Month: January 2021

The reading for this week was a chapter on ‘Understanding Art: The Play of Work and Spectator’ by Monica Vilhauer in Gadamer’s Ethics of Play: Hermeneutics and the Other (2010).

In Truth and Method, Gadamer introduces the concept of “play” in his description of the “event” of understanding that occurs in the experience of a work of art. […]

Gadamer aims to show us how the spectator plays a crucial interpretive role in what the meaning of the artwork is. He aims to show us how it is only in the back and forth play of communicating meaning between presenter and spectator that interpretive understanding occurs and the artwork achieves its completion. […]

Gadamer teaches us to recognize how understanding itself only takes place in a dynamic, interactive, interpretive process of working through meaning with others. A shared understanding is in this way an interpretive event that takes place in a play of presenting and recognizing meaning.

Vilhauer, 2010 p.31

This suggests that the spectator’s interpretive framework of an artwork could be influenced by their knowledge base, lived experience, cultural capital, etc. The interpretation of the artwork is very subjective and objective, but the argument is that the artwork is complete when the collaborative meaning-making is conducted. Within a teaching context, I think this could be seen within group tutorials, when the ‘feed-forward’ aspect of feedback is taking place. I quite like the thought that teaching cannot take place without a cyclical approach of student and teacher exchange – an exchange of knowledge, if you like.

An interesting question was posed to the group, asking us whether we notice anything different about the way you contribute as a student in sessions in an online environment. Personally, I feel more comfortable contributing as I am not limited to verbal contributions, and I find myself able to construct my thought and sentence when typing it out. I think I find it hard to muster the words coherently when put on the spotlight. On the flip-side, I find it difficult to keep up with the chat if it’s popping alongside the spoken aspect of the session – multitasking is difficult, and I keep getting the fear that I’ll miss something important. Additionally, adding something in the chat makes it feel like there’s a sense of permanence to my thoughts… but then again, in a blackboard collaborate recording, the chat isn’t recorded but the audio (so spoken contributions) is, so there’s a different sense of permanence.

Here’s what my group ended up adding to the whiteboard, I wrote, “it depends on the situation.” Once I get to know the group I am in, I find myself feeling more comfortable sharing my thoughts (and being challenged), whereas if it’s in a big group I feel more shy about contributing or being seen as wrong or, to put bluntly, stupid. Looking through what was written, I see that I’m not alone in feeling this way – there’s some comfort in that somewhere.

It is evident though that the opportunity to speak within a big group feels more daunting than in a smaller group. Breakout sessions/rooms tend to lubricate the classroom discussion, after which you can feel more confident to contribute when you return to the bigger group. There is a duty of care to enable students to have the time and space, to sit in silence for a minute, to consider their thoughts and contributions. Sometimes calling students out by their names to encourage them to contribute can be worthwhile, but it can also put those who are shy or nervous on edge about being called out and they may disengage more. It’s hard creating a happy-medium.

It was quite nice to see how passionately Lindsay spoke about Gadamer, and she very helpfully summarised his philosophy on ‘horizons’. Below is a paraphrase of what she said.

The metaphor of a fusion of horizons is stemmed from the idea of horizons encompassing your world view. Depending on your historical context, your horizon will look different. For example, when you move somewhere, your horizon will change (depending on the day, time, etc). When we try to understand each other, you are trying to understand someone else’s world perspective or world view. Through the fusion of horizons, you are being empathetic rather than erasing the difference. Prejudice is necessary for an understanding, and you must consider your positionality.

I quite like the metaphor of a horizon being relative to your world view. Depending on which way you look, the horizon can adapt and change.

Finally, we looked at the ways in which universities are measured for the Teaching Excellence Framework. I really dislike the way in which it’s rated, and how it’s used as an excuse to hike up tuition fees. I think it’s important to gather student feedback and to publicise things, but the government model of NSS (and I guess TEF) is done in such a manner that they presume one size fits all. Comparing an arts university alongside a Russel group or non-arts related university is counter intuitive. Particularly with DLHE as statistically creative graduates take longer to settle into their creative careers than those who go into graduate jobs which are related to their degree. The precarious working conditions and the emphasis on freelance work as a creative graduate is not taken into consideration for the government-led stats data, so how can one truly measure and compare an arts university amongst others? Surely measuring success, or what is deemed successful (by whom? who holds the power to decide what is successful?) is only really there to cater for the neoliberal view of individualism, feeding into capitalism. But when there has been a proliferation of universities and varying degrees offered (e.g. how many graphic design or fine art courses do UAL offer?), how do you decide which to apply for? Perhaps measurement is a side effect rather than the root of the problem.

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References

Vilhauer, M. (2010) ‘Chapter 3 Understanding Art: The Play of Work and Spectator’ in Gadamer’s Ethics of Play: Hermeneutics and the Other. Lanham, Md, Lexington Books. pp.31-48

Today marked the beginning of the Teaching and Learning unit, and I came to the session not really knowing what to expect. Perhaps I hadn’t seen the schedule when I had looked on Moodle, but I was pleasantly surprised.

We kicked off with James Wisdom (a Visiting Professor in Educational Development from Middlesex University) who presented ‘The Context of UK Higher Education, 2021‘. This was an overview of both the historical context and current situation of HE and creative HE, highlighting the politics, economics and attitudes influencing the policymaking around HE. Having recently written a dissertation on the role of HEIs in preparing creative graduates for the labour market, I was aware of the depressing statistics and issues surrounding the government’s focus solely on the economic value of HE, and how they do not favour creative education which puts the future of creative HE at risk. Will it be accessible to underrepresented applicants in the future? Or will it become more elitist, perpetuating the homogeneous workforce that is prevalent within the creative industries, further widening the gap to access? The gender pay gap was briefly discussed, but what about the access barriers to POC? If not the government, then is it for universities to address these issues to level the playing field, and if so – where does the funding come from and how do they drive the change into industry? Some food for thought.

James raised some interesting questions such as which way HE should develop in the next generation, whether the standard models of studying will remain post-Covid, the potential for change in academic culture and what it means to be a professional HE teacher. I feel he was purposefully quite provocative in some suggestions, perhaps to spark a debate or to highlight opposing views. What about the impact of neoliberalisation in HE (and in this context you could replace neoliberalisation with individualisation) and how that ties in with the consumerist perception many students come with? The students expect value for money, are we providing it? How can we manage student expectations?

Overall, James was a very engaging speaker, who spoke at a slow speed to allow us to digest the information provided. Having just been in an online Away Day yesterday where I felt the Chair had whizzed through their presentation at bullet speed, I was grateful for the change and for the ability to be able to keep up with the content. His humour and ability to respond to the questions or comments in the instant messaging whilst teaching made for an engaging session. I very much enjoyed this.

Following a short break, the second and final speaker, Victoria Odeniyi (Project Researcher, UAL), presented her ongoing research titled ‘Reimagining Conversations with Multilingual Students‘. She noted her interest in researching real-world problems through the lens of language. She argued that language can be framed not only in a technical or communicative skill, but also the subtleties found in understanding cultural differences such as the grammatical ordering of sentences. This resonated with me, as a British-Japanese bilingual, as I often find it difficult to be concise with my thoughts, particularly when I’m speaking. Previously, somebody has speculated the reason why I do this could be due to Japanese sentence structure, where the verb often comes at the end of the sentence – perhaps my brain likes to mix it all up.

Victoria explained that she has been observing online teaching sessions at LCC and LCF, observing who dominates the conversation and who remains silent. She questioned whether the silence or pause was productive or negative in the context, and reflected on the pros and cons of the chat function (e.g. it enables those who are not confident enough to speak up to have a space to contribute or ask questions, whereas it can also be distracting and disrupt the flow of a conversation). It’s a shame that the research hadn’t begun prior to the Covid-19 pandemic so that there could be the face-to-face teaching to compare her research with.

Having done a spot of shadowing of a delivery of a session on Blackboard Collaborate myself, I have observed the awkward silences and the apprehension of turning a camera on, and experienced the uncertainty of speaking to a group of headless icons, unable to gauge the reaction or note the subtle body language of the listeners. I have also seen how an international student was utilising a translation service, which acted as a delayed form of subtitles for the session. This meant that it took a little longer for them to respond, and those silences were really important for them to be able to gather their thoughts and translate parts which were necessary. This made it really clear that to be truly inclusive in the delivery, you needed to allow the time, and to adapt by typing the questions/comments whilst also speaking.

During the lecture, there was a discussion about colloquialisms and whether they have a place within the teaching environment. I am of the view that as long as colloquialisms are expanded on which would ensure inclusivity (one noted how they had a glossary of terms as they spoke quite naturally through colloquialisms), they should be fine to use – it’s part of the language, and the classes should be established as safe spaces where inquisitive questioning is encouraged when an individual does not understand something. This in turn could spark a conversation about how a particular phrase is said in a different language.

Overall, it as an interesting session. I’m looking forward to learning more, and getting to know the rest of the cohort better for peer-to-peer learning. I’m sure there’s plenty I can learn from experienced academics!