Phd anxiety: Perhaps your anxiety is of a form specific to magicians...

Seth Godin's blog has a provocation: "Perhaps your anxiety is specific to magicians" He found the quote in a strangely-translated instruction manual for an obscure but beautiful trick. But, as he notes, it has wide applicability. Perhaps your/my anxiety is specific to phd students and a fear of being judged and found wanting. perhaps its a similar one to magicians, the tricks arent new enough, the performance not exciting enough...these are the stressors of performing or of anyone who has to stand up and stand out and stand for something. Perhaps it is due to the fact that you're trying to control things that you can't possibly control. I cant controll what others will make of my work, I can only make it smooth enough...rough enough...logical enough. Anxiety may be a sign that you care deeply about your work. Now that you've been reminded that you care, the anxiety gets reframed. Its a positive motivation now, not something to be fearful of; not something immobilizing. Write because you have something to say :)

A phd in a haiku. Taming a meandering river

Could you write your phd in a haiku?
Over at dissertation haiku the invitation is to post your dissertation in haiku format
I found this a bit more evocative than the pragmatics of the 160 character text rendition I wrote.
And surprisingly it awakened me to really consider what it is I'm studying. And hence to clarify why it is I keep going off track; its because i have two things (at least) happening simultaneously.


Haiku 1.
Regarding the study:

Enactments of change
Whats thought? whats done?
Reality multiplies

Haiku 2.
Regarding the site of study:

silent and invisible
still i talk, and you listen
whats with that?

Haiku
A very short form of Japanese poetry typically characterised by three qualities:
The essence of haiku is "cutting" (kiru).
This is often represented by the juxtaposition of two images or ideas
And a kireji or 'cutting word' between them. A kind of verbal punctuation mark signalling the moment of separation and this colours the manner in which the juxtaposed elements are related.
Traditional haiku consist of 17 syllables on
In three phrases of 5, 7, and 5 on respectively.
Any one of the three phrases may end with the kireji.

(Although I have described haiku as based on 17 syllables, this is inaccurate as syllables and on are not the same, but close enough for my purposes)

More joy of text (PhD writing)

There are so many ways to be involved in text that it is a shame to adhere only to prose. I've curated a gallery of my phd journey via Flikr. Today's twitterings on #phdchat introduced another by @londonaesthetik - here's my thesis as pie.

The joys of writing: Other places: Cafes- advantages no ironing! No library shelves to be seduced by, no emails, or internet or skype or twitter to sink into. Combined with a pomodoro, its a kick start ot my writing day. Doesnt actually have to be the creative side of writing, its just as amenable to the editing phases or the reading and putting this into endnote or whatever data management system is being used. Creativity of writing, the phd as haiku, the phd as a tweet, the phd in text speak, and of course there's always blogging. The blog allows a different voice, here mine's more playful, more provocative, less constrained. Sometimes its tangential. But sometimes its writing the tangents that allow me to become clearer. In the thesis I am using multiple fonts for different voices, as well as varied backgrounds behind the words to simulate that a message is received by txt. Ive also a lolcat provocation as one representation in the conclusions. Then there's writing around, not so much progressing the thesis but it's the skype chats, the instant messaging or icq of ideas and provocations to thoughtfulness. Or the writing around that's the annual review (I always think of this as an exercise in creative writing, yet am always surprized by how close to the truth it looks retrospectively). Creativity around the writing. Here there are postit notes, writing on mirrors or ranchsliders instead of whiteboards, Great for rearranging and structuring. There's also bath crayons. And there is always mindmapping the pen and big paper. And proving realities are multiple, there's the reinterpretation of one's writing. Here there are wordles of the thesis, or the infographic that my computer mouse thought i was producing. And there's the flight of imagination where i wish I could just write on the inside of a glass sphere for then it wouldnt matter what comes first last or where in the middle of things ideas should fall. i stop short however of the following creative writing idea.

Ode to a work place taniwha

As always, writing in the genre of scientification might be subject to misinterpretation.
All the characters referred to are fictitious. Realities are of course in the eyes of beholders. And taniwha do not exist.

I'm an assertive person
doesnt mean i wear a t-shirt saying I'm up for target practice.
What it means is that if i am bullied
I will respond assertively.
I will try. I can wish my emotions would be less reactive. I would wish the same of those i work with.

I think there's potential for better workplaces. I would not be an educator if I thought i could not make a difference.
And when troubled emotionally one way of distancing from the trauma is to make use of a coping mechanism, rationalization.
I can rationalize the unpleasantness, I can tell myself its a time for "head" rather than "heart".
"If its been better before, it can be better again."
This means that if it has never been this bad before, chances are it will not stay this awful.
Sadly, research on bullying is not strong in supporting this.

Nonetheless, I'm going to start attempting to make a positive difference, because I care to work in a collegial and supportive way.

The following is based on a composite of experiences, that may help others being traumatised at work:

When I receive emails, being a researcher into the use of text for conveying support, I take notice.
Being a teacher of communication skills this really is my passion.
My psychotherapist might call it rationalization or intellectualization.

When I receive emails that are patronizing I print them. I highlight where improvement might be possible:
"See here, where you wrote "you know very well who..." this is sarcasm and it's not helpful.
I reflect on whether I asked because I seriously did not know.
Similarly when in the email irony was referred to, I note that irony is in the eye of the beholder,and is a very similar construct to sarcasm, beliefs that may be projections on the part of others. Irony as a form of sarcasm is, at a very basic communication level, unhelpful.
Pointing to the ironic or being sarcastic undermines trust.
Both contribute to twisted logics.

As an example: It is not ironic that I ask for financial support for attending a conference when the opportunity is advertised and it is not associated with my having not attended an optional forum irrelevant to my teaching, my research interests, or my research paradigm.
The two issues are not connected.

A further example: when you ask me what is the nature of my illness and what is keeping me "infirmed", you do not have a right to this information. NZ law under the privacy legislation does not require that I discuss this with you.
With decades of experience in being as a health professional, and 50+ years experience of my body and soul; I would be a reasonable judge of when going to work is injurious to my health and such self reflection on my state of being I would take up with my General Practitioner. Being trusted to know my own body and to recognize what injures it and to respond appropriately is part of being adult.
I'd like to work in a place that trusted my self assessment.

More examples: If i ask for something and instead am made to account for something else ... and several "something elses" I feel singled out as I suspect this is not the treatment given to any other staff member when they put in for things such as a funding application. To be told i did not go to a foum, and that this was demonstrating my lack of collegiality, and therefore i should not expect funding are not connected events. Too much is presumed about what collegiality involves, and what other factors coloured attendance.
This is evidence of harassment when no one else has to account for other activities unrelated to the funding request.
And is actually the fodder of personal grievance cases.
I'd like it if as a manager you engaged on task, stay within the scope of what is releevant, or not, to the case in point and to the criteria published on the funding application.

When what seems trivial escalates: A threat to remove a signed off provision of leave and funding agreed to in an annual professional development plan would be a further example.
When feeling threatened, a defensive response is likely. Stay in an intellectualising space. Point to the digital trail, stay emotionally clean in responses, have a trusted friend or union representative advise on any responses in writing.
"When you ask me to provide how this will be covered and you state that you have asked for twice before....but never have, point to an email trace that supports how this was never requested...
Pointing to the threatening or patronizing tone where demands of "you shouldnt have to ask for it again" with caution.
Such threats are harassment, and in this instance meets judicial measures of harassment and bullying because it demonstrates discriminatory practice.

When a situation escalates I believe it polite to let someone know that i will address it with the next level up as resolution is needed. Note the positive tone here.
You may have a workplace policy that suggests this is the expected means for resolution.
Being clear in my communications I inform the person of this out of politeness on my part and as a request for resolution.

Karpman's triangle A victim and persecutor can be made to play over again and again.
I teach students about Karpman's triangle, here's some suggestions for interrupting this game:

Recognize the game.
Choose not to play.
Remove yourself from the situation.
Acknowledge what is said with active listening skills. Note: this is different to agreeing, it lets the other person know they have been heard.
Accept that one can only change oneself not the other, however stay engaged for the dynamics change when one's own ways of relating change.
Use assertiveness skills, start with I statements.
When this does not work, and the situation escalates, ask to speak to your manager's manager. Include your manager's manager in emails.
However, make sure you remain polite, invite early mediation, invite assistance in sorting a problem.
I recommend staying clear of accusations.

Never "stroke" a bully. It is tempting to be extra nice to someone who bullies so that they will not turn on you. Unfortunately this produces a mixed message that positively reinforces bullying behaviour. They become genuinely surprized when their behaviour is challenged because so many people apparently "love them".
Respond early if you think you are being bullied. This establish limits fast, some people really dont know that they are doing anything wrong. Bullying is usually only considered a problem by the bosses boss if it is repeated- something difficult to establish if not recorded. Serial bullying requires a trail that can be audited.
There is isa difference between firm management and bullying. One stays on task, does not belittle, and treats people fairly, the other does not.


As an educator I just have to believe I can make a difference and so I invest in teaching a manager how to do their job better also.
For example I tell myself:
"I think you have potential, I do believe that people can change.
I intend working with you on this.
Thankyou for being gracious enough to concede that you were being terse, loud, abrupt (substitute in here any acknowledgement they have made (if they have made one).
What I might say to the person is
"I appreciate that you are frustrated, and i appreciate your honesty in saying that you find my attitude and behaviour frustrating.
The problem that I see is that we need better relating skills"

between us

The subtext is I'm working on my communication skills. I'd like it if you worked on yours.

This draws on assertiveness skills:
When "this" happens, I feel "frustrated".
When a decision is made to cancel a course, and then have it reinstated but with no staff to run it (because they were made redundant), that would leave me less able to perform my current workload. I planned my course work to allow for time to write, to meet the goals set by this institution. To be redirected denies me an opportunity that I planned for, it denies me successful completion of commitments regarding research outputs and so would also deny me the potential measures that promotion rounds are reliant on.

When yelled at in front of colleagues, and this can also be heard by others three rooms and more than 25 feet away, this is unacceptable.
And then ask for the behaviour wanted: i" would appreciate it if you did not shout at myself or others."

When taken a deteriorated relationship in the workplace to mediation, sustain the positive intent:
Thankyou for taking the time to set up a meeting with HR to address this.
I would be more than happy to have your inline manager present as well.
I am happy to meet with you at a time convenient with my support person/union representative/ whanau/ lawyer...

Prior to any such meeting, talk with your support person. Take advantage of any EAP (employment assistance program) where it is available.
One EAP counsellor i spoke with said, "clarify the purpose of any such meeting, plan for what you expect, clarify what the meeting is for, think about what you will do if it changes into something else pointing out that that was not what was agreed to and that you need to take further counsel if it has turned into, for example, a performance review or disciplinary hearing without your knowledge.
Politely ask for another date to be set, and leave.
Get counselling, get a medical certificate, get your resilience up, get union advice, take legal counsel if needed.

Coda:
Best inaugral speech i ever heard was by the previous Dean of my faculty; when you swim with sharks, don't bleed.
I've stopped bleeding.

Glossary
Bullying: Bullying is ongoing unreasonable behaviour which is often intended to humiliate or undermine the recipient but is not specifically unlawful.(http://www.eeotrust.org.nz/toolkits/harassment.cfm)

If you are not sure if you are over reacting, bringing it on yourself, or are working with a bully consider if you experience the following:
Belittling opinions or constant criticism
Yelling or screaming or offensive language
Derogatory, demeaning or inappropriate comments
Insults
Overwork, unnecessary pressure and unreasonable deadlines
An unacceptably aggressive style from a superior
Constant nit-picking, fault-finding and criticism of a trivial nature
A constant refusal to acknowledge you and your contributions and achievements
Constant attempts to undermine you and your position, status, worth, value and potential
Belittling, demeaning and patronizing you, especially in front of others
Humiliating, shouting at and threatening you, often in front of others
Setting unrealistic goals and frequently changing goals
Twisting, distorting and misrepresenting what you say or do

Further reading: Paul T. P. Wong, 2006, How to humanize higher education and reduce human suffering

Further advice:
Do make use of your employers commitment to your good health, make use of counselling. In NZ this may involve EAP (employee assistance programme) counselling.
When entering into a management set meeting...do ask the intention and expectations.
Model civility.
Use the words that invite participation: curiousity, try to avoid resistance and defensiveness.
If it in anyway turns into a disciplinary case. EXIT. Give notice that that was not what you had prepared for.
Personally i would not enter any ambiguous meeting with HR present that suggests my behaviour is on the table without Union support or a lawyer.
Ensure you take hard evidence that supports what you believe the meeting needs to address.
Ensure you are clear of what you are expecting to have addressed.
Make sure any minute taker documents what you want documented.
Such as acknowledgement of practice to be improved upon. And how this will be shown.
If you have asked for things (that your workplace may be required to supply on request) such as workloads, ask when will be provided.
And if you have not got what you wanted ask for an external mediator.

Taniwha: Beliefs in the existence of taniwha in "modern times" suggest their a potential for controversy where development and infrastructure schemes might be blocked.
"Māori academic Dr Ranginui Walker, in a detailed letter to the Waikato Times, said that in the modern age a taniwha was the manifestation of a coping mechanism for some Māori. It did not mean there actually was a creature lurking in the water, it was just their way of indicating they were troubled by some incident or event." (Wikipedia)

Regarding the taniwha image: Ureia, guardian taniwha (sea creature), depicted in a carved poupou (house post) from the interior of Hotunui, a carved meeting house of the Ngati Maru people, Thames, New Zealand. This house was built in 1878 by Ngati Awa carvers from Whakatane, as a wedding present when a woman of their tribe married a Ngati Maru leader. The house is now in the Auckland War Memorial Museum.
Photo by uploader, 20 May 2006, no rights reserved. Kahuroa 18:55, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

An afterword.
Latour's dynamics of science could help to explain such an occurrence, were such an occurrence based in reality.
Note however that, reality is multiple as Mol has taught us. And note especially that in the literature of workplace bullying the perpetrator is unlikely to recognize that what they do is wrong, or that it is bullying....
However back to the dynamics...
Practice and reality are both made in relating, and as my thesis argues, some people's reals get made for better and for worse in such relating.
Changing the actors might change the practice that evolves, but so too might changing the patterns of relating.
Serial bullying is only stopped when it is recognized and documented; this takes courage.
The toxicity of a workplace may require earlier rather than later intervening.
And sadly, sometimes what is role modelled becomes the standard of practice, and standard or norms of practice that are not challenged may even be used in defense of a bully. (For example, a work-place with a lot of swearing).

The hope for a better future is in knowing that our realities are made in our activities, and where our activities can be done differently, our realities can also be made differently.

I would like to tell a victory story, but am instead telling of how to interrupt, how to alter. This is not of win or lose.
Troubling, telling stories are not bound by niceness. This particular "ache of wings” (a phrase borrowed from Patti Lather) wrestles with how to tell of what's not so pretty...but there is also, always, hope.

Paper presented at nlc2012

A haxell nlc_2012_slideshare

View more presentations from Ailsa Haxell.

When we surf, what surfaces: "Turn arounds" in teaching and learning in online spaces

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=9ziS3mpjgvI

Ive been enjoying the challenge of engaging internationally through the networked learning conference pre conference nings.

There's's a nice link above (i have yet to watch it...such trust on my part...but its here so i have ease of access later ) associated with the video is Alan Levine's turn around on "what surfaces when we go online"
==>so when we surf, what surfaces.

What has surfaced for me:
Lankshear and Knowbel on digital literaces ask for consideration of the values that shift when the activities of learning shift with a read and write web ( means of production of knowledge shifts).

My own use of email and #nlc that created its own turnaround on doctorial consortium organisation

Some firming up of some of my own nascent beliefs on teaching and learning:
Here's an excerpt from the paper i will be presenting:

Fox (2002) identifies learning as something that happens naturally, incidentally, pervasively & situated within everyday life yet much of our theorizing of learning develops in institutionalized settings. The result is a privileging of practice as it occurs in the formal education sector over the informal and the privileging knowledge of networked learning that involves particular groups of people, and the ways these people relate. To use the eloquent words of Fenwick and Edwards (2010) and with acknowledgement to Pickering (1993) this concurrently risks effacing the fascinating mangling of context that generates particular practices that do not fit the picture of formal educational settings. Researching networks in the wild contributes in redressing this imbalance.

And scary surfacing is do i put it in a post doc paper, or add it to the thesis that is too long ...
and also, now i contend with digital traces and potentials of accusations of plagiarizing myself or resubmitting what i have written elsewhere i also go through contortions of altering what i leave behind in this space.

And in answer to Jeffrey's twitter question about where nlc leaves me; not confused :)
A little more confidence in my understandings of learning and teaching whether online or otherwise.
And regarding identity: more confidant in my readings of Latour (hybrids), de Beauvoir (women being made not born) Haraway (cyborg) and Foucault
More confidant in myself as created in association and in my associations.
Empowered even.
But i am aware that this remains a contentious way of being in the world for many.

Note also the imagery and a Tsunamis identity:
Great Wave off the Coast of Kanagawa, by Hokusai, a famous late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century Japanese artist. Part of The Thirty-Six Views of Fuji series (1823-29), this print, although often used a graphic in tsunami literature, is somewhat misleading in that context because tsunamis do not always manifest themselves as the huge breaking waves depicted in the print.

Reflections on progressing doctoral work as a work in progress

This blog post was precipitated by responses i made over on silence and voice on Jeffrey Keefers blog.
The void in form is a beautiful haiku on how we are shaped in association, this blog expand on this further in considering how the phd thesis is extended through associations, particularly via presenting.
(Acknowledging Lennie, I. (2003). Managing metaphorically. In S. Linstead (Ed.), Text/work : representing organization and organizing representation (pp. 41-56). London, England: Routledge.
whose article introduced me to the haiku above)

My first writings to my supervisor came back with an email subject line saying "all good", made me want to open the email :)
This was an unbelievable experience: to have a supervisor with a positive orientation toward the formation of ideas. My previous experience as a student was a supervisor who saw his role as critical and shredding; in the line of what doesnt kill you makes you stronger (this by the way is a patently rubbish approach, even though at the time i thought it was good for me *sigh* ). Has taught me so much about supervision and encouragement.

My first two conferences, really got me nothing beyond my own clarity in writing better, thinking better. feedback zilch.
But still extremely useful as my own clarity was invaluable.

Most conferences treat my subject as a voyeuristic oddity. Slightly annoying but at least tells me my subject is still new knowledge.

My fourth conference provided someone with an opportunity just to pass judgement on young people/peer counselling as suspect. Yes there are some people as just want to make themselves look grand. Didnt work. Looking back it just feeds one of my current conclusions regarding violence against young people and their living in a world lacking in trust and where weaknesses rather than strengths are made larger than life. At the time i thought nothing of it. I presented with a broken foot, all other pain paled into insignificance. I really didnt care much about it at the time, but the niggle is still there. Learning to share: Please do not grandstage at conference presentations.

My third conference, a tiny little one, a seminar would be more accurate, this was more informal and positive, but the methodology (narrative) was sideways to my own, but their interest and encouragement was great, particularly a willingness to entertain that a thesis could contain imagery. I was really unwell at this one, probably undiagnosed swine flu in the days preceding.

An online presentation in a MOOC was grand, shared space with an excellent researcher and thinker Frances Bell. Again what i learned of my own thinking and of shared presentation was probably more important than feedback gained, but this felt like a learning curve on a new area of thinking that i think i will be mulling post doc as well.

My presentation to workplace seminar: I think they wondered on what planet this could be called research. Nothing constructive here except i felt pressured to put actor-network theory into modes of thinking they might recognize as valid such as discourse analysis or psychoanalytical thinking. Retrospectively this taught me of how pressured we are to make sociological excuses for doing sociology. Taught me to stay true to form.

A three minute thesis competition precipitated me into thinking conclusions, useful as I changed gear in my thinking, even though those conclusions are less important than the ones i have now.

Presentation back to my site of study. Really good opportunity to share findings, had learned from previous presentations, these people didnt get side tracked with the voyeurism. They precipitated their own "so what" ways of thinking on what was shared. the heart and purpose of an ANT analysis though i dont think i recognized this at the time. I was surprizingly nervous on this one. I knew they knew if i would be talking sense or not.

Presentations on work in progress to own phd group always invaluable= Feel the support. These people experience the journey and speak with heart. This also helped with reframing of what felt like wicked problems that got me past periods of crisis.

I am looking forward to my next conference; again topic a bit sideways, more of a teaching learning focus; but at least method might be understood. Am looking forward to what others do using the method also as this is a rarity for me.
I have also never been to a conference with a doctoral consortium before or with people i have 'met online' but not in real life.

Other challenges to my thinking included some chapter writing and text book and journal editing. Again useful in clarifying the thinking. Occassionally distracting, a sideways movement to my thesis writing but linked. Problem has been when i know i have written it but word searching the thesis doesnt find it...because it was elsewhere. Some of this i still wonder about shifting across but word counts make this difficult. Other option is to cite myself :)

Ive also playfully presented what i am studying using other media just to see how it shifts the thoughts; haiku, the twitter 140 word challenge, plain language statements...
My biggest challenge has been a research question that writhes. which part of this monster do i elect to stay with., how to tame it into a jar of 1000,000 words.
During phases of my writing i have blogged for feedback, but actually this is more often a repository of thoughts as they coagulate. However, its also been a space where others have sometimes engaged with me. There are authors who respond when mentioned, who are happy to expand their own thinking as well as that of others in this joyous thinking exercise... an Ive had moments of stained glass and sunshine in blogging where I engaged with Prof Tom Baker, replicating the classic Rollo May/ Carl Rogers argument on goodness/badness.
His response of Fur Elise brought tears to my eyes. Writing this thesis has been breathtaking at times. truly honouring. now to finish it. honouring all those that have helped it on its way.

What have been your experiences of what progressed your Phd in presenting your work to others?

keeping "in touch" with a mobile phone

aww shucks, whispering sweet nothings really is possible on a sensory level. Fabian Hemmert has prototypes developed. Where to next...phone sex?

Me and my significant other (PhD)

Spicing up my relationship with my thesis
OK you dont want to do the research i did to get here, googling this is seedy. But here's the list i managed:

Make a date
Do it somewhere else (cafe writing)
Focus on what brought you together, reminisce on the highlights
Dont focus on the big O... make the journey pleasurable
Get a book about new positions... (read as new ways to approach that chapter)
Have time alone and time together (will i ever come back if i spend time alone)
Dont come to it tired
Experiment: clothe it differently - talk/write in a different voice, role play...
Fantasize the future; practice introducing yourself as Dr....plan a honeymoon .... the graduation party... play dressups Find out what your regalia will be, imagine self appropriately attired.

Ok, none of those quite did it for me (today)
So its PhD tough love time:
set the parameters
check in every day
make a compulsory 20 mins together with no distraction commitment

Please, keep it seemly, but if you have further suggestions, please add them here, i need them.

analysis paralysis or lost on the dark side of the moon

Its not totally incapacitating, i can analyze my results, my problem is what to spend time analyzing, what to put in, what to take out.
The data i collected reminds me of a prism that defracts white light into pretty much infinite layers of colour. One path in into this but many multitude of paths out...which i attend to? Which are pretty, shortest route, best journey, best companions... distracting, lead nowhere, are already well travelled?

I wasnt expecting this.
The research process says formulate the question, do the data capture, immerse in the data and the answers fall out.
Yeah, right.

And then i went a bit postmodern, whose answers matter? Whose answers matter most?
I tell myself in my sternest voice: Take a punt, its certification you want, and not in the sense of a being certified.
But I'm still stuck, I've written several concluding segments, and there could be many more, but a word count doesn't allow for all of these, so just choose!

But which one! i am behaving like a recalcitrant child, too many lollies in th elolly shop...but thats not it either. If i choose a 'wrong' lolly it doesnt matter, theres not several years hanging on it.

And i tell myself, just answer the question ...but i'm back on a mobius strip, the question turns.

So im lost in space, somewhere on the dark side of the moon, best i can come up with is make the choices, justify them, and leave the other data to my post doc life...

Taking further advice from astrobites


I now know how i got here.
I started a phd with what felt like unlimited words and close to unlimited potential.
I had a question, i folded it in half and in half and in half again, each time i narrowed it down, and i wrote to each aspect narrowing it further, coming closer to a point of completion, but this method is never ending, and apparently it has a name:

“Zeno’s Paper,” that twist on the well-known Greek paradox that states that first you write half of the paper, then you write half of what’s left, then half of that, and so on. You are spoiled for choice as to where to end your paper, and without a clear place to stop or an external pressure such as an obvious threat of being scooped, your brain can’t pick where to put it down and call it done.
Analysis paralysis is a serious threat, and one that can ensnare anyone. Any situation that presents a large number of options with no clearly superior choice can cause it, and it can lead to getting scooped, not publishing anything, or, in the worst case, inability to complete a thesis.

So what to do:
write the possibilities,
make a list,
delete at least half the list,
remind oneself that one only has to overwhelm the small space, a phd is not about everything on a topic
Then slash the list:
Write your question, possibly write a smaller question, or even a new question and justify the shift,
Colour code the options for importance, for relevance,
Allocate the ones on the list that are important but not to be addressed here,
allocate the proportion of words allowed
allocate the mumber of days left
work to the plan

And here's where i got another insight, i never work to the plan, i work to the contingent relationships...
whats topical, whats addressing the question (the new question) those involved...and inside of a time frame and a word limit...

It will never address everything, nor everything perfectly, it is but one enactment out of many possibilities.

So i understand my predicament a bit better, i'm not spinning anymore, but i notice im still here, not there...

Black and blue
And who knows which is which and who is who.
Up and down.
But in the end it's only round and round.

"There is no dark side of the moon really. Matter of fact it's all dark."
Not a pessimist really: just over being postmodern.

And so i tell myself yet again, the question doesnt get answered, i write this in my thesis, might as well give the ammunition to the other side...or enter the dark side of thesis writing...
I write the question wasnt bad.
I writie this research surprises me. I set out to investigate how technology was shaping counselling, and shaping us. I end with how we should treat our young better.

This is not because I have a bad question. It is not because I am unable to maintain a focus. Instead, in staying close to how we relate with our technologies I have learned more of how people relate not only with their technologies, but with each other.

In investigating the relationship between what people think about change and what they do to enact it, I have studied how practice changes by talking with, working with, and followed actors involved in their working lives at Youthline. A short answer to this question would be that the relationship is complex. Individuals both do and don’t effect change, and they do this both deliberately and incidentally, and that change happens whether or not there is awareness of what is occurring.

Such an answer is not useful as practical guidance for implementing change in any organization. No advice is given as to how others might implement text counselling in another situation. No list of recommendations forthcoming. The question was ambitious, but it was not too big. There is no answer because the question does not end. Instead a challenge evolves. For there is an answer of sorts: change is shown as being constituted in relationships. What we think and do are deeply embedded in relationships, constituted as well as constitutive.

Accepting that change is constituted in relating, how we might then care to relate is the ongoing matter of concern.

Wishing for the cloths of heaven to end a thesis

My problem: in an ANT analysis finding a way forward when the knowledge known is always partial; fractional and biased.
I too am situated so how to tell of what to do?
In addition the world keeps spinning and what is advised will be more outdated then than even it is now.
What recommendations would i make?

"I have no comfortable knowing of what will be. Moving forward responsibly is to know that what is done, is done on imprecise knowledge. There is no comfort to be had, wrapped in the surety of any cloth of heaven, but to tread lightly(footnote to poem). Care, rather than the illusion of movements predicated on the logical choice of a rational chooser, provides a relational stance on which to move forward. And to move forward carefully, mindful that one’s own reality is not the only one there is."

He wishes for the cloths of heaven, William Butler Yeats

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

And because my thesis is about how we are mediated by text, here is a translation of this poem into txtspk:

HAD I d hevNs' embroiderd cloths
Nrort w goldN & silvR lite
d blu & d dim & d drk cloths
Of nyt & lite & d half-lite
I wud spred d cloths undR yor fEt
bt I, bn poor, hav only my dreams
I hav spred my dreams undR yor fEt
Tred softly cuz U tred on my dreams

How to end a thesis

With a full stop, you get to your 85000 words says Bruno Latour and you put a full stop at it.
A good thesis is a finished one.

mmmm dont think the academy is quite ready for that, but there is a surprizing lack of detail of how to end a thesis. At least there is in regard to completed ones. Lots of advice I have on how to walk away from one, which i am thankful is not my need.
(But of these my favourite is in the movie The Big Chill, Where William Hurt says as Nick: "I could have. I chose not to. I'm not hung up on this completion thing."

And there is a beautiful cartoon by leunig on letting go


And instead of finishing it and then letting go, i have , perhaps, procrastinated in looking at famous last lines:
Frankly my dear I dont give a damn.
( Not quite the last line, Rhett's last words to Tara in Gone with the Wind. )
(But I do give a damn so this one's not realy for me)

‘I leave this manuscript, I do not know for whom; I no longer know what it is about: stat rosa pristina nomine, nomina nuda tenemus.’ From Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose
(now this is another reason i want to end the thesis, this has been on my reading list for a while).

Oscar Wilde's life ended with
"My wallpaper and I are fighting a duel to the death. One or the other of us has to go.”
(and i include this because so much house maintenance has been neglected)

And from tips on writing dissertations and thesis I get;
La Bégueule (1772); The perfect is the enemy of the good
(the primary goal being to get a Ph.D. , not apparently to change the world, or get a booker prize for writing)

And then I turned to my favourite authors in the research i have undertaken, predominantly those of Actor-network theory to look for their closing words.
(particularly because telling the story is a performance in its own right)

Annmarie Mol in The Logic of care:
So let us care instead. The world - or so the logic of care reminds us - is not something we may look at and judge from the outside. Instead, we are caught up and participate in it, body and all. Chronically, until the day we die.

Bruno Latour in Pandora's hope:
To retrieve the Hope that is lodged there, at the bottom, we need a new and rather convoluted contrivance. I have had a go at it. maybe we will succeed with next attempt.
(truly ascerbic wit. But no, I'm not planning on writing another one of these)

John Law in After method. Mess in social science research
We need quite other metaphors for imagining our worlds and our responsibilities to those worlds...Forms of crafting. Processes of weaving...Metaphors for the stutter and the stop. Metaphors for quiet and more generous versions of method.

Bruno Latour in Reassembling the social
Is it absurd to want to retool our disciplines to become sensitive again to the noise they make and to try to find a place them?

Bruno Latour in Aramis
The last words from the Professor, rather than the last words of the book)
...Listen to him, he's learnt nothing. But in five years i'll come along and study it for you, your Prometheus...they'll be asking me for another postmortem study..."

Annemarie Mol in The body multiple
This study does not try to chase away doubt but seeks instead to raise it. Without a final conclusion one may still be partial: open endings do not imply immobilization.

Sherry Turkle in Evocative objects
Our theories tell us stories about our lives. As we begin to live with objects that challenge the boundaries between the born and created and between humans and everything else, we will need to tell ourselves different stories.

And from other thesis I have read:
From Ingrid Mewburn (of thesiswhisperer blog fame)
However this ANT turn does ask us to be more responsive and attentive to what is going on as we act: if we are ‘doing reals’ we are also ‘doing goods’ – or ‘doing bads’. But I think it’s worthwhile to pursue understanding design studios this way because it means there’s enormous potential here for those who want to make change because, as John Law puts it, ‘reality is not destiny'

From Ray Meldrum, who finishes his citing Dreyfuss on design for people saying:
His final words are telling:
Perhaps A.A. Milne was really addressing us rather than children when he wrote: ‘Here is Edward Bear, coming downstairs now, bump, bump, bump, on the back of this head, behind Christopher Robin. It is, as far as he knows, the only way to come down stairs, but sometimes he feels that there really is another way, if only he could stop bumping for a moment and think of it.’ (p.230)
Stopping the bumping and exploring another way to come down (or go up) neatly describes the becoming of this thesis.

From Patricia Thomson (of patter blog fame)
"Doing justice' is about everyday acts that add up, in the end, to making some difference. That is what this story says.
What this story cannot say is...
It cannot say how it is that ....
It cannot say what it is that schools and social policy might need to to do in order to 'do justice'.
That story requires more in the telling than a literary turn. What is needed to tell that story is a sociology of education that is unafraid of the economic, unafraid to put not only policy and difference but also the class back in the classroom.
it is to that project that I perhaps can claim to have made some contribution.


So what I have learned? (About finishing, that is)
1. first you have to not want to be attached to the thesis any more. It took me ages to get to this, but tired of having my summers in the company of my laptop. And I tired of a front door that needs painting, and a garden that resorts to the judicial use of poison rather than gardening...and so it goes on .... there are after all many other things to do with a life.
2. it really helps if you stay on topic, even if the path taken meandered, it really does look better to come from there to here with a trajectory explained.
3. eloquence, clarity, and conviction, matter to a reader


AND dont ask. No its not finished yet!

But if you want to add your fav finishing lines, please feel free :)

On techno-bunny bliss

I live in fear of ever meeting my favourite writer, I might not live up to her expectation.
And she might not live up to mine, but i am in phd writer love.

I cannot forget the moment as a phd student when my mouth fell open at reading an academic journal from 1988 that said "And like the god trick, this eye f#cks the world of masculinist extra-terrestrial projects for excremental second birthing.
(Haraway, D. (1988). Situated knowledges: The science question in feminism and the privilege of partial perspective. Feminist Studies 14(3), 575-599. p581)

And now i find this same author cited on twitter and I just had to go chasing down another rabbit hole to find the article that referred to "not some kind of techno-bunny bliss".

Ahhh the eloquence, fluffy dolphin syndrome has nothing on techno-bunny bliss.

And now I have a rebuttal to Latour's thinly veiled reference to Haraway
with "Bruno Latour’s complaint about the stupidity of critical theorists is just doing critique once again."

Nonetheless she also states:
Bruno and I are in relentless alignment, even as we give each other indigestion about some of the ways we do it. I think we love each other’s work because that is what matters.
(To think of the world through connections)

And some more clarity on why a perspectives or relativistic position is not being argued in my thesis:
This is not a relativist position. This is not about things being merely constructed in a relative sense. This is about those objects that we non-optionally are. Our systems are probabilistic information entities. It is not that this is the only thing that we or anyone else is. It is not an exhaustive description but it is a non-optional constitution of objects, of knowledge in operation. It is not about having an implant, it is not about liking it. This is not some kind of blissed-out techno- bunny joy in information. It is a statement that we had better get it – this is a worlding operation. Never the only worlding operation going on, but one that we had better inhabit as more than a victim. We had better get it that domination is not the only thing going on here. We had better get it that this is a zone where we had better be the movers and the shakers, or we will be just victims.

And a final note:
"women thinkers are made to seem derivative of male philosophers, who are often their contemporaries – made to be derivative and the same, when we are neither."

I found the article i wanted and more,
Nicholas Gane, interview with Donna Haraway.
Gane, N. (2006). When we have never been human, what is to be done?: Interview with Donna Haraway. Theory, Culture, Society., 23, 135-158.

many thanks to @bonstewart on twitter for providing the retweet that got me t/here.

my phone just does its own thing without me

http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2011/12/carrier_iq_it_s_totally_rational_to_worry_that_our_phones_are_tracking_everything_we_do_.html

Ok so its its not so much watching me as telling mobile network operators where its been to....

If my thesis was ... a writing retreat exercise

The writing retreat I am on had a small exercise i thought i would share because it prompted some unusual thinking for me about my thesis.
Here's the exercise as shared by Gilly Bolton to Barbara Grant,
(And it starts a lot like a Youthline feedback exercise i use in personal development groups so dont know why i had never applied it to my work in progress, but there you go- it takes intersections with others sometimes to see things can be done differently)

If your thesis was a colour what colour would it be?

If your thesis was a piece of fruit what fruit would it be?

If your thesis was a piece of music what music would it be?

Share it with a friend, you might also say why.

Then write a 15 minute letter to a novice, or a researcher switching to your field as to what your piece of writing is about and why it is hugely important.

Then 10 minutes, imagine and write what you think that novice would say back to you.


What i got out of this:
I thought my thesis was blue and changed my mind: it was more vibrant than that. So its purple. Not in the sense that chaos is purple, and regalness never crossed my mind. Just that it is not cool, its vibrant, but its also easy going so there is no red yellow or orange there.

Fruit, was a strawberry because of the tang, but then i dropped this for a passionfruit, multiple bits going onn inside.

The music i had always thought would be a symphony. But its not.
Its Mike Oldfields Tubular Bells , 1981 ish so feels a little dated, (not my thesis, just the music) But what Tubular bells does is a controlled demonstration of multiple instruments, these instruments do not come into the network but can be discerned as they enter and their interactions are formed in association. Its not totally like an actor-network as the instruments themselves exit again unaltered, but what i want to convey is the music of two instruments or more is different to any of these individually. In terms of the thesis, it is about not being able to replicate the whole symphony, but to have a controlled entry through the writer that discerns just what is being shaped, identifying the traces.

http://youtu.be/xPEt5OTR6Vc


The other exercise was a surprise- i received back a succinct understanding on how come ANT doesnt do perspectives but is about multiple realities....a bit coloured by the previous exercise but in tubular bells the instruments and their activities are all positioned, the bell doesnt have a perspective on me, it doesnt know i exist, the triangles, or whatever do nor have a perspective on the bells.... what they hold is position and they act from this in their own reality, and our realities differ, our hinterlands differ, our possibilities differ, what we enact differs. Our relaities sometimes interact, sometimes align and sometimes collide, but this is not usually noticed untill we discover contradictions and contestations.

pencil meme "best education allegory ever"

a twittering gone viral pencilchat#

Allegory provokes layered meanings. In this playfully rendered lolcat, a juxtaposition of imagery occurs with txtspk. The disjunction between what is written and the image portrayed allows for multiple meanings to be entertained, and for alternate realities to be glimpsed.

The use of meme invokes a language of puns requiring a second thought forcing the reader beyond the obvious.

The Goldilocks moment, not too hard , not too soft

John Dron 23 November in Change11 mooc
http://change.mooc.ca/files/audio/change11_23Nov2011.mp3

What are technologies anyway?
Dron starts with eg of screwdriver or is it a paint-tin opener, or a stirrer or a backscratcher…its not a single technology

We have a tendency to think of it as one thing, but really its many; there are
an infinite number of possible ways it can be used

This is a very ANT (actor-network theory) conversation. To consider that we and they (others including things) are made in association. And reminds me of Latour talking about what a gun is; a weapon or an item of beauty to a collector.
As well as reminding me of Simone de Beauvoir and Judith Butler on what makes a woman...

And then he put a thought provoking question forward:
Do people learn better with screwdrivers or without them?
This is a nice way to introduce the implausability of the common question:
do students learn better with pencils, elearning, classroom, moocs….

And I would suggest a better ANt like question, what happens when these approaches are used rather than the dichotomies of good or bad.

There are limits though
More than one less than many as Annmarie mol would have said

Further definition of technology is useful in considering therefore the orchestration of phenomena for particular use,
It becomes different technology when used for different things
Its about organizing things in the world.

A soft technology, many have had this idea, but how and why a thhing is used a particular way and the limits on possibility, that is, the orchestration of a phenomenon

Pedagogies as technologies

Multiple blurred and overlapping meanings

Technologies don’t have to be embodied in the thing, but the ways in which we use it, organized, a thing that is in our heads
Very ant like again; for we are shaped and shaping in association. Akrich would have talked of this in terms of what is inscribed into an object

Soft is enacted
Hard technology is in bits bytes atoms physical stuff
Not embodied is an important aspect
Latourian take on this is that we are all socio-technical hybrids and Donna Haraway would have us named Cyborg, but Dron doesnt go this far.

We implemented this and they learned better as a result
But its really about an orchestration of things
Not that online better than face to face, its just the way it is done

All technological assemblies constituted in relation to other things around them. Eg a computer keyboard as a particular bunch of things in order to get some result

Soft technologies an active orchestration by individual people, something without meaning until we start using them. Knitting needles no purpose untill applied.
Now there's a technology that has many uses licit and otherwise, ....but would also have been interesting to consider technologies as more immersed with us and us in them...I am reminded of Sherry Turkle's evocative objects, things we think with.
In contrast knitting machines are hard, the usability constrained, embodied
A continuum nothing wholly hard or soft

Not just about machines, eg legal system is a hard human system
Its not about soft or hard software etc its about created in limited ways
(this is similar to psychology of hard and soft architecture)

The thing about hard technologies, they make some things easier possible, eg refrigerator. To cool food is difficult with a soft technology eg shifting into shade or fanning…
Reducing scope of possibility to make things easier we harden technologies in order to be more simple, regular, reliable

Hard technologies are brittle, stifle creativity, and that’s the point as choices are not needed,
(He made a reference here to "see a city is not a tree" but I am unclear as to why)

Soft gives flexibility, creativity, but a soft technology is hard to use, but you are having to orchestrate those possibilities to make them happen.
(Okay, the use of hard for difficult needs to be considered as it begins to get confusing)

Soft technologies need people, they are nothing without people, whereas a fridge will trundle on by itself, automated.

“We shape our buildings and after the buildings then shape us” (Winston Churchill)
But it’s a lot more iterative than this suggests, he comes back to this later in q and a’s

Hard and soft not good or bad of themselves…fridge not good or bad, pre made web design versus the slowness involved if i had to start from scratch with coding is so slow, I want things to be easier, the big question then becomes how hard or soft in any situation

Moocs too soft for most people, an lms such as blackboard too hard for many…but also complexity: whose good or bad, used by different people, teacher as an authoring tool, or for the student as a learning tool…
Intent and use and what’s the orchestrating intent matters,
The pedagogies pulling at each other, acting together and in tension, a tug of way, technologies that fight with us
Technologies that don’t fit together well are also easily done eg lecture driven classroom and add a discussion forum and then assess the discussion forum…doesn’t add up. We need to design so the assembled work together, it is really easy to make deeply incompatible combinations thoughtlessly.
that is, an electronic system and a pedagogy may be in conflict
Important to assemble them effectively

Hard technologies limit the range, they structure our spaces, we will bend our pedagogies easier than change a hard technology

Facebook kind of hard, everything about it channels in a particular direction
the softer things we want to do being filtered through a hard technology
kind of how a university works, the beaurocracy of learning objectives
This is what i've been trying to do how we shape those technologies and the balance between hard and soft at a particular time, I really don’t want to have to design a lms and would much rather have the one I want than one that doesn’t, balance of constraints with movement

Not too hard not too soft on a given moment, in a given application of technology being adapted to purpose: the Goldilocks moment

eg twitter, how we should be building egs of not too hard not too soft just right
It's about building assemblies that are just right, the assembly makes it possible, just to assemble is how to do it, different ways, to make a hard technology softer easiest way is to add on to it eg blackboard here's mcqs you have to choose….but automated…so solution is to allow some kind of dialogue to happen that it can then be changed overridden by the teacher on the basis of the student's sound argument...so we add to to make softer, so softer when we aggregate.
(Seems an incongruity with knitting machine versus knitting needles where that aggragation made it harder...so some assemblies I would say soften, and some harden. Latour would talk of the adding chains of connection that strengthen, this understanding might also be applied to what hardens. Again a very ANt/ Latourian argument presented yet ANt was never mentioned.)

eg initially twitter didn’t begin with @ or # and the smart people in twitter then automated it, and made the system softer, it did not limit it, but added to

So softer increased use, so it became hyperlinked….auto ...adding to doesn’t always make harder.
(I can also feel a Macluhan moment coming on where we addd and add and then there is a flipping pint where the new technology obsolesces)
We harden eg when I say I’ll give u some feedback, ill give you some feedback to a learning outcome, I'll grade it…each step a little harder. So it's important to see pedagogies also as harder or softer.
And all technologies grow on a past

It becomes important then to think about what kinds of systems support aggregation so its about malleability
A key thing in aggregation, does it make it softer hardier, easier more difficult, more or less open for possibilities and fitness for purpose as well as adaptabilities...
eg electrical plug adaptor that’s multi use across the world
to make technologies not too hard or too soft

The elephant in the room is its not the technology as much as the passion, artistry in order to make those technologies do wonderful things, to get to those points we need to be I would say thoughtful

This was a very actor-network congruent presentation

In Q&A
Cites Ursula Franklin, wholistic technologies that expand vs prescriptive technologies
Thinking of things as technologies gets us away from the kneejerk all technology bad, restrictive technologies terrible…they are not

To follow up, further reading: Dron has allso written a paper called any colour you like so long as it’s blackboard

How to make the just right Goldilocks moment, eg grsshapper in a mook, enabling aggregation, harness when its needed, useful to have technologies that can be hardened or softened by those using it.
Might just be the policies around the use that need softening...might be us that need to soften rather than the techy. Again I am reminded of Latour and also Peter Sloterdikt in how to make digital spaces suit our human needs, but this has given me a way in to lever that conversation in my thesis
A guided path option, with choices that soften or harden,
To be harder when we need them and softer when we don’t, having smaller optional hard pieces eg drop downs…but problem is can end up with millions of small pieces and it becomes difficult again…

Yes there are some good ideas in this for the thesis, both philosophically, and for the handling of current pragmatic difficulties associated with the practice I have investigated (use of SMS messaging for youth counselling).
Great presentation.

refs for where i am coming from
Franklin, U. (1999). The real world of technology (Revised ed.). Toronto, Canada: House of Anansi Press.
Latour, B., & Sloterdijk, P. (2009). Networks and spheres: Two ways to reinterpret globalization. Presentation to the Graduate School of Design [Video webcast]: Harvard University. Retrieved from http://webcasts.gsd.harvard.edu/gsdlectures/s2009/sloterdijk.mov
Mol, A. (2002). The body multiple: Ontology in medical practice. London, England: Duke University Press.
Sloterdijk, P. (2009). Spheres theory: Talking to myself about the poetics of space. Harvard Design Magazine, 30, 126-137.

Reculturing a higher ed work place

A report commissioned by the Tertiary Education Union and put together by the New Zealand Work Research Institute in conjunction with AUT University, surveyed 3000 academic and support staff from universities, polytechnics, technical institutes and wananga. Massey University had the second-highest number of people respond at 444, behind Otago University on 460.

One of the report's authors, Professor Tim Bentley from AUT, said the one-in-six figure was high compared with overseas samples.

The impact is not only personal, the costs are high- personal and financial.
There are more sick days- in academia this means either loss of classes taught or more stress on colleagues.
There are costs to the employer with time spent with HR and or in mediation let alone the potential if not actuality of legal action.
There may also be costs incurred with employment assistance scheme counselling.
In addition are the costs on peers of supporting distressed colleagues- which then detracts from the ability of this person to do their own job well when time is spent supporting colleagues ...
When a person leaves there is also the cost of staff turn over.

It makes sense -logical sense and finacial cents -to end work place bullying.

A zero tolerance for bullies and for bullying.

Regarding educational leadership Michael Fullan suggests reculturing educative places so that people are able to flourish.
I agree with him.

He writes:
Solutions must come through the development of shared meaning
The key to successful change is the improvement in relationships between all involved and not simply the imposition of top down reform.

Turning around a workplace culture takes collective action.
I see a visioning exercise then...
What is it we value
What is it we grow now
What is it we would want to do if not impeded (blue sky thinking)
And steps to get there...
...as a collective.

Creating change...

The art of writing

Here's the evidence of thesis writing being a distributed activity. The image portrayed is a graph created of movements on my mouse captured in 23 minutes of writing my thesis summary. The free software comes form iograph.
Writing is a distributed activity: the movements of the mouse attest to this. In is finger tapping movements on a key pad, as well as the lighting of pixels on a screen,and captured as a pdf file, or printed as ink on the page.
And the electricity, and plastic and metal gadgetry that is the laptop...
In addition text being distributed is also evident in that we, you as the reader and myself as the writer, have a shared meaning as to what these alphabet symbols mean and how on being strung together particular recognizable configurations are read as words, and in sentences particular meanings can be made.
And this occurs to the extent that Cooren writes of the spoken word as puzzling in that we assume the centrality of a speaker when myriad beings are involved and demonstrates that when we speak, many other voices are speaking as well.

In thesis writing there is also the distribution that involves myself as a student, a supervisor, and myriad other beings in a chain from here to there involving the institution I am enrolled at.
And a library and world wide web of readings that informs what i write of...and the twittersphere that introduced me to iograph.
And the research undertaken that prompted my thinking about how different communication and computer technologies alter how we see the world, and how we are seen, how we are shaped as well as shaping.

The textual format that can be traced not only in current time but which can also be traced downstream to the evolution of writing, and upstream with where such writing might lead with meanings made and paths then taken.

From something so little as a scribble of a graph i can make meaning... if I am willing to.
In arguing the textual form as distributed, this is also an example of actor-network theory at play, there are myriad beings involved, human and otherwise, and they are often silenced.
Such distribution is not only geographical but also 'folds time' or as Michel Serres (1995, cited in Latour, translated by & Venn, 2002 ) describes it, grasping a ‘garland of time’ as Michel Serres (1995)
Or I might have used the Deleuze and Guattari's metaphor of a thousand plateaus and reference to rhizomatic ways of learning (discussed last week by Dave Cormier in chage11#) except they didnt go so far as naming the technological so strongly in an ecological systems approach, nor giving voice to so many other actors.
The forward by Latour on Cooren's book that discusses discourse as a distributed activity also contributed to this post.

Current discussions in #change11 seem annoyed by the metaphors that make theorizing accessible to some and less so to others. What is made more or less strong, whose realities are being voiced, whose could or should be, are also ANT issues.
That rhizomes or garlands make it clearer for me, someone brought up more in a garden than in an academic house, is something I'm grateful for.

Refs
Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F. (1987). A thousand plateaus: Capitalism and schizophrenia. London, England: University of Minnesota Press.
Latour, B. (2010). Who is making the dummy speak? In F. Cooren (Ed.), Action and agency in dialogue: passion, incarnation and ventriloquism (pp. xiii-). Amsterdam, The Netherlands: John Benjamin.