Colin Lankshear - Böcker

"....undeterred by sociological pessimism, Colin Lankshear hacks away at the underbrush, clearing a path for a new critical-liberatory discourse"James Paul Gee, Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts.This book explores everyday social practices and how they influence who people are, what they become, the quality of their lives, the opportunities and possibilities open to them, and those they are denied. It focusses especially on language and literacy components of social practices, asking: * How are language and literacy framed within different social practices?* How are social practices in turn shaped and framed by language and literacy?* What are the consequences for the lives and identities of individuals and groups?* How can we understand these relationships, and build on this understanding to develop critical forms of literacy and language awareness that enhance human dignity, freedom and social justice?In addressing these questions the book draws on social practices from diverse settings: from classrooms using conventional texts to so-called "enchanted workplaces"; from a Third World peasant cooperative enterprise to modern technologically-equipped homes and classrooms. The result is a rich sociocultural account of language and literacy, which challenges narrow psychological and skills-based approaches, and provides an excellent theory base for informing the practice of literacy educators.It will be compelling reading for academics, teachers and students of language and literacy education, critical literacy, discourse studies and cultural studies.

“This informative book helped me to understand research in general and to bring focus and clarity to my current research project. The text answers questions and provides guidance and support in a manner that is user-friendly and easy to comprehend…. After reading this book, I feel empowered as a teacher-researcher and would unhesitatingly recommend it to other teacher-researchers, graduate students and educators.”Francesca Crowther – teacher and doctoral student, Nova Scotia, Canada.

This book provides a comprehensive and detailed approach to teacher research as systematic, methodical and informed practice. It identifies five requirements for all kinds of research, and provides clear and accessible guidelines for teachers to use in conducting their own classroom-based studies.

Features:

A clear definition of teacher research which insists on more than ‘stories’ and anecdotal ‘retrospectives’Innovative organisational structure based on the collection and analysis of spoken, written and observed data, with strong emphasis on the design of research projectsEasy-to-use and widely applicable tools and techniques for collecting and analysing data in qualitative researchInformed by the authors’ own wide-ranging experiences, A Handbook of Teacher Research provides everything the teacher researcher needs in order to conduct good quality practitioner research. It is ideal for upper level undergraduate Education programmes and for postgraduate research, as well as for teacher researchers who conceive and drive their own independent studies.

“Like a compass guiding you to what’s important and why in this rapidly evolving field, this new edition is utterly stimulating but also thoughtful and measured.”Daniel Cassany, Literacy Researcher and Teacher, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain

"Essential reading for those interested in new and emerging literacy practices, New Literacies maps the contours of on- and off-line participation and how it is transforming learning and communication. This book provides the necessary theoretical background and illustration of practice for a radical re-appraisal of how we think about literacy and literacy education."Guy Merchant, Professor of Literacy in Education,Faculty of Development and Society, Sheffield Hallam University

The new edition of this popular book takes a fresh look at what it means to think of literacies as social practices. The book explores what is distinctively 'new' within a range of currently popular everyday ways of generating, communicating and negotiating meanings. Revised, updated and significantly reconceptualised throughout, the book includes:

Closer analysis of new literacies in terms of active collaborationA timely discussion of using wikis and other collaborative online writing resourcesUpdated and expanded accounts of digital remix and blogging practicesAn explanation of social learning and collaborative platforms for social learningA fresh focus on online social networkingA new batch of discussion questions and stimulus activities The importance of social learning for becoming proficient in many new literacy practices, and the significance of new media for expanding the reach and potential of social learning are discussed in the final part of the book. New Literacies 3/e concludes by describing empirical cases of social learning approaches mediated by collaborative learning platforms.

This book is essential reading for students and academics within literacy studies, cultural or communication studies and education.

First Published in 2004. This work explores various forms of oppression that plague contemporary society. Through the analyses and reflections of theorists and social activists - including Paulo Freire himself - Politics of Liberation brings together, under a common project of human liberation, critical voices from around the globe: Mexico, Guatemala, Britain, Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Australia, New Zealand and the United States. The essays argue that Freire's work offers an avenue out of the malaise of contemporary politics and culture. They place Freire temporally in relation to moments of modernity and postmodernity; culturally and existentially in relation to the First and Third Worlds and at the standpoint of indigenous peoples; politically in terms of his attention to the range of sites and dimensions of oppression and their relatedness; and intellectually in relation to the eclectic range of theories on which he draws. The book is a response to the current global crisis of solidarity among progressive and dissident intellectuals, educators and cultural workers.

In the hypercompetitive context of the new global economy, building a smart workforce is widely regarded as a key strategy for enterprises. But is this any more than another 'fast capitalist' slogan? What substance can be given to the idea? What are its associated values and practices? This book explores these issues from an international perspective in fresh and challenging ways. Key themes include:* competence and being competent in the world of work* experience, common-sense and expertise in workplace learning* social practices and literacies in the workplace* developing smart, self-directed workers* taking responsibility for learning in workplaces* empowering workers as learners in the workplaces.These essays are written by leading edge workplace analysts and practitioners from Australia, New Zealand, Sweden and the USA. Their wide-ranging, multi-disciplinary approach will be of interest to all forward-thinking academics, students and leaders in management, organizational development and workplace learning.

In the hypercompetitive context of the new global economy, building a smart workforce is widely regarded as a key strategy for enterprises. But is this any more than another 'fast capitalist' slogan? What substance can be given to the idea? What are its associated values and practices? This book explores these issues from an international perspective in fresh and challenging ways. Key themes include:* competence and being competent in the world of work* experience, common-sense and expertise in workplace learning* social practices and literacies in the workplace* developing smart, self-directed workers* taking responsibility for learning in workplaces* empowering workers as learners in the workplaces.These essays are written by leading edge workplace analysts and practitioners from Australia, New Zealand, Sweden and the USA. Their wide-ranging, multi-disciplinary approach will be of interest to all forward-thinking academics, students and leaders in management, organizational development and workplace learning.

To understand contemporary times, we must appreciate the extent to which our lives are affected by the cultural and political struggle between "official" narratives and the counternarratives which emerge as oppositional responses. Counternarratives develops a concept of "postmodern counternarratives" as a frame for exploring the politics of media, technology and education within everyday struggles for human identities and loyalties. The authors identify two forms of counternarratives. One functions as a critique of the modernist propensity for grand narratives. The second concept, which is the focus of the book, builds on the first; the idea of "little stories" addressing cultural and political opposition to the "official" narratives used to manipulate public consciousness. Each marks an important point of contestation within contemporary education and culture: curriculum, pedagogy, literacy, media representations and applications of new technologies.

To understand contemporary times, we must appreciate the extent to which our lives are affected by the cultural and political struggle between "official" narratives and the counternarratives which emerge as oppositional responses. Counternarratives develops a concept of "postmodern counternarratives" as a frame for exploring the politics of media, technology and education within everyday struggles for human identities and loyalties. The authors identify two forms of counternarratives. One functions as a critique of the modernist propensity for grand narratives. The second concept, which is the focus of the book, builds on the first; the idea of "little stories" addressing cultural and political opposition to the "official" narratives used to manipulate public consciousness. Each marks an important point of contestation within contemporary education and culture: curriculum, pedagogy, literacy, media representations and applications of new technologies.

Written by internationally acclaimed scholars on futures of critical theory, this book attempts to renew and reinvigorate critical theory by extending its range and its intellectual trajectories through strategies of inclusiveness that respect and build on parallel traditions. The authors reinterpret the work of Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, and Heidegger in relation to central figures (Kant, Marcuse, Foucault) and themes of critical theory—the critique of modernity, theory of the self, and the question concerning technology. Key chapters address the critical significance of the work of the French theorists Levinas, Deleuze, Derrida, Lyotard, Irigaray, and Bourdieu and while other chapters focus on thinkers as diverse as Zizek, Giddens, Said, and Guattari, and deal with contemporary topics such as cyberfeminism and antiglobalization.

We are living in a time of resurgent global conflicts and imperialistic tensions_a time in which many children are being left behind by school systems that appear more concerned with developing accountability schemes and standardized models of testing than with defending the right of every child to have access to a good education. The efforts of countless teachers, activists, and families working and living in poor areas around the world are labeled as failures, entirely discredited on the basis of their expendability in relation to capital gains, or simply ignored. In response to these oppressive and challenging conditions, this book's contributors_a group of committed educators and activists working in an ethos of solidarity across geopolitical and geographical borders_have advanced arguments and strategies that link educational transformation to the larger struggle to transform oppressive social relations. In a clear attempt to move beyond both nostalgia and romanticism, Critical Theories, Radical Pedagogies, and Global Conflicts draws from a range of viewpoints-conceptual and thematic, transnational and crosscultural, First World and Third World_to articulate new directions for teachers and activists working to demonstrate that another education, and indeed, another world, is possible.

Situated at the intersection of two of the most important areas in educational research today — literacy and technology — this handbook draws on the potential of each while carving out important new territory. It provides leadership for this newly emerging field, directing scholars to the major issues, theoretical perspectives, and interdisciplinary research pertaining to new literacies. Reviews of research are organized into six sections: Methodologies Knowledge and Inquiry Communication Popular Culture, Community, and Citizenship: Everyday Literacies Instructional Practices and Assessment Multiple Perspectives on New Literacies ResearchFEATURES Brings together a diverse international team of editors and chapter authors Provides an extensive collection of research reviews in a critical area of educational research Makes visible the multiple perspectives and theoretical frames that currently drive work in new literacies Establishes important space for the emerging field of new literacies research Includes a unique Commentary section: The final section of the Handbook reprints five central research studies. Each is reviewed by two prominent researchers from their individual, and different, theoretical position. This provides the field with a sense of how diverse lenses can be brought to bear on research as well as the benefits that accrue from doing so. It also provides models of critical review for new scholars and demonstrates how one might bring multiple perspectives to the study of an area as complex as new literacies research.The Handbook of Research on New Literacies is intended for the literacy research community, broadly conceived, including scholars and students from the traditional reading and writing research communities in education and educational psychology as well as those from information science, cognitive science, psychology, sociolinguistics, computer mediated communication, and other related areas that find literacy to be an important area of investigation.

Situated at the intersection of two of the most important areas in educational research today — literacy and technology — this handbook draws on the potential of each while carving out important new territory. It provides leadership for this newly emerging field, directing scholars to the major issues, theoretical perspectives, and interdisciplinary research pertaining to new literacies. Reviews of research are organized into six sections: Methodologies Knowledge and Inquiry Communication Popular Culture, Community, and Citizenship: Everyday Literacies Instructional Practices and Assessment Multiple Perspectives on New Literacies ResearchFEATURES Brings together a diverse international team of editors and chapter authors Provides an extensive collection of research reviews in a critical area of educational research Makes visible the multiple perspectives and theoretical frames that currently drive work in new literacies Establishes important space for the emerging field of new literacies research Includes a unique Commentary section: The final section of the Handbook reprints five central research studies. Each is reviewed by two prominent researchers from their individual, and different, theoretical position. This provides the field with a sense of how diverse lenses can be brought to bear on research as well as the benefits that accrue from doing so. It also provides models of critical review for new scholars and demonstrates how one might bring multiple perspectives to the study of an area as complex as new literacies research.The Handbook of Research on New Literacies is intended for the literacy research community, broadly conceived, including scholars and students from the traditional reading and writing research communities in education and educational psychology as well as those from information science, cognitive science, psychology, sociolinguistics, computer mediated communication, and other related areas that find literacy to be an important area of investigation.

This book presents an ethnographic and discourse analytic study of a highly popular online fan fiction writing space. Its analyses highlight the range of sophisticated literacy practices that English language learning youth engage in through their fan-related activities. Discussion also centers on how opportunities for language socialization, literacy, and identity development converge and diverge between academic settings and informal learning contexts such as fan fiction sites.

First Published in 2004. This work explores various forms of oppression that plague contemporary society. Through the analyses and reflections of theorists and social activists - including Paulo Freire himself - Politics of Liberation brings together, under a common project of human liberation, critical voices from around the globe: Mexico, Guatemala, Britain, Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Australia, New Zealand and the United States. The essays argue that Freire's work offers an avenue out of the malaise of contemporary politics and culture. They place Freire temporally in relation to moments of modernity and postmodernity; culturally and existentially in relation to the First and Third Worlds and at the standpoint of indigenous peoples; politically in terms of his attention to the range of sites and dimensions of oppression and their relatedness; and intellectually in relation to the eclectic range of theories on which he draws. The book is a response to the current global crisis of solidarity among progressive and dissident intellectuals, educators and cultural workers.

This book brings together a group of internationally-reputed authors in the field of digital literacy. Their essays explore a diverse range of the concepts, policies and practices of digital literacy, and discuss how digital literacy is related to similar ideas: information literacy, computer literacy, media literacy, functional literacy and digital competence. It is argued that in light of this diversity and complexity, it is useful to think of digital literacies – the plural as well the singular. The first part of the book presents a rich mix of conceptual and policy perspectives; in the second part contributors explore social practices of digital remixing, blogging, online trading and social networking, and consider some legal issues associated with digital media.

In the last five years, Web 2.0 applications – vast virtual worlds, multiplayer online games, social networking, and file sharing among them – have inspired new notions of what it might mean to be literate in the twenty-first century. While previous scholarship on Web 2.0 has focused on its social and recreational uses, this book explores its ability to enrich and transform the educational experience of children and young people. It discusses the opportunities and risks presented by this large-scale shift in popular engagement with new media, and uses illustrative vignettes to document the work of innovative educators who construct new ways of thinking and being around Web 2.0.

Who Do They Think They Are? Teenage Girls and Their Avatars in Spaces of Social Online Communication documents a descriptive case study of teenage girls who created autobiographical avatars for their social online spaces. It explores the complex and often conflicted negotiations behind girlhood identity and representation in a cyber-social world. Comparisons are drawn between autobiographical avatars and the profile pictures that teenage girls use on their social networking sites as they consider the manner in which identity is negotiated, constructed, co-authored, and represented. The contradictions and expectations of online social and popular culture make representations of identity simultaneously limitless and limiting for the girls who create them. Given the nature of the identity-defining and social act of creating an autobiographical avatar, a critical media literacy frame provides a pedagogical opportunity for bringing avatar construction into the secondary English language arts classroom. This book provides guidance for educators and researchers interested in the social construction of identity in an increasingly visual world, and will be valuable in courses ranging from literacy studies, media education, cultural studies, youth studies, educational research, teacher education, and popular culture to feminist, gender studies, and women’s studies courses.

Schools remain notorious for co-opting digital technologies to «business as usual» approaches to teaching new literacies. DIY Media addresses this issue head-on, and describes expansive and creative practices of digital literacy that are increasingly influential and popular in contexts beyond the school, and whose educational potential is not yet being tapped to any significant degree in classrooms. This book is very much concerned with engaging students in do-it-yourself digitally mediated meaning-making practices. As such, it is organized around three broad areas of digital media: moving media, still media, and audio media. Specific DIY media practices addressed in the chapters include machinima, anime music videos, digital photography, podcasting, and music remixing. Each chapter opens with an overview of a specific DIY media practice, includes a practical how-to tutorial section, and closes with suggested applications for classroom settings. This collection will appeal not only to educators, but to anyone invested in better understanding – and perhaps participating in – the significant shift towards everyday people producing their own digital media.

Schools remain notorious for co-opting digital technologies to «business as usual» approaches to teaching new literacies. DIY Media addresses this issue head-on, and describes expansive and creative practices of digital literacy that are increasingly influential and popular in contexts beyond the school, and whose educational potential is not yet being tapped to any significant degree in classrooms. This book is very much concerned with engaging students in do-it-yourself digitally mediated meaning-making practices. As such, it is organized around three broad areas of digital media: moving media, still media, and audio media. Specific DIY media practices addressed in the chapters include machinima, anime music videos, digital photography, podcasting, and music remixing. Each chapter opens with an overview of a specific DIY media practice, includes a practical how-to tutorial section, and closes with suggested applications for classroom settings. This collection will appeal not only to educators, but to anyone invested in better understanding – and perhaps participating in – the significant shift towards everyday people producing their own digital media.

Some educational researchers claim that videogames can energize learning in both traditional and non-traditional contexts; cultivate skills more useful to a changing economy; and present information in ways more appealing to students. The notion of «serious games» dates back as early as the 1950s, but so far has failed to make a significant lasting impact on what goes on in education. The Work of Play is an attempt to describe such learning on the micro-level, capturing the moment-by-moment interactions between players and showing how meanings are shaped over time. It builds on anthropological methods, including ethnography and conversation analysis, to re-construct how situated learning occurs and how players’ perception of the game evolves as their experiences with the game change. This is a valuable book for researchers and for classroom use at the upper-division undergraduate and graduate levels.

Educators Online fills a significant need, introducing educators to social and collaborative technologies that will enrich their own lives and those of their students. Proceeding from the understanding that once teachers become comfortable with these technologies, they will be more willing to experiment with them in their classrooms, Laura M. Nicosia blends theories of new media literacies with anecdotal accounts from her much-sought-after professional development offerings. Educators Online focuses on why teachers should use these technologies; thus, even as the technology evolves, this book will be seminal. The social practices associated with these applications nurture stronger professionals and, by extension, improve both teaching and learning. The book will compel professional educators, support staff, and pre-service teachers to dive into these networks at their own pace and have a «virtual coffee break» with each other. This book will prove valuable in courses on teaching methods, educational technology, introduction to social media, introduction to digital literacies, and digital rhetoric.

This book examines how common e-learning technologies open up compelling, if limited, experiential spaces for users, similar to the imaginary worlds opened up by works of fiction. However, these experiential worlds are markedly different from the «real» world of physical objects and embodied relations. This book shows these differences to be of central importance for teaching and learning.

This book presents sixteen essays in the new literacy studies tradition, written during the period 1985-2010. It covers a diverse range of themes with a particular emphasis on topics of cultural, political and historical interest. The collection includes both previously published and unpublished works, and is organized in four sections. Topics addressed in Part 1 include functional literacy, the politics of literacy in Nicaragua during the Sandinista period (1979-1990), the rise of the working class press in Britain, and reader response and the teacher as meaning-maker. Part 2 discusses critical literacy and active citizenship, literacy and empowerment, language and the new capitalism, varying ways of using computers in and out of school, and the way a low achieving student challenges conventional notions of literacy failure. Part 3 addresses the new literacy studies and the study of new literacies, the theory and practice of attention economics, and early developments in the use of ratings within online communities and social practices. The final part of the book takes up the theme of researching new literacies, discusses practices of digital remix, and provides a case study of becoming research literate within a context of DIY media creation.

This book presents sixteen essays in the new literacy studies tradition, written during the period 1985-2010. It covers a diverse range of themes with a particular emphasis on topics of cultural, political and historical interest. The collection includes both previously published and unpublished works, and is organized in four sections. Topics addressed in Part 1 include functional literacy, the politics of literacy in Nicaragua during the Sandinista period (1979-1990), the rise of the working class press in Britain, and reader response and the teacher as meaning-maker. Part 2 discusses critical literacy and active citizenship, literacy and empowerment, language and the new capitalism, varying ways of using computers in and out of school, and the way a low achieving student challenges conventional notions of literacy failure. Part 3 addresses the new literacy studies and the study of new literacies, the theory and practice of attention economics, and early developments in the use of ratings within online communities and social practices. The final part of the book takes up the theme of researching new literacies, discusses practices of digital remix, and provides a case study of becoming research literate within a context of DIY media creation.

Leet Noobs documents, for over 10 months, a group of players in the online game World of Warcraft engaged in a 40-person joint activity known as raiding. Initially, the group was informal, a «family» that wanted to «hang out and have fun.» Before joining, each player had been recognized as expert in the game; within the group they had to adapt their expertise for the new joint task and align themselves to new group goals. Through their shared activity, members successfully established communication and material practices that changed as they had to renegotiate roles and responsibilities with new situations and as the larger gaming community evolved. Players learned to reconfigure their play spaces, enrolling third-party game mods and other resources into their activity. Once-expert players became novices or «noobs» to relearn expert or «leet» gameplay. They became «leet noobs» who needed to reconfigure their expertise for new norms of material practice. Ultimately, these norms also changed what it meant to play World of Warcraft; some group members no longer wanted to just hang out and have fun, and eventually the group died in an online fiery meltdown.