 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
 |
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
Editor's Note: This is a new section within Ed at a Distance
Magazine. Included here will be statements - disturbing, funny, profound
and evocative - from students exploring their experiences with online
and technology based learning. We hope that teachers, administrators,
instructional designers and other students will be as intrigued as we
were by the contrast in learning experiences.
STUDENT EXCHANGE
Peer-to-Peer Asynchronous Online Learning
About Bias
Mary Holm
Thoughts on Online Courses
Dan Ryan
Initial Thoughts on Choosing Explanations
Kevin Mayhew
Gathering Information
Donna J. Cox
About Bias
Mary Holm
Posted: Sat, 23 Jun 2001 10:47
Bias can be deliberate, intentional, and discriminatory. Bias can also be naive; the influence of the country we live in, the area in which we reside, parental or teacher guidance, friends, co-workers, acquaintances, strangers, and life experiences all create our biases.
We play a significant part, however, in bias creation with acceptance or rejection of an idea. Even if ideas are a matter of conditioning, we have the responsibility to look at our biases and question them. I may add, that although questioning is a responsibility, it may not be possible at any certain time depending on exterior or interior forces. In other words, you may not be able to see it, even if it struck you in the face. Sometimes, people choose because of those around them. Sometimes, the choice is made because there seems no other option at the time.
Every person, every instance that we meet will somehow alter our bias. Think about it. Your life and the journey that you are taking, is significant, because you will influence another - and they will influence you. Perhaps it is not another, but a place, a taste, a sense of touch, a smell. We store these things in our subconscious, only to be influenced by them.
Can we choose to develop our own criteria and think differently? Yes, but we must also face resulting consequences, after having made that commitment. Perhaps that is why people 'run with the herd.' And even if we choose to develop our own criteria, we are still influenced by subconscious bias.
If we want the biases (discriminations) of others to change, then we must think differently and become pro-active in our attempt to change their bias. But we must be certain that our pro-active idea does no harm in and of itself. We have to try and see the BIG PICTURE. How will my ideas affect others? Will these ideas cause harm? Is that 'harm' for the overall good? What is good - what is truth? Oh, oh here we go again! These questions must be raised by every individual, unless you want to be lead around by the ring that others (and yourself) have placed in your nose. Wow! What a painting!
I have learned that research is extreeeemely time consuming, and that, even using the hexadigm, will never fully realize the whole truth and nothing but. However, I bow in admiration to those people who are writing educational books because of the vastness of knowledge already written and currently being discovered. Their challenge, and ours as educators, parents, and friends is to bring as much of the truth as we can possibly acquire; to check and re-check facts, and perhaps come up with some of our own discoveries or theories for reinforcement and advancement of society.
I have also learned that the unintentional bias, as I have stated in my outline for this assignment, can be just because of the vastness of information present. What do I include? Will it be significant? Can I really include everything? (No) But I also think that using the hexadigm as a way of thinking will promote looking at a topic from a number of views, thereby reaching a greater truth.
This is a second posting of Bias and What I Have Learned.
Mary Holm
About the Author as Student
Mary Holm is an art teacher at Peonia High School and a graduate student who will be completing her Masters in Education after this course and a studio art course to be taken in the fall. This is her first web course.
Thoughts on Online Courses
Dan Ryan
Posted: 06/22/2001 3:12:04 AM
For what its worth...I just took an online course...using WEBCT is a piece of cake.... key to class success is an instructor who is willing to devote enough time to students who have some difficulty with the topic (mine was a UNIX shell prgmg course)...fortunately I had enough of a programming background to deal with the class...other students weren't so fortunate.... The teacher was VERY unresponsive...I ended up tutoring 6 students so they could pass the class...like someone noted…great interaction...but I'm not so sure so many people would take that amount of time when they are not responsible for doing so, not getting paid to do so, or don't have the time to do so...I just got so pissed off at the teacher's lack of concern that I did it.... don't want to have to do it again. I don't belong on this email list.(DEOS Listserv)..topic just hit home and I had to stick in my two cents...
Dan R
About the Author as Student
Dan Ryan has many years of business and systems data processing experience. He holds an MBA in Computer Methodology from Baruch College, CUNY. He gave permission to use his comments in hope that "the comments might help get a message through to those who need it".
Initial Thoughts on Choosing Explanations
Kevin Mayhew
Posted: Sun, 08 Jul 2001 16:20:30 -0700
I guess the roller-coaster ride must continue! Last week I thought I was really clicking with the assignment material and this week I've been reading and re-reading the material trying to allow the light bulb to come on. Since the electricity is apparently off for the time being, I will fall back on one thing I've learned about this course: when in doubt, just start writing and trust your peer students to point you in the right direction … so here goes:
It seems that of the early schools of interpretation (I counted about 15 of them in the first two readings, not counting the framework items upon which they are built), a number of them apply directly to my topic. For example, the whole issue of Moral Criticism, involving the charges and counter-charges of ethical improprieties by Catholics and Protestants, certainly had an impact on how native people in the Americas were viewed by Europeans. The manifestations of those mindsets were most dramatic in the way in which the Spanish conquerors viewed and subjugated the natives. Traditional worldview of the Americas and their inhabitants as needing to be conquered, stripped of power and wealth, and religiously converted were just some of the results of the moralist views taken by the Spanish. The research I have done suggests that scant attention was paid to the pottery being made. The exception, of course, was when pottery (especially figurines) was adorned with some other item of "value" to the Spanish, like gold, silver, or jade.
Along with this moralist crusading by the Spanish is, in my mind, a connection to what I have labeled as Nietzsche's School of Heroic Leadership. It seems that Spanish conquerors had the mentality that the native people were "an 'inferior herd', who needed high-class, heroic leadership by a 'superman' guiding them …" (Bensusan, Foundations of the Evaluation Categories, p. 9). This mindset began with the first conquerors and at least continued through the many different Spanish court appointed Viceroys who ruled New Spain. This way of viewing the masses of natives would naturally extend to the level of recognition and value that would be placed on all facets of the culture, including the pottery. It is interesting to note, as I have stated in past posts, that many Europeans viewed Latin American art with nothing less than disdain until well into the 20th century. Again, the stigma originally attached to the entire culture seems to have lasted for many centuries.
My posts in the last assignment tended to rely on what is called the School of Biographical Criticism. I tried to interpret the writings of authors based upon some limited biographical sketch that I had pulled together. Some of that information came from the author's own words and other data was culled from my own interpretations of what the author was communicating to the reader. In both cases, however, the focus was to understand what motivated the author to produce his/her work.
Last week, many of the posts from students either hinted at or expressly stated that there was a connection to not only the world environment at the time of publication but also how the audience of the time would receive, analyze, and react to the information. I think this was all a part of what has now been labeled by Dr. B. as the School of Social Criticism. Social theory, Dr. B reports, "suggested that if an artwork was successful, the artist must have incorporated ideas, values and stylistics which were meaningful and acceptable to the audience … " (Early Schools of Interpretation, p. 1). If that measurement were applied to pottery ware, it follows that unsuccessful artwork (as labeled by the Spanish, for example) did not appeal to the audience. But does that mean it wasn't art? Does that mean it didn't incorporate the values, ideas, and styles of the times? Wouldn't the interpretation of the native pottery creators and their customers tend to clash with those of the Spanish?
The School of Formalism, which I initially thought would come riding to the rescue of the dilemma I had with Social Criticism, failed to do so. My first thoughts were that viewing the native pottery ware from a position unblemished by social principles would let the true artistic quality and cultural significance of the work shine through. My understanding of this school of interpretation was that aesthetic principles, not social ones, would be the measuring stick. I immediately reasoned that the aesthetic principles would be those defined by the native population in which the pottery was produced. I was disheartened to see that this school was based only on the "'Classics' of Western Civilization … [and] … was not interested in the 'variants' or the 'deviants' found in [other cultures such as those in Mesoamerica]" (Bensusan, Early, p. 3).
I found some solace in Carl Jung's School of Archetypal Criticism. This interpretive school reasoned that humans are similar in that they all have individual journeys through time that bind them together. The psychological events that defined those journeys were thought to be "universal", with the understanding that the uniqueness of each person and culture could still be identified. It seems to me that this school of thought would apply to pottery production just as well as any other cultural event. First, it acknowledged that individual effort and the specifics of one's journey through life were meaningful; they counted toward the culture that one inhabited. Second, it tended to level the playing field for all people, which by extension, would apply to what they produced as human beings. And third, it formed a linkage among the various levels of social construct: fine culture (upper class), popular culture (middle class), and folk culture (rural and everybody else). This last point is important, I think, because it tends to blur the hard lines that separate those levels. This, in turn, increases the ability to view and ponder pottery, for example, without fear of ridicule and with some attention to its place in history. For example, everything from what is labeled utilitarian pottery (i.e. plates for everyday use) to fine artwork (i.e. ceremonial tomb figurines) could be viewed in terms of its place and priority in the cultural continuum.
There are other schools of thought that my topic area can be viewed from. Some of the Global and Post-Modern Schools (Cultural Relativism and Cultural Diversity) would apply, in my opinion. I notice, however, that next week's assignment calls for us to compare and contrast a number of schools of interpretation. Since that appears to be what I have been doing in this post, I think I'd better back off a bit. My thinking is that this week and next will be one big super-assignment with basically the same goal: to understand and apply to our topics the many differing perspectives that exist when people begin evaluating cultures. Your criticism of my interpretations is encouraged. Thanks.
Kevin
About the Author as Student
Kevin Mayhew is an undergraduate student in a World Perspectives online course at NAU. He is 46 years old, a Captain with the Tucson Police Department and presently assigned as a uniform patrol commander. He has taken several web classes but this is the first using this format.
Gathering Information
Donna J. Cox
Posted: Date: Tue Jun 26, 2001 14:39
I like the fact that I can work online in my nightie or go to class without make-up. The downside is that it requires a lot of keeping up and organization. Do I like it better than ITV...you bet. People express more of their feelings on the Internet and it gets rid of inhibitions. Most of my classmates in my last ITV (Interactive TV) class never even told me their names AND, if I wanted to discuss what the prof was saying, I got dirty looks.
Also, I had a student sit by me (so I could help) to explain what the prof said (the counselor suggested I help) and one of my classmates turned me in for talking too much. I whispered and the other student had a learning disorder but it didn't matter.
At least this way we can all talk and ask questions and learn from each other. I like it.
Donna Cox
About the Author as Student
Donna Cox, mother of 4 sons, grandmother of 2, and owner of 3 cats and a dog was raised "all over the world", and just returned last year from living on the island of Crete for 4 years. She is an undergraduate student working for her Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Studies. She is 56 years old and her goal is to graduate before she's 100! She states that, "This computer and web class has me terrified. So if I stumble, consider it a senior moment and help me back up - PLEASE."