Tuesday 9 December 2014

Where I (possibly) stand

Thinking about non-positivist as opposed to positivist thought, Embodiment versus Dualism is complex.
I believe that dance is associated with a non-posistivist stance and I feel that I clearly 'know' this through my experience dancing and teaching. I know that there is an interaction between many elements or factors that affect people moving so that there can't be total certainty, or a single version of truth about it, out there.
My emotions, what has happened before I come into the studio, what I ate before class  what I learnt in a class last week, last year, 10 years ago, where I am in the room, tension somewhere in my body, the teachers mood, an old injury, will all affect how I experience a tendu today and how I am able to learn or work on that particular skill. Because of all these things it will also be a totally different experience for each individual. And all this applies to my viewpoint if I'm the teacher and not the participant. Through a non-positivist lens (Im trying to see it as a spectrum though) as a teacher I would hope to attend to some of these factors in teaching skills, or movements that will help a student to understand things more fully and have more tools to use develop their own knowledge, of doing a tendu for example. I want my students to work with principles of movement rather then then idea of "this is how it's done".
I'm not sure  how my understanding of these concepts today chimes with others understanding, yours and the theorists, but it helps to write about it. The blog is a bit of a testing ground which is great but also a bit scary as others might make comments that reveal to me that my thinking is superficial, narrow or off-base on this.
There are lots of versions of the truth out there including mine. This seems obvious, knowledge is always from an individual perspective, it's how each individual understands something, but I realise it's not so obvious and often raises conflict when my thinking sometimes reveals how I'm looking at certain things in quite a positivist way, especially in terms of this MA study if not perhaps so much in the dance studio.
So in my research, I'm trying to put my idea/s, on the subject out there to share, alongside other people's. And to articulate more clarity for myself about the field of research I'm inquiring into.

The module 2 research proposal is helping me challenge the way I think about research. I'm thinking about ways to match the subject I'm exploring with the methods I choose to explore it and gather data. The methods are hugely important and reflect my stance on everything mentioned above. Its starting to sink in much more, how the way we choose to do things says much about our beliefs and politics. There are so many choices to make about which qualitative frameworks and methods fit best with my stance and the ideas I'm discussing.

I was talking with a friend who has also been studying for an MA, in Psychology, about learning and emotion. It often seems to come up through Skype chats too, and I often leave the conversation with these kinds of thoughts. How new learning, perhaps especially as an adult, often challenges the identities we have constructed for ourselves. The identity of the knowledgable teacher, the pride in our position at work, the way people often link doing a good job with being a good person and the emotions of fear and uncertainty that can result from the struggles and conflicts of new learning. 



2 comments:

  1. I just realised I didn't get on to dualism and embodiment there. Next time!

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  2. Hi Rose,
    This blog is so great. I wish I had been able to read it when I was on module 2. Saying that it is so relevant for all of us as we are all still in it, living it, travelling through it and still many a time, echoes of previous MAPPERS ideas, oral presentations or blog discussions arrive in my thoughts and spill into my work. As you mention, whenever you form fresh knowledge it then stays with us. We are all developing new understanding not finite answers (note to self!)
    Methods and Methodologies really swamped me, mainly all the different research methods used in inquiry, grounded theory, action research, ethnography. It was overwhelming that I couldn’t form an understanding of these academic writings, research structures and tools immediately that I hadn’t heard of in my life! I did tweak my methods during and when in the actual research setting as things presented themselves to me that I could not foresee.

    It has been a cathartic journey. I hasten to add a good one! These changes became part of the process in action and considering other influences to the environment they became apparent. I had to re evaluate and still are.
    I found Module 2 really hard to connect with and understand I think because I went from harping on about myself to then having to make decisions! That was my tough time I have tried to look back and ask why and I still don’t know. I am finding it really nice to read your working through it and sharing your ideas and decisions, as now I understand the process of that module it is helping me, as my organisation of my writing now needs to be looked at as I write up ‘what happened’.
    I have found that embodiment has popped up in much of the literature that I have read across my subject and themes. It was interesting to go back to Descartes looking at Dualist ideas and I briefly looked at the ideas Greek philosophers formed and then influenced the next ‘batch’ of thinkers theorists. Reassuringly these ideas popped up in my key texts. It was also good for me to keep a note of the opposing ideas to balance things out so I was not all one sided. I get the feeling that is important at MA level and with my habits, personality, heal the world ideas I have to keep a check on being analytical and show other peoples contrasting ideas, this echoes the end of your blog on being an adult learner I think I wrote before on a blog how I felt that my ‘not’ understanding it was easier to push them away and think they were just not for me

    Touching again on the mentioned adult learners. My body has opened up to a learning I was craving. My body with my head on it that has my brain, but now my learning feels in my bones and my heart also. When I go on a course now and learn a piece of choreography and am a beat behind, I don’t hate myself anymore. I just say it takes me longer these days (I have a lot going on in the computer in my head) and actually it needn’t be about my ego anymore. I teach children and I want to teach not just children but anyone. More so using dance within the community. That dance is there and available to everyone… Not an imitation of me or another practitioner! It is a nucleus to communicate an idea, of importance and meaning.
    Techniques are and have practicality and importance but what’s the point in having something put together with the right stuff but not made with depth or meaning!
    I am thinking architecture Bauhaus V Mock Tudor.
    This new practical working shift in my pedagogy is continuing with me now and will continue.

    Thanks Rose for another great post.
    Mary

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