. While that may be true for some, research is also showing that students are in fact able to decide for themselves, often without any special training, what will work for them and what will help them achieve their objectives. Doctoral and other studies conducted recently at Suranaree University of Technology have shown that with minimal or no explicit training students can dispense with the support of a teacher provided they have access to good resources and are encouraged to exercise pedagogic initiative. In general, they make good decisions and achieve good progress. Examples of this include the study, at university level,

124  Andrew-Peter Lian and Punyathon Sangarun of English for tourism (Parnkul et al., 2020), university English writing skills (Chaiwiwatrakul & Sangarun, 2016) and the pronunciation of English (He & Sangarun, 2015) by Chinese university learners of English. This outcome, where autonomous students can learn successfully quite independently of teachers or curricular structure, is also consistent with Sugata Mitra’s Self-Organizing Learning Environment (SOLEs) (Mitra & Dangwal, 2010; Mitra et al., 2003) in yet another manifestation of the rhizomatic convergence of the moment, though Mitra makes no reference to rhizomes. In his context, e.g. the hole in the wall experiments in India, young children, not adults, are able to solve significant learning problems by seeking the solutions to big questions with just the help of the Internet and some encouragement (but no explicit teaching) by adults. Equally successful appear to be young students in the Sudbury Valley school system (Greenberg et al., 2005). Of course, enabling students to be autonomous and giving them the freedom to analyse their difficulties and to learn to make decisions about their difficulties and learning processes do not mean that they will choose to remain alone and unsupported. They can seek help whenever and wherever they want to. A rhizomatic structure does not forbid consultation with teachers or anyone else, expert or otherwise. On the contrary, such support is an integral part of any rhizomatic structure. In summary, then, learners appear quite able to make good decisions about their learning provided they are given freedom, resources and adequate time (assuming, of course, that they want to learn). Having said that, the fact that learners can make good decisions based on experience and intuition does not mean that these decisions cannot be improved. Intuition is based on learners’ belief systems, and these belief systems may be mistaken or represent uninformed views on the learning process. Findings from research can be used to improve their decision-making. For instance, there is a commonly held belief that in the learning of pronunciation vowel and consonant sounds are separate from and more important than prosodic features such as intonation, rhythm and stress and that they need to be addressed first. There is also a strong belief that the primary, natural, obvious, way of addressing this problem is through articulatory descriptions involving diagrammatic representations of vowel articulation using vowel quadrilaterals and the like. This belief and variations on that are entrenched in the dogma of the language-teaching field though it is not universally held to be true. In fact, there is a strong research evidence that an initial focus on prosodic features will be more beneficial and will correct most if not all vowel and consonant sounds as prosody not phonemes has a holistic impact on pronunciation as a whole (Garcia, 2018, p. 261). After proper prosodic training, only a small number of residual vowel and consonant problems should remain, and these can be addressed discretely. This is because the correct tensions and articulatory features of prosody will be automatically transferred to the individual sounds as both prosody and individual sounds are produced simultaneously by the same articulatory mechanism. So, any learners who believe that they have pronunciation issues should first check on the status of their prosodic mastery before deciding whether or not to intervene directly on vowel sounds or whether it

Rhizomatic learning systems and precision language education 125 might not be better to work on their prosody first and reassess the status of their vowels and consonants on completion of that training. Should the problem persist, they should seek help for vowels and consonants. While the research supports the viewpoint just mentioned, it still has to make inroads into the belief systems of most teachers and the general public who will continue to make use of an outdated thinking paradigm. Making this research finding public, by way of information rather than prescription, will help learners decide how to address pronunciation issues. Findings such as these need to be drawn to learners’ attention so as to allow them to make the best decisions. This could be achieved through the provision of regularly updated information systems such as newsletters for added support. Alternatively, one might even envisage some kind of optional computer-driven micro-dialogue with a form of software that would help students decide on the areas that they were interested in pursuing. The system would then draw their attention to relevant research and other resources available without making specific recommendations. It would be software in the spirit of decision support systems but not at all directive, just informative (assuming that such an impartial function might even be possible). To summarize, learners are free to create and then to navigate the content and structure of their learning resource space according to their preferences and inclinations. They are free to draw on any resources that they can find or deem usable. What emerges is not so much a network but something akin to a cloud, the rhizomatic cloud: a structureless, dynamic, ever-changing and constantly re-negotiated learning space. This is what provides rhizomatic learning systems with their characteristic openness, lack of prescription and responsiveness to students’ real needs. In turn, this allows them to be dynamic, non-hierarchical, exploratory, consultative, nomadic, supportive and, necessarily, resource-rich (both human and other resources) – and that is where their strength lies. Hence, they have no predetermined beginning or predetermined end. Starting point and ending point are contingent on students achieving their objectives. Recordkeeping systems could be built into the cloud and could keep track of the path travelled by the learners, enabling them to contemplate retrospectively their selfmade, responsive, curriculum and decide on the success or otherwise of their decision-making processes. The rhizomatic cloud does not make assumptions about which individual learning strategies and solutions may or may not work for any specific learner. These could be the subject of future research projects – but for the moment, they are the responsibility of learners. What it does provide, however, is an umbrella that connects all systems with no prejudice as to their functions other than meeting the perceived/actual needs of learners. In effect, it provides not so much a pedagogy of autonomy (a term with potential limitations) but something broader: a pedagogy of freedom. While, understandably, there are some pessimistic opinions as to the likely success of learners’ self-determination skills, there should also be optimistic opinions about them. Once learners have had control transferred to them and

126  Andrew-Peter Lian and Punyathon Sangarun they have learned how to learn (with or without help), they will emerge as much stronger, more flexible, more independent learners. This, of course, is a very positive outcome that should not be ignored but should serve to counterbalance and perhaps even replace pessimistic views. It is certainly an aspect of the rhizomatic model that needs to be researched in greater depth. Any and every form of resource enabling learners to create personal learning environments can be included in the rhizomatic cloud. However, pedagogic resources figure amongst the most valuable, provided they are exploited as a matter of choice rather than imposition after students have engaged in a serious decision-making process. Amongst the most interesting are those emerging from research in personalized learning tailored to the individual. Such an approach, like rhizomatic systems, is designed to avoid a one-size-fits-all model of pedagogic intervention and draws on a precise analysis of each person’s learning processes, including discoveries in the biological processes of perception and learning. These considerations lead to the notion of precision language education (Lian & Sangarun, 2017) which can be thought of as a refinement of personalized learning. Precision language education is an extension of the rhizomatic paradigm as defined above and in Lian (2004). The term appears not to have been used until introduced by Lian at a conference at Ton Duc Thang University, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam in 2016 (Lian, 2016) and then, more formally, in 2017 by Lian and Sangarun (2017). It addresses the solution component of students’ personal learning needs and is broadly inspired by precision education, which, in turn, is based on the notion of precision medicine. Precision medicine seeks to do away with statistically derived models of medical treatment (though, like precision education, it may not be able to do so entirely in the first instance), in favour of treatment that, inter alia, is finely tuned to the physiology and DNA structure of patients so as to target precisely each patient’s problem, treat disease accurately and effectively and avoid deleterious side-effects. The same logic can be applied to education. It is being applied institutionally in at least one university in the United States, National University, where it has become the principal educational paradigm for all learning and teaching activities (National University Precision Institute, 2017). It is still in the early stages of development but is showing promise. In summary, the rhizome reveals problems in more detail and more accurately than traditional systems. It then passes them on to precision language education for remediation. Both are part of the same precision mindset. These principles are summarized in the following quote from Lian and Sangarun (2017, p. 1). Precision language education provides a new way of dealing with individual differences by effecting as precise a diagnosis as possible on each language learner, thus triggering specific interventions designed to target and respond to each person’s specific language-learning problems

Rhizomatic learning systems and precision language education 127 The following quote from a meta-study on personalized language learning (PLL) (Chen et al., 2021, p. 218) is typical of the beliefs about the processes of PLL: Our findings provide implications for instructors conducting precision language education or are thinking of doing so. To personalize students’ learning of pronunciation, listening, and speaking, instructors can take advantage of chatbots, online chat rooms, and VR-based dialogue games. User-friendly mobile phones and chatbot-based applications are effective supplementary tools for regular language curricula to realize language learners’ personalized listening and pronunciation practice with voice messages. In an online chat room, students convert their input into the intake in situations where language serves as a communication tool instead of the focus of such interaction. Moreover, VR games can be integrated into pronunciation recognition and assessment systems embedded with ASR to construct a real-life social community responding to the learners’ speech, intent, gestures, and behaviors. Additionally, collaborative game-based learning with interaction and communication features can support social interactivity during gameplay and allow students to communicate and interact with one another, thus enhancing their communication and speaking skills While all of the suggestions listed above by Chen et al. (2021) are likely to have some effect, we know that pronunciation is a complex that relies heavily on good perception rather than simple exposure and practice in context. It is common knowledge that persisting with uncorrected phoneme production will only lead to the entrenchment of pronunciation errors, not their correction. The question then is how to bring about correction in a field that is not renowned for achieving success. Further, the above processes do not make any specific/ precise assumptions about the nature of pronunciation (and perception), the nature of listening or the nature of any feedback that ASR (Automatic Speech Recognition) systems might deliver and how that feedback would work. We also know that being told that they are mispronouncing is not sufficient for students to self-correct. These exercises would be strengthened significantly through the addition of a more “precise” or “personal” component tailored as closely as possible to each student’s perceptual and production difficulties and leading to a personalized corrective programme for each difficulty encountered. A refined diagnostic phase would lead to an equally refined corrective phase As a follow-up to the Chen et al. quote above, examples relating to pronunciation in a rhizomatic context might be helpful. Imagine the following situation. A Mandarin-speaking Chinese English language learner is working on the production of a complex project such as “Create a Day on American TV”. As part of this effort, he/she is working as a team member to produce a (possibly frivolous) video-recorded facsimile of an American daytime television show. The student is experiencing a pronunciation problem which is hindering intelligibility and proving bothersome. He/she is having difficulty

128  Andrew-Peter Lian and Punyathon Sangarun distinguishing between [ɪ] as in ship [ʃɪp] and [i:] as in sheep [ʃi:p]. Here is an example of how precision language education might address the problem. It will describe not only the process but, critically, the level of precision required. Scenario 1 The student seeks the help of a specialist on-demand corrective phonetics unit. An assistant guides the student through a diagnostic process. Based on the principles of phonetic intervention of the verbotonal system (Asp & Guberina, 1981; Garcia, 2018; Guberina, 1956, 1972; Lian, 1980) the student is exposed to a set of digitally filtered 2 examples of the word [ʃɪp] (ship) and similar words in different contexts. The sound [ɪ] and only [ɪ] is modified (as represented in [ʃɪp]) according to a set of parameters which have been experimentally determined to produce optimal perceptions for various types of language learners (in this case Mandarin-speaking learners of English) (Wen, 2019; Wen et al., 2020). These parameters have been called corrective “optimals”. For the moment the determination of these corrective optimals is based on statistics. We are at the beginning stages of such studies. With time and further research, they will be further refined and become more adapted to each learner and their sociolinguistic group in a true precision language education perspective. The procedure is quite simple. The student is exposed to the filtered sounds/ words and then repeats the sounds/words. The assistant judges which of the optimals results in the best production of [ʃɪp] (ship) and other words/sound sequences containing the target sound [ɪ]. The same procedure is followed for the contrasting sound [ʃi:p] (sheep). For the sound [ɪ] (ship), optimals are distributed as follows: • •

89.2% of learners favour the following discontinuous filter settings (0–320 Hz + 2,419–3,048 Hz – centre frequency: 2,715 Hz). 10.8% of learners favour the following discontinuous filter settings (0–320 Hz + 1,815–2,286 Hz – centre frequency: 2,037 Hz).

For the sound [i:] (sheep), optimals are distributed as follows: • • •

86.5% of learners favour the following discontinuous filter settings (0–320 Hz + 4,838–6,096 Hz – centre frequency: 5,431 Hz). 10.8% of learners favour the following discontinuous filter settings (0–320 Hz + 4,567–6,459 Hz – centre frequency: 5.431 Hz). 2.7% of learners favour the following discontinuous filter settings (0–320 Hz + 4,435–5,588 Hz – centre frequency: 4,978 Hz).

At the end of the diagnostic session, the student is provided with two sets of optimal frequencies tailored to their own perceptions, one for [ɪ] and one for [i:]. They are then directed to simple listen and repeat and other exercises that have been optimized for their hearing and spend some time refining their perceptions

Rhizomatic learning systems and precision language education 129 and productions of the words [ʃɪp] (ship) and [ʃi:p] (sheep) as well as the contrast between the sounds [ɪ] and [i:] in various contexts. This is a good example of precision language education at work and the level of precision required. The frequencies identified are quite “precise” and differ significantly from one another. They also vary according to the perceiver. In this example, two or three groups are identified according to which of the vowels is presented. So far, in related research, up to four optimal sets have been identified depending on the vowels concerned. Complete descriptions of the terms and procedures can be found in Wen (2019) and Wen et al. (2020). It should be pointed out that the figures listed above represent in themselves an increase in precision when compared to previous work as optimals defined previously consisted of (very broad) full octaves: /ɪ/= 1,600–3,200 Hz (centre frequency = 2,263 Hz); and /i:/= 3,200–6,400 Hz (centre frequency = 4,525 Hz) (Wen et al., 2020). Importantly, the study by Wen et al. (2020) clearly demonstrates that there is significant perceptual diversity in learners even within the same sociolinguistic community. And it is this diversity, which doubtless is not limited to sounds, that needs to be catered to by educational systems through advanced research. Scenario 2 Scenario 2 of the above situation currently does not exist. It is situated in the short to mid-term future. In this scenario both the diagnostic and corrective phases are replaced by software, perhaps driven by machine learning or deep learning algorithms that automatically update their knowledge base. In the diagnostic phase, the various optimals will be presented automatically and a judgement as to correctness will be made by a piece of software. This is possible now, at least in principle, using a machine learning algorithm and with free software such as Teachable Machine (https://teachablemachine. withgoogle.com). Once the diagnosis has been made and the student’s optimals are determined, another piece of software will present the optimals as part of a set of related exercises. From time to time, the diagnostic system will be invoked to check the student’s progress. The student is now entirely self-managed and independent from human intervention while still receiving high-quality support equivalent to or better than human support. In the next iteration of the system just described, the student him/herself may be able to vary the characteristics of each optimal either completely or within certain parameters. Changing all parameters at will may yield interesting results although very time-consuming and perhaps not very fruitful. Nevertheless, with both forms of student variation, it would be possible to keep a record of the optimals determined and decide the extent to which variations to the original settings are possible. For instance, should the filters be narrower? Should they consist or more than two-wavebands? Should the loudness balance between the various components of the optimals be

130  Andrew-Peter Lian and Punyathon Sangarun different? Thus, the diagnostic tool would now also become an important research tool that would enrich not only the diagnosis itself but also constantly strengthen the theoretical underpinnings of the pronunciation support: we are likely to discover that different sociolinguistic communities will have different corrective optimals. Both Scenario 1 and Scenario 2 require fine tuning of the exercises for each learner and a high level of explicit precision. That is not always the case. New and more automatic systems are now emerging as a result of continuing research. They are all compatible with precision language education, but do not all require the level of precision seen in the two scenarios above. For example, work done on the teaching of intonation in China using the low-pass filtering of auditory signals3 has resulted in the development of a self-managed rhizomatic-inspired approach yielding excellent results for both intonation and individual phonemes (He et al., 2015; He & Sangarun, 2015). Another compatible approach for the teaching of listening comprehension also makes use of low-pass filtered intonation patterns to facilitate development of the listening skill (Luu & Lian, 2019). A third approach examines learners’ preferences in a procedure that uses learners’ own voices as models for intonation learning instead of using native speakers (Li et al., 2020; Li & Lian, 2022). Finally, a fourth approach, this time designed to lighten the brain’s processing load also uses low-pass filtering in conjunction with Electroencephalographic and fMRI scanning in a dichotic setting where one ear received the low-pass signal and the other received the normal sentence. This resulted in a clear advantage for the configuration consisting of left ear filtered and right ear unfiltered (Cai & Lian, 2018; Cai et al., 2021; Lian et al., 2020). At this stage of our understanding of the process, this load-reduction is automatic and does not require tuning. This seems to indicate that adjustments to settings are not always a characteristic of precision education. While all of these approaches show promise, they are still at the beginning of their precision journey and will require a significant amount of research before they are completed. As precision increases so should learning effectiveness.

The rhizomatic principle at work In the above examples the rhizomatic cloud provides a macro environment for learning by giving students the opportunity and freedom to challenge themselves through complex real-world or realistic tasks, the opportunity and freedom to identify their real difficulties and needs and the opportunity and freedom to access an arsenal of tools both “natural” and pedagogic, often based on biological research, to self-manage and correct those difficulties and needs. It does not engage in pre-determined micro-management but supports students in their attempts to self-determine and manage problems. In particular, pedagogic tools, if they are developed properly, will become more adaptive as a result of increasingly in-depth research.

Rhizomatic learning systems and precision language education 131 Modern rhizomatic systems such as the one described above are integrally connected with technology. There are at least two ways in which this happens. The first relates to data collection and the second to distribution.

Data collection The structure and activities of technology-integrated rhizomatic systems are ideal for data collection and can, as we have seen, act not only as a learning structure but as a research tool. Data collected can take a multitude of forms. We will refer to just two. The first is that the system can track the paths that students take to solve their problems. That information can be provided retrospectively to the student to give them insights into what decisions they made and how they made them. Learning scenarios will occur tens of thousands of times a day and will produce tens of thousands of pieces of learner data and hundreds of thousands of possible solutions giving rise, potentially, to thousands of serious research projects or, at least, research contributions. This massive amount of research data could undergo big data analysis and be used either for confirming current research findings or for initiating new research directions. This will be a wonderful addition to our current efforts to discover how learning works and could be fed back into the rhizomatic cloud in support of learners. The second is that the system can keep track of student input into diagnostic and other applications. In terms of the above example, every time a student determines his/her optimal frequencies for a vowel or consonant, it will be recorded and analyzed in due course. Just that one activity will again be able to provide massive amounts of data to help us fine tune the pedagogic applications in the cloud as well as enrich the myriad research projects that emerge from it. Thus, the rhizomatic cloud, if managed properly, can support not only learning but also act as a quasi-endless supplier of research data.

Distribution It should be clear by now that a modern rhizomatic system will be heavily dependent on computing for access to software and for communication. For best results local rhizomatic clouds should not be orphaned and remain entirely local. They should have high connectivity to all parts of the Internet and be available worldwide. They should also connect to other rhizomatic clouds and be able to share information with them. To that end, proponents of rhizomatic clouds should consider setting up distributed servers to facilitate easy sharing. The advantages of such an arrangement far surpass anything that could be provided by a single server, especially in the area of economies of scale at all levels. This idea is not conceptually new, but it does have one important feature: it requires a commitment by more than one organization to the rhizomatic ideal – and this will help strengthen the movement. Of course, there are many obstacles

132  Andrew-Peter Lian and Punyathon Sangarun to this, not the least of which is a willingness to adopt a rhizomatic model of learning at more than the experimental level.

Ethical oversight Of course, such massive computerization and data storage raise the specter of what Yuval Noah Harari (Yuval Harari on Sixty Minutes, 2021) refers to as people hacking: the use of private data by organizations to gain an advantage over private individuals, be it manipulating them in some way, e.g. influence their mind or take their money, etc. In order to avoid this, strong ethical oversight will have to be instituted in all rhizomatic structures, an oversight that will have to be readily monitored for all activities in both the short term and the long term.

When is rhizomatic not rhizomatic? Cormier (2008) deliberately set out to create a community that will set or negotiate some kind of curriculum. There seems to be a fixation on curriculum for collective action even though there is no requirement for it in rhizomatic theory. This looks like a remnant of traditional views of education. Still, it cannot be ignored as Cormier is undoubtedly a leading and popular figure in the rhizomatic movement. A study (Mackness et al., 2016) designed to test the value of the “community as curriculum” procedure discovered that the “community as curriculum” tended to generate problems rather than solve them. Tensions and contradictions arose within the very groups whose formation Cormier encouraged and considered as naturally integral to rhizomatic systems. This is because, in his eyes, the group was seen as critically important to rhizomatic learning, and, furthermore, Cormier felt the need to orchestrate it at least by making it a condition of participation in the experimental course. In our definition of rhizomatic system which, essentially, focuses on the individual, such social tensions cannot exist as power is not vested in any group or the obligation to form/maintain any group, but in the individual. There is no one with whom to disagree as anyone is free to disengage at any time except when working collectively to achieve a group’s agreed objective. Thus, any course of action by learners that emerges is the outcome of an individual’s decision-making rather than any collectively constructed detailed “curriculum” although agreement to act collectively along agreed lines to accomplish a particular task is often the case. Any groupings formed by a learner’s navigation through the rhizomatic space as he/she constructs his/her personal learning environment will be essentially in the form of affinity groups perhaps dealing primarily with objective-setting or objective-attainment rather than with the solution of individual learning problems. Our work is much closer to Sugata Mitra’s notion of Self Organizing Learning Environment (SOLE). Interestingly, SOLEs do not claim connection to any external theory and the system is essentially self-referential. In our rhizomatic world, freedom to act independently is affirmed as a major driving force, and groups form and dissolve organically according to need or whim but do not

Rhizomatic learning systems and precision language education 133

Figure 8.2  Principles of the rhizome Source: Deleuze and Guattari, 1980/2013 in Mackness et al., 2016

draw attention away from any individual student’s primary objective of solving learning problems as and when they arise, for example, see Lian (2004, 2011) and Lian and Moore (2014). At the end of the day, from our perspective, the issue is not so much whether Deleuze and Guattari got it philosophically right (though they probably did). The issue is whether learners, applying Deleuze and Guattari principles (almost certainly unconsciously… the best way???), are able to construct individual learning pathways leading to successful achievement of their learning objectives (whether personally selected or negotiated with other individuals or with an educational organization) (Figure 8.2). In that respect, the rhizomatic model described in this paper, especially in the light of its independent genesis, does not aspire to any philosophical orthodoxy but, essentially, inscribes itself alongside other contenders of self-directed learning, a paradigm to which rhizomatic learning necessarily belongs albeit sometimes with important differences in implementation. Having said that, Deleuze and Guattari’s six principles for rhizomatic thinking apply to our model and justify the rhizomatic label that we have attached to it. These principles are reproduced below for convenience (from Mackness et al., 2016) together with their reformulation for learning contexts by Funes (2015) (in Mackness et al., 2016) where the six principles are paired to form three groupings.

134  Andrew-Peter Lian and Punyathon Sangarun

Figure 8.3  The relevance of the rhizome to teaching and learning Source: Funes, 2015 in Mackness et al., 2016

Of course, these principles may well apply equally to other forms of selfdirected learning in particular Sugata Mitra’s SOLEs which, amongst the multitude of possible self-directed learning systems, comes closest in spirit to our work as well as to the notion of rhizome in general. This is particularly visible in relation to the role of teachers and curriculum/syllabus that are not necessarily an integral part of either (Figure 8.3). It would be interesting to investigate which amongst the many autonomous and self-directed (language-)learning systems developed over the years conform to those six principles no matter what their theoretical origins. That could be the subject of a separate and quite rich research study. Yet, even without such a study, one cannot help but suspect that those approaches that provide learning activities close to those described in the present study will de facto draw on the Deleuze and Guattari principles – as in the case of Sugata Mitra’s SOLEs, or the Sudbury Valley school approach (Greenberg et al., 2005). Neither of these approaches claim their origins in rhizomatic principles, yet they clearly do connect with them (although with possible compromises due to circumstances). Ultimately, perhaps the six principles represent an illuminating formulation of universal features of any and all genuinely freedom-based pedagogies, and Deleuze and Guattari may have successfully captured its philosophical dimensions. Such an outcome would not be at all surprising as the phenomenon of learning is itself universal in nature though individual in its application. It seems necessarily activated/limited by general neurobiological features of human

Rhizomatic learning systems and precision language education 135 existence and implemented in specific social contexts and the six principles may be sufficiently abstracted to take account of both the neurobiological and the social. Hence the interest, or even urgency, from both a theoretical and a practical perspective (for proponents of rhizomatic learning) to follow up on this question by engaging in the research project alluded to above. Identification of the six principles, or even a subset, in other approaches with different names would do much to legitimize the rhizomatic position in the world of learning.

Some implications of adopting a rhizomatic approach as defined The shift to a rhizomatic approach as defined here has several nonexclusive implications. The first is that by transferring responsibility for diagnosis of problems and for selection of activities to the learners’ autonomous attention students’ real needs are actually met and it arrives at a better understanding of learner difficulties and more effective intervention for self-correction and correction in general. Careful monitoring will provide a rich source of data to improve our understandings of the learning process. This will lead to greater success and, ipso facto, to greater satisfaction for both learners and/or educational institutions involved. At the moment, there is a little doubt that success in language-learning in certain countries, such as Thailand, is quite low (for instance, Thailand ranks 100 out of 112 (very low proficiency) in the EF proficiency index, Vietnam ranks 66 (low proficiency), Indonesia 80 (low proficiency), Cambodia 97 (very low proficiency) (Education First Ltd, 2021) despite very significant government investment in English language education. It is becoming urgent to find an alternative to the ways in which language education is being conducted in Southeast Asia. Clearly, what is being done now is not effective. The second is that it changes the roles of both students and teachers. Students are empowered to act on their own behalf and teachers now become part of the general support infrastructure rather than as the orchestrators of all activities. The lack of predetermined curriculum and syllabus results in a reduction of constraints on both students’ and teachers’ activities, not to mention preparation time by teachers who can now turn their attentions to other matters. Third, ideally, with the growth of success and role changes, stress levels (anxiety) should be reduced for both students and teachers and, further, motivation should rise in line with proficiency. To some extent, then, rhizomatic systems if implemented properly will respond, at least partially, to the endless concerns over anxiety and motivation that have been expressed for at least 40 years (and that are clearly still unresolved) despite countless research publications on these issues.

Is there a downside? When making predictions about the implementation of theoretical models, even if there is some evidence to the contrary (e.g. Chaiwiwatrakul & Sangarun, 2016;

136  Andrew-Peter Lian and Punyathon Sangarun He & Sangarun, 2015; Parnkul et al., 2020), it is common to overestimate the positives and underestimate the negatives. Indeed, no solution is perfect, especially if it is relatively untried and has not yet been optimized. The same is likely to be true here. The following list of possible negative consequences (also nonexclusive) will illustrate. First, while it is possible to implement rhizomatic systems within traditional educational structures, the likelihood of interference with the rhizomatic process is high. The most probable contradiction between the two systems is in the matter of time. In principle, rhizomatic systems are temporally openended, whereas traditional educational systems are time-bound (a semester lasts a certain number of weeks and progress is expected to happen at a specific rate within that timeframe). It is quite possible that a rhizomatic “course” (i.e. a student’s path to success) may need to last much longer than a traditional course as learners navigate through the unpredictability of their individual needs. At the same time, the reverse is also possible as in the case of Chaiwiwatrakul (Chaiwiwatrakul & Sangarun, 2016) where the time needed for the teacherless group to reach the course objectives was half that of the teacher-supported group. Second, while it is true that both teachers and students may, in principle, experience more relaxed, less stressful conditions, there will be a need for developing a growing base of relevant pedagogic resources, possibly based on research connected with precision (language) education. For instance, multimodal databases and suitable search engines to provide data for lesson self-generating systems or dialogue generators or other self-managed information and pedagogic systems will be necessary. In turn, this may bring about an increase in the costs of education and a redistribution of funds perhaps away from traditional facilities and traditional publishers and towards new pedagogic endeavours consistent with rhizomatic systems. That is where research comes into play. Third, widespread adoption of rhizomatic systems may result in the necessity to reorganize the education system at a general level. The transition from traditional to rhizomatic system is fraught with the risk of great chaos and would have to be handled with great care. Going hand in hand with these issues is the question of the widespread adoption of a rhizomatic mentality. The current educational system has been in existence for such a long time that shedding its assumptions, presuppositions and even assessment systems will almost certainly encounter great resistance, resulting in potential turmoil. Such consequences are avoidable if the ground is carefully prepared and further research into rhizomatic learning systems themselves clearly demonstrates advantages over traditional educational systems. Arguably, however, the adoption of rhizomatic learning systems, either gradual or rapid, will be emancipatory for all, bringing about new freedom and new success for all – and that will be to the benefit not only of students and teachers but society in general as the educational systems is intimately interwoven with the fabric of society.

Rhizomatic learning systems and precision language education 137

Conclusion In closing this discussion, it may be worth pointing out that rhizomatic environments are not new – they already exist. The world is rhizomatic by nature, and the 21st century is well in tune with that. The rhizomatic way is the “natural” way of doing things, especially now that we will have access to countless resources both existing and in the making. Look at how we go about fixing a broken printer. Most of the time, we do not go to an expert to fix it, at least not immediately. Instead, we go to Google or, better still, YouTube which we will search using our personal understandings of the problem at hand. Google/ YouTube will then usually provide us with a number of choices for fixing the problem (YouTube will even show us). We will then select one of these choices or modify it and then apply it according to our understandings, to our own printer in an experimental manner. If the solution works, we will be happy. If it does not, we will consult with others perhaps more broadly or of increasing expertise until we find a solution that does work. This is the essence of rhizomatic intervention, and we engage in this activity all the time. We just don’t call it rhizomatic, we call it finding a solution for ourselves on the Internet and we do not claim that it is a form of education – which it is. We have learned much from the experience. Yet we have been conditioned to accept that education must be regulated and government-controlled, that it must have an approved syllabus that it must comply with a set of regulations, also approved, and that any form of education that is not so regulated is suspect and bad. And that governments/teachers etc. know best. Approved educational organizations test on exit in order to certify minimum, stable, standards in a just in case perspective hoping that they will meet the demand of educational consumers – and often they do not. There is often a mismatch between graduates’ knowledge and employers’ needs. As a relatively trivial but significant example, a recent survey of doctoral programmes in a university revealed that the university was interested in producing graduates with a high level of intellect whereas employing universities expected graduates, from now on, to be able to run online programmes in order to combat the COVID-19 pandemic or similar situations in the future. Nowadays, independently of COVID-19, significant consumers of education such as Google, and many others, tend to test on entry in a just in time perspective. They do not care about the exit standards of the university; they want to know how their future employees fit with their current needs and not necessarily for the next 30 years. They know that henceforth mobility levels will be high. And these concerns for short-term specialist knowledge are mirrored in the proliferation of nanocourses and even MOOCs that attempt to compensate for universities’ perceived shortcomings. Educators (and connected policymakers, etc.) do not recognize the rhizomatic mode as an officialized way of studying. It is just too unregulated, too different, too chaotic, too uncontrolled, too dangerous. What if it fails? What if the students do not learn what we insist that they learn? The truth is that everything fails, including the highly regulated environments. Despite all the controls that

138  Andrew-Peter Lian and Punyathon Sangarun are in place all over the world, including syllabuses and teaching algorithms, people still fail to pass (language) competency tests such as IELTS, TOEFL and TOEIC. It is not as though our currently regulation-enacted systems have been a source of resounding success. Far from it. What we need to do is learn to give up control and allow freedom to take over – and powerful places like Google are giving themselves that power. Others are sure to follow and this accounts in part for the current university crisis in the United States and possibly elsewhere. Our job as educators should not be to force-feed people into getting a specific kind of knowledge inside their heads (although that is sometimes necessary especially in the technical area) but to provide opportunities for enthusiasm and development and allow them to move forward. We know that this is possible through the Sudbury valley schools and the hole in the wall experiments and through the flurry of activity generated by modern technology throughout society with the development of millions of personal websites. All of these people are ordinary people who are highly motivated and interested in something that is relevant to them. We do not need to trick them into being motivated, they are already there, and we need to learn to harness that energy. Having said that, rhizome and precision (language) education work hand in hand in close harmony. Assuming learner engagement, the freedom of the rhizome enables the self-identification of problems/needs while precision language education, with its research-based processes and adaptability, enables self-managed highlevel solutions, thus creating a perfectly autonomous, self-managed, coherent and responsive learning environment that actually meets the needs of students. As feedback mechanisms improve (certainly with the assistance of Artificial Intelligence techniques) and precision advances (through intensive in-depth original (language) learning research), we can expect significant enhancements to self-managed, personally tailored, (language) learning followed by a significant improvement in the (language) education enterprise more generally. The stumbling block in all of this is the need for extensive long-term research consistent with the need for a new learning paradigm and that, in turn, relies on the need for a continuing commitment to personalized education in general and precision education in particular. These commitments will require large-scale adoption of the rhizomatic paradigm, and this may take a long time to enact as change is slow and people are reluctant to embrace it even though many claim to favour it. The rhizomatic movement is clearly growing, slowly, organically, naturally, and it is incumbent on its proponents to accelerate efforts to unify by creating large-scale operational systems both as a testbed for the necessary research and as proof-of-concept for the sceptics. Once this happens. We can look forward to progress and an end to stagnation.

Notes 1 Listed below are a few references to nodes in the diagram: precision language module (Lian & Sangarun, 2017); multimedia database (Lian, 2004, 2011); materials generator, dialogue generator, lesson generator (Lian, 2014).

Rhizomatic learning systems and precision language education 139 2 The process of filtering involves the removal of certain frequency bands from a naturally produced sound (e.g. a single phoneme) or sequence of sounds (e.g. a sentence) (Wen et al., 2020). 3 Low-pass filtering was obtained by digitally filtering audio recordings of sentences. Frequencies above 320 Hz were removed from the sound signals, and frequencies below 320 Hz were maintained.

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9

Rhizomatic pedagogy in higher education A comparative analysis Suzan Koseoglu and Aras Bozkurt

Introduction Rhizomatic learning, as a pedagogical approach and vision, draws from the post-structural philosophy of rhizomatic thinking (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987). In Deleuze and Guattari’s work, rhizome is used as a metaphor to highlight nonlinear and horizontal connections, heterogeneity, and multiplicity in knowledge construction. The strong influence of rhizomatic philosophy in higher education is evidenced by the rapid emergence of educational research1 exploring rhizomatic learning both as a theoretical lens and a topic of inquiry (e.g., Connell-Whitney, 2020; Costandius et al., 2020; Maioz-Basterretxea, 2015; Samson et al., 2022). This is perhaps because, as Bozkurt et al. (2016) argued, “rhizomatic thinking, and by extension rhizomatic learning, is a philosophy, a heutagogical approach, a critical approach, and a combination of all these” (p. 7). Similarly, Kang (2007) uses “rhizoactivity” as a heutagogical framework for describing lifelong learning in the age of postmodernism (p. 217) and a method and philosophy for critiquing traditional approaches in adult learning. In Kang’s work, rhizoactivity is diverse in character or content, nonlinear, and relational (p. 207), because it reflects our experience in this world. Kang writes: Rhizoactivity sprouts or props up at any place in any time of one’s life to make connections to whatever is available. It is not a linear activity. It opens itself to any possibility. There is no beginning and ending. … The image of a postmodern learner, who is a nonunitary being that has multiple subjectivities, cannot be singular. (p. 216) The rhizomatic direction in learning, or the multi-directional aspect of it, that there cannot be clear beginnings and ends in the learning experience, is an important concept to understand in rhizomatic pedagogy. Deleuze and Guattari (1987)

DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378-12

Rhizomatic pedagogy in higher education 143 explain the rhizomatic direction by contrasting rhizomatic structures with arborescent structures: A rhizome has no beginning or end; it is always in the middle, between things, interbeing, intermezzo. The tree is filiation, but the rhizome is alliance, uniquely alliance. The tree imposes the verb “to be,” but the fabric of the rhizome is the conjunction, “and … and … and …” This conjunction carries enough force to shake and uproot the verb “to be.” Where are you going? Where are you coming from? What are you heading for? These are totally useless questions. Making a clean slate, starting or beginning again from ground zero, seeking a beginning or a foundation-all imply a false conception of voyage and movement. (p. 25) Rather, rhizomatic thinking proposes “another way of traveling and moving: proceeding from the middle, through the middle, coming and going rather than starting and finishing” (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p. 25). This concept should be considered in connection with the “nomadic” planes of thinking, or in the context of our discussion, of learning. Nomad space is “smooth or open ended” in comparison with “striated” or “gridded” space, as in striated spaces, movement is confined to “paths between fixed and identifiable points” (p. xi). For example, in traditional higher education, the starting point to an educational programme is typically the identification of learning outcomes, which are then validated and tested via assessment. In rhizomatic learning, however, because learning is viewed as a nonlinear, unstructured (Cormier, 2015), and constantly evolving process (Bissola et al., 2017; Phillips, 2017), the identification of intended learning outcomes and modular arrangement of content or standardized assessment are not always desirable or viable. We would like to give some context to this discussion using a well-known application of rhizomatic learning in education in an informal context. Rhizomatic Learning: The Community is the Curriculum (Rhizo14) and Rhizomatic Learning: A Practical View (Rhizo15) were two massive open online courses (MOOCs) designed with a rhizomatic pedagogy and vision. Led by Dave Cormier (a prominent voice in rhizomatic learning), these courses demonstrate how rhizomatic pedagogy might work in practice. As both courses explored rhizomatic learning at a meta-level, these courses are also good resources to understand the philosophy of the approach and identify possible barriers or challenges. In both Rhizo14 and Rhizo15, “learning within communities and from communities” was a key principle, as curricula was not designed around predetermined educational content but instead around social connections. After an initial introduction, new topics emerged from the weekly discussions among active participants (Bozkurt, 2016; Mackness & Bell, 2015) (see Tables 9.1 and 9.2). There was no predefined content, learning objectives, or assessment. The course convenor encouraged participants to consider their learning subjectives instead; these were the learning goals identified by the learners themselves.

144  Suzan Koseoglu and Aras Bozkurt Table 9.1  Emerging topics addressed during Rhizo14 and Rhizo15 Rhizo14 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

Cheating as Learning Enforcing Independence Embracing Uncertainty Is Books Making Us Stupid? Community as Curriculum Planned Obsolescence The Lunatics are taking over the Asylum Demobbing Soldiers Why do We Need Lurkers? Creativity: The art of thriving in arid Environments Powerful thoughts 1/2 MOOC Missionaries

Rhizo15 1 Learning Subjectives – designing for when you don’t know where you’re going 2 Learning is not a counting noun … so what should we count? 3 The myth of content 4 Can/should we get rid of the idea of “dave”? How do we teach rhizomatically?a 5 Is community learning an invasive species? 6 Rhizomatic learning, a practical guide

a Note: “dave” refers to Dave Cormier, who was the course convenor in Rhizo14 and Rhizo15.

In these examples, rhizomatic learning is used to describe a model of learning that is networked and emergent (Cormier, 2008). In relation to this, Cormier (2008) notes, in the rhizomatic model of learning, curriculum is not driven by predefined inputs from experts; it is constructed and negotiated in real time by the contributions of those engaged in the learning process. This community acts as the curriculum, spontaneously shaping, constructing, and reconstructing itself and the subject of its learning … These two rhizomatic MOOCs show how rhizomatic pedagogy can foster nonlinear and unstructured learning experiences with no clearly defined end points and predetermined outcomes. Going back to the notion of nomadic spaces, as Table 9.2 Example for Postgraduate Certificate community contributions PG Cert Module 1 Study Day 2 Programme Outline 10:00–10:30 Welcome; Designing community guidelines for participation (led by PG Cert Module 1 facilitators) 10:30–10:55 Chronicles of Neurodiversity: Sharing our difficult experiences as different thinkers (led by a PG Cert programme participant) 10:55–11:00 Break 11:00–12:00 Teaching into the void? The good, the bad, and the ugly in the (online) classroom (led by a member of staff at Goldsmiths) 12:00–12:10 Break 12:10–12:50 Teaching students from diverse backgrounds (led by a PG Cert programme participant) 12:50–13:00 Closing remarks and looking ahead

Rhizomatic pedagogy in higher education 145 rhizoactivity is relational and emergent, this also means that it is shaped by “emotion, intuition, spiritually, bodily feeling” (Kang, 2007, p. 217). Learners are not limited to following predefined trajectories of learning and being – knowledge “grow[s] and propagate[s] in a ‘nomadic’ fashion, the only restrictions to growth being those that exist in the surrounding habitat” (Sharples et al., 2012, p. 33). Bozkurt et al. (2016) use nomadic learning as a concept to highlight uncertainty and continuity in the learning process: referred to as nth learners, nomadic learners are motivated by intrinsic drives, identify their own goals, and choose their own paths in their learning journey. We have described rhizomatic learning as a philosophical approach and a pedagogy of practice for adult education up to this point in the chapter. Most of the descriptions of the approach describe an ideal or a pedagogical vision, but as with any pedagogical approach, this isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach. Studies show that rhizomatic learning can be complex and challenging for learners, as the approach requires learners to have a high degree of autonomy and self-regulation skills, as well as the confidence and motivation to be active in social networks (both online and in person). All of these are taught or learned skills, which means not all students will have the means to be successful in rhizomatic learning. In addition, the extent to which these skills are deemed desirable depends on the individual circumstances of the learner (e.g., why should I be motivated to learn this way?). Inclusion and sense of belonging are also shown to be problematic concepts in networked communities. Based on their research on Rhizo14 and Rhizo15, Mackness and Bell (2015) noted that it can be difficult for learners to establish meaningful connections in the learning community – the effectiveness of a decentralized and emergent course structure was questionable for some learners. In another study on Rhizo14, Bell et al. (2016), drawing from literature on community building and their own research on connectivist MOOCs, highlighted the need to provide “support for intergroup tolerance, trust, and respect” (p. 5). We shall come back to these findings in the discussion section of this chapter.

Reflective case studies This section reports two reflective cases from Goldsmiths, University of London (UK) and Anadolu University (Turkey). In the first case, Suzan Koseoglu, the first author of this chapter, describes how rhizomatic learning is used as an overarching pedagogical framework in a postgraduate level programme at Goldsmiths. In the second case, Aras Bozkurt, the second author, describes how he incorporated rhizomatic learning in postgraduate programmes at Anadolu University in an effort to transcend the structured formal curriculum. Reflections on rhizomatic learning at Goldsmiths, University of London by Suzan Koseoglu Goldsmiths, University of London is a constituent college of the University of London in England, with a rich academic heritage centred on critical scholarship

146 Suzan Koseoglu and Aras Bozkurt and creativity. Critical thinking and theory are embedded in the university’s academic practice and, to some extent, institutional policies and outlook. For example, the college positions itself as “a creative powerhouse, a thought-provoking place” for both students and academic staff and includes equality, inclusion, and social justice as central values to Goldsmiths’s learning, teaching, and assessment strategy. This positioning, at times, sits at tension with the Goldsmiths community who seek decolonization of higher education and demand equality and equity for those who have been traditionally marginalized in higher education and in the broader society. A recent example for this would be Goldsmiths Occupation (Guardian, 2019), an activist-protest where students and staff demanded race equality in Goldsmiths’s institutional policies and practice. At the time of writing this chapter (Spring 2022), Goldsmiths was going through a major restructuring with plans to reduce all departmental budgets, cut the number of professional and academic teaching staff, overhaul some academic departments, and revise all departmental curricula to address a large deficit in the college budget. This massive restructuring of college services – of administration, teaching, and professional services – is called the Evolving Goldsmiths project or the recovery programme: it is hoped that with such interventions, Goldsmiths not only will survive, it will also be able to better compete with other institutions in an increasingly neoliberal economy, where students are often positioned as “customers” and educational institutions as “providers of service.” In response to the recovery programme, college staff have been taking strike action; strikes will have taken place for a total of 37 teaching days in the 2021/2022 academic year by the end of April (around a third of total teaching days in Autumn and Spring terms). It is within this difficult institutional context my reflections on rhizomatic learning should be understood. Rhizomatic Learning has been used on Goldsmiths’s Postgraduate Certificate in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education programme (PG Cert) for a number of years to guide the curriculum, first implicitly arising from the idea that the practices of the Goldsmiths community could form the basis for professional development and, more recently, explicitly as a pedagogical framework along with experiential learning (hooks, 1994; Kolb, 1984) and critical self-reflection (Brookfield,1995). PG Cert is a two-year Master’s level programme designed to enhance the pedagogical practice of teaching staff at Goldsmiths. There are four modules in the programme: Module 1 is an introduction to some key learning theories and pressing issues in Higher Education (e.g., participants studied race equality, neuro-diversity, and inclusive teaching in the 2021/22 academic year). In Module 2, participants work on a case study related to an aspect of their teaching. Module 3 is a theoretical and practical study of technology enhanced learning. In Module 4, participants work independently on a pedagogical research project. During the early waves of the COVID-19 pandemic, the programme was delivered completely online. As of October 2021, a blended model was adopted with on-site and online study days, and asynchronous activities in the college’s virtual learning environment (VLE).

Rhizomatic pedagogy in higher education 147 Participant profile on the programme is diverse with early career and senior academic staff, professional staff with teaching responsibilities, and PhD students who work as associate lecturers at the college. As a result of this diversity, teaching staff enrol in the programme with different goals and expectations. Rhizomatic learning is a useful approach both for creating a curriculum that is of interest to programme participants (or colleagues) and also to show participants that we, the programme convenors, aim to build a learning community with diverse voices. In other words, it is both a philosophy we bring onto the programme and an intentional method for building a learning community. Some specific methods that have helped us bring rhizomatic learning to the programme are as follows. An initial conversation on rhizomatic learning We explain our collaborative and community-based approach to all participants on the first day of the programme and open it to discussion. A rhizome is a powerful metaphor for participants to see how relationships between students and teachers could be horizontal in structure, and the knowledge emerging from those relationships bi-directional, akin to Paulo Freire’s (1970) notion of student-teachers and teacher-students. We discuss this further in the discussion section of this chapter. Co-construction of the curriculum We, then, explicitly and actively work on the co-construction of educational content and activities with programme participants, especially at the beginning of the programme when participants get familiar with the overall programme format. Although we have a set of broad themes to focus on in the programme (e.g., inclusive pedagogy or critical pedagogy) and curate readings and plan activities aligning with these themes, we also build flexibility and openness to the curriculum so that participants can diverge from these or put forward other study topics along with new resources and activities. One way we do this is by inviting participants to present or lead programme sessions about their work, research, or ideas. We seek contributions from the larger Goldsmiths community too and plan sessions with guest lecturers ahead of time. We also ask for contributions to the programme reading list. Participants are free to use any literature they find relevant to inform their coursework. There are learning objectives specified for each module, however, these learning objectives are designed in a way to help participants bring their own experiences and interests into their learning. The actual learning outcomes are shaped by participants’ backgrounds, motivations, along with what we study in a given module depending on what the community brings onto the module. In other words, the purpose of the learning objectives is to empower learners for meaningful, subjective learning outcomes. Participant contributions often lead to unexpected directions in pedagogical debate and inquiry, which manifest itself in class discussions, shared resources,

148 Suzan Koseoglu and Aras Bozkurt and also assessment and feedback. For example, a creative collaborative writing activity led by a colleague PG Cert participant on makerspaces and learning through play was received very positively by other participants. Few participants mentioned that they would experiment with this activity in their teaching. In another example, we observed how a participant’s lecture on race equality in higher education ended with a heated debate on the meaning of free speech in higher education. Seeing the interest in this topic, we added resources on anti-racist pedagogy in our shared class resources – the lecturer who facilitated the session also suggested readings and resources on race equality and equity for the group. We then actively sought other members of the Goldsmiths community who could contribute to this important discussion and invited a lecturer with significant experience in anti-racist pedagogy in schools onto the next study day. We, both programme convenors and participants, continued to build on this theme in assessment (via coursework and feedback) and also in other modules. Flexibility in what we learn and how we learn Participants are encouraged to decide what to work on for the study days and how. We don’t necessarily know what we will be studying on a module study day or in the VLE forums before the programme starts, as these are very much dictated by what the community decides to bring onto the PG Cert through the sharing of experience and pedagogic practice. We do provide a structure to work from (e.g., by inviting guest lecturers to the programme or by suggesting readings); however, we also recognize the fact that all participants on the programme have rich experiential knowledge through which educational theory and practice are understood and interpreted – for us bringing this diversity and richness in knowledge and practice onto the programme is more important than covering predefined “educational content.” Here it is important to draw attention to how these strategies relate to the wider institutional context. PG Cert is not immune to the tensions or the realities of Goldsmiths (briefly described above). Co-construction of the curriculum in our context not only means the co-construction of class resources and activities but also taking collective decisions on how to go about the educational process. These decisions can challenge wider institutional practices and policies. For example, when participants asked for online study days in Autumn 2020 when COVID-19 was still prevalent in the UK, we found ourselves in a difficult position as college policies and regulations did not allow online programme delivery in an effort to go back to “on-campus education”. On one hand, we agreed with participants and wanted to support those who wanted to have an option to study online, but, on the other hand, the college requirements prevented us from changing the educational mode without going through formal, and often lengthy and tedious, administrative processes. In the spring term, however, when the Omicron variant was spreading fast in the UK, we decided to switch to an online mode of delivery as we could not put ourselves or our participants at risk.

Rhizomatic pedagogy in higher education 149 Another example would be how in Spring 2022 some participants protested having an online study day during strike action. Our initial reasoning was that going forward with the online session wouldn’t mean crossing the picket line as all programme participants were staff members, not fee-paying students. We reflected on our decision to go forward with the study day and decided to cancel it to stand in solidarity with colleagues who had been fighting for their rights in a very difficult academic climate. Reflections on rhizomatic learning at Anadolu University by Aras Bozkurt Anadolu University is a state university delivering education in dual mode to both on- and off-campus students. With nearly 3 million enrolled students each academic year, the institution is referred to as a giga university (Bozkurt, 2019). A central mission of the university is to provide equity, equality, and social justice via open education in the Turkish Higher Education context (Bozkurt, 2019). In Turkey, The Council of Higher Education (CoHE) is responsible for the planning, governance, coordination, and supervision of higher educational processes (CoHE, 2022). All higher education curricula at Anadolu University accommodate the European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System (ECTS) and meet the requirements of the Bologna Process (European Commission, 2022). Such a structure mandates that all courses in the institution should be structured according to CoHE metrics, with predefined objectives and measurement through conventional assessment and evaluation processes. In this tightly structured educational context, an experimental implementation was conducted during Fall 2020 and Spring 2021 terms in two separate postgraduate level courses: UZE605 Learning with Technology and UZE618 Trends in Open and Distance Learning. UZE605 covered topics such as theories of educational technology, use of educational technology, and learning design for synchronous and asynchronous courses. UZE618 covered topics such as hard and soft technologies, trends in educational technology, e-learning, m-learning, and u-learning. Both courses were 14 week-long. The first half of the courses focused on theoretical or conceptual discussions while the second half focused on applied knowledge. Due to pandemic requirements in 2020 and 2021, the courses were fully online and adopted distance education strategies. Accordingly, as the facilitator of the courses, Aras Bozkurt, I used rhizomatic pedagogy to transform some aspects of the course into a rhizomatic learning journey. In a way, I hacked the formal course curricula to give space to unstructured and nonlinear instances of learning. To do this, I benefited from the following strategies. ALT-CV Alternative Curriculum of Vitais (ALT-CV) was an orientation activity aimed to develop a sense of community among learners in the first week of their courses. Instead of creating traditional CVs, which typically include information on

150  Suzan Koseoglu and Aras Bozkurt educational background, working experiences, skills, and competencies, learners were asked to share with others their favourite color, music, leisure time activities, etc. ALT-CV activity was designed to help learners liberate themselves from the expectations and requirements of traditional courses, from the dogmas of conventional learning processes, and to help learners bring their identities and backgrounds onto the programme. The main purpose of this activity was to humanize the learning experience and help build community. With this activity, I hoped students would see that they are not always expected to follow the status quo in higher education. Thought-provoking prompts In addition to many icebreaker and orientation activities in both courses, the first week was dedicated to a discussion forum question: “What is your purpose to take this course, and why are you here?” The purpose of this prompt question was to raise students’ awareness of their learning journey and consider their learning subjectives. With this activity and similar prompts, the expectation was that learners would develop critical thinking skills and begin exploring and identifying their own learning goals. Liquid curriculum During the first week of both courses, one discussion forum was dedicated to elicit topics that learners were personally interested in. These topics, then, were integrated into two discussion forums (in week 6 and week 12) and collectively inquired as part of the curricula. In addition to this activity, emergent topics were linked to relevant and corresponding areas in the structured curriculum. The idea and practice of the liquid curriculum helped learners shape the course content to some extent and facilitate the idea that the community was the curriculum. “Truth is relative” as a driving motto In each online asynchronous forum discussions and synchronous weekly meetings, learners were constantly reminded that the instructor, metaphorically, wasn’t seeking black or white but intended to explore grey areas. That is, each of the 14 modules was never meant to reach any predefined learning objectives identified by the instructor, but some learning subjectives that were unique to each learner. I constantly reminded learners that truth is a relative term and rather than seeking one specific answer, learners should pursue their own questions, demonstrate their own interpretations, and show their own perspectives. This was successful for encouraging learners to freely express themselves and think out of the box. Wildcard sessions Wildcard sessions were free spaces to give learners more agency and unleash their critical thinking. These were applied two times in each course. The purpose of

Rhizomatic pedagogy in higher education 151 these sessions was to allow learners to go beyond the boundaries of the structured course and express any emerging issues during the course. These sessions not only included academic discussions but also included discussions around social and socio-economic issues. This is not surprising considering that learning is a social process and we cannot isolate learning from the social world surrounding us. Most of the wildcard sessions surfaced learners’ personal interests, marginal ideas, observations, and critiques regarding teaching and learning in education in general and distance education in specific. These sessions were helpful for learners to freely express themselves, share their ideas with others, and develop a critical stance. Self-evaluations In addition to grading through conventional methods (e.g., learning analytics, peer-evaluation, grading), I introduced peer- and self-evaluations in the courses. These were included in the summative assessment. The purpose was to help learners reflect on their learning process and to what extent they successfully pursued their learning subjectives. In all, the formal learning and structured curriculum was bent to provide exit points, liberate learners where possible, and encourage agency at best. Inspired by rhizomatic learning, the system was hacked to give learners more autonomy and enable them to shape the curriculum as a community and individuals.

Discussion and conclusion The two cases we describe here in the context of a postgraduate programme at Goldsmiths, University of London, and in two postgraduate courses at Anadolu University illustrate how variations in context – in circumstances, policies, student profiles, institutional cultures, disciplinary subjects – lead to different applications of rhizomatic pedagogy in higher education institutions. In other words, the case studies demonstrate that rhizomatic learning in higher education should be considered in relation to the macro context of the institution and the disciplinary practice, the meso context of the classroom ecology (online or on-campus, we don’t make a distinction here), and the micro context of the individual learner. Rhizomatic learning, just like any other pedagogical approach, is responsive to all of these different dimensions affecting teaching and learning in higher education. Outcomes-based and performative approaches that are central to so many higher education practices create structures that resist or reject rhizomatic pedagogy, but, also, rhizomatic pedagogy emerges because of the strain such rigid and prescriptive structures put on educators and learners (Teaching Excellence Framework in the UK or CoHE in Turkey). Our view is that as the many pressures on higher education intensify, more colleagues will seek coconstructed pedagogies focusing on shared learning and agency. This is not very different from bringing play into education to “celebrate and re-energise teaching and learning” (James, 2017, p. 13). It is becoming increasingly clear that we,

152  Suzan Koseoglu and Aras Bozkurt educators and students, need spaces away from “the metric and measurement driven culture of Higher Education” (James, 2017). In the context of Education, we argue that it is more helpful to view rhizomatic learning as a pedagogical philosophy rather than a prescriptive method with rigid rules or principles for practice. Rhizomatic learning as a philosophical orientation is helpful for putting the whole person at the center of education; “the experiences, emotions, relationships, knowledge, and skills that shape our students as human beings” (Koseoglu, 2020). Our students – postgraduate research students, professional and academic staff – appreciate it when we see them as a whole person, and, in return, we hope that they too will see us in that way. The approach is also helpful for building entry points in higher education curricula for critical and co-constructed approaches to education such as engaged pedagogy (hooks, 1994) or critical pedagogy (Freire, 1970). As we noted above, learners connect with the metaphor of rhizome quickly. Through this metaphor, we, course convenors or facilitators, show them that we reject a “banking model” of education (Freire, 1970) where students are passive recipients of knowledge transmitted to them by a higher authority. They also understand that we value the experiential knowledge learners bring into their education and that we are willing to learn and grow from this process. Thus, rhizomatic learning is useful to create a story of learning (Blaschke et al., 2021), to start a critical conversation around traditional, top-down, and linear models of adult education by considering nonlinear models of education with different entry points and multiple outcomes. Our observations align with Mackness and Bell (2015) who researched rhizomatic learning in Rhizo14: “Many Rhizo14 participants valued the metaphor of the rhizome for teaching and learning. Quoting from survey responses, participants of the Rhizo14 course thought that teaching and learning based on this metaphor is ‘subconscious’, ‘subterranean’, ‘subversive’, ‘a non-linear, multi-directional underground web of connections’. Learning is ‘haphazard’, ‘messy’, ‘serendipitous’, ‘esoteric’, ‘dynamic’, ‘unbounded’, ‘unpredictable’, ‘adaptive’, ‘self-organising’ and ‘non-hierarchical’”. However, Mackness and Bell (2015) also note that for some participants, the metaphor had a negative connotation (e.g., “a pernicious, pervasive weed”). The metaphor of rhizome spurs educators’ imaginations; it is a powerful thinking exercise to imagine different possibilities for education – to make the social pedagogical and pedagogical social – but, as Mackness et al. (2016) note, “metaphors need to be treated with care” (p. 81). For example, let’s consider a nomadic learner, on a nomadic plane of education. We might consider her free, unconstrained in her thinking and in the directions she takes: she is constantly in movement moving from one plane of learning to another. Now let’s consider that she is a mother and that she is travelling with her children. Let’s also add another layer to this narrative; while her fellow travelers are all young in their early 20s, she is the only mature student and working full-time. The more “ANDs” we add

Rhizomatic pedagogy in higher education 153 (a woman AND with kids AND mature AND working …), the more the notion of a nomadic learner enjoying unlimited freedom as a self-directed “individual” or “independent” learner becomes questionable. This reminds us of feminist critiques of flexibility and self-directed learning in online education (see, e.g., Houlden & Veletsianos, 2019), as the imagined online learner is often a male with privileges (von Prümmer, 1994). To argue that rhizomatic learning should unfold according to a set number of principles would, ultimately, be a position of privilege as well. For example, although a principle of rhizomatic thinking is that any point of a rhizome can be, should be, connected to any other (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987), such connections often do not happen organically for all students. Students need time to understand how things work in class, expectations and boundaries, and manage new relationships. They need time to be able to open themselves to different ways of studying or being a student. Some students prefer working with predefined educational content and perhaps more independently without necessarily tying themselves to a community. Surprises, unexpected paths or routes to education are not always welcome when students want to plan ahead and know what the outcome will be. We also need to recognize that, for many students, the educational outcomes are very much shaped by the pedagogical, social, and financial support the university provides. Where are you coming from? What are you heading for? These are important questions to consider for our institutions and students. Our students do critique this method at times and state their preference to learn from a more structured method. For example, a PG Cert participant at Goldsmiths said in class evaluations, “I do not like the approach of anything goes.” Another PG Cert participant critiqued monocultural approaches in education in her final assessment using the interrelated relationship of corns, beans, and squash as an inspiration for collaborative and interdisciplinary higher education pedagogies (Wingfield, 2023). Wingfield’s work can also be considered as a critique of rhizomatic pedagogy. Going back to the critique of uncritical use of metaphors in education by Mackness and Bell (2015), it is a reminder that ideas from other disciplines need to be treated with care in Education (on this topic, also see Harris, 2016). “Learning does not exist without diversity” says Wingfield, “and therefore the design of educational practices and pedagogies should not be mono-cultural.” The case studies also demonstrate the extent to which teachers may need to facilitate rhizomatic learning in formal higher education, to encourage inclusive participation and to create spaces for critical reflection. When higher education teachers use the approach with care and intentionality, rhizomatic pedagogy has the potential to become a form of critical pedagogy educators can use to “shift the discourse from terms of a struggle against students to one of shared responsibility” (Goodyear, 2021). Teachers in rhizomatic pedagogy “inquire alongside students” (Reilly, 2011) and use their knowledge and skills for effective learning design (Couros, 2009). In our examples, teachers are not removed from rhizomatic planes of learning, rather their roles shift to “facilitator,” “course convenor,” or “co-learner,” but, also, we were “teachers” in a more traditional sense as well,

154  Suzan Koseoglu and Aras Bozkurt as we used our extensive knowledge of pedagogy and disciplinary practice to create a networked model of learning and to guide participants/students in this process. In both cases we presented here, we played an important role to nurture a community with diverse voices, to initiate and sustain a working structure where students could learn from peers and colleagues.2 Borrowing from hooks (1994), we used our instructional authority to “affirm students’ presence, their right to speak, in multiple ways on diverse topics” (p. 84). This was an ethical imperative, as Mackness and Bell (2015) suggested in their critique of experimental MOOCs. We also recognized social learning or experiential learning to encourage learner agency in class. Bandura (2009) defines agency as “the human capability to exert influence over one’s functioning and the course of events by one’s actions” (p. 8). Drawing from Freire’s (1970) critique of the banking model of education, Hase and Blaschke (2021) note that “when the student is a passive recipient of education with no say in process or content, then agency is removed.” They, then, argue that agency can be fostered by encouraging learners to construct meaning through direct experience, by helping them engage with “their social and cultural contexts” and make meaningful contributions to their learning. This process looked very different in the two case studies we described here (at Goldsmiths and Anadolu University) due to differences in sociocultural contexts. For example, an ice-breaker activity posing students the question “What is your purpose to take this course and why are you here?” may be standard practice in many postgraduate level programmes in the UK and US, but in the context of Turkish education, this simple activity is affirmative in nature, as students in Turkish state schools typically go through a traditional and rigidly structured education system, where the teacher and the institution are the ultimate and absolute authorities in education. Here, we need to consider the hidden curriculum to be able to understand the rhizomatic plateaus that the learning community potentially built and traversed together. Through activities like liquid curriculum, “truth is relative” motto, or self-evaluations, learners sense the power of their agency and understand that their values are respected and that they can diverge from the official curriculum – the instructor disrupts the oppressive educational system which is so familiar to Turkish students. The unspoken, but very well-known, scripts for educational practice (e.g., teacher teaches, students pay attention or appear to pay attention) are challenged by shared experience and practice. In the context of Goldsmiths, the students were professional and academic staff members of an institution renowned in critical thinking and, as such, they did not expect a learning environment which imposed such authority on them. We might perhaps argue that one rhizomatic plateau learners traversed was on race equality and equity in higher education. As this was a topic with high relevance to Goldsmiths (see the context of Goldsmiths above), we experienced intensity and momentum in related educational activities. Are our case studies good examples for rhizomatic learning? To what extent were we able to, or did we want to, use a Deleuzoguattarian philosophy of rhizomatic thinking in our teaching practice? Perhaps these are not very useful questions. To what extent did learners feel excitement in their co-journey? To what

Rhizomatic pedagogy in higher education 155 extent did they find inspiration from others and feel supported and included in their development? These are questions worth exploring going forward with rhizomatic pedagogy in Education.

Acknowledgments Suzan Koseoglu would like to thank her colleagues Mary Claire Halvorson and Dr Raed Yacoub. Mary Claire Halvorson, the former director of professional development at Goldsmiths, created a networked model of professional learning at the institution and used a rhizomatic pedagogy long before Suzan joined the university. Dr Raed Yacoub always raised the concept of fairness in his teaching practice.

Notes 1 Phenomenology, in particular, is a research methodology that has been influenced by the rhizomatic philosophy of thinking. See, for example, Entangling a Post-Reflexivity through Post-Intentional Phenomenology by Vagle and Hofsess (2016). 2 Hence our decision to use the term “rhizomatic pedagogy” in this discussion.

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Rhizomatic pedagogy in higher education 157 Koseoglu, S. (2020). Access as pedagogy: A case for embracing feminist pedagogy in open and distance learning. Asian Journal of Distance Education, 15(1), 277–289. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3893260 Mackness, J., & Bell, F. (2015). Rhizo14: A rhizomatic learning cMOOC in sunlight and in shade. Open Praxis, 7(1), 25–38. http://doi.org/10.5944/openpraxis.7.1.173 Mackness, J., Bell, F., & Funes, M. (2016). The rhizome: A problematic metaphor for teaching and learning in a MOOC. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 32(1). https://doi.org/10.14742/ajet.2486 Maioz-Basterretxea, L. (2015). La pedagogía rizomática en la educación artística. Doctoral dissertation. Universidad Internacional de La Rioja (UNIR): Re-Unir. Phillips, J. (2017). Towards a rhizomatic understanding of the desistance journey. The Howard Journal of Crime and Justice, 56(1), 92–104. https://doi.org/10.1111/ hojo.12193 Reilly, M. A. (2011). Rhizomatic Learning [Web log post]. http://maryannreilly. blogspot.com/2011/06/rhizomatic-learning.html Samson, S., Hutchings, C., Goolam Hoosen, T., & Thesen, L. (2022). ‘I am everywhere all at once’: Pipelines, rhizomes and research writing. Higher Education, 83(6), 1207–1223. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-021-00738-z Sharples, M., McAndrew, P., Weller, M., Ferguson, R., FitzGerald, E., Hirst, T., Mor, Y., Gaved, M., & Whitelock, D. (2012). Innovating pedagogy 2012: Open university innovation report 1. The Open University. Vagle, M. D., & Hofsess, B. A. (2016). Entangling a post-reflexivity through post-intentional phenomenology. Qualıtatıve Inquıry, 22(5), 334–344. https:// doi.org/10.1177/1077800415615617 von Prümmer, C. (1994). Women-friendly perspectives in distance education. Open Learning: The Journal of Open, Distance and e-Learning, 9(1), 3–12. https://doi. org/10.1080/0268051940090102 Wingfield, E. C. (2023). Using botanical structures to inform collaborative and multi-disciplinary learning in the digital age. In S. Koseoglu, & G. Veletsianos (Eds.), Feminist critical digital pedagogy. EdTech Books. https://edtechbooks. org/feminist_digital_ped

10 Enabling rhizomatic collaborations Social and technical factors that impact agile thinking and learning Apostolos Koutropoulos

Introduction My interest in collaborative academic work began in 2011 when I was a participant in early Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs). A particular MOOC, titled MobiMOOC, that focused on the subject of mobile learning, provided an interesting space for emergence. The subject matter of the MOOC was interesting, but what happened during the MOOC was even more interesting: Participants adapted their MOOC participation to better meet their needs, and part of that adaptation was a clustering of people who were interested in doing research on MOOCs (cf. de Waard et al., 2011a, 2011b). This type of collaborative effort amongst strangers really piqued my interest because, as a college student, my previous collaborative class experiences made me cautious of any sort of groupwork, a sentiment that also seems to be shared by students today. My prior experiences of working together with others felt uneven from project to project and from class to class. But what about in the MOOC context? One of my teammates’ curiosity was also piqued, and she posed the question “Why did we collaborate?” after one of our final collaborative works from that MobiMOOC was published. While we didn’t get to explore the answer to that question, the question did come back during and after my participation in the rhizomatic learning MOOCs (RhizoMOOCs) that were initiated by Cormier (2014a, 2014b, 2015). In the years following the MobiMOOC I observed a pattern: In connectivist MOOCs (cMOOCs) participants often formed and extended their networks to pursue tasks and interests that they had in common with other community members in the MOOC. Some of these activities resulted in deliverables that were collaborative academic research. The same thing happened in the RhizoMOOCs, with working relationships formed amongst strangers occurring during and after the conclusion of the MOOCs. Thus, I revisited the question “Why did we collaborate?” as the focus of my dissertation inquiry. This chapter presents some of the findings from my dissertation work (Koutropoulos, 2021) and provides a background within which these results can be further explored.

DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378-13

Enabling rhizomatic collaborations 159

Background The focal point for my narrative inquiry into collaboratives were Cormier’s RhizoMOOCs (Cormier, 2014a, 2014b, 2015). The first RhizoMOOC had over 500 participants registered (Cormier, 2014c), however, as other researchers highlight, given the connectivist nature of the course, not everyone registered on the course platform (Peer2Peer University, P2PU); therefore the exact number of participants who started the course is unknown (Mackness et al., 2016). By the end, Cormier (2014a) estimated that about 50 core participants continued to actively participate, while the rest remained only distantly connected. Out of those 50 core participants, about 15 are known to have participated in various collaboratives (rhizocollabs) that resulted in published or presented academic work. This section focuses on two bedrock elements for understanding rhizocollabs: The first element is the MOOC itself, which provided a space for the collaborative phenomenon to exist. The second element is a brief exploration of collaborative work in an educational context, which sets the stage to better understand the phenomenon of rhizocollabs. RhizoMOOC The RhizoMOOC was a set of connectivist MOOCs that ran in 2014 and 2015. Cormier describes his original intentions as creating a six-week course on the P2PU platform to have short conversations about his work on rhizomatic learning; at the time he was expecting no more than 50 people to be interested in joining (Cormier, 2014a). Connectivism was posited by Siemens (2005) and described as a learning theory for the digital age. Connectivism seeks to explain learning in complex and rapidly changing digital environments. The MOOC, as a format, emerged as an instantiation and an exploration of connectivist ideas. When other forms of MOOCs emerged later on, the original MOOCs started being described as cMOOCs. Key principles of connectivism include the notion that “nurturing and maintaining connections is needed to facilitate continual learning,” that one of the core skills in learning is the “ability to see connections between fields, ideas, and concepts,” and that the intent of connectivist learning activities is the pursuit of current, up-to-date, and accurate knowledge (Siemens, 2005). The principles provided an underpinning for cMOOCs, including the RhizoMOOCs. Even though both RhizoMOOCs are described as being cMOOCs (Mackness et al., 2016), the metaphor of the rhizome provided the foundational philosophy for the design of the RhizoMOOCs (Mackness et al., 2016). In describing rhizomatic learning, Cormier (2008) wrote that in the “rhizomatic model of learning, curriculum is not driven by predefined inputs from experts; it is constructed and negotiated in real time by the contributions of those engaged in the learning process” (p. 5). Cormier’s notion of the Rhizome derives from, and is influenced by, the work of Deleuze and Guattari (1987). In Cormier’s formulation of rhizomatic learning, “knowledge can only be negotiated, and the

160  Apostolos Koutropoulos contextual, collaborative learning experience shared by constructivist and connectivist pedagogies is a social as well as a personal knowledge-creation process with mutable goals and constantly negotiated premises” (2008, p. 3). Cormier frames his metaphor of the rhizome as trying to solve issues such as determining what we consider current, or accurate, in emerging fields where currency becomes increasingly transitory. Cormier argues that the existing cycles of discovery, learning, and publishing are too static and prescribed to be useful in more fluid environments; hence, a new way of teaching and learning is needed in order to avoid learning based on outdated information. During the RhizoMOOCs, Cormier provided prompts each week. These were points to ponder or perhaps stated differently a type of weekly intellectual agitation. The participants took his vague prompts and interpreted them in a variety of ways (Cormier, 2014a). Cormier adopted the role of party host (Lau, 2014) where participants were encouraged to mingle and discuss without any specific plan or destination. This created both opportunities for unforeseen creativity and some potential sources for conflict. An example of such unforeseen opportunities is what Lau (2014) describes in her article: There was an example of an instance where “an experience which started with poems left by participants in the comments of one of [her] blog posts, leading to audiovisual remixes, and culminating in a week-long, seven-person poetry collaboration across Twitter and SoundCloud” (p. 237). Mackness et al. (2016) describe the atmosphere of play and fun as emerging from the group, and in addition to the poetry other types of multimedia were part of the regular collection of artefacts, including personal writings, music, photography, and other artwork. These types of engagement were participant-initiated (Bali et al., 2016). One of the types of connected and collaborative activities, and the focus of this chapter, were activities that explored emergent knowledge and that lead to a type of academic deliverable. There were different permutations of people working together to understand their learning experiences in these RhizoMOOCs, with examples of such work including the work of attempting to understand rhizomatic learning experiences (cf., Bali et al., 2016), examining participatory research in cMOOCs (Hamon et al., 2015); and the examination of shared space in the RhizoMOOC and how it enabled community beyond the curriculum (Honeychurch et al., 2016). Even though years have passed since these two RhizoMOOCs concluded, individuals from those MOOCs still engage with one in various shared spaces. Mackness and Bell (2015) described the RhizoMOOC as being on the extreme end of the c/x MOOC continuum “because unlike prior cMOOCs, the course was designed to have no centre” (p. 21), while other researchers gave the RhizoMOOCs a new prefix and called it an rMOOC, short for Rhizomatic MOOC (Bali et al., 2016), recognizing the form of the RhizoMOOCs as sufficiently different from past cMOOCs. While there were both positive and not-so-positive experiences in the MOOCs, some researchers “conclude that the emphasis in #rhizo14 [was] on contribution and creation rather than content mastery, [and] encouraged a sense of ‘eventedness’ (shared experience), which allowed our community to thrive” (Honeychurch et al., 2016, p. 1).

Enabling rhizomatic collaborations 161 Collaboration The rhetoric of university Centers for Teaching and Learning emphasizes the value of designing courses that include activities that require learners to collaborate because collaboration is an important mode of learning (Koutropoulos, 2021). This focus on collaboration isn’t new. A cursory review of the literature identifies calls for collaborative work go back at least 40 years (e.g., Feichtner & Davis, 1984), and it’s not unusual to connect the need for collaborative work and skills to the work environment. Feichtner and Davis (1984) write that in their academic discipline (management), the shift from individual decision-making to group decision-making has become the norm due to the ever-increasing complexity of the business environment. This necessitates working together because one person cannot satisfactorily cope with this increased complexity. This may sound familiar if you’ve read about connectivism which was formulated some 30 years later. As the old saying goes, plus ça change … When it comes to collaboration, it is important to acknowledge an elephant in the room: Both in the published research and in everyday parlance, the terms “collaboration” and “cooperation” often are used interchangeably (Hogue et al., 2018; Koutropoulos, 2021; Olivares, 2007). Even in the educational professional practice literature the terms “cooperative learning” and “collaborative learning” are used interchangeably in the same document. Things get muddier still when we consult both the interdisciplinary and intradisciplinary literature. For example, in the field of education early work in computer mediated learning was called Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (Stahl et al., 2006, emphasis added), while similar trends in the workplace environment were called Computer Supported Cooperative Work (Grudin, 1994, emphasis added). In the field of education, Bruffee (1995) had a major influence in distinguishing differences between collaboration and cooperation. He notes that cooperative learning was developed originally for younger learners, with the goal of teaching foundational knowledge and maintaining group member accountability in the process. Students in a cooperative could break down individual parts of a larger project; individuals could accomplish their own parts, as an independent contribution to the larger project. This model provides the instructor with a position of authority. In collaborative learning, the work is not divided into neat pieces as it is in cooperative learning. Therefore, in collaborative learning, the lines of accountability are much more blurred than in cooperative learning. Accountability is kept track of in cooperation but not in collaboration. Collaborative learning also encourages group dissent through which members of a working group can propose alternate ideas and debate them to come up with the best alternatives. There are additional views on the subject of distinctions between collaboration and cooperation. For instance, Dillenbourg (1999) summarizes his view that “the words ‘collaborative learning’ describe a situation in which particular forms of interaction amongst people are expected to occur, which would trigger learning mechanisms, but there is no guarantee that the expected interactions will actually occur” (p. 5). Furthermore, for Dillenbourg, the division of labour

162  Apostolos Koutropoulos is a matter of scale. In a collaborative effort, the complexity of collaboration, and how interwoven one’s work is with the work of others in that collaborative, can depend on the task and the individual circumstance at any given time; that is to say that in collaboration the extent of the division of labour is unknown at the beginning of the collaboration and the division of labour is negotiable; whereas in a cooperative the extent of the division of labour is known and made explicit at the outset. In other literature, Downes (2010), in his work, shared two unattributed definitions for collaboration and cooperation where the characteristics of these two modes are flipped compared to Bruffee’s work. Regardless of what one calls this kind of working together, due to the unclear nature of difference between collaboration and cooperation, I propose that we should not be thinking of two distinct modes of working together, but rather a consider collaboration as existing in a continuum of working together, a continuum that might be impacted by the specific attributes of the learners, the environment, and the intended outcomes. Regardless of where you are in that continuum, there are some elements of working together that have risen to importance. Amongst the elements needed for successful collaboration we have locus of control, trust, expertise, group membership, and appropriate scaffolding for working together with others. Cecez-Kecmanovic and Webb (2000) highlight that “learning through a collaborative process cannot be forced upon or induced through outside forces: it has to be internally created, mutually accepted as valid and valuable, and enacted by students” (section 2, para. 4). In a collaborative effort, members of a team should want, at some basic level, to work with one another without the need for an external force to push towards that that collaboration. Learners need to retain their own locus of control. This connects to Kirschner’s (2002) feelings of positive interdependence, without which collaborative efforts are not as strong. Despite the negative feelings towards group work, it is important to note that even without an external force acting upon the learner to encourage (or force) them to work together, learners may seek out opportunities to collaborate. In some cases, it might be directly related to the perceived expectations of future working environments (e.g., Alpay & Littleton, 2001). In other instances, learners seek out collaborative work because of positive past experiences (Brindley et al., 2009). Research also demonstrates that learners can experience higher satisfaction in online learning when they work in collaborative learning (Kumi-Yeboah et al., 2017). Also, while learners may dread and avoid collaborative learning in the form of small groups, with members not of their own choosing (Brindley et al., 2009; Nielsen et al., 2010), the research indicates that heterogeneous groups gain competence ability quicker than groups that were more homogenous (Palincsar & Herrenkohl, 2002; Topping, 2005), and the worst group experiences tend to be the ones where students form their own groups (Feichtner & Davis, 1984). Studies show that students appreciate the benefits of working in teams towards advancing individual and collective knowledge (e.g., Ku et al., 2013) and that students do enjoy collaborating, sharing, and riffing off each other’s ideas, but it’s usually the collective assessment poses an issue (Macdonald, 2003).

Enabling rhizomatic collaborations 163 Finally, for collaborations to be successful there needs to be some element of guidance and scaffolding. Putting students together and expecting them to “figure it out” can hurt both the group formation process and the underlying reasons for designing collaborative work into the course. This is where a metacognitive understanding of how groups function is useful for learners. A well-known, and oft shared, group development model is Tuckman’s (1965) stages of group development which include: Forming, norming, storming, and performing. A later revision to the model added adjourning as the culminating stage of the process (Tuckman & Jensen, 1977). Collaborative learning, and collaborating with others, is not an easy task. It takes effort to set up, mentor learners to work together with others, and to establish trust and working relationships amongst learners who are new to one another. However, the benefits of collaborating with others can outweigh the start-up costs associated with collaboration. Regardless of how learners end up in collaborative learning contexts, they need to develop strong feelings of being welcomed, accepted, needed, valued, and have a sense of belonging (Peacock & Cowan, 2019), as well as having a feeling of trust in their fellow co-participants (Rourke, 2000).

Rhizomatic collaborations: Technology and people While a fair body of research exists for the MOOC’s various types and manifestations, the phenomenon of organic and emergent collaboratives from within the ranks of MOOC participants had not been a phenomenon that has gathered much research attention. The motivations for voluntarily forming and joining collaborative efforts when they are not prescribed by a course are diverse and multifaceted. This section will dive deeper into complex nature of rhizomatic collaborations (rhizocollabs). Deleuze and Guattari (1987) write that rhizomes have no start, no end, and they grow in any direction. This seemed true, to some extent, in the RhizoMOOCs; however, for my exploration of the rhizocollabs I needed to start somewhere, end somewhere, and pick one particular direction. The rhizocollabs that I explored were focused on collaborations that culminated in academic products, such as peer-reviewed publications, and were impacted by one’s background, the technology used, and emergent group roles. This section explores these aspects of rhizocollabs. The power of origin stories In any sort of exploration there is always a story that occurs before the story that is under exploration (Craig, 2009). What came before the RhizoMOOC and the rhizocollabs influenced subsequent interactions and activities of participants in those spaces. Some collaborators had crossed paths with one another before meeting again in the RhizoMOOCs, while others had followed in well-worm paths that fellow participants had previously traversed without knowing that they had done so. Some collaborators were new to the MOOC phenomenon, while others had started participating in these open learning spaces via past

164  Apostolos Koutropoulos cMOOCs. Overall, unlike my prior collaborative experience in MobiMOOC (e.g., Koutropoulos, 2016), participants in the RhizoMOOCs had some sort of prior knowledge of, or experience with, open learning and personal learning networks (PLN). These types of prior experiences prompted some of the participants to join spaces such as the RhizoMOOCs because they were looking for a kind of engagement that may not have been available either at their institutions or other proximal spaces. Past cMOOCs have been considered to be PLN spaces, and thus MOOC space has PLN attributes. In other words, the space is diverse, flexible, and multifaceted and supports professional growth across four domains: Cognitive, social, affective, and identity (Trust et al., 2018). In my exploration of rhizocollabs I discovered that the fluidity and loosely structured nature of such a rhizomatic learning space was something that participants were willing to allow so that they could see where it led. It should be noted that not every participant in this space felt this way (e.g., Mackness et al., 2016); however, amongst the group of collaborating members there was an acceptance of the flexibility and potentially ambiguous learning space, which ultimately opened up possibilities that may not have existed in a more defined space. Discovering the RhizoMOOCs also took many paths. Some collaborators discovered them on Twitter, others by reading Cormier’s blogs, others by googling for things, and others by pure happenstance through their social networks. This points to at least two important elements. First is, the emergent, diffuse, and fragmented nature of the MOOC learning space (McAuley et al., 2010); and, second, are the prerequisite literacies to be able to discover, navigate, and participate in such environments. The prerequisite literacies are evident by proxy: Most collaborators fit the demographic of MOOC participants described in the research literature of the time, namely individuals who have earned at least a college degree, with many having earned postgraduate degrees, and who are between the ages of 20 and 50 years old, they are also all employed, a characteristic common amongst MOOC participants in research examining characteristics of MOOC learners from that period (Koutropoulos, 2021). The motivation to collaborate with others is not monolithic. Some participants collaborated because there were fun things happening in the MOOC and they wanted to be part of that experience. Others were interested about what the collaborative efforts and work made them think. In a similar vein, the background and prior experience of RhizoMOOC participants brought a variety of skills and ways of being to the rhizocollabs. For some participants, the writing credit on academic work didn’t matter all that much, but it was a nice by-product of their collaboration, after all they were academics and that sort of thing mattered at some level in their professional lives, even if it wasn’t the primary motivation. Research does report on the issue of the free-rider problem (e.g., Gottschall & Garcia-Bayonas, 2008); however, participants in the rhizocollabs did not mention this as an issue for them. They seemed more interested in doing and in being in the moment than accounting for individual credit. And, while the academic publication was a welcomed hidden benefit of the entire endeavour, it was not the primary reported purpose for coming together with others to collaborate.

Enabling rhizomatic collaborations 165 As a conclusion to this section, I offer the suggestion that a participant’s prior experiences, one’s “origin story” will make a difference in and shape the collaborations that they take part in. Some of the collaboration members, in reflecting back on their experiences, mentioned that it makes a big difference who attends a cMOOC and what their backgrounds are. Given that the rhizocollabs that I explored emerged from the RhizoMOOCs, one can conclude that who shows up to a collaborative effort, and the skills and attitudes that they bring, impact the collaboration. Technology mediation and affordances A shared space that is technologically mediated plays a role in people’s collaborations (Janssen et al., 2009), and unsurprisingly this was something that was observed in the collaborations that emerged from the RhizoMOOC. One level of influence that technology has in mediated communications comes via the algorithms that display posts on social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook. As was the practice at the time, MOOCs were often announced and promoted on social platforms. They were shared via original posts and retweets. Depending on who you followed, or what the algorithm thought of your interests, some posts may have been promoted and thus brought to a user’s attention, while others not. Collaborative sessions and projects were also announced on such social media platforms, so this type of algorithmic “meddling” may have promoted collaborations to some people, but not as much for others. Eventually word did get out about the collaborations that were happening as part of the RhizoMOOC, given that in a rhizome there is more than one path to the information; however participants may not have felt as conformable joining a project that was already underway. A major innovation during this time period was the ascendance of concurrently collaborative writing tools, such as GoogleDocs. Prior to GoogleDocs, the technologies used – namely Microsoft Word – became an intellectual hindrance. Each participant had to wait until the next person in line sent them their version of the document, and that person sent it to the next person until the group circle was complete. This is an example of a technology forcing a sequential collaboration (Salmons, 2019). With offline tools, like Word, waiting to take turns was not optimal and it proved to be an impediment to collaboration, especially when there were multiple authors involved. Having the ability to see what others are writing in real time, and to engage in conversation with your collaborators was a revelatory experience, and it broke participants free from the constraints of sequential collaboration. Having our collaborative space to be GoogleDocs provided a few affordances. First, one could engage in side conversations in the margins by using the commenting feature. This provided a space for ideas to develop in the margins until they were ready to join the main document. Second, the main body of the text permitted everyone to join in the same space and ask questions. Some documents included multimedia elements and resembled what Ely (2007) calls a pastiche.

166  Apostolos Koutropoulos With elements that were sometimes hard to understand, having this joint space made it easier to communicate. Third, GoogleDocs had recently introduced the suggest feature in the summer of 2014 which allowed coauthors to suggest edits to sections written by others. This enabled another level of politeness norming in the writing process. Finally, having a central space freed us from having to worry about document version control, or stated differently avoiding having to ask the question “who’s got the most recent version?” because the most recent version was always online. As a collaborative group, authors didn’t have to deal with other members labelling a document as “final” and then having the oft-mocked “final final final final” version at a future point in time. This type of collaborative writing, enabled by GoogleDocs, removes the sequential order that enforces a hierarchy and a unified authorial voice (Hogue et al., 2018). The previous way of working with documents, one author at a time in a sequential manner, is a legacy of p-Learning (Dron, 2016), while the GoogleDocs approach to collaborative writing was developed in parallel to the RhizoMOOC course interactions and overall course ethos. This flexibility of GoogleDocs enabled collaboration despite conflicting schedules and having participants in different time zones. Technology also helped shape group norms and communications approaches. Through the technological affordances of GoogleDocs there were a variety of politeness options and norms that emerged on different GoogleDocs. In the older version of GoogleDocs, the two main options were that one could post comments, or one could edit over someone else’s text. To be polite, you could use a different colour to show what changes you made or use the strikethrough formatting option (e.g., strikethrough) to show that you deleted something. However, using different colours and strikethrough text also made editing a challenge. Starting in June 2014, there was a “suggest” option available in GoogleDocs that functioned much like track changes in Word. It’s worth noting that, at the time, the suggest option did not work well on mobile devices; you could neither see nor could you make any suggested changes. This made it only half-useful, according to some participants. The suggest function was useful for several participants, and it seemed to enhance collaborative procedure options. Norms also emerged over the use of the suggest function. Some of the approaches used in the rhizocollabs harken back to Roschelle and Teasley’s (1995) narrations, a verbal strategy that enables members of a collaborative to monitor each other’s actions and interpretations. Group dynamics and group roles Teamwork is not only a dynamic process that unfolds over time (Bell et al., 2018), it is also a journey (Gardner, 2005). Clusters of activity and norm-setting occurred both in situ, in the documents that participants worked on, and ex situ via private messages and emails between group members. An example of in situ collaborative activities was in GoogleDocs where a participant added some rough ideas to the document to get a broad sense of what the exploration was about. The particular participants may not have been protective of their words in that they wanted others to add to them and edit

Enabling rhizomatic collaborations 167 them. This is connected with elements of trust between collaborators. Trust and respect enable the feedback loops necessary for this type of collaboration (Hogue et al., 2018). Unsurprisingly, trust along with getting acquainted and communication have also been identified as an important component in collaborations (e.g., Palloff & Pratt, 2007; Salmons, 2019). Some collaborative activities began as communal writing spaces in that participants wrote in the same document, but in separate pages. One author wouldn’t edit the other author’s words until concrete ideas were ready to be shared, and there could be some discussion. The ideas in the communal writing space could converge or diverge. Through these activities individuals in these collaboratives could get acquainted with one another. Getting acquainted is more than just knowing people’s names; it’s getting to know people’s predispositions, their thoughts and beliefs and ways of being (Hasler-Waters & Napier, 2002), and this aspect of collaboration, the getting to know each other and building that trust, was partly achieved through participation in the RhizoMOOC because participants engaged in the collaborative joint exploration space, but also in the main course exploration space. The research literature on collaboration indicates that there is, at times, a hesitation to share knowledge in a group setting out of fear that you might be misleading your fellow groupmates or out of a fear of criticism (Ardichvili et al., 2003). This is the case because there is normally an aversion to making ourselves vulnerable within the hierarchical structures that exist in day-to-day life (Bali et al., 2016). However, the reflections shared by rhizocollab participants run counter to this aversion to sharing. The RhizoMOOCs were nonhierarchical and this ethos appears to have transferred over to the rhizocollabs that took place. The open nature of collaboration in these groups is reminiscent of a type of gift economy (Raymond, 2001; Rheingold, 1993) which served as a means of increasing group cohesion (Cohen & Bailey, 1997). Another aspect of collaboration emerged was the lack of pressure to participate at a certain minimum level. Those who worked together with others felt comfortable participating in these collaboratives to the extent that they felt comfortable or were able to. The pressure to produce a certain percentage of work often derives from the freeloader problem whereby an individual benefits from the work of others without contributing to the team. In the case of these rhizocollabs, an individual who contributed to the work produced was acknowledged, regardless of what their percentage of contributed work was. In fact, it was often hard to parse out who had contributed what when the final document was complete. This no pressure participation also connects with another attribute of rhizocollabs: Permeable group membranes. I argue that the group membership membrane in such rhizocollabs is more permeable when compared to groups formed in traditional learning settings. Individuals are welcomed to join a group endeavour at the beginning of the project, but they are also able to join later in the project’s life cycle. For example, if a participant cannot participate in a group early on because of external circumstances, it is possible to join a collaboration that is already underway when those circumstances change, and the prospective collaborator feels comfortable jumping in when an exploration is already in

168  Apostolos Koutropoulos progress. Thus, group membership is not solidified and closed off at the beginning of the project life cycle, and it is perhaps an example of the no start, no end in a rhizome that Deleuze and Guattari discuss in their work. This permeability is also an example of the rhizome, as described by Cormier (2008) when he describes the rhizome as being connectible, modifiable, and as having multiple entries and exits. There are also connectivist threads in this aspect of collaboration because connectivism views knowledge as a networked state and views learning as the process of generating those networks and adding and pruning connections (Siemens, 2013), and permeable membranes for group participation encourage that adding/pruning and ebb/flow of connections. This membership permeability is also visible in the adjourning state of collaborative groups. When considering the Tuckman and Jensen model of group development (1977), one typically considers an entire team as having adjourned; in other words, adjourning is not a phase typically attributed to individuals in that group. However, the permeable membrane of group membership in these collaborations means that adjournment occurred at the individual level, not at the group level. The natural adjournment point, the completion of a project, can become an opportunity for re-convening as additional ideas and projects rise to the surface and pique the interest of the group. Participants may take advantage of the sense of flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990) that they may be experiencing as their state in the collaborative work experience provides for that sense of high productivity that is enjoyable. Those who choose to not reconvene for any subsequent group configurations are considered to be adjourning. Finally, defined group roles within a team emerged as an important element of the rhizocollabs and closely tied to that is the notion of a catalyst. Some people were described as catalysts in a collaborative. Catalysts are individuals without whom things would stagnate or not move along. Catalysts are certain right people at the right time that can move things along. They aren’t necessarily the overseers of the process, but rather provide key skills, ideas, or frames of view to fellow collaborators in order to get “unstuck” from wherever point the group was stuck on. They may be ever-present throughout rhizocollab or jump into specific spaces and stages as needed. Thus, some participants were identified as consistently being catalysts, while others were situational catalysts. Ultimately, as these groups developed, and continued to evolve, their participation norms evolved through sustained contact with one another, both in situ, in the documents that they were working on, and ex situ – on platforms like Facebook, where they could get acquainted with one another, got to know and trust their fellow participants, emerged into catalyst roles, and participated through an open culture of sharing. Connect, collab, learn, and enjoy Ultimately, the rhizocollabs were about connecting, collaborating, learning, and enjoying the process. Mackness et al. (2016), writing about the RhizoMOOCs, indicate that for most participants the value of the course experience lay in

Enabling rhizomatic collaborations 169 “the spirit of exploration, openness, experimentation, of trying new things” (p. 78), something which seems to have translated into the collaborative experiences I examined. The rhizocollab experiences, for some participants at least, were transformative in nature. Some collaborators indicate that they’ve reached a stage in their professional development where they preferred to work with others rather than on their own, and it’s important to highlight that this wasn’t always the case. Similarly, other collaborators report of looking to finding ways to maintain connections and continuing to know the people they worked with. This is a good example of what Fini (2009) wrote when discussing early cMOOCs wherein lifelong learners can use various tools and approaches to build and manage their own learning networks. Additionally, MOOCs as learning spaces aim to foster autonomous and self-regulated learners who interact in many spaces, and in a distributed manner (Siemens, 2013), and the rhizocollabs were an example of this. Other participants described being part of the collaborations in the RhizoMOOCs as being some of the most exciting academic work that they’d been part of, and this academic work was done in collaboration with some of the most exciting people they’d had the opportunity to get to know. The rhizocollabs brought a “freshness” and engagement that was not available to them locally. The diversity of participants also enabled participants to learn more about topics that didn’t necessarily have immediate applicability. Through collaborations with others, participants also had opportunities to broaden their horizons in unexpected ways because they were working with others from different disciplines. The process of writing certain papers was described as fun by many participants, and there was a great degree of pride associated with those papers. Collaboration just got really easy over a period of time, and I would argue that participated started experiencing a state of flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). One participant also commented that they thought that the rhizocollabs embodied what was happening in the RhizoMOOCs, giving a sense that those connectivist and rhizomatic principles that were the start of the course were carried over into the work that emerged from it.

Concluding thoughts and looking ahead To conclude this chapter, I wanted to focus on seeds that could bloom and flourish when applied in other learning settings. Much of what I’ve discussed so far concern collaborations that occurred in specific RhizoMOOCs, but I’ve distilled three broad principles that I think could be of value to educators who are interested in rethinking their pedagogy, reevaluating processes, and reengaging with fun as part of their processes. I close this chapter with some ideas of where to go next for researchers and practitioners who are interested in exploring further, whether it’s on their own or with collaborators! Collaborations need a sandbox One of the themes woven into the conversations about rhizocollabs was how interconnected the RhizoMOOCs were to the collaborations that occurred.

170  Apostolos Koutropoulos Some participants saw the collaborations as being just a small part of their overall course experience. Some participants connected their specific collaborations to the overall course as well as to other participants in the course. These connections indicate links between the two spaces – those of the RhizoMOOC and the various rhizocollabs taking place. Even if a RhizoMOOC participant was not part of a specific rhizocollab, the echoes of that collaboration reverberated back into the RhizoMOOC. Many metaphors were used to describe this, such as a sandbox, a hive, throwing a party, or going to camp. All of these bring forth the mental image of having a space that is not only conducive to these activities but also actively promotes their serendipitous creation. Without the course acting as a sandbox, participants would not have this space to explore. Zweig (2011) proposed the term structured serendipity where creativity can be enhanced by the environment in which activity takes place. In such a space, individuals from different disciplines come together in a joint space to explore and are open to where the path may lead. Each brings their own backgrounds and knowledge, which ultimately, according to Zweig’s structured serendipity, enhances creativity. This breaking down of boundaries and the exploration of learning and knowledge at the boundaries were commented upon both in regard to the RhizoMOOCs and the collaborations that participants were a part of. Other terms that emerged as descriptors for such sandbox spaces were Community of Practice (Wenger, 1998) and Affinity Spaces (Gee, 2005). A Community of Practice is described to have a five-tiered stage of development which starts at a “potential” phase where people face similar situations without the benefit of shared practice, culminating in a “memorable” phase where the community is no longer central, however, the people who were involved remember it as a significant part of their identities (Wenger, 1998, p. 3). Communities of Practice can be seen as ways of not only solving problems of common interest to its members, but also a forum to spread best practices and to develop the skills of some members (Wenger & Snyder, 2000). To this end, Communities of Practice can be seen as part of a social learning system (Wenger, 1998) where members engage in the community to not only learn something new from their joint research but also learn from one another. Some members of the rhizocollabs were not as fond of the term Community of Practice as a descriptor of what we did, and they adopted the term Affinity Space. Gee (2005) describes Affinity Spaces as being a space where participants pursue common endeavours, a space that is shared between masters and newbies, a space that encourages individual and distributed knowledge, a space that honours tacit knowledge, where leadership is porous and leaders are resources, and where there are many different forms and paths to participation. Gee (2017) indicates that Affinity Spaces are “squishy and not well-bounded” (p. 28), whereas Lammers (2012) describes them as both permeable and interconnected spaces. This is important to keep in mind because it was observed that permeability exists with regard to group membership, as described above, and the interconnectedness was demonstrated by the multiple paths that participants took to

Enabling rhizomatic collaborations 171 arrive at the RhizoMOOCs. These multiple pathways and boundary learning spaces are also features of rhizomatic learning (Cormier, 2008). From my experience in these rhizomatic spaces, I agree with Jones et al. (2016) when they comment that Communities of Practice and Affinity Spaces as overlapping. These rhizocollabs were neither firmly in the category of Community of Practice nor in the Affinity Space. I settled for calling such a space a sandbox. The space where we congregate and our individual connecting practices are polymorphic. Different individuals will affiliate with different aspects of the sandbox that all group members play in. Hence, it is important to consider the space as one with many different attributes that are shaped by the places, practices, and participants in it, rather than a framework that shapes that space and how individuals fit into it. Education vs learning A second theme was the notion of distinguishing between learning and education. Education was viewed more as a structured space. Education usually operates within the core of what is known and codified as knowledge, and as relevant applicable practice. It is foundational by nature. Education doesn’t necessarily push at the boundaries, and when it does it’s in defined ways and within boundaries. Couros (n.d.) provides some additional attributes for education. He states that education starts with looking for answers, that is, it is about compliance, standardization, and that it’s time-bound. And, finally, education is about content consumption that is sequential in nature, in other words, a student completes the first course before attempting the next course in the sequence. RhizoMOOCs, on the other hand, operated in the realm of learning. The collaborations that emerged from the RhizoMOOCs inherited this attribute and also operated in the realm of learning. Learning is something that happens in the periphery of knowing. It is a practice that pushes up against boundaries to see how permeable, flexible, malleable, or absolute they are. This type of pushing at the boundaries sometimes means that the safe space of knowing what to expect does not exist. While participants mentioned trust and respect for others as existing within their collaborations, that does not negate the fact that when our assumptions are challenged we did not feel intellectually threatened in some way. Learning can be a true cacophony as communication is exchanged amongst different people all at the same time. As a participant in a learning environment you might get some of what’s happening, and you might not understand it right away. It’s a dynamic process that can be ambiguous at times and require clarification. Couros (n.d.) also offers his own definition of learning. He indicates that learning begins by asking questions. Learning is also social, it is personal, it is not time-bound, and is about creating. In a learning environment, as framed by Couros (n.d.), learning is non-linear, and participants are both learners and teachers; and it’s about challenging those perceived norms. Hence, what occurs in both RhizoMOOCs and in the collaboratives that emerged exemplifies the nature of a rhizomatic learning space as described by

172  Apostolos Koutropoulos Cormier (2008): Knowledge is developed by negotiation, it is contextual, collaborative, and social; the goals are mutable and constantly negotiated. This process may sound chaotic for a setting which has attributes of education rather than learning, but a balance between these two positions can be had in a traditional, knowledge-bound, and time-bound classroom. Embodied kefagogy Finally, there was an element of playfulness in the learning that occurred, both in the RhizoMOOCs and in the rhizocollabs. This was more visible in other RhizoMOOC collaborations, but even the academic collaborations were also described as being fun and engaging. Some people participated in the RhizoMOOC as a type of pastime. There is no singular way of describing this, and this might make for a great topic for future research. Some previous research on MOOCs has called this phenomenon edutainment (Zheng et al., 2015); however, edutainment is the wrong term to describe this motivation. Edutainment is defined as learning through the use of entertainment (Zorica, 2014), something that does not apply in this context. There were other suggestions for coining terms using Greek + “agogy,” so two potential terms that I propose to describe these experiences are kefagogy (kefi + agogy) for learning in a state of high spirits, cheer, and joviality and pareagogy (parea + agogy) for learning with good company. There is a term, HOMAGO or “Hanging Out, Messing Around, and Geeking Out” (Ito et al., 2009), that applies to learning activities with children and that also describes, in part, the spirit of these collaborations. The overall idea with HOMAGO is that we learn “along [a] kind of axis or overlapping Venn diagram that includes the most casual (Hanging Out), proceeds to a more active and engaged, if still very diffuse mode (Messing Around), to a more focused and productive mode (Geeking Out)” (Friedman, 2014). A handful of RhizoMOOC participants on Twitter identified themselves as practicing HOMAGO in their MOOC experiences. Ultimately, a playful and open ethos was an important aspect to these rhizocollabs. It made a complex, and difficult task, expanding the boundaries of knowledge, appear effortless. Looking ahead There is still a lot to be discovered about rhizomatic styles of collaboration. One such aspect revolves around Peacock and Cowan’s (2019) Sense of Belonging. For learners, this Sense of Belonging is made up of two key attributes: (1) it involves feelings of being accepted, needed, and valued; and (2) it includes feelings of fitting in and being connected to a group, class, subject, institution, or all of these. Aspects of trust, and belonging, are critical to collaborations, and I argue that parea (company) is also an important aspect in rhizocollabs. In a rhizomatic learning environment, with no start, no end, and many points of entry and exit, what does a Sense of Belonging look like?

Enabling rhizomatic collaborations 173 Another of my favourite terms to emerge through this exploration is cacophony. It sounds ugly, but it can be quite interesting because it indicates a kind of plurivocality that emerges during the pushing of boundaries of knowledge. Explorations of the rhizocollabs that emerged from the RhizoMOOC indicated that there was a plurivocality in the collaborative spaces, but what does it mean for learning? This type of space can be examined the lens of critical digital pedagogy (Morris & Stommel, 2018) to further explain or describe some of the collaborative work in these spaces. Also filed under cacophony, or perhaps bricolage, or swarming (Hogue et al., 2018) is the exploration how do people discover or develop their authorial voice in multiauthor or plurivocal collaborative works. Finally, as Rovai (2002) writes, trust, interaction, and spirit are three things that are important for communities to succeed. Spirit is cohesion and camaraderie – a community spirit. Additional aspects that emerged from my explorations of the rhizocollabs are aspects of social equity, social presence, group facilitation, and group size. Future research can explore how these spirits of cohesion and camaraderie or cheer (kefi) relate to the sense of fun felt by participating in the MOOC and in the collaborations. Rhizocollabs are not an easy thing to pin down, given that they inherit properties from rhizomatic learning that may make them elusive to study, but it proved to be an engaging form of collaboration that pushed at the boundaries of knowledge.

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11 The rhizomatic learning process of educational commons Yannis Pechtelidis, Silia Raditsa, Sofia Sarakenidou, and Sasa Dimitriadou

Introduction This chapter aims at the exploration of a controversial issue as the construction of knowledge and the development of the learning process in the field of education. Formal education is usually founded on the idea of true and objective knowledge which represents an independent and pre-existing reality and assumes the responsibility of transmitting this ‘true’ knowledge to children. On the contrary, Biesta & Osberg (2007, pp. 17–18) argue that in an evolving world we cannot rely on past rules dictating what we should do in the future and that knowledge is not an accurate representation of real life. Furthermore, learning is not understood as a process of transferring an objective picture or description of reality from someone who knows to someone who does not know, unmediated, without interpretation from a certain perspective. Instead, knowledge is the creation of the new, the novel, that which did not exist in the past (ibid., 33). Therefore, knowledge is a social construction and learning is a contingent, collective process of knowledge construction based on multiple and often unpredictable interactions between teachers/educators, children, and young people with unpredictable outcomes (Lenz Taguchi, 2010). Precisely because learning is a diverse and complex process that develops at multiple levels, it cannot have a fixed root or a starting point and a predetermined end or a linear trajectory with a beginning, middle, and end (ibid., 22). Based on the theory of the rhizome, the sociology of educational commons, but also the pedagogical theory of Malaguzzi, pupils or students, and teachers are perceived here as co-shapers of the learning process, co-producers of knowledge, and of social reality in general. The logic of rhizomatic learning lies at the heart of educational commons and will be discussed in the light of the ‘stigmergic’ cooperation and the methodology of pedagogical documentation, so that to make visible and intelligible the collective process of meaning making and learning. In particular, special emphasis is placed on the dual methodological movement of pedagogical documentation: (a) the circular and (b) the horizontal. On the one hand, the pedagogical documentation is used to slow down movement to reflect on a learning event, and on the other hand, it is used to speed movement up in the spaces of early childhood education. In the circular movement of DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378-14

180  Y. Pechtelidis, S. Raditsa, S. Sarakenidou, et al. pedagogical documentation, the pace is delayed in order to give the time to the members of the learning community to re-enact an event, to decode the norms, the patterns, and to identify the structural constraints and conditions of a specific pedagogical space. The circular movement can smooth out or flatten out the space for accelerating the horizontal creation of lines of flight that facilitate the production of new knowledge and realities. We will first define the theoretical framework of this chapter. In particular, we will clarify concepts such as the rhizome, the rhizomatic learning, the educational commons, stigmergy, and pedagogical documentation, and then we will highlight the relationships among these concepts and the dynamics their articulation produces for a more participatory, inclusive, and creative learning process and education. We will then talk about the methodological framework of this research and provide a description of the pedagogical site of a libertarian commons-based learning community, the Little Tree, where the case study was implemented. Finally, we will discuss the data of the research in the light of its theoretical framework and the dual movement of the rhizomatic pedagogical process of the commons.

Theoretical and methodological framework Rhizomatic learning and knowledge creation In terms of educational activity, learning process, and knowledge creation, we can use the image or metaphor of the rhizome as described by Deleuze i.e. as a tangled mass or tangle of roots of a plant, usually growing underground, in all directions and with continuous connections. This image or metaphor is the opposite of the traditional conventional tree metaphor for education and learning, with its fixed hierarchical sequence of root, trunk, and branches, which suggests a fixed and predictable order. Especially in (pre)school education this image or metaphor of the tree refers to the image or metaphor of the ladder where children progressively move from one developmental stage to another, step by step, in a linear and predetermined path from bottom to top, from a regime of ignorance or not knowing to a regime of enlightenment and knowledge, gradually conquering the learning goals set from the beginning of this learning path (Moss, 2019, p. 117; Sellers, 2013, p. 11). From the rhizome standpoint, knowledge is directly related to the creation of the new, that which did not exist before the learning and educational process began and is not thinkable in terms of existing categories of thought (Biesta & Osberg, 2007, p. 33). The starting point here is the children’s own learning strategies and knowledge production practices rather than their adaptation to preconceived theories and practices (Olsson, 2012, p. 90). At the heart of this approach is the interaction and dialogue between children and adults. Dialogue presupposes the practice of the pedagogy of listening, which develops around an ongoing struggle to produce meaning from what has been said, without preconceived ideas about what is right or appropriate (Rinaldi, 2006, p. 15).

The rhizomatic learning process of educational commons 181 The ‘rhizome’ and the ‘tree’ represent two different types of logic and two different ways of learning and producing knowledge. On the one hand, the tree with a linear, progressive, universal, and fixed logic, and the rhizome, and, on the other hand, the rizhome with a dynamic, flexible, lateral, and creative logic which embraces change, complexity, and heterogeneity and suggests a dynamic world in constant change and always in progress. Deleuze through the logic of the rhizome attempts to move towards a local, rather than universal, logic that produces changing and multiple truths, ‘lines of flight’ towards new thinking and knowledge. Rhizomatic thinking “would be determined in the movement of learning, not by the outcome of knowledge, and which would not let anyone, any authority, ‘ask’ questions and ‘define’ problems” (Deleuze & Parnet, 1987, p. 24). In rhizomatic education we are in an intermediate smooth space with no fixed starting and ending point, no distinction between the learning educational process and the learning outcome. Students/pupils/children and teachers/pedagogues/ companions are changing and constantly evolving, they are in a process of becoming with unknown dynamics. This logic of constantly new connections causes ‘lines of flight’ towards new directions and leads those involved away from closed, taxonomic, bipolar thinking towards open and endless thinking. Movement, flow, and a strong desire to avoid being constrained by the ‘orthodox thinking’ of transmitting and reproducing what is already known are central to this Deleuzian view of education (Moss, 2019, 118). ‘Orthodox thinking’, which is embedded not only in mainstream education but also in many alternative approaches of education (Pechtelidis & Kioupkiolis, 2020), attaches great importance to stability, linearity, predictability, and closure or the end of a process, having as ultimate aim as that of stabilizing, defining, and representing in predetermined ways of education, learning, knowledge, and pedagogical identities (identities in general). The challenge to this orthodox and prophetic thinking and pedagogy is encapsulated in the Deleuzian notion of nomadic, which can be used to define a nomadic pedagogy that escapes conventional categories (Dahlberg & Moss, 2009; Sidebottom, 2021). Nomadic pedagogy, like the nomad, is in constant movement, always in an intermediate space, in between, without fixed starting and ending points, without borders. The nomadic perspective shows us another way to think about education, learning, knowledge, and thinking. It shifts the focus to the learning process itself, rather than to its end. Applying Deleuze and Guattari’s (1987) post-structuralist perspective on education (Bazzul & Tolbert, 2017; Olsson, 2009; Sidebottom, 2021), rhizomatic nomadic learning contributes to a commons-oriented education (Pechtelidis, 2020; Pechtelidis & Kioupkiolis, 2020) where the community itself is the curriculum (Cormier, 2008, 6) challenging traditional notions of top-down instructional design where goals predate the participation of children (Kaustuv, 2003). Specifically, the ‘curriculum’ is developed, evolved, and adapted by the commoners (the members of a community of the commons) in a dynamic way in response to the circumstances in which they are involved (Pechtelidis & Kioupkiolis, 2020). In such social contexts, the interconnectedness and collectivity of the learning process is promoted, while there are no predetermined limits or predetermined

182  Y. Pechtelidis, S. Raditsa, S. Sarakenidou, et al. outcomes and prescribed ways of acquiring knowledge. In the light of a horizontal theory of learning, it is expected to be most effective when it allows participants to react to circumstances, maintaining ‘lines of flight’ (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987) that allow for a fluid and constantly evolving redefinition of the work in progress. In this sense, rhizomatic learning is at the core of educational and pedagogical commons (Pechtelidis & Kioupkiolis, 2020). Educational commons ‘Educational commons’ refers to learning communities where decisions about the educational process are made collectively by the three groups of teachers/ educators, learners, and their guardians (when they are under age). The very practice of education and learning becomes a ‘common good or resource’ which is collectively shaped and managed by the members of the educational community in terms of equality, freedom, and participation. In the ‘educational commons’, teachers, educators, facilitators, and students or pupils, children, and youth communicate and collaborate beyond the conventional divisions and hierarchies between teachers and students, in a process of collective exploration and learning that is open, critical, and ongoing. Understanding children and young people as social actors is crucial for how they become visible and their contribution to knowledge production and their participation in the decision-making processes. In the educational commons, teachers become companions or critical friends who facilitate and support, rather than guide with instructions the educational process, in which pupils are largely self-acting, creating individually and cooperating with each other (Bourassa, 2017; De Lissovoy et al., 2015; Korsgaard, 2018; Pechtelidis, 2020; Pechtelidis & Kioupkiolis, 2020). The growing paradigm of the ‘commons’ is a powerful alternative for deepening democracy in the field of education and for social change in general, on a footing of equality, sharing, participation, togetherness, caring, and freedom. The educational commons involve the co-production, distribution, and collective ownership of knowledge in non-formal, informal, and formal learning spaces, like classrooms, that share space for collaboration, project-work, content creation, meetings, socialization, playing, and studying. In the educational commons, the community of people building them can intervene in governing their interaction processes and their shared resources. Educational commons provide the community with free and easy access to knowledge and information, reinforcing intercultural and intergenerational dialogue and social inclusion, develop essential social and personal skills for both children and adults, establish spaces of democratic citizenship (Pechtelidis, 2018, 2022; Pechtelidis & Kioupkiolis, 2020). Stigmergy and lines of flight The rhizomatic, nomadic, learning process of the commons could be seen in the light of ‘stigmergic’ cooperation. Stigmergy refers to the indirect communication between agents and actions. As Kostakis and Bauwens (2018, 12) say,

The rhizomatic learning process of educational commons 183 “Consider the way ants or termites exchange information by secreting pheromones (chemical traces). Through this indirect form of communication, these social insects manage to build complex structures such as pathways and nests. An action leaves a trail that stimulates the execution of a subsequent action, by the same or a different agent (ant, termite or peer in the case of the CBPPCommons-based Peer Production)”. In this stigmergic perspective, in an education of the commons the position of peers is occupied by students/pupils/children and teachers/educators/ pedagogues who participate in a situated, collectively distributed action of sharing information, which provides both the stimulus and the instruction for further work, study, and research. Stigmergic collaboration is a form of motivation at work (Bollier & Helfrich, 2019, p. 135). Stigmergy is an effective way of disseminating information and decisions to a wide and spatially distant audience, which is motivated to participate in this process of information and knowledge production and, more generally, to continue working in unpredictable directions. Typical examples are the Wikipedia entries and the codes of free and open source software produced through the contributions of large numbers of people, many of whom are children and young people. An education based on the logic of the commons is an open, contingent, and transparent social system where everyone can see the traces of the work of others and can therefore adapt to its needs. A simple signal encourages instant collaboration not only on a small scale (of the classroom or school) but also on a large scale such as local and global society through technology. The commoning of the Curricula of (pre-)school education involves the stigmergic logic of learning and knowledge production by children and teachers. The stigmergic logic contrasts with the dominant orthodox logic of the curricula and the learning process in formal school education based on centralized external control, enclosure (strong classification and strong framing, according to Basil Bernstein), hierarchical command, and the prescription of the learning trajectory and the participation of pedagogical subjects in it in prescribed ways. The results of a commons-based education are subject to constant quality control through a kind of heterarchy supported by the tool of pedagogical documentation. Heterarchy is a hybrid form of governance because it can combine in the same system vertical, top-down reversible hierarchies and bottom-up participation, and horizontal (peer) dynamic and organizational logics. Pedagogical documentation The methodology of pedagogical documentation, applied initially in Reggio Emilia preschools (Dahlberg et al., 1999), is a useful and constructive way to implement and promote the commons’ values of sharing, caring, experimentation, and contingency and to systematically evaluate the ‘rhizomatic learning’ and knowledge creation that is fluid and contingent. This practice can be briefly described as a process that brings to light the learning process and the conditions of knowledge production in order to make them subject to discussion,

184  Y. Pechtelidis, S. Raditsa, S. Sarakenidou, et al. critical reflection, interpretation, and dialogue. It involves (a) the documentation of the material (photographs, videos, recordings, drawings, notes, etc. of children and adults) produced daily in the context of a project that starts with an idea or stimulus posed either by children or adults and (b) discussions and analyses of this material in a demanding and democratic context, always in relation to others (Moss, 2019, pp. 85–86; Olsson, 2009). Pedagogical documentation can also work as a tool for evaluation, which is perceived as a collective meaning-making process rather than a technical practice. This methodology not only can make pedagogical work visible, but also subject to interpretation and argumentation within a community of participants. Pedagogical documentation as an ethico-political practice strives to avoid closure by opening up the evaluation and self-conduct to debate and contestation (Dahlberg & Moss, 2005). Evaluation becomes a democratic common process and (provisional) decision in which the children are active participants. They should take responsibility – not delegating responsibility to the experts, legislators, and inspectors (Pechtelidis, 2022). In the light of the pedagogical documentation, the educational and research interest shifts from the individual child, his/her deficiencies and needs, to the relationships between children and the productive desire that develops from their interactions. From this standpoint, in early childhood education the focus is on: • • • • • •

What do children explore? What desire is at stake at any given time in the group of children? How do they move in the classroom? What rituals have they created and how do they function? What materials attract their interest and why? Are there words and expressions (patterns) that the children use individually and collectively in a situation and how do they work?

The pedagogical approach of the commons is built on a certain post-foundational conception of knowledge and learning, as it is quite briefly described above, and the role of the ‘child’ in learning and knowledge creation process. In particular, drawing on poststructuralism, Sociology of Childhood and more generally on contemporary Childhood Studies, but also on Malaguzzi’s pedagogical theory (implemented in Reggio Emilia schools), children are recognized as co-creators of the learning process and knowledge, but also of reality in general. According to Malaguzzi, children have unknown potential or a potential that we do not fully know. This assertion alludes to the famous quote by the Dutch philosopher Baruch Spinoza: “we never know in advance what a body can do”. In this perspective, the child learns from birth, without having to be prepared to learn at a later age (Moss, 2019, p. 70). This pedagogical approach is implemented through strategies and projects rather than programmes and curricula, because the latter are strictly pre-planned and based on prediction and ‘prescription’. These result in the encapsulation of

The rhizomatic learning process of educational commons 185 experience, the ‘stifling’ of creativity and authenticity and therefore a conceptual and social closure. This pedagogical practice contributes decisively to the commoning of education and its opening to society and contemporary challenges, through (a) strengthening the participation of children, their families, and the wider community in school processes, (b) the continuous professional development of teachers, (c) the encounter between theory and practice, (d) the strengthening of research in the context of the learning process, and (e) the deconstruction of the dominant discourses about childhood and education by opening the way for the production of new discourses with the direct participation of pedagogical subjects (Moss, 2019, pp. 85–88; Olsson, 2009, pp. 100–102). In the next section, we will use as an example a case study to clarify the theoretical discussion above.

Description of the case study The case study was conducted in a self-organized learning community named ‘The Little Tree that will become a forest. Institute for theory and practice of a libertarian education’, in Thessaloniki, Greece, from March to June 2022. The aim of this project was to explore the ways and the processes in which preschool children in a libertarian context of the commons co-shape educational practice and create collective meanings and knowledge. The collaboration between the Laboratory of Sociology of Education and the Little Tree began in 2017 in the context of the study of educational commons in Greece and continues until now in the context of the EU-funded research project SMOOTH (Horizon 2020) about Educational Commons and Active Social Inclusion. The Little Tree consists of a group of three educators and a group of 15 children from 2- to 4-years old. The teachers/companions, the children, and their parents or guardians actively participated in this study. The members of this community come from different social backgrounds. The children’s assembly lies at the heart of this learning community, and the curriculum is an open work on progress co-constructed by the members or the commoners of this libertarian educational commons. The ‘Little Tree that will become a forest’ operates according to the commons’ values of self-organization, cooperation, caring, sharing, and experiential learning. The idea of creating an alternative libertarian school was born in August 2012, in the first self-organized children’s camp, in the occupied forestry of the Flamourion nursery, in Vertisko, Thessaloniki, Greece. The people who attended that camp and lived in Thessaloniki continued to meet in an assembly called ‘Assembly for the creation of an alternative school’. The starting point of these people was the desire and the need to create an alternative school based on the desire for freedom and community life: an education that emerges out of respect for the autonomy of each child and his or her personal pace and develops through the experience of a direct-democratic decision-making process, peer learning, solidarity, and participation in collective life. Also, opening the issue of

186  Y. Pechtelidis, S. Raditsa, S. Sarakenidou, et al. libertarian education up to the public sphere is a major priority for the educators of the Little Tree (Karamali, 2017, p. 43).

The methodology of pedagogical documentation in the Little Tree During the case study the pedagogical documentation methodology was used to explore the ways in which children create autonomous learning groups and resolve their conflicts. We also explored how younger children are involved in these processes. The group of children were fully aware of how the documentation was used, so as to have control over what is important to them. In particular, photographic material taken outdoors and handwritten notes were used. The photos depict the children’s explorations when they discover something new or challenge themselves in a new way or even when they ask for it. The handwritten notes describe each group formation, how the children grouped and regrouped during their free play, what kind of play they participated in and how long they participated in certain games. Not only written notes, but also filming was used to record in detail the dialogues that had been taking place in the children’s assemblies and in the learning groups that the children formed, as well as in the group activities. The recordings focus not only on the children’s ideas and creativity, but also on their social interaction, the expression of emotions and every aspect of their daily life that is a source, tool, and stimulus for learning through symbiosis. An integral part of the pedagogical documentation process was to discuss and reflect together with the children on the taken photos, the videos or the notes, so that they become an active part of the reflection process. Through this systematic and multifaceted documentation, the pedagogical team was given the opportunity to reflect, analyse, and discuss the material both in the children’s assemblies, with the children and in some cases with their parents or guardians. Therefore, a new pedagogical and social space was created where those involved can develop knowledge and understanding of how children learn and produce meaning and how the concept of the ‘child’ is built through the actions of the adults. The material collected will be preserved and further processed as a living record of pedagogical practice. Hence, the process of pedagogical documentation acts as a way of revisiting past experiences and will generate new interpretations and reconstructions of what happened in the past (Dahlberg et al., 1999). This requires, however, that adults are in constant reflection and contemplation, which places high demands but can also act as a challenge and inspiration for deeper engagement. In pedagogical documentation, observation possesses a central role, however is not perceived as the objective mapping of social reality, but as a situated process of co-construction and collective meaning making. Pedagogical documentation, therefore, can function as a tool for creating a critical and reflective collective practice that challenges dominant discourses and constructs alternative discourses.

The rhizomatic learning process of educational commons 187 Finally, by bringing the pedagogical process to the forefront and making it a matter of democratic and open dialogue, pedagogical documentation provides the possibility of highlighting both the dynamics and the limitations of the work of libertarian early childhood education environments of the commons, such as the Little Tree.

The dual movement of pedagogical documentation This study deals with learning processes and learning events with children, using the tool of pedagogical documentation, as two different but intertwined methodological movements: a ‘circular’ and a ‘horizontal’. We will discuss those two movements in the usage of pedagogical documentation in the Little Tree from a non-linear understanding of time. Drawing from Lenz Taguchi (2010, p. 97), the ‘circular’ movement is about delaying or slowing down the speed of the pedagogical documentation “to be able to re-enact (re-live – live again) the event, and make counter-actualizations that can make new invention possible”. Actually, this movement causes a delay between perception and practice, which can enrich and complicate things and thus make possible re-enactments and counter-actualizations (Deleuze, 1990). During the circular process we reflect on what happened, therefore this process entails a re-enactment, which makes reading, talking, or writing against the orthodox thinking or common sense possible. Also, it can make it possible to understand the structural conditions in the event, how the pedagogical space is organized, in terms of discursive coding; for example, how a practice, an activity or material, is coded in relation to gender, class, ethnicity, age, etc. Therefore, in the delaying and slowing down circular movement the participants engage in decoding of a coded situation, activity, or event. The counter-actualizations always make possible an opening up of other ways of thinking and doing, a recoding that can be more constructive for pedagogical practices. Inspired by Deleuze and Guattari (1987), Lenz Taguchi (2010, p. 99) says “If the ‘circular’ movement is about slowing down, delaying and flattening out, the ‘horizontal’ is about speeding up the movement of the flow of the events - as in thinning and smoothing out and creating a smoother space to enable transformation and change in a new event emerging”. In a pedagogical space like the Little Tree that is not heavily striated or disciplinary and immobile, there are shifts between the circular and the horizontal movements all the time. “The speeding up and the smoothing out of the pedagogical space can take place right in the middle of the event in-between a child and a material in processes of experimentation” (ibid). In such cases where the pedagogical space is smooth enough, what Deleuze and Guattari (1987, pp. 88–89) have called the ‘line of flight’ becomes possible. The people involved extend themselves in creativity and are taken away from their normalizing habits of mind or habitual ways of doing things. The force of line of flight creates new spaces of possible thinking and doing that transformed the participants as thinking and embodied beings. Following Deleuze and Guattari, we can think of the event

188  Y. Pechtelidis, S. Raditsa, S. Sarakenidou, et al. of the line of flight as ‘a form of experience itself’ (Taguchi, 2010, p. 99). The line of flight is about “extracting an event from things and beings, to set up a new event” (Deleuze & Guattari, 1994, p. 33). Rhizomatic learning through trucks and ambulances Circular The daily children’s assembly was called and the topic of the day was the place the children would like to visit on the planned monthly field trip. One of the children expressed a desire to visit trucks and this triggered a lively discussion where the children expressed their desires, interests, and fantasies: Child (henceforth C)1: There are no trucks on the mountain, I went and didn’t see any. If we go somewhere far away there won’t be any. If we go somewhere near there will be. C2: I want to go to the trucks. I went to the mountain but there were no trucks. I saw a big one, so I got in and drove. C3: On the trip I’ll bring the red piano. C13: There are no trucks on the mountain because there are no houses. C14: I will bring my cart and my monkey on the trip. C2: I want to get the truck’s steering wheel. The child who suggested the topic of the visit brought an excavator from home the next day and a group of children started talking about and naming the parts of the vehicle: the cabin, the wheels, the windows, the beacon, and the siren. In one of the following children’s assemblies we noticed that some children’s interest had turned to vehicles with a siren and more specifically to the ambulance. C12 takes the floor and gives information about the hospital. C11 describes vomiting and why we vomit and says that we can also die from vomiting. An adult companion asks what happens when we die and C13 says that the blood runs. Companion: And what does it mean that we die? The children discuss blood and look at their hands for scratches. The companion asks them if we go to the hospital for a scratch and C10 talks about it and shows them his scratches. The companion says that sometimes we can take care of our scratches or wounds ourselves and adds that maybe they could arrange a visit to a hospital. The children make the sound like a siren and discuss the ambulance and injuries. They talk about the paramedics too. Some of the other children were interested in the wheels of their vehicles and bikes and discussed which bike has more wheels and they said that the one with 2…3…7 has more wheels and they started counting the wheels.

The rhizomatic learning process of educational commons 189 Children share their information, their experiences, their memories, and their feelings, constructing a collective knowledge that is not uniform, homogeneous, monolithic, solid, and linear. The knowledge they create, either autonomously or with the contribution of the companions, is not intended to record objectively the reality, but to co-create and reflect on it. In the above examples we observe the children expressing themselves without instructions, but also the companions rephrasing what they have said, as well as emphasizing or supplementing on the children’s interests. Also, what was observed is the children’s unconditional acceptance of the multiple and different views of the others. Thus, a child may express a concern that there are no trucks on the mountain and some children may rush to suggest solutions, and others who are not concerned about trucks may state that they will bring their musical instruments. The connection between rhizomatic nomadic education and the Reggio Emilia’s pedagogical approach is located in the reinvention of the roles of students and teachers as active members of a fluid community that is self-managed through the assembly by and large. The children’s assembly is a structural element and a daily routine of the Little Tree. Children participate in it voluntarily and usually with great willingness. The assembly could be argued to be part of the circular movement as it enables children to express themselves and reflect on the events they were engaged in. It plays a core role in flattening out the pedagogical space and speeding the co-creation of new thinking and doing, or lines of flight, up. The pedagogues/companions’ assembly at that time focused mainly on the pedagogical interventions that can be made in the space of the Little Tree in order to challenge children to develop their interests, which have been observed and organized through pedagogical documentation. In addition, there was a desire from all of them to seize the opportunity that had emerged through the children’s specific interest to bring them in touch with some values of the commons that inspire them, such as ‘caring’ and ‘mutual aid’. An anatomy corner was therefore created by the pedagogues and the children, containing a human skeleton, relevant books, and a first aid kit. In the Little Tree when a child gets hurt or falls then the other nearby children rush to help them immediately. The first aid starts by asking if he/she is hurt or scared, then if the child is crying they wipe away the tears and clean the wounds, and in a third phase if necessary they bring the first aid kit (acetic acid, band-aid, iodine, wax ointment). From the beginning of the community building, the pedagogical team has tried to convey the value of mutual-aid by offering help to the children themselves and at a second level by encouraging them to help each other. It is extremely interesting to observe children who have not yet acquired the verbal communication skill helping children with more advanced language skills. Thus, we see infants as young as two years old taking care of children of the same age or even older children, helping them to put on shoes, climb a tree, blow their nose, fill the water bucket, etc.

190  Y. Pechtelidis, S. Raditsa, S. Sarakenidou, et al. Horizontal After the pedagogical team’s assembly described above, a toy dump truck and another bag with medical tools (thermometer, stethoscope, gauze) were placed at the pedagogical space of the Little Tree by the adults as stimuli for the children. In addition, there were various materials and tools in the area for the children to use such as shovels, rakes, buckets, car wheels in many sizes. Immediately after the children’s assembly about the excursion in the construction site, the trucks and the ambulance, we noticed that the children either collectively or individually engaged in activities relevant to their interest expressed during the assembly. The children used some empty crates for fruits or vegetables, put them in a row outside the woodworking area and turned them into trucks, cars, ambulances, and cranes in their imaginative play. The main area of the carpentry (an enclosed wooden semi-outdoor space) served as a workshop and toolbox for repairing the trucking machinery. There they discussed which part of the transport or machine was broken, and they used a screwdriver, an electric screwdriver, pliers, a hammer, etc. in their experimental game. The crates were dressed with ribbons and wood and the children simulated steering wheels, wheels, etc. The children’s conversations were enriched with real-life facts about what happens when in the cars with their parents, what music they usually listen to, if their dad and mom talk, what colour the car is, etc. C2 paints the excavator with colours and C10 and C1 accompany him by doing the same. C2 then washes the excavator at the tap. A small group of children build a truck in the carpentry with wood, nails, and screws. C8 and C5 sweep the pine needles and clean the stones. Some dig with shovels in the sandpit and fill the truck bed. C2 joins C9 to transfer liquid colour to hollow wood and from one jar to another. C1 and C14 try to empty the dirty water from the tire by rocking it back and forth. A1 and C2 return to the tire and try to empty it using rakes and hoes, but they give up and rake the dirt around. C1 continues to try and the others leave. C1 puts in a big rock and brings water with a bucket and puts it in the tire. C14 and C1 bring water and fill the tire. C2, now develops a construction with the building material making the siren sound, while C12, C13, and A9 play an imaginative role game of doctor and patient. In particular, they use the thermometer to measure the fever in their imaginative babies, using the water bottles instead. C12 announces how much fever the ‘babies’ have and C13 wonders if they can go to school with this fever or not. Then C9 takes the stethoscope and examines C13. He puts the stethoscope to her chest and tells her: take a breath. C12 (plays the mom). You need to go to the doctor. C13 (plays the child). I don’t want to… and she hugs her ‘mom’. In particular, we observe the spontaneous rhizomatic creation of knowledge by the children, where each subgroup of children with trucks as a stimulus, some

The rhizomatic learning process of educational commons 191 were led to a more detailed exploration of the topic (trucks, stones, etc.), others to similar topics, e.g. ambulance, and others at first sight dealt with topics without a clear affinity with the original topic (musical instruments). Thus, the collectivity, the subgroups, and each individual child, through work and play, act like autonomous nomadic living organisms in motion and they advance like a rhizome. Circular At the next assembly of the pedagogical group, the pedagogues discussed all these different interests that have arisen from the trucks, ambulance, hospital, sickness, ways of transporting liquids and solids, means of transport, wheels, steering wheel, shovel, rake, etc. But as the time until the excursion was very limited they decided to increase the interest in trucks since this is the decision of the assembly. A presentation of the documentation board was made to the children’s assembly. This board initially included visual material with trucks of various kinds. The documentation board triggered a discussion that delves into more specific interests of each and every one in relation to trucks: • • • • • • •

We will fill them with soil I want to see the steering wheel I like pictures of trucks What are they carrying? What do the trucks carry? Truck and ship combined! Why does this truck have a red cross? A companion counted the wheels. She formed a circle with her finger on the ground: “It is a circle!”

By showing the children the documentation that was produced, or asking them and discussing with them what it is they were doing the process slows down and stimulates the children to counter-actualize, namely to decode and recode what it is they were doing and thinking. This in turn speeds up the movement and creates a line of flight into a new construct of thought or embodiment (Taguchi, 2010, p. 101). The delaying or slowing down ‘circular’ movement thus works as a precondition for accelerating a ‘horizontal’ movement and the creation of a smoother space and a line of flight (ibid). The different starting points and the children’s questions that emerge through their interaction with the pedagogical documentation board create a dynamic that activates a rhizomatic, nomadic learning process. The companions, as active subjects of this process, encourage experimentation without being constrained by the predetermined prescriptions of the curriculum and pedagogical objectives. Horizontal The excursion day finally arrived, when the whole community along with the children’s parents or guardians would visit the trucks. The pedagogical team had

192  Y. Pechtelidis, S. Raditsa, S. Sarakenidou, et al. already investigated possible places in the city that would serve this purpose and had come up with a public park, a former military camp (Pavlos Melas) where constructions were being carried out, thus becoming an open construction site for the public with many kinds of trucks and machines parked and in action. The distance walk to the construction site from the Little Tree was about 45 minutes approximately where the community would tour into the abandoned camp and the construction site: C2, who with the help of the documentation board had expressed a special interest in photographs of the vehicles, arrived carrying a camera and saying he brought it to photo shoot the trucks. There was a hand-operated cement mixer in the community gathering area. C2 put stones into the concrete mixer together with C5 and C13. They collected stones and threw them in. They also put in grass. C8 came in and C2 showed him the steering wheel of the cement mixer. C5 started to turn the steering wheel and C2 told him to do it together. Adults come along and they all discussed the steering wheel of the cement mixer and the steering wheels of other vehicles, something that from days ago had caught the attention of several children. By implementing the decisions of the assembly directly, children experience the feasibility of managing everyday life in the school environment. This creates a collective experience that fantasies and desires can be realized in the here and the now. Commons’ theory places particular emphasis on the direct and active involvement of subjects to enrich, maintain, and sustain a common resource, like knowledge. In this case children experience a prefigurative community in progress in the present, where imagination is not a dreaming but a realistic utopia, as Buber (1958, p. 14) says in the Paths of Utopia “create the space now possible”. In the Little Tree the co-building of a community from early childhood is part of an ethico-political proposal for self-organization and situated collective freedom (Suissa, 2019). Circular During the morning assembly, which took place at the construction site just before exploring the site, it was said by the children: “I’ve come here to see a dump truck; I’ve come here to eat; I’ve come here to see a bulldozer, or I’ve come here to see trees and the nature and I saw just a car”…. The companions gave each child a card depicting a vehicle/ machine and asked them to name them all together. They encouraged the children to search the area to spot them. Horizontal C1 spots an excavator from a distance. The children discover the area with the machinery trucks. Next to the truck machines is a very fine hill of sand. A group of children are not being moved by the machinery but instead they go to the sand

The rhizomatic learning process of educational commons 193 hill and continue the same activity they usually do at the school site. They are using shovels to carry sand on the trolleys of small trucks they have brought with them. Another group of children approach the machines with enthusiasm and work on their various parts. The children were particularly impressed by the large sizes. They measure how high the cockpit ladder is, how much volume the wheel takes up and also how big the excavators are. Something else they are focused on is the yellow colour of the machines, as well as their height since they could easily see the cables at the bottom of the machines: • • • •

What is a shovel? This shovel can hold too much soil. Look how big the wheels are. C6 points out a ladder. This is where the driver gets in, he says. Then he discovers the ladder in the other vehicles. A companion gives information about the crawlers. They observe the cranes and parents give information about the machines.

Collaboration and learning are stigmergic, horizontal, asynchronous, and irregular as peers (children and teachers), like termites, share information and instantly adjust their behaviours. Stigmergy creates the conditions for diverse discoveries and their rapid public sharing, as it stimulates immediate responses from others and a distributed self-organization, without the need for central guidance. Just as ants and termites use instant learning and collaboration to build their complex nests without a central designer or supervisor. Circular The next day, during the children’s assembly, the reflection of the excursion takes place with the help of the documentation board where pictures of the children’s activities have been added: • • • • •

I went to the excavators. I put soil with the small shovel in the truck. Pouring dirt into the truck. K3 got into a cement mixer. We’re looking at the huge wheels on the truck!

After observing the continued and growing interest in the wheels, the pedagogical team added four medium-sized wheels to the carpentry construction area to be possibly used to construct vehicles. Horizontal C2 is in the creek pulling out rocks for the excavators to come and pick them up, and he says “I’m going to build a bulldozer”. At the carpentry, C9 is holding two wheels and asks C11 “will you use them as ‘big eyes’.”

194  Y. Pechtelidis, S. Raditsa, S. Sarakenidou, et al.

Conclusion The knowledge creation processes and the learning events described above occurred in a pedagogical space that is not heavily striated and an educational activity that is open, collective, and experimental. This pedagogical approach is closely linked to the notion of knowledge as a common resource (Hess & Ostrom, 2007) and in particular to the values of contingency, experimentation, and surprise that are fundamental to a commons-based learning community. From this perspective, learning activity does not develop linearly, progressively and predictably from one stage to another. Rather, it proceeds as a rhizome through applications, experimentation and testing, deviations that include ‘lines of flight’ leading in unpredictable directions, not always positive and beneficial, which are triggered through encounters with difference, as new connections are made and new theories are tested in practice. We observed that the children act as researchers and the assembly is the place where they share and reflect on the results of the research they conducted during their activities, constructions, discussions, and play. In particular, we explored what children did, their desires at stake, how they moved in the classroom, the rituals they created and how they functioned, materials that attracted their interest and why, words and expressions (patterns) that the children used individually and collectively in an event and how they worked. The above conception of knowledge and the learning process is linked to a general trend in the field of epistemology of shifting from a static, passive, and representational approach to knowledge to a more active, participatory, and contingent one. Under this emerging epistemological prism, knowledge is no longer perceived as a perfectly precise and objective representation of a pre-existing reality, but instead knowledge is directly intertwined with action, activity, and the dynamic social situations in which it is produced (Biesta & Osberg, 2007, pp. 15–16). Based on the principles of social constructionism, learning and knowledge are conceived as a process of co-construction or meaning making always in relation to others, i.e. collectively (Rinaldi, 2006, p. 125). Learning resembles a complex network of connections (ibid., 15), and knowledge is the product of these connections. Therefore, education should strengthen and promote these connections and effectively challenge and cross the enclosures and boundaries raised by politics, economy, and science to separate rationality, imagination, and emotions. In other words, education should support learning on the basis of the interconnections of individuals, subjects, and the material and cultural environment (Vechi, 2004, p. 18). This post-foundational epistemological conception of knowledge and learning is related both to the rhizomatic, nomadic conception of Deleuze and Guattari and the educational commons’ logic and ethics. The engagement with rhizomatic learning provides us with new perspectives to seek inspiration for alternative narratives about learning, education, and early childhood. The rhizomatic learning involves the creation of something that has never existed before, something that is impossible to imagine from what has come before (Biesta & Osberg, 2007, p. 33). Learning may lead into unexpected and surprising places. It challenges the ‘orthodox thought’ or the thought as

The rhizomatic learning process of educational commons 195 reproduction, which is dominant mainly in formal education. It questions the passive process that works in education of taking into our heads contents that have been around for a long time. Rhizomatic learning changes our thinking through experimentation and engagement in new open educational spaces and horizontal democratic relationships in everyday school life. From this learning perspective, childhood can be seen as another autonomous period in the life of the individual, and child as an active, spontaneous, and unique being, able to discover its own way to express itself, to act, to try, to decide for itself without being cut off from the adult world. Children live in the present and for the present. Childhood is not a transitional preparation for future adulthood, it is a special period with special characteristics and special problems. The child can act according to its inner motivations and desires to structure itself and understand others. Early childhood is the basis for the individual to cultivate autonomy, self-confidence, and critical consciousness through the experience of reality. The liberation of childhood from adult aspirations is the first step in gaining freedom. By defending the autonomy of childhood and the child’s capacity for self-determination, the child can choose for their life inside and outside the ‘walls’ of school and home. Also, in this learning context, educators learn to think differently and think new. They perceive their role from a different angle, the rhizomatic and nomadic angle, according to which the educator is not someone who knows and transmits a supposedly true and already known set of ideas to a child who needs to know. Educators can experiment and create spaces of equal freedom and creativity. Deleuze, like Foucault, is preoccupied with how to think and see differently and the potential for becoming something different. In this concept, learning is grounded on a principle of constant and intensive creativity. It offers us a new way of envisioning thought and knowledge, and new ideas about how they might be created and how this experience affects us. Deleuze through the post-structural lens of potentiality and contingency takes us to an education where we never know in advance what will happen, and what a child’s body can do. It takes us to an education of the not yet known, creating the conditions of generating new ways of being.

Acknowledgement This paper is supported by European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement 101004491, SMOOTH.

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12 Changing the image of thought Rhizomatic learning and human-nature relationships in the Anthropocene Jonas Mikaels Introduction Working with DeleuzoGuattarian concepts in educational research is about changing the image of thought. For the chapter in hand, I used concepts by Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari to challenge dominant taken-for-granted ways of conceptualizing teaching and learning. This includes challenging and disrupting fundamental ideas of Western thought, such as the people-centred world view of anthropocentrism. There has been a growing interest in the work of French philosopher Gilles Deleuze and his co-writer the psychoanalyst Félix Guattari across a range of fields extending from philosophy (Grosz, 2008) to feminist theory (Braidotti, 2013); politics (Massumi, 2014); literature (Buchanan, 2000) and increasingly in outdoor and environmental education (Gough & Sellers, 2004; Stewart, 2020). The increasing interest in Deleuze and Guattari, and posthuman research practices in outdoor and environmental studies is especially concerned with the roles of place (Gough, 2008, 2015; Mannion et al., 2013; Stewart, 2008, 2015), and contemporary animism and new materialisms (Clarke & McPhie, 2014, 2016; McPhie & Clarke, 2015). Deleuze and Guattari were not interested in concepts to determine what something is – that is, its essence or being. Rather, they were interested in the concept as a vehicle for expressing a dynamic event or becoming: a novel concept implicit in a particular event “secures … linkages with ever increasing connections” within practical life (1994, p. 37). Following Deleuze and Guattari (1987), Stewart (2015) comment that rather than asking the essentialist question of what a concept is, it is more fruitful to consider how the concept works and what it allows you to do or produce. Semetsky (2011) suggests that the unpredictable connections in these becomings presuppose not the transmission of the same, but the creation of the different – the process that has important implications for education as an evolving and developing practice of the generation of new knowledge and new meanings. In this chapter, I would like to share some of my thoughts and ideas concerning rhizomatic teaching and learning. I will do this by sharing an example from my own practice. But before I do that, I find it purposeful to present some key concepts related that have been highly influential for my own thinking and practice as an outdoor educator. I begin the chapter by providing an overview of the DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378-15

Changing the image of thought 199 conceptual and theoretical framework underpinning my notion of a rhizomatic learning environment. I then present a brief background of relational materialism and posthuman theorizing in education.

Thinking differently about thinking differently In its simplest form, education is an encounter, a connection between teaching and learning, wherein something happens. This something is what Deleuze and Guattari (1987) refer to as an event. The event is not a disruption of some continuous state, but rather the state is constituted by events underlying it, and when actualized, mark every moment of the state as a transformation. Stagoll (2005) suggests that Deleuze is careful in preserving dynamism in his concept. An event is neither a beginning nor an end point, but rather always in the middle. This notion of dynamic change is related to the concept of becoming, with the event representing just a moment of productive intensity. For Deleuze and Guattari (1994), a concept exists in relation to the problem it addresses. Therefore, a concept cannot be looked at in isolation because every concept exists in relation with other coexisting concepts. In other words, the concept of event and becoming cannot be looked at in isolation, because it exists in relationship with other coexisting concepts, such as rhizome and deterritorialization. For Deleuze and Guattari (1987), the rhizome is a mode of thought that displaces binary logic for open pluralistic thinking. Colebrook (2002) described the rhizome as an alternative to the traditional arborescent (tree-like and hierarchal) model of structuring knowledge and thought. Like tubers and mosses, rhizomes grow laterally and are entangled on a plane of immanence, that is, together with everything else on the same level. Tree-like thought involves the logic of a distinct order and direction, whereas rhizomatic thought tends to make nonhierarchical, laterally proliferating, and decentred connections. Roy (2003) suggested that seeing the curriculum more as a rhizome opens possibilities of seeing the curriculum in terms of its connectivities and relationalities, rather than as a preformed and pre-given structure. Working with DeleuzoGuattarian concepts in educational research is about changing the image of thought. Roy (2003) suggests that the use of Deleuzian concepts “is to help pry open reified boundaries that exist not just in thought, but as affective investments that secure those territorialities” (p. 13). This is similar to how Foucault (1977) describes discursive practices or discourse. The term discourse signals a relationship between meaning and power that constitutes practices. These three strategies – practices, discourse, and power – work together to constitute certain ways of understanding the self. Foucault (2000) described practices as “places where what is being said and what is done, rules imposed and reasons given, the planned and the taken-for-granted meet and interconnect” (p. 225). Discourses, what Foucault calls regimes of truth, are defined through the dominating relations of power and knowledge. Relations of power define the knowledge that may be accepted, and knowledge is a prerequisite for power to operate. Through the power–knowledge relationship within the

200  Jonas Mikaels discourse, certain desirable subjects are created, and within the framework of the discourse, a variety of subject positions are also made available. In other words, how we think and feel about something will affect what we see as possible within that specific image of thought. Roy (2003) suggested that the effort is to loosen boundaries to move beyond those confining spaces, allowing new modes of transformation to become available to enhance our affective capacities. For Deleuze and Guattari (1987), becoming involves questioning cultural hierarchies, power, and the majoritarian. The concept of becoming offers alternative lines of flight or nomadic (open-ended) thought as well as opportunities to (re)think and (re)create educational philosophy and practice. An aspect of becoming is that it must take as its aim the nondominant. MacCormack (2001) argues that becoming is as much about becoming nondominant as it is becoming something else. Roy (2003) refers to the DeleuzoGuattarian concept of line of flight or deterritorialization as “a movement by which we leave the territory or move away from spaces regulated by dominant systems of signification that keep us confined to old patterns, in order to make new connections” (p. 21). Furthermore, Roy (2003) proposes: To proceed in this manner of deterritorialization, we make small ruptures in our everyday habits or thought and start minor dissident flows and not grant ‘signifying breaks’, for grand gestures start their own totalizing movement, and are easily detected and captured by majoritarian discourses. (p. 31) In other words, it is more rewarding to make small changes one step at the time as we try to create new knowledge and new meanings in our effort to move beyond dominant ways of thinking. Big leaps tend to draw to much attention and are therefore easily taken up by dominant ways of thinking. The rhizome is a key concept in Deleuze and Guattari’s thinking. The rhizome, according to Deleuze and Guattari (1987), is a mode of thought that displaces binary logic for open pluralistic thinking. In other words, the rhizome is an alternative to the traditional arborescent tree-like hierarchal model of structuring knowledge and thought. An alternative Colebrook (2002) describes as a “chaotic root structure: connecting every point to every other point, moving in every direction, branching out to create new directions” (p. 77). The metaphor of the rhizome is helpful in describing the complex and often messy nature of learning. Like the learning process, a rhizome has no beginning or end, rather it is always in the middle. The rhizome is an antigenealogy. It is a short-term memory, or antimemory. The rhizome operates by variation, expansion, conquest, capture, offshoots. Unlike the graphic arts, drawing or photography, unlike tracings, the rhizome pertains to a map that must be produced, constructed, a map that is always detachable, connectible, reversible, modifiable, and has multiple entryways and exits and its own lines of flight. (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p. 21)

Changing the image of thought 201 Instead of thinking about philosophy as something abstract, Deleuze and Guattari encourage us to plug-in their conceptual ideas into real-life situations, to provoke innovative ways of thinking about lived experience. To challenge one dualism, Deleuze and Guattari invoke another. For example, the arborescent treelike hierarchal mode of thought is challenged by the rhizomatic non-hierarchal mode of thought. Whereas tree-like thought involves the logic of a distinct order and direction, rhizomatic thought tends to make non-hierarchical, laterally proliferating, and decentred connections. Colman (2005) comments that: ‘rhizome’ describes the connections that occur between the most disparate and the most similar objects, place and people … Deleuze and Guattari’s concept of the ‘rhizome’ draws from its etymological meaning, where ‘rhizo’ means combining form and the biological term ‘rhizome’ describes a form of plant that can extend itself through its underground horizontal tuber-like root system and develop new plants. (p. 231) Deleuze and Guattari (1987) emphasize that the rhizome is “a map and not a tracing” (p. 12). They argue that tracings and reproductions are part of all arborescent logic and lead to codified forms of learning with closed or fixed structures, whereas maps are open and connectable to other dimensions. Maps, for Deleuze and Guattari, are “oriented toward experimentation in contact with the real” (p. 12). Cormier (2008) suggests that in a rhizomatic learning environment, curriculum is constructed and negotiated in real time by the contributions of those engaged in the learning process, rather than driven by predefined inputs from experts. Instead, the learning community acts as the curriculum, spontaneously shaping, constructing, and reconstructing itself and the subject of its learning in the same way that the rhizome responds to changing environmental conditions. Deleuze and Guattari (1987) state that all spaces are more or less striated. Striated spaces tend to be prescriptive, regulated, and restrictive. Smooth space is open-ended, non-linear, nomadic, and fluid. Following Deleuze and Guattari (1987), “we must remind ourselves that the two spaces in fact exist only in mixture: smooth space is constantly being transversed into a striated space; striated space is constantly being reversed into smooth space” (p. 552). We all experience the striation of spaces in the multiplicity of contexts we live our daily lives. In any given time and place, there are certain actions and ways of speaking that are socially acceptable according to cultural and social norms. This echoes what Foucault (1977) refers to as regimes of truth, which are defined through the dominating relations of power and knowledge within the discourse. In this connection, Roy (2003) suggests that: […] strata upon strata generate forces that gravitate toward specific channels only. Over time, stringent orthodoxies appear that govern modes of being and thinking, along with rigid investments in maintaining the status quo.

202  Jonas Mikaels These tell us what should be, and what is acceptable, molding and shaping experience in highly selective ways. (p. 11) Deleuze et al. (1983) refer to these ideas or discourses of pre-set notions that shape experience, as signifier systems. In this chapter, I refer to learning about humannature relationships in outdoor studies as such systems, ruled by several regimes of truth or signifiers, for example in the form of curriculum based on learning outcomes and objective assessment. For Deleuze, all bodies in an event are understood as causes. Semetsky (2011) argues that the process of becoming is always placed between two multiplicities, yet one term does not become the other; the becoming is something between the two. Therefore, becoming in Deleuze and Guattari’s (1987) thinking does not mean becoming or imitating the other, but rather becoming-other.

Relational materialism In thinking with Deleuze, the relationship between bodies, either human, nonhuman, or any kind of matter needs to be read horizontally as a flat ontology, rather than vertically as a hierarchy of being. Drawing on the work of relational posthumanists, primarily Barad (1998, 2008), Haraway (1997, 2008), and Hultman and Lenz Taguchi (2010) suggest that by embracing more-than-human perspectives, all other nonhuman forces and matter itself are granted active agency and considered “mutually agentic in transforming discourse, discursive practices, and human subjectivities” (p. 526). Hultman and Lenz Taguchi (2010) suggest that multiple forces are at play as we try to make sense of the world and discourse is only one such force. In other words, our reality cannot be seen as constructed through social interactions involving humans only, since all other nonhuman forces are always already involved in the process. Hultman and Lenz Taguchi (2010) argued for, what they call, a relational materialist approach as a way of challenging anthropocentrism and for the decentring of humans “to engage with affective physicality, human-nonhuman encounters and a keen interest in what emerges in mutual engagements with matter” (p. 526). From a relational materialist point of view, there are no distinctions between natural or unnatural environments, as we (humans) are always already belonging and participating in a more-than-human world. Similarly, Nicol (2014) proposes an ‘ecological ontology’ to embrace the conception of the relational human being and “that the nature of human existence, is one of relationships” (p. 451). To view the world in this way requires a shift from the people-centred worldview of anthropocentrism, where human beings are seen as apart from and having power over the natural world, and therefore are entitled to use it and control it, to a perspective of ecocentrism where human beings are viewed as part of the natural world. However, Nicol (2014) suggests that when viewed from the standpoint of ecological ontology, and to avoid falling into the dualistic trap by viewing ecocentrism as the dualistic alternative to

Changing the image of thought 203 anthropocentrism, these ideas should be understood “not as opposites but in their relation to each other” (p. 451). Rautio (2013) comments that rather than having environmental education categorically teaching us ways how to be less anthropocentric, focus could be on educating us of the ways in which we as humans already are nature. In other words, to avoid emphasizing a people-centred world view in our attempts to be less anthropocentric, we need to let go of implicit discourses in which human actions are distant from nature in favour of educating for relational perspectives in a more-than-human world.

Towards posthuman and rhizomatic teaching and learning practices in education Over the past ten years, I have become more and more interested in re-inviting questions of ontology into outdoor studies and my own teaching and learning. Consequently, questioning taken-for-granted assumptions, and challenging anthropocentrism using place-responsive perspectives to think and do outdoor education differently, has been of key concern. According to Taylor (2016), teaching and learning practices in education operate in a time in which regimes of accountability and evidence-based practice are prioritized. A possible risk is that this may create dominant ways of thinking which sustain dualisms and firm distinctions between subject/object, as well as between the researcher and the outside world. Snaza et al. (2014) offer a rationale for engaging in posthumanist research and ways of thinking, by proposing that posthumanism has the possibility of transforming educational thought, practice, and research in three related ways. Firstly, it forces us to notice the human-centeredness in much of educational philosophy and research. Secondly, it allows us to reframe education to focus on how we as humans are always already interconnected with more-than-human life. Thirdly, drawing on these first two posthumanist insights, it enables us to begin exploring new directions in research, curriculum design, and pedagogical practice. This resonates with St. Pierre (2011), who argues that one of the problems with humanistic qualitative methodology is related to the centring of the human subject. In other words, from the anthropocentric worldview that places the human being and human experience as the obvious starting point and primary focus in research. Consequently, an effect of this anthropocentric approach is that a hierarchy and dualism between a subject and an object is constructed. Hultman and Lenz Taguchi (2010) suggest that in thinking with Deleuze, the relationship between bodies (human, nonhuman, or any kind of matter) needs to be flattened and read horizontally rather than vertically as a hierarchy of being. DeLanda (2002) propose the concept of flat ontology as a critique of anthropocentrism, and it offers a visual idea of posthuman ontology. Haraway (1997) suggests that when viewing the world as a flat ontology, no single aspect has primacy over another. Therefore, nature is no more original than culture, and the social aspect is no more important than the material. Rather, as suggested by

204  Jonas Mikaels several authors, there is only natural˜cultural (Latour, 1993), or naturecultures (Haraway, 2003), or cultureplaces (Quay, 2017). Hence, from a relational materialist/posthumanist perspective, there are no distinctions between nature and culture as they are already coexistent and enmeshed in one another. This brings us to another meaning of the word relational which plays a key role within a relational materialist approach. According to Deleuze and Guattari (1987, 1994), the relationship between bodies needs to be read horizontally as a flat ontology. Relational in this way of thinking refers to a nonhierarchal relationship between humans and the more-than-human, including matter itself. In other words, following Deleuze and Guattari (1987), everything, animals, humans, rocks, and trees, exists on the same immanent plane, completely without hierarchies. This is perhaps the biggest difference between Foucault and Deleuze. While there is flatness Deleuze’ philosophy, Foucault’s notion of power and the subject positions offered by such power relations remain hierarchal. The decentred subject is a key concept within poststructural and posthuman ontology. Nearly 50 years ago, Foucault began to loosen the boundaries between subject and object by announcing the “death of Man.” Not only did he take down man from his superior position as the crown of creation, but Foucault also began questioning the legitimacy of a human subjectivity and instead offered a more peripheral and decentred position. Despite having the boundaries between subject and object loosened by philosophers such as Foucault and Deleuze, dominant subject/object, human/nonhuman, discourse/matter, and nature/ culture dichotomies are still present in Western thought. The dominant focus of educational research has been on issues of epistemology, primarily concerning how we as humans come to know, relate to, and interpret knowledge (St. Pierre, 2011). One of the most widespread criticisms towards this human-centred and anthropocentric notion in educational research is that it, in a hierarchal manner, places humans above matter and the more than human (e.g., Hultman & Lenz Taguchi, 2010; Snaza et al., 2014). This way of placing humans as the centre and the origin of all knowing also has implications for educational practice.

Rhizomatic learning In the following section, I will provide an example from my own teaching practice. For the past two years, I have had the privilege of teaching a course within in a master’s programme in outdoor studies called NOFRI. The acronym is short for the Nordic master’s in friluftsliv/outdoor studies. This new programme that started in 2020 is a joint venture between four institutions in three Nordic countries. In the first semester they study in Sweden, then they go to Norway for the second semester, the third semester in Iceland, and in semester four the students write their master’s thesis. The students that join this NOFRI master’s programme come from all over the world. However, most of the students come from Europe and the Nordic countries.

Changing the image of thought 205 The course I have taught during the first semester in Sweden is called pedagogical perspectives in friluftsliv. This course has a specific focus on humannature relationships. In this course, various landscapes are explored and offer entry points for discussions and analysis related to place-responsive, environmental, and cultural perspectives. The overarching theme of the course is “Place-responsiveness in education and eco-tourism through a posthuman lens.” Place-responsiveness is a term coined by Cameron (2003), who suggested that it “carries with it the impetus to act, to respond” (p. 180). Following Stewart (2020), Wattchow and Brown (2011), and Mannion et al. (2013), this chapter employs a place-responsive approach that pays particular attention to the empathetic response to the cultural, historical, and ecological conditions of place, or how people perceive, enact, and embody place(s). Lynch and Mannion (2021) suggest that place-responsive pedagogies embrace capability for ways education can address urgent and complex issues such as climate change through explicitly teaching by-means-of-an-environment aiming at understanding and improving human-nature relations. As such, place-responsive pedagogy can be understood as part of a wider educational response to the challenges posed by environmental issues, such as sustainability and climate change. Initially, I had designed the course for on campus teaching and meeting the students face to face. However, due to the Corona pandemic, I had to rethink and turn the course into online teaching. This was quite challenging, but it also turned out to be very rewarding. I knew that teaching the same way as a regular campus course and having the students carrying out similar learning activities as if I was meeting the students face to face simply would not do. Therefore, I had to come up with new ideas and approaches on how to engage the students in the theories and perspectives presented in the literature that is part of the course reading list. As mentioned earlier, I find that the notion of place is productive as a framework because it offers a contact zone, an in-between space for the intersection of multiple and contested stories about place(s). I also find the concept of place inherently rhizomatic in that it can be addressed from multiple entry points. This may include exploring what makes the place unique, the natural and cultural history of the place, its flora and fauna, environmental challenges, whose story is given voice, and stories belonging to the place that are being silenced. Furthermore, place offers a conceptual framework that allows us to include taking more than human perspectives into account. These seemingly endless possibilities of entries and exits allow the students to engage in the learning activities by bringing their own personal interest and curiosity into the process. In the new online version of the course, I designed two case studies for the students to explore. Each case study consisted of two elements. The first element was about documenting their findings using a video blog or vlog. Each vlog should be a maximum of 5 minutes. The students were encouraged to be creative and combine, for example, embedded video recordings with supporting text and images. The vlog should then be uploaded and shared onto the GIH play media gallery or on YouTube. The second element of each case study was to

206  Jonas Mikaels include an in-depth analysis where they discussed their findings in relation to the literature. The two case studies had different topics and were accompanied with different sets of literature to go with them. After each case study was completed, the students shared and discussed their vlogs and written analysis. The first case study was underpinned by a place-responsive pedagogy. The students were invited to choose a place in their local surroundings. Since all the students were engaging in the course from different parts around the world, many different and thought-provoking stories were shared in the group because of this. I encouraged the students to come up with a research question to guide their inquiry. The research question could either address environmental challenges, stories that belong to the place, or whatever else they were interested in and that prompted their curiosity. It was up to the students to decide what the focus of their inquiry should entail. The second case study was underpinned by exploring human-nature relationships and using the previous case study as a steppingstone. In this second case study I encouraged the students to explore the following research question: How does the choice of activity or mode of travel affect your experience of place and connection to the natural world? Some students preferred to continue their work from the first case study. For example, one student had interviewed three locals about their connection to the specific place in question. They had lived their entire life in the same place and the student found their stories so interesting that she wanted to deepen her understanding and get to know more about their connection to the place. Based on my experience from designing, implementing, and evaluating these two case studies with two different student groups over the course of two years, I offer three touchstones as working tools that might help educators who wish to engage in rhizomatic teaching and learning. The first is about agency. If we as educators really want the students to be engaged in the learning process, we must provide them with agency. Something that all the students mentioned in the evaluations is that they felt in control over their own thoughts and decisions. They also expressed that this allowed them to be creative. The second touchstone is related to the element of surprise. By providing the students with agency and allowing them to work creatively with theoretical perspectives created an element of surprise since none of us knew exactly what was going to come out of this. For example, one student found out that the lake and wooden area where he had spent a lot of time growing up was in fact man made. Going back there with intention of finding out as much as possible about what makes this place unique eventually turned out to be a very interesting and though-provoking case study. The third touchstone is about guided discovery. The term guided discovery is often used to describe a teaching and learning environment where students are actively participating in discovering new knowledge (Byra, 2000). The goal of discovery is to facilitate deep learning. Often this arises from viewing a problem or phenomenon from multiple perspectives. The role of the teacher is more of a facilitator there to guide the learning process when needed. The guided

Changing the image of thought 207 discovery approach supports the two previous touchstones presented above. It provides the students with agency that allows them to take an active role in the learning process by being immersed in authentic situations within a topic or phenomenon of their own choice. The main advantage of the guided discovery approach is that it opens possibilities for creating a rhizomatic learning environment that fosters learners’ autonomy, curiosity, and critical thinking.

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208  Jonas Mikaels Gough, N. (2015). Rewording the world: Narrative and nature after poststructuralism. In Experiencing the outdoors (pp. 233–244). Brill. Gough, N., & Sellers, W. (2004, July 6–9). Re/de/signing the world: Poststructuralism, deconstruction, and ‘reality’ in outdoor/environmental education research. Paper presented at the Connections and disconnections: Examining the reality and rhetoric, International Outdoor Education Research Conference, La Trobe University, Bendigo, Victoria, Australia. Grosz, E. A. (2008). Chaos, territory, art: Deleuze and the framing of the earth. Columbia University Press. Haraway, D. J. (1997). Modest−witness@ second−millennium. Femaleman−meets− oncomouse: Feminism and technoscience. Routledge. Haraway, D. J. (2003). The companion species manifesto: Dogs, people, and significant otherness (Vol. 1, pp. 3–17). Prickly Paradigm Press. Haraway, D. J. (2008). When species meet. University of Minnesota Press. Hultman, K., & Lenz Taguchi, H. (2010). Challenging anthropocentric analysis of visual data: A relational materialist methodological approach to educational research. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 23(5), 525–542. https:// doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2010.500628 Latour, B. (1993). The pasteurization of France (Alan Sheridan and John Law, Trans.). Harvard University Press. Lynch, J., & Mannion, G. (2021). Place-responsive pedagogies in the Anthropocene: Attuning with the more-than-human. Environmental Education Research, 27(6), 864–878. https://doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2020.1867710 MacCormack, P. (2001). Becoming hu-man: Deleuze and Guattari, gender and 3rd rock from the Sun. Intensities: The Journal of Cult Media, 1(1), 1–1. Retrieved May 9, 2022, from http://intensities.org/Essays/MacCormack.pdf Mannion, G., Fenwick, A., & Lynch, J. (2013). Place-responsive pedagogy: Learning from teachers’ experiences of excursions in nature. Environmental Education Research, 19(6), 792–809. https://doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2012.749980 Massumi, B. (2014). The power at the end of the economy. Duke University Press. McPhie, J., & Clarke, D. A. G. (2015). A walk in the park: Considering practice for outdoor environmental education through an immanent take on the material turn. The Journal of Environmental Education, 46(4), 230–250. https://doi.org/ 10.1080/00958964.2015.1069250 Nicol, R. (2014). Entering the fray: The role of outdoor education in providing nature-based experiences that matter. Educational Philosophy and Theory, 46(5), 449–461. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-5812.2011.00840.x Quay, J. (2017). From human–nature to cultureplace in education via an exploration of unity and relation in the work of Peirce and Dewey. Studies in Philosophy and Education, 36(4), 463–476. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11217-016-9507-6 Rautio, P. (2013). Children who carry stones in their pockets: On autotelic material practices in everyday life. Children’s Geographies, 11(4), 394–408. https://doi.org/ 10.1080/14733285.2013.812278 Roy, K. (2003). Teachers in nomadic spaces: Deleuze and curriculum. Peter Lang. Semetsky, I. (2011). Becoming-other: Developing the ethics of integration. Policy Futures in Education, 9(1), 138–144. https://doi.org/10.2304%2Fpfie.2011.9.1.138 Snaza, N., Appelbaum, P., Bayne, S., Carlson, D., Morris, M., Rotas, N., Sandlin, J., Wallin, J., & Weaver, J. A. (2014). Toward a posthuman education. Journal of Curriculum Theorizing, 30(2), 39.

Changing the image of thought 209 St. Pierre, E. A. (2011). Post qualitative research: The critique and the coming after. In N. K. Denzin & Y. S. Lincoln (Eds.). Sage handbook of qualitative inquiry (4th ed.) (pp. 611–635). Sage. Stagoll, C. (2005). Event. In A. Parr (Ed.), The Deleuze dictionary (pp. 87–88). Edinburgh University Press. Stewart, A. (2008). Whose place, whose history? Outdoor environmental education pedagogy as ‘reading’ the landscape. Journal of Adventure Education & Outdoor Learning, 8(2), 79–98. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-40320-1_8 Stewart, A. (2015). Rhizocurrere: A Deleuzo-Guattarian approach to curriculum autobiography. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 28(10), 1169–1185. https://doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2014.974719 Stewart, A. (2020). Developing place-responsive pedagogy in outdoor environmental education: A rhizomatic curriculum autobiography. Springer Nature. Taylor, C. A. (2016). Edu-crafting a cacophonous ecology: Posthumanist research practices for education. In Posthuman research practices in education (pp. 5–24). Palgrave Macmillan. Wattchow, B., & Brown, M. (2011). A pedagogy of place. Outdoor education for a changing world. Monash University Publishing.

13 Rhizomatic learning and the problematic field of ideas Rodrigo Barbosa Mugnai Lopes

Introduction: The question then … Occasions are not uncommon when the thought experiences that writing allows us to carry out allow us to launch, each time its appearance encourages us with a renewed breath, the question of what we are in the process of doing, the meaning of what we are doing when the office or task is to write in philosophy. But writing also offers us a permanent availability, perhaps a kind of disposition towards philosophy, which is certainly not the fixing of a point of clarification to know with certainty what to write, nor in advance where it is necessary to arrive, to then conclude, at the end of the intellectual endeavour, that we have successfully completed the journey. The dimensions of becoming and of the experience of writing would dispense with such pretensions. That is, if we think with Deleuze that writing is inseparable from becoming, from a minority work of thought, nomadic and molecular, as a line of escape from the hegemonic forms of representation, then writing in philosophy is primarily an opening of thought to life, to what can institute the intensive plan in thought and conquer for it the “zone of proximity, indiscernibility or indifferentiation” (cf. Deleuze, 1998, p. 1). with which it is possible to experience the genesis of thinking in thought: “It is true that on the path which leads to that which is to be thought, all begins with sensibility. Between the intensive and thought, it is always by means of an intensity that thought comes to us” (Deleuze, 1994, p. 144). Thus, making the experience of the encounter of thought with what forces it to think, the sign, with what exists to be thought, is the condition of having the experience of writing and of the becoming of philosophy as an act of thought. In this regard, Deleuze said in Proust and Signs: “The act of thinking does not proceed from a simple natural possibility; on the contrary, it is the only true creation. Creation is the genesis of the act of thinking within thought itself” (2000, p. 97). In the presentation to the Brazilian public of the translation of the work Empirisme et Subjectivité, by Gilles Deleuze, we see Luiz Orlandi affirm that “instead of practicing exclusions that end up reiterating false notions of progress in philosophy, one of the most fruitful interests of philosophical studies is to participate attentively in this intersection of disparate ideas, revealing unexpected landscapes in this vast disjunctive synthesis that is conceptual thought” DOI: 10.4324/9781003376378-16

Rhizomatic learning and problematic field of ideas 211 (Deleuze, 2001, back cover). We agree, in the same way, that in the face of the complex conceptual constellation that opens up a varied field of themes and possibilities of reading, writing in philosophy is perhaps related to a specific exercise of thought: to open up the availability of philosophical thought is to propitiate the confrontation with tradition, launch the challenge of working with formalized knowledge, revisit the authors, and review the knowledge accumulated in the face of the new demands that today imposes on us. All this is important, because without this work of thought, at the same time solitary and inhabited by concepts and experiences, we would not have a word more to say about what it can have of novelty, invention, surprise; but also, and mainly, because it is at this turning point that the new leaps to our eyes, that creation in philosophy is once again possible. In this sense, we understand what Deleuze said about the Stoics: “The genius of a philosophy must first be measured by the new distribution which it imposes on beings and concepts” (1969, p. 15). In this way, it is in a relationship of constant distance regarding the way in which the dualist perspective in philosophy separates – or enclosing – into distinct and irreconcilable blocks, from static notions, the processes by which individuals and knowledge are transformed, that we see the inscription of another possibility for thinking about these relationships; outlined, however, by a more intrinsic duality, marked no longer by an irreducible opposition, but by distinct series of events that differ with each occurrence of change. In Deleuze’s words: “It is a more profound and secret duality hidden in sensible and material bodies themselves: subterranean duality” (1969, p. 10). In this duality, we do not seek to produce an identity or a homogenization of thought, but individuations and differentiations in the many series of historical changes through which we make temporally specific experiences and through which we become historical individuals, but also unique. In this sense, there is a question of concept that we believe is important to clarify: the exercise of writing, the production of philosophical writing. Perhaps it is, in fact, an opportunity to think, that is, to make us think about the formative aspect of writing in philosophy – the production of thought in philosophy – not exclusively about learning the content and which would otherwise result in an expansion of the knowledge, important of course; but as for the activity of writing itself, of a certain function of writing, precisely twofold. The first concerns the elaboration of the text and its content, and which conforms to the investigation of themes, to the very particular work of maintaining and expanding knowledge. Another refers to the production of writing, to the exercise of thinking about himself, in the words of Michel Foucault, “[…] which reactivates what he knows, makes present a principle, a rule or an example, reflects on them, assimilates them, and thus prepares to face reality” (2001, p. 1236). On writing and thinking, that is, writing as an exercise in thinking, Foucault wrote that: […] writing is associated with the exercise of thinking in two different ways. One takes the form of a “linear” series; it goes from meditation to writing activity and from this to gumnazein, that is, to preparation in the

212  Rodrigo Barbosa Mugnai Lopes real situation and to experience: work on thought, work on writing, work on reality. The other is circular: the meditation precedes the notes which allow the re-reading which, in turn, invigorates the meditation. In any case, whatever the cycle of exercise in which it takes place, writing constitutes an essential stage in the process towards which all askêsis tends: namely, the elaboration of the discourses received and recognized as true into rational principles of action. (2001, pp. 1236–1237) This fragment is part of a longer text entitled L’écriture de Soi and first published in 1983, which is part of a series of studies on the arts of the self: in this case, the aesthetics of existence in Greek-Roman culture from the first two centuries of the Christian Era. But there are two forms of writing analysed in this text by Foucault: the hupomnêmata and the correspondence. As for the first, which is closest to our exercise of writing thought in philosophy, one aspect invites us to reflect: the hupomnêmata were notebooks of quotations, fragments of works, of subjects read, heard or simply thought of, of examples and actions, in order to allow for later reflection, and with that the constitution of certain precise knowledge: “They constituted a material memory of things read, heard or thought; they offered them as an accumulated treasure for later re-reading and meditation. They also formed a raw material for the writing of more systematic treatises” (Foucault, 2001, p. 1237); but also, and mainly, for the constitution of the self: “This is the objective of the hupomnêmata: to make the collection of the fragmentary logos and transmitted by teaching, listening, or reading a means for the establishment of a relationship of oneself with oneself so adequate and complete as possible” (Foucault, 2001, p. 1239). In Deleuze, too, we recognize these variations of the becoming and experience of writing in the strange availability of philosophical thought. First, when asked about the reason for writing a book about Foucault, two years after his friend’s death, and whether there was something symbolic in the publication of this book, we see Deleuze reply that his efforts are concentrated on knowing the Foucault’s logic of thought that “[…] does not cease to grow in dimensions, and none of the dimensions is contained in the previous one. So, what forces him to launch yourself in such a direction, to trace such an always unexpected path?” (1992, p. 118). What interested Foucault and what Deleuze constantly shows are the renewal of thought. In this regard, Deleuze himself reiterates how much contemporary thought is indebted to Nietzsche’s philosophy and, in the wake opened by this philosopher, we find Foucault, who made his own philosophy an act of thought; that is, an experimentation and a problematization of thought. As Deleuze said, in the book that he would have liked to have written with Foucault: In truth, one thing haunts Foucault – thought. The question: “What does thinking signify? What do we call thinking?” is the arrow first fired by Heidegger and then again Foucault. He writes a history, but a history of thought as such.

Rhizomatic learning and problematic field of ideas 213 To think means to experiment and to problematize. Knowledge, power and the self are the triple root of a problematization of thought. (1988, p. 116) But about the philosophical project that he coined critically and inventively, in particular the fundamental questioning about the genesis of thinking in thought, we see Deleuze clarify in Difference and Repetition: We recall Heidegger’s profound texts showing that as long as thought continues to presuppose its own good nature and good will, in the form of a common sense, a ratio, a Cogitatio natura universalis, it will think nothing at all but remain a prisoner to opinion, frozen in an abstract possibility …: “Man can think in the sense that he possesses the possibility to do so. This possibility alone, however, is no guarantee to us that we are capable of thinking.”; thought thinks only constrained and forced, in the presence of what “causes thought”, of what is to be thought – and what is to be thought is just as well the unthinkable or the non-thought, it is to say the perpetual fact that “we are not thinking yet”. It is true that on the path which leads to that which is to be thought, all begins with sensibility. Between the intensive and thought, it is always by means of an intensity that thought comes to us. (1994, p. 144) In the face of the questions that these philosophers allow us to ask, which allow us to think, we certainly do not find the elaboration of a method or a set of axioms and logical rules to conduct reasoning undoubtedly according to a universal order – Cogitatio natura universalis – of edification of thought in philosophy and, in turn, on how to write the philosophical thought. What we recognize in them is a broad and active interest in the actuality of philosophy, for the inventiveness of philosophical thought today, which has more to do with what Nietzsche called the unactual or untimely: the project of a philosophy as an act of thought. In this case, we suggest approaching these two authors to what Richard Rorty (1994) called “edifying philosophers” as opposed to the image of “systematic philosophers”: who offer us not universal arguments and great truths, but the experience of thought, the urgency of thinking in philosophy the experience, and experience of thinking philosophically. It is clear, therefore, that what we have highlighted with this analysis is the unique relationship between writing and learning. Let’s see, then, if this is not the case. In the case analysed by Foucault, “the written annotation of actions and thoughts as an indispensable element to the ascetic life” (2001, p. 1234) could already be found in Vita Antonii, by Athanasius, one of the oldest texts that Christian literature has produced on the subject. This text has a very important aspect that allows us to retrospectively analyse “the function of writing in the philosophical culture of the self precisely before Christianity: its close connection with the corporation of companions, its degree of application to the movements of thought, its role as proof of the truth” (Foucault, 2001,

214  Rodrigo Barbosa Mugnai Lopes pp. 1235–1236). Above all, a function of writing that has to do precisely with learning, with the act of learning: writing “offers what has been done or thought to a possible perspective …” (Foucault, 2001, p. 1235). The purpose of writing has never been other than learning: learning as a transformation of oneself and of thought. In this regard, Foucault opportunely reminds us that “writing constitutes an experience and a kind of touchstone: revealing the movements of thought …” (2001, p. 1235). Precisely for this reason, writing is not only a work about acts, but a work of learning about thinking: No technique, no professional skill can be acquired without exercise; one can no longer learn the art of living, the technê tou biou, without an askêsis that must be understood as a training of oneself for oneself: this was one of the traditional principles to which, a long time later, the Pythagoreans, the Socratics, the Cynics gave it so much importance. It seems that, among all the forms taken by this training (which involved abstinence, memorization, examination of conscience, meditation, silence and listening to the other), writing – the fact of writing for oneself and for the other – has played a role considerable for a long time. (Foucault, 2001, p. 1236) Furthermore, reminding us of an expression that exists in Plutarch, Foucault also considers that writing has an ethopoietic [éthopoiétique] function: “it is the operator of the transformation of truth into êthos” (2001, p. 1237), that is, the transformation of knowledge into life. And wouldn’t be this passage from knowledge to life, to ways of existing in the world, the highest value of learning? Let us remember that, for the Greeks, êthos is a way of being of the subject, of thinking and of leading life translated into customs, in fundamental habits: whether in the form of behaviour (of personal decisions in relation to obligations and institutions); whether in the context of culture (as a set of ideas, values​​ or beliefs); or in the form of an internalized subjectivity (with respect to will, desire, choices). In this sense, we need to recognize that the ethopoietic function is not only relative to writing, but to life. It has to do with learning not as adaptation or transmission of knowledge, but as poiesis, that is, as creation: rhizomatic learning. With Deleuze the experience is no different. Writing assumes a central role in the learning of thought and, mainly, of life. Deleuze’s testimony in the text Literature and Life is fascinating: “To write is certainly not to impose a form (of expression) on the matter of lived experience. […] Writing is a question of becoming, always incomplete, always in the midst of being formed, and goes beyond the matter of any livable or lived experience. It is a process, that is, a passage of Life that traverses both the livable and the lived. Writing is inseparable from becoming …” (1998, p. 1). And Deleuze draws some very interesting conclusions from this autopoietic experience of writing. As an example, the idea of ​​writing stands out not as a record of lived things, but as a becoming, that is, as forms of expression of the ways of existing in the world that fulfil a virtualization

Rhizomatic learning and problematic field of ideas 215 function, as an escape component that escapes its own formalization. Learning, like writing, is a permanent act of creation. Deleuze will say that it is to enter a “zone of proximity”, like becoming: “One can institute a zone of proximity with anything, on the condition that one creates the literary means for doing so” (1998, pp. 1–2). It is clear that Deleuze is talking about literature here, especially the literature of Le Clézio, André Dhôtel, Kafka, Michaux, Lawrence, Moritz. But we sense that somehow this is the case of rhizomatic learning. With learning it is no different. As with writing, “There are no straight lines, neither in things nor in language. Syntax is the set of necessary detours that are created in each case to reveal the life in things” (Deleuze, 1998, p. 2). But it would be wrong to believe that writing and learning are a solution, or just the result of premeditated reflection. In this regard, Deleuze’s considerations on the postulate of knowledge, found in the chapter “The image of thought” of Difference and Repetition, are very relevant. Rather, rhizomatic learning is of the order of the problem and the problematic, which we will consider next.

The problem of presuppositions “We never know in advance how someone will learn: by means of what loves someone becomes good at Latin, what encounters make them a philosopher, or in what dictionaries they learn to think”, considered Gilles Deleuze (1994, p. 165) when analysing the eighth postulate in the work Difference and Repetition. Learning is one of the most important topics today. How does one learn? It is also a philosophical subject of the first order. Deleuze also considered that “To learn is to enter into the universal of the relations which constitute the Idea, and into their corresponding singularities” (1994, p. 165). If the Idea is, in turn, a system of differential relations and singularities corresponding to the degrees of variation of these relations, then learning is to conjugate the remarkable points of a subject with the singular points of the Idea to form a problematic field. This is the main argument in defence of rhizomatic learning. Before that, however, we will highlight a question that may well serve the purpose of an introduction, if not the idea of an approximation, to the subject of teaching and of presuppositions of thought. However, the intention is not to validate some current thesis to the detriment of another that, for different reasons, starts from different premises or that does not share the same results. None of these matters, because we do not propose to analyse the theme in the way of an ideal synthesis of divergent conceptions – that is, a synthesis of universals as a product of dialectical reason – but in the way of a problematization. Above all, because it is the way of doing, that is, of operating the problematic field of ideas that is relevant in this exercise of thinking about teaching and learning as problematization. It is true that “teaching” has to do with instructing, transmitting, making known to someone, which has to do with the mediation of knowledge, which is why didactics emulates the epithet of great science. And since school education is not a spontaneous activity, much less private or individual, “teaching” also

216  Rodrigo Barbosa Mugnai Lopes has to do with curricula, learning objectives, methodologies, and program content. Many would argue that all of this is relevant, which is true, but a problem remains unposed. The implicit presupposition that gives teaching this goodwill and belief in naturally truth-oriented thinking remains hidden. Everything happens as if teaching had the means to awaken in man the good will to lead him to learn, to cultivate friendship for truth and knowledge. We speak, of course, by analogy about teaching, but it is in relation to philosophy that these questions never cease to be formulated. Precisely because the implicit element of this image of philosophy results from the identification of thought with the general form of representation, or recognition: the principle of a Cogitatio natura universalis. This element consists only of the supposition that thought is the natural exercise of a faculty, of the presupposition that there is a natural capacity for thought endowed with a talent for truth or an affinity with the true, under the double aspect of a good will on the part of the thinker and an upright nature on the part of thought. It is because everybody naturally thinks that everybody is supposed to know implicitly what it means to think. (Deleuze, 1994, p. 131) Well then. The question that we have raised concerns, therefore, the problem of presuppositions in philosophy. The importance of Difference and Repetition in this case is undeniable, which is why we chose to base the analysis on Deleuze’s critique of the dogmatic image of philosophy, according to which thought coincides with representation: “to think is to represent”. It is true that this problem belongs by right to philosophy, but it belongs no less to teaching. The reason is simple: just as there is no philosophy without an image of what it means to think, there is no teaching that is exempt from conception. The fragment refers the analysis to the problem of the implicit presupposition in thought. While objective presuppositions are the concepts explicitly presupposed by a given notion or conception, the former is of a special kind: according to Deleuze, it has the form of Everybody knows…: “Everybody knows in a pre-philosophical and pre-conceptual manner … everybody knows what it means to think and to be. … As a result, when the philosopher says ‘I think therefore I am’, he can assume that the universality of his premises – namely, what it means to be and to think … – will be implicitly understood, and that no one can deny that to doubt is to think, and to think is to be. …” (1994, pp. 129–130). Such an implicit presupposition in philosophy is, in fact, a double. The notion of thought as the natural exercise of a faculty presupposes, on the one hand, the good will of the thinker and, on the other hand, the good nature of thought. It is never too much to remember that this is the form and discourse of representation: it is because everyone thinks naturally that everyone is assumed to know implicitly what it means to think. The presupposition of good will, of good nature … All this leads philosophy not to the creation of concepts, of a specific conception, but to the form of representation or recognition in general. It means to say that “presupposition” is

Rhizomatic learning and problematic field of ideas 217 what is universally accepted and that such universality is only the form of what it means to think, not what is thought about. It is, therefore, the meaning of a philosophy that is not historically and culturally situated, but a pre-philosophical and natural image of what it means to think: “The most general form of representation is thus found in the element of a common sense understood as an upright nature and a good will (Eudoxus and orthodoxy). The implicit presupposition of philosophy may be found in the idea of a common sense as Cogitatio natura universalis. On this basis, philosophy is able to begin” (1994, p. 131). Such presupposition of thought, Deleuze called dogmatic or orthodox image: Postulates in philosophy are not propositions the acceptance of which the philosopher demands; but, on the contrary, propositional themes which remain implicit and are understood in a pre-philosophical manner. In this sense, conceptual philosophical thought has as its implicit presupposition a pre-philosophical and natural Image of thought, borrowed from the pure element of common sense. According to this image, thought has an affinity with the true; it formally possesses the true and materially wants the true. It is in terms of this image that everybody knows and is presumed to know what it means to think. Thereafter it matters little whether philosophy begins with the object or the subject, with Being or with beings, as long as thought remains subject to this Image which already prejudges everything: the distribution of the object and the subject as well as that of Being and beings. (1994, p. 131) In other words, the presupposition of such an image for thought is what constitutes the implicit presupposition of philosophy as a whole. But it refers only to the coordinates of thought, not to philosophies in the time. The problem of presuppositions concerns, therefore, not the conceptions, but the coordinates by which we think what we think: “By the image of thought, I do not understand the method, but something deeper, always presupposed, a system of coordinates, dynamisms, orientations: what it means to think and ‘orient oneself in thought’” (Deleuze, 1992, p. 185). Thus, the problem of the implicit presupposition of philosophy is entirely the problem of the presupposition of a dogmatic image that guides thought in the direction of the common-sense ideal. But isn’t it precisely against this decision-making that one intends to consider thought as an experimentation and a problematization? And wouldn’t this alternative be the one that best expresses teaching as a problematization of thought? It is, in fact, the alternative that we will now examine. However, it cannot be installed right away. First, the critique of the identification of thought with the form of representation needs to be unfolded in the analysis of a double that constitutes the postulate of recognition: the ideal of common sense and good sense “of all things in the world the most equally distributed” (Deleuze, 1994, p. 132). In fact, not just by right, these are the implicit elements of the orthodox image of thought. They are not accidental or complementary. They are original, since from them derive the two great orders of generality: the qualitative order

218  Rodrigo Barbosa Mugnai Lopes of similarities and the quantitative order of equivalences. Also, because it is at this inflection point that we see teaching replicating the same presuppositions, a circularity from which it is not easy to get out. Unless … Unless one renounces the form of representation as well as the element of common sense. According to Deleuze, it is “As though thought could begin to think, and continually begin again, only when liberated from the Image and its postulates” (1994, p. 173). Obviously, this is not a solution, but something different. To pose problems, to create them, is to determine a position of the concept, not to ask questions in series. It’s a problematization. The concept of idea, for example. It is not the same in Plato, Descartes, or Kant. Despite the generality that makes thought operate by similarity and equality, allowing more similarity than the concept can support, “idea” is not the same concept for these philosophers. Insofar as concepts are just possibilities, it is necessary to give them a position, without which thought will remain trapped in a merely abstract possibility. The concept of idea for each of these philosophers corresponds to different gradients of problems. Therefore, if the problems are not the same, neither the concepts will be. “In fact, concepts only ever designate possibilities. They lack the claws of absolute necessity – in other words, of an original violence inflicted upon thought; the claws of a strangeness or an enmity which alone would awaken thought from its natural stupor or eternal possibility” (Deleuze, 1994, p. 139). More important than the concept is the problem that determines it. Therefore, thinking through representation is not the same as thinking as problematization. And this difference comes to teaching as much as to philosophy itself. Let us return to the problem of postulates. It is as if everything there is to think about conforms to the order of the solutions, all that remains is to dazzle them according to universally shared premises. But this is the case with implicit presuppositions. On the other hand, objective presuppositions are given explicitly, they are communicable according to well-known rules. This is the case with science, but also with teaching in a certain sense. For this second case, they are publicly available: pedagogical projects, curricula, public policies, new technologies, etc. We could even say that they are, therefore, universals of communication. Now, there is no school teaching that can ignore them, although it is always possible to modify them according to well-defined rules that cannot be reduced to one model or another. What there is, on the other hand, is a profusion of teaching models and methodologies, from traditional to active or studentcentred. We oppose none of this. The problem lies in presuppositions of another kind, subjective or implicit. We are back, in a way, to the starting point. What does teaching have to do with thinking according to the form of representation? First of all, it has to do with what has been explained: the problem of implicit presuppositions. They correspond to an orthodoxy of thought that refers philosophy to representation and the latter to teaching. Again and again, one thing and another are thrown into a circularity where difference is impossible, as the double aspect of the ideal of common sense and good sense has taken its place: “Natural good sense or common sense are thus taken to be

Rhizomatic learning and problematic field of ideas 219 determinations of pure thought. Sense is able to adjudicate with regard to its own universality, and to suppose itself universal and communicable in principle” (Deleuze, 1994, pp. 132–133). Now, thinking according to the form of representation, in addition to presuppositions, has a model: recognition. “Recognition may be defined by the harmonious exercise of all the faculties upon a supposed same object: the same object may be seen, touched, remembered, imagined or conceived. …” (Deleuze, 1994, p. 133). Let’s take a good look at the issue. This means, in other words, that each faculty has its own data and its own way of operating, its own style. Thus, it is not in the same way that the sensible, the imaginable, the intelligible … are represented, each being acts of distinct faculties: sensibility, imagination, intelligence, etc. However, the object is only recognized or represented in thought, reiterates Deleuze, when each faculty sees it as identical, that is, “when all the faculties together relate their given and relate themselves to a form of identity in the object” (1994, p. 133). This, after all, is the model: the ideal of common sense as a subjective principle of collaboration between faculties, that is, as concordia facultatum (the form of identity of the object) and, on the other hand, good sense as what determines the contribution of the faculties according to each case, acting as a kind of unit for thought, potentiam cogitandi (potency of thought). In the case of teaching, equally, both instances preserve the essence of the model of recognition: the norm of identity and the norm of distribution. Also, because there is a correspondence between them that always needs to be resumed. Deleuze explains that: “At this point, however, we must refer to the precise difference between these two complementary instances, common sense and good sense. For while common sense is the norm of identity from the point of view of the pure Self and the form of the unspecified object which corresponds to it, good sense is the norm of distribution” (1994, pp. 133–134). Insofar as such things are rightfully valid for philosophy, thinking according to the postulate of recognition presupposes such a distribution, and that was what remained to be explained. Herein lies the correspondence with teaching. The ideal of common sense confers on the act of teaching the rule of identity to bring into agreement the faculties that act in the learning of the content. Without much effort, we can infer that although a certain philosophical theme, for example, dialectics, is taught according to different, sometimes antagonistic philosophers, schools or currents of thought, there is a certain shareable universality extracted from the object’s form of identity. In other words, despite the different points of view on the subject, there is still the formal identity that brings them together in a concordia and that despite their differences. On the other hand, such a formal identity would not produce its effects without another rule being explained: distribution. Good sense, as a norm of distribution, corresponds to the power of thought that defines the contribution of each part or faculty according to the case. So, for example, it is not in the same way that dialectics is taught in History of Philosophy, in Aesthetics, or in Logic. There is always a certain division, observing the norm of distribution and collaboration between the faculties, as much as there is a formal identity of the object as universality of the concept.

220  Rodrigo Barbosa Mugnai Lopes This explains why teaching largely corresponds to the model of recognition. On the other hand, it does not fully explain why in the world of representation there is only thought of generality. We turn once again to Deleuze: “Generality presents two major orders: the qualitative order of resemblances and the quantitative order of equivalences. Cycles and equalities are their respective symbols. But in any case, generality expresses a point of view according to which one term may be exchanged or substituted for another” (1994, p. 1). The first is fully understood by the recognition model. As for the order of equivalences, there is an aspect that takes us back to philosophical knowledge and explains why teaching remains in the shadow of representation. What defines the order of equivalences is the exchange or substitution of particulars in correspondence with the generality or universality of the concept. Such a conduct describes the teaching situation well. Teaching is a practice that brings together other practices, not just an exercise, but a technique that puts them to operate in linear series, that is, by segmentarity, or in sets that work in parallel or by intersectionality. Therefore, a dispositive that acts according to the equivalence rule. “Teaching” is to instruct, which is equivalent to transmitting, which is equivalent to explaining, which is equivalent to making known, which is equivalent to … Thought is thus conceived in principle as representation. It is no longer a possible, nor an internal difference, it has become something else … something similar to generality, as if there were only thought of the general. Teaching, in this way, is entirely covered by representation: by its element, the presuppositions; by its model, recognition; by its form, the ideal of common sense and good sense. That is why there are so many models, methodologies, schemes, or teaching rules. Always equivalence and its judgments. And isn’t what we are doing precisely a problematization of thought?

Notes for a conclusion We propose a paradoxical use of equivalence. Deleuze recalled that “More important than thought is ‘what leads to thought’; more important than the philosopher is the poet” (2000, p. 95). And we could complete by saying that learning is more important than teaching. This is true, but still no less paradoxical. In Proust and Signs, Deleuze puts to the test the limit of philosophical interpretation: the genesis of thinking in thought. He explains that without something to force him to think, thought would be nothing but an abstract possibility. Here we see an equation enunciated with variations and different gradients of intensity: if thinking is problematizing, then problematizing is experimenting. But it is not in the same way that every philosopher gives rise to it, some perhaps have never formulated it. Let’s see what this consists of. Why is what gives thought more important than thinking? Why is the poet more important than the philosopher? Well, because “the poet learns what is essential is outside of thought, in what forces us to think”, explains Deleuze (2000, p. 95). The poet is capable of this, unlike the philosopher who is content only to interpret. But rhizomatic learning has another destiny: “apprenticeship falls rather on the side of the rat in the maze,

Rhizomatic learning and problematic field of ideas 221 while the philosopher outside the cave carries off only the result - knowledge - in order to discover its transcendental principles” (Deleuze, 1994, p. 166). And why is learning more important than teaching? Well, here is the alternative or formulation of the problematic. In fact, we find it in the tension generated by the passage from thought of representation to philosophy as problematization. This entire field of ideas is problematic because it is not subject to the regime of solutions, nor to the postulate of knowledge. According to Deleuze, “knowledge designates only the generality of concepts or the calm possession of a rule enabling solutions” (1994, p. 164), while learning does not have any rule to determine the solutions in each case. The act of rhizomatic learning consists, therefore, in first admitting that the problem is not a subjective, private determination, which would mark a moment of insipience of knowledge. In fact, the problematic structure is part of the objects of knowledge themselves, which are apprehended as signs, that is, as problems for thought, “just as the questioning or problematising instance is a part of knowledge allowing its positivity and its specificity to be grasped in the act of learning” (Deleuze, 1994, pp. 63–64). In this sense, it does not correspond to generality as much as it does not emanate from recognition. Learning is having the will, the sense, and the means to think about problems. “To learn is to enter into the universal of the relations which constitute the Idea, and into their corresponding singularities” (Deleuze, 1994, p. 165). There is a beautiful passage from Difference and Repetition that casts a point of light where knowledge casts shadows: The idea of the sea, for example, as Leibniz showed, is a system of liaisons or differential relations between particulars and singularities corresponding to the degrees of variation among these relations – the totality of the system being incarnated in the real movement of the waves. To learn to swim is to conjugate the distinctive points of our bodies with the singular points of the objective Idea in order to form a problematic field. (Deleuze, 1994, p. 165) However, the problematic is not a provisional state of knowledge. There is a big mistake in thinking that in the absence of solvability, the problematic remains as a state of indeterminacy of the problem. Just as it cannot be explained by the categorical series, neither can it be assimilated to the logical form of hypotheses. “By contrast, the Idea and ‘learning’ express that extra-propositional or subrepresentative problematic instance” (Deleuze, 1994, p. 192). In other words, it means to say that the Idea is not the element of knowledge, but of a learning that differs in nature from knowledge, given that rhizomatic learning is an activity entirely involved in the understanding of problems as such, in the apprehension of singularities and of differential relations. That’s what happens with learning to swim or learning a foreign language. In any case, learning means composing the singular points of one’s own body or one’s own language with those of another element that makes us penetrate a set of problems hitherto unknown and surprising. These are problems that demand the transformation

222  Rodrigo Barbosa Mugnai Lopes of our body and our language towards the formation of a problematic field of ideas and the acquisition of knowledge, which designates the cases of solutions. The same thing goes with problems. “A problem does not exist, apart from its solutions. Far from disappearing in this overlay, however, it insists and persists in these solutions. A problem is determined at the same time as it is solved, but its determination is not the same as its solution: the two elements differ in kind, the determination amounting to the genesis of the concomitant solution” (Deleuze, 1994, p. 163). The problematic belongs completely to the conditions of the problem, to its divisions and to the conjunctions of singular points, while its specification refers the problem to the constructed solutions. That is why rhizomatic learning may be defined in two complementary ways, both of which are opposed to representation in knowledge: “learning is either a matter of penetrating the Idea, its varieties and distinctive points, or a matter of raising a faculty to its disjoint transcendent exercise, raising it to that encounter and that violence which are communicated to the others” (Deleuze, 1994, p. 194). Even so, learning is not the result of a solution presented to the problem, knowledge, but its proof. Just as knowledge is understood by the modality of solutions, rhizomatic learning is entirely assimilated by the problematic. In this sense, it is the whole pedagogical relation is transformed.

References Deleuze, G. (1969). Logique du Sens. Éditions de Minuit. Deleuze, G. (1988). Foucault. University of Minnesota Press. Deleuze, G. (1992). Conversações. Editora 34. Deleuze, G. (1994). Difference and repetition. Columbia University Press. Deleuze, G. (1998). Essays critical and clinical. Verso. Deleuze, G. (2000). Proust and signs. University of Minnesota Press. Deleuze, G. (2001). Empirismo e subjetividade: ensaio sobre a natureza humana segundo Hume. Editora 34. Foucault, M. (2001). Dits et Écrits II: 1976–1988. Éditions Gallimard. Rorty, R. (1994). A filosofia e o espelho da natureza. Relume-Dumará.

Index

Activity Theory 48 Actor Network Theory 3 arborescent 32, 43, 44, 57, 59, 60, 63, 199, 200, 201 assemblage 4, 44, 46, 58, 91 autopoiesis 102–104 becoming 3, 23, 27, 31, 34, 35, 38, 39, 45, 46, 58, 64, 70, 75, 76, 80, 87, 90, 91, 98–101, 103, 105, 106, 108, 135, 151, 181, 192, 195–200, 202, 207, 210, 212, 214, 215 connectivism 69–71, 159, 168 curriculum 15, 34, 55, 56, 59, 76, 82, 103, 108, 119, 132, 144, 148, 160, 181, 185, 199, 200, 203 Deleuze and Guattari i, xiv, 3, 4, 6, 11, 21, 35, 37, 41–46, 49, 51, 54, 55, 59, 60, 62, 65, 66, 68–70, 76, 89, 91, 96, 98–101, 133, 134, 142, 159, 168, 181, 187, 194, 196, 198–204, 208 deterritorializing 4, 31 direct instruction 17, 18, 19, 82 educational technology 9, 13, 20, 149 edusemiotics 80, 83, 84, 87, 89–91, 94, 95, 96 e-learning 14, 69 framework 4, 9, 15, 16, 18, 19, 22, 41, 42, 46, 51–55, 57, 60, 81, 119, 142, 145, 146, 151, 171, 180, 200, 205 higher education 5, 31, 32, 55, 56, 70, 72, 75, 142, 143, 145, 146, 147, 149, 150, 151 hybridity 6, 80, 81, 83, 85, 87, 90, 91, 93, 95, 97

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informal learning 14, 17, 72 language education 4, 5, 119, 122, 126, 128, 130, 135, 138 learning communities 57, 98, 109, 182 learning theory 159 line of flight 187, 188, 191, 200 mediated mind 6, 80, 81, 83, 85, 87, 90, 91, 93, 95, 97 metaphor 3, 13, 28, 42, 43, 61, 69, 70, 76, 88, 102, 110, 142, 147, 152, 159, 160, 170, 180 m-learning 149 mobile learning 72, 158, 149 MOOC 57, 63, 141, 144, 155, 158– 160, 163, 164, 172–176 multiplicity 3, 11, 12, 14, 22, 35, 43, 52, 69, 98, 105, 142, 201 networked learning 9, 155 nomad 3, 46, 98, 101, 106, 109, 110, 143, 181 nomadic pedagogy i, 4, 33, 35, 38, 110, 125, 143, 144, 152, 153, 155, 181, 182, 189, 191, 194–196, 200, 201, 208, 210 non-linear 3, 5, 28, 30, 43, 44, 57, 61, 93, 99, 152, 171, 187, 201 non-hierarchical 44, 57, 61, 94, 102, 119, 121, 125, 152, 201 online learning 70, 88, 89, 162 pedagogy i, vi, vii, xi, xiv, 4, 6, 7, 24, 32, 38, 62, 78, 90, 95, 98, 102, 103, 107, 108–110, 112–114, 125, 142–145, 147, 149, 151–155, 158, 169, 176, 180, 181, 195, 205, 206, 208, 209

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224  Index personal learning environments 126 plateau 4, 30, 36, 37, 41, 68, 154 postmodernism 142 problematic 6, 7, 44, 56, 59, 63, 108, 141, 145, 158, 176, 210, 211, 213, 215, 217, 219, 221, 222 rhizomatic learning i, vi, ix, xi, 3, 4, 6, 7, 11, 12, 15, 16, 41, 55, 65, 74, 76, 80, 87, 89–92, 102–104, 106, 109, 110, 112, 117, 119, 125, 132, 133, 135, 136, 142–146, 149, 151–155, 158–161, 163–167, 169, 171, 173, 175–177, 179–183, 185, 187, 189, 191, 193–195, 197, 199, 207, 214, 215, 220, 221, 222 rhizome xiv, xv, 3–6, 9, 10, 12, 14, 15, 21–23, 32, 35, 36, 42–44, 46, 49, 51, 53–55, 57, 58, 60, 65, 66, 68–70, 76, 88, 98, 101, 102, 104, 106, 110,

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119, 121, 122, 126, 133, 134, 138, 142, 143, 146, 152, 153, 159, 163, 165, 168, 179, 181, 191, 194, 199, 200 seamless 10, 65, 66, 71, 72, 76 semiosis 6, 80, 81, 83–85, 87, 89–91, 93, 95, 97 social contract 5, 65–68, 70, 74, 76, 77, 79 social network 145, 164 systematic 66, 186, 212, 213 teacher education 15 technology 11, 23, 24, 38, 63, 77, 78, 97, 102, 113, 114, 123, 139–141, 149, 155, 157, 158, 163, 165, 166, 173, 175–177 territorializing 4 triadic 7, 84–86

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