rhizomatic learning

File:Oryza longistaminata rhizome.jpg

Rhizomatic learning takes its name from the rhizome, a type of plant stem which Deleuze and Guattari believed provided an interesting contrast with rooted plants. In her work Deleuze, Education, and Becoming, Inna Semetsky summarizes the pertinent differences of the rhizome:

The underground sprout of a rhizome does not have a traditional root. There is a stem there, the oldest part of which dies off while simultaneously rejuvenating itself at the tip. The rhizome’s renewal of itself proceeds autopoietically: the new relations generated via rhizomatic connections are not copies, but each and every time a new map, a cartography. A rhizome does not consist of units, but of dimensions and directions.{{cite book|author=Inna Semetsky|title=Deleuze, Education and Becoming|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DGB1NgAACAAJ|year=2006|publisher=Sense Publishers|isbn=978-90-8790-018-2}}

Connections have been made between the rhizomatic method and John Dewey's work at least since Richard Rorty remarked that Dewey was "waiting at the end of the road which ... Foucault and Deleuze are currently traveling."{{cite book|author=Richard Rorty|title=Consequences of Pragmatism: Essays, 1972-1980|url=https://archive.org/details/consequ_ror_1982_00_4657|url-access=registration|year=1982|publisher=U of Minnesota Press|isbn=978-0-8166-1064-8|pages=[https://archive.org/details/consequ_ror_1982_00_4657/page/9 9]–}} Dewey himself remarked early in his career on the contrast between the organic and non-hierarchical nature of learning outside and inside the classroom. According to Dewey, learning in agrarian culture was structured conversationally, driven by student interest, and featured many links but little hierarchy: "There are certain points of interest and value to him in the conversation carried on: statements are made, inquiries arise, topics are discussed, and the child continually learns."{{cite book|author=John Dewey|title=The School and Society|url=https://archive.org/details/schoolandsociet01dewegoog|year=1915|publisher=University of Chicago Press|pages=[https://archive.org/details/schoolandsociet01dewegoog/page/n55 35]–}}

In the 1990s feminist scholars such as Mary Leach and Megan Boler began examining the application of Deleuzean thought to feminist pedagogy, particularly in the teaching of history and literature.{{rp|1}} Other critical pedagogy theorists soon engaged with the concept. Roy Kaustuv described the rhizoid structure of curriculum, and its potential to free students from the linearity associated with much educational structure.{{cite book|author=Kaustuv Roy|title=Teachers in Nomadic Spaces: Deleuze and Curriculum|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VR8OAQAAMAAJ|year=2003|publisher=P. Lang|isbn=978-0-8204-6737-5}} Juha Suoranta and Tere Vadén, writing in 2007 about the pedagogical implications of "wikiworld" note:

The division between a hierarchical tree-like democracy or organization and that of the rhizomeian democracy or organization not only has political implications in the ideas of "leaderless revolution" and networked dissidence but also educational implications in how to organize curricula ... In this situation, teaching cannot be easily seen as an authoritarian activity but more like "subversive activity" (Postman & Weingartner, 1971) in which teachers, along with their students, compare information from various sources, negotiate their knowledge and experiences together, and interpret the world."{{cite book|last1=Suoranta|first1=Juha |last2=Vaden|first2=Tere|editor=Peter McLaren|others=Joe L. Kincheloe|title=Critical Pedagogy: Where are We Now?|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=M97YKJdkJbcC|year=2007|publisher=Peter Lang|isbn=978-0-8204-8147-0|chapter=From Social to Socialist Media: The Critical Potential of the Wikiworld}}

In addition to its association with critical pedagogy, rhizomatic learning has seen a resurgence of interest based on its connection to emergent online learning practices such as MOOCs.{{cite book|author1=Steve Wheeler|author2=Richard Gerver|title=Learning with 'e's: Educational theory and practice in the digital age|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3oswBgAAQBAJ&pg=PT47|date=26 February 2015|publisher=Crown House Publishing|isbn=978-1-84590-961-1|pages=47–}}

Educational researcher Terry Anderson has criticized the way in which advocates of rhizomatic learning seem to attack the idea of formal education as a whole.{{Cite web|title = Alienated from Change11 MOOC|url = http://terrya.edublogs.org/2011/11/08/alienated-from-change11-mooc/|website = Virtual Canuck|accessdate = 2015-05-30|last = Anderson|first = Terry}}

George Siemens, one of the inventors of massive open online courses, has questioned the usefulness of the rhizomatic metaphor when compared to traditional network analysis:

I don’t see rhizomes as possessing a similar capacity (to networks) to generate insight into learning, innovation, and complexity ... Rhizomes then, are effective for describing the structure and form of knowledge and learning ... [h]owever, beyond the value of describing the form of curriculum as decentralized, adaptive, and organic, I'm unsure what rhizomes contribute to knowledge and learning.{{Cite web|title = Rhizomes and networks|url = http://www.connectivism.ca/?p=329|website = Connectivism|accessdate = 2015-05-30|last = Siemens|first = George|date = 10 November 2011}}

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Category:Pedagogy