Place-based praxis: exploring place-based education and the philosophy of place.
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Date
29/06/2012Author
Harrison, Samuel Carey
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Abstract
This thesis interweaves two strands of inquiry, one educational, the other
philosophical. The educational inquiry is seeded by the need to understand both
embodiment and learning within experiences of place in education. The second
strand is prompted by Evernden’s insight that the environmental crisis is a ‘crisis of
being’ (1985). Evernden argues that our perceived separation from the world is at
the root of the environmental issues we face. Highlighting the role that ‘place’
might have in both these inquiries, I examine the educational and philosophical
debates around place, drawing especially on place-based education (Gruenewald &
Smith, 2008), and phenomenology (Merleau-Ponty, 1968). Arguments from within
these literatures indicate that experiences of, and in, place hold the potential to reexamine
what it means to be part of the world, here, now.
Three key research questions emerge from my examination of the literature: 1 –
what role do experiences of place have in education? 2 – what is the ontology of
place? and 3 – how does place affect thinking and learning? This third question is
the meeting point of the philosophical and educational threads of the inquiry, and
also reflects back on the process of the inquiry itself. Given the focus of these
questions on the lived experience of place, phenomenology is chosen as a suitable
methodology. However, I argue that the full potential of phenomenological
research can only be met through a more participative and experiential approach.
Drawing on literature on participative research, grouped under the term ‘action
research,’ (Reason & Bradbury, 2001), a series of collaborative phenomenological
research workshops were run in 2009 and 2010 with two groups of practicing
educators.
Descriptions of experiences of place and place-based education, from within the
workshops and the participants’ workplaces, were distilled into themes by the
groups. These themes served two purposes: the first was to explore the possibilities
of place-based education in various working contexts, an inquiry which was
completed during the workshops. The second was to seed a phenomenological
investigation into the ontology of place, exploring questions from the philosophical
debate on place. This second part of the inquiry was completed by myself.
Both groups felt place-based education revealed aspects of place taken for granted
or un-explored. This was summed up by one participant in the phrase ‘bringing
place to life.’ The participants’ understandings of the different aspects of placebased
education including the pedagogy involved, and the possible outcomes, show
how place-based education was understood and applied in different contexts. The
phenomenological analysis which builds on the participants’ understandings,
describes a contrast between un-examined place and the intimate and immersive
experience that can occur when place is ‘brought to life.’ The final part of the thesis
explores in further depth the role of the mind in ‘bringing place to life,’ putting
forward the idea of mind as a phenomenon which can adopt different scales. When
learning and thinking on the same scale as the body, the mind is brought to place,
and the dualism between mind and body breaks down. ‘Thinking in place’ is put
forward as a way of understanding both the experience of learning in context, and
the phenomenological immersion of both body and mind in place. The conclusions
explore the implications of this research for the various fields touched on in the
study: educational approaches such as environmental education, philosophical
approaches to place, and research methodologies.
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