Walking the Talk: Co-constructing the politics of meaning, diversity and learning

11th – 13th September 2024, Bari

SIG 10, 21 & 25 Conference 2024 – EARLI

In the current landscape of educational research, there is a growing awareness of and interest in discussing the positionality of all actors involved. Through their actions and words, students, teachers, researchers, tutors, etc., all express values and worldviews, collectively shaping the narratives on education across formal and informal learning contexts. At a broader level, this co-constructive process also involves actors such as policymakers, funding agencies, scientific associations, and EdTech companies. In that sense, the social interactions relevant to educational research are not only processes evolving during learning but also involve discourse and action communicating about learning – verbally and nonverbally, explicitly and implicitly across different places and situations.

Thus, not only do educationally relevant phenomena give rise to a polyphonic co-construction of meaning – such co-construction, in turn, also shapes how we perceive and act and thus transforms these phenomena. Our participation as educational researchers in this co-construction has deep implications for educational theory and practice. In this context, a particularly relevant – perhaps confronting – question for reflection is: who gets to participate in co-constructing the politics of meaning and learning? Who are ‘we’ and who are the ‘others’? For even if we agree on valuing diversity, the meaning of ‘diversity’ itself is not fixed, seeing that various kinds of diversity can be at stake in educational research and practice. Depending on how the meaning of diversity is co-constructed, different actors can be included and excluded as agents (e.g., do we mean only human diversity or also more-than-human diversity?).

At this conference, we take the time and space to engage with research as a reflexive praxis. Notably, we aim to expand our understanding of learning and social interaction, diversity in education, and educational theory to foster dialogue not only on what we do but also on how we do it and what that communicates. Such dialogue entails exploring how both our empirical findings and our ways of doing research shape and are shaped by educational discourse and practice. We invite participants to present theoretical, empirical and practical contributions on topics within the scope of SIGs 10, 21 and 25 and to address the implications of their research for educational practices and/or the worldviews and values shaping their research projects.

For more information, go to SIG 10, 21 & 25 Conference 2024 – EARLI