At the beginning of any collaborative endeavor, it’s important to begin to understand what we mean by the terminology. It’s relatively common for specific terms to carry a multitude of meanings and so it behooves us to agree on what we mean when we use them in the context of our discussions.
Culture (from the Latin cultura stemming from colere, meaning “to cultivate,”) generally refers to patterns of human activity and the symbolic structures that give such activities significance and importance. Different definitions of “culture” reflect different theoretical bases for understanding, or criteria for evaluating, human activity.
Ya, ya, fine … now stop and look at what’s up there. Look at it from the context of your own “culture” … What patterns of human activity and symbolic structures can we find in just the first few lines of this ridiculously small snippet of culture.
- The educational convention of establishing an agreed upon meaning of terminology: Why do we do this? Since terms are placeholders for ideas, symbolic generalizations of larger constructs, are we not actually doing a disservice in educational exploration by establishing the meanings before we have the discussions? Shouldn’t our discussions actually *be* the definitions? Educators seem to want to decide what the outcome will be before the discussion begins. Is that a cultural issue? Philosphers seem to have a looser context. Technologists might just want to agree on a standardization that permits exchange to occur.
- The technological ability to retrieve information on demand as represented by the reference to a definition that’s already written out for me at Wikipedia: What was your reaction to the definition? Did you see “wikipedia” and dismiss it as “unreliable”? Is your cultural bias (either way) toward the source coloring your perception of the value of the information? How can you tell?
- Meaning is dependant on context and context is defined by culture: Some of you are reading this from the context of “students in my class.” Others are reading it from the context of “twitterpeeps who followed a tweet.” At least some of the people in the first context don’t even know what the second context is. Does what I’ve written, as an attempt at “agreement” actually engender different meanings based on those two contexts? If not — are the cultures too similar? Are there contexts that are sufficiently different that we might actually have created an apparent agreement that is actually an unnoticed difference?
Given all this, and the post from yesterday, how do we approach a “simple” directive like “Describe the effect on culture of the printing press/movies/air conditioning/automobile”? How do we get at even the simple things, like — what does “effect on culture of the printing press” mean? Which culture are we talking about? Which printing press? Which effect? Is it even possible to discuss it comprehensively? As in “all effects” or “all cultures” or “all printing presses”? Can one person — even a specialized scholar in the field of “effect on culture of the printing press” — actually learn this? How would you know if you had it all? What if there’s a piece you missed? Could you tell? Would you know?
Does it matter?
January 15th, 2008 at 10:30 am
On the subject of “our discussions [being] the definitions” — it’s impossible to have a discussion without common vocabulary. In order to have a conversation about the influence of culture on [insert topic here], we have to define what we mean by culture. This definition need not persist beyond the bounds of the conversation, if it is a matter of disagreement, but we must have at least a provisional definition in order to proceed. I must know what you mean when you say “culture” in order to reason with you, and even if my own definition may be somewhat different, I can still accept your definition for the purpose of discussing the influence of what you call culture. This is a process familiar to philosophers, scientists, mathematicians and theologians alike; no matter how logical or intellectually rigorous you may seek to be, you have to start from a set of common axioms.
The trick in all this is to make sure that your definitions are carefully phrased so that you don’t fall into tautology. This problem pops up often in popular discussions of biology: If natural selection is erroneously defined by the speaker as “survival of the fittest”, and “fitness” is defined as “those who survive,” then you haven’t explained anything. If, on the other hand, we define natural selection as “those genes that help confer reproductive success on an individual will be more widely represented in the population in subsequent generations,” then we have a useful definition that we can have a conversation about, regardless of whether it encompasses all of the nuances that people usually associate with the concept.
January 15th, 2008 at 11:36 am
“…it’s impossible to have a discussion without common vocabulary…”
That’s my question, alright. I maintain that this is an assumption based on a cultural context. The assumption is based on the idea that ‘common vocabulary’ is an illusion fostered by everbody reading a definition, nodding in agreement, but holding different interpertations of the definition.
More to the point in relation to the intersection of technology, education, and culture … do we *need* definitions of these terms? Or are we trying to agree on what the intersections might mean in our own individual contexts?
January 15th, 2008 at 1:18 pm
I would argue that they aren’t actually “definitions” but mere opinions, or one’s viewpoint on an idea. We must change our way of thinking to believe that every “definition” is an opinion or a viewpoint. That is why I don’t have any problem with wikipedia, I know what it is, I know that it can’t be the lone source of facts. I must look to other sources to create an opinion of what something is or isn’t. We must look at everything with basically one eye. That is why we must provide our students with different opinions and facts and then let them form a definition or opinion.
January 15th, 2008 at 10:30 pm
Does it matter? After reading the introduction in the Solomon book, I don’t think that a deep discussion on the definition of culture really matters. What we need to try to understand is what the accessibility of and mindset toward information technology is among the different socio-economic groups (such as upper and lower middle class, poverty.) This will show us what we are up against as we try to incorporate technology into education. In my case, the mindset of my “culture” is very resistant to the idea that the exchanging of information over the internet can be a way doing school. But maybe it can be.
January 13th, 2009 at 1:16 pm
I think it has a profound effect on culture. Depending how people were raised and what they were raised to believe in. I know when I read something, see something, or observe something, sometimes I interpret it differently than somebody else. That doesn’t mean I am right or wrong, it just means that I interpret it a different way. Definitions are good for everybody, however, I feel that even though there is a definition, people still interpret things differently. I understand wikipedia, I do allow my students to sometimes use it as a source, however, I want them to branch out and look at other sources rather than wikipedia. This allows different outlooks and opinions to gather.
January 21st, 2009 at 8:01 am
[...] how do we define it. I had this to say last year and I think it’s still valid. Go read it. On Culture At the beginning of any collaborative endeavor, it’s important to begin to understand what we [...]
January 21st, 2009 at 3:18 pm
I liked the comment about terms actually being a disservice to education since we should be establishing the definitions through discussion. I feel that some terms that are abstract should be established by disscussion and implementations of our own experience and beliefs. Wikipedia is something I use often as a spring board of figuring out ideas and tools. I then find my own uderstanding and meaning by the way I use the term in my own life. I looked up gators first thing last semester and quickly gave me an idea of what a gator was. I use a gator for this class to quickly be notified of classmates posts and notices of resource feeds. I am sure there is a great deal more that a gator can be used for and my definition may be minimal compared to someone that has used the tool longer and for more reasons. Terms need to be given definitions to give people an idea then adapt it to your style of thinking and beliefs.
January 22nd, 2009 at 9:38 am
I use wikipedia a lot. However, I do not necessarily consider it a 100% reliable website. I would never cite it as a reference. I think additional research needs to be done past this site. I am a skeptic of any website though, and I prefer to do more research than just take as fact what is on it. Does this mean I have some sort of cultural bias? Maybe, I don’t know.
Oh, and I have no idea what it means for “twitterpeeps that followed a tweet.” I just read these terms on another blog this morning…
January 22nd, 2009 at 12:13 pm
I use Encyclopedia Britannica a lot. However, I do not necessarily consider it a 100% reliable source. I would never cite it as a reference. I think additional research need to be done past the static nature of a printed page. I’m a skeptic of any book, though, and I prefer to do more research than just take as fact what is on the page.
The point here is that there are problems with every source. Even this one. One of the key “21st Century Skills” is the ability to critically evaluate resources — to cross reference, correlate, and triangulate.
It’s good that you “prefer to do more research than just take as fact.” The process is key to acquiring knowledge. Be wary of discarding ideas based solely on reference. Some of next year’s best ideas will come from this year’s discounted crackpots.
And no, that’s not a “cultural bias.” It’s probably a healthy attitude.
January 22nd, 2009 at 9:51 pm
I think that the definition of culture will differ from person to person based on their culture. In some classes the teacher gives you a term and the definition of their choosing and that it what the term is suppose to mean. I like being able to discuss and come to a common ground based on different perspectives and come up with a class defintion instead. I think that once we dig into defining culture our indiviudal definitions may change to include the thoughts of others.
January 23rd, 2009 at 1:05 am
Culture is so diverse that is matters greatly on the impact of each situation/ circumstance. It would be hard to assume that culture will impact each situation in the same way because there are many different cultures and ways to solve problems. The way we define culture is based on our own beliefs.
January 23rd, 2009 at 2:24 pm
I think culture just depends on how everyone sees it. It is like everything else and how they view what they see. I have always wonder where defintions came from and how they came about. My definition for my culture would be that people around me are very religious and old timey while the younger generation are tech – savy and ready for an adventure. As far as wikipedia goes, I was always told never to use it for resourceful information or use it in my paper. It is a good place to get information but anybody can change that information so that it seems to be reliable. I have used wikipedia for an example in the class that I taught and the students didn’t know that anybody could post information on the website.
January 24th, 2009 at 9:58 pm
Culture could be defined in so many ways, for example, I think the culture of the school could be referred to as a positive, safe, learning environment. I agree that wikipedia is not a valuable resource, since the information can be changed by anyone. However, I think that relates to many sites that could be accessed, especially through the internet. So, looking at several sources is best to get valid, accurate information.
February 1st, 2009 at 3:54 pm
Culture is a matter of perspective, and everyone’s perspective can be very different. The culture in my school could be very different from another school just 30 miles away and very different from a school in another state or part of the country. When dealing with resources we must use several sources to have credible research. There are so many resources available through the internet that we must be careful which ones we rely on and which we do not. We must be able to evaluate these resources consistently and effectively. I also think as educators that we must realize that every student in your classroom could experience many different cultures in their lifetimes and that we must teach many different viewpoints if possible.