Learning from the whirlpools of existence: Crises and transformative processes as complex and rhythmic phenomena

The aim of this paper is to problematize and enrich the use of the concept of crisis in adult education to theorize further its contribution to the study of transformative processes. This paper discusses first the implications inherent in the adoption of event-based and processual approaches to crises. It seeks then to nuance and problematize the ways in which the relationships between crisis, learning and (trans)formative processes are conceived in adult education, especially through transformative learning theory and biographical approaches. The reflection highlights the difficulty of capturing the fluidity of learning and (trans)formative dynamics. Inspired by Edgar Morin’s paradigm of complexity and illustrated by examples taken from the COVID-19 pandemic, three principles are defined to help conceiving what structures, regulates and reorganizes such dynamics. The contribution concludes by emphasizing the importance of developing a critical awareness of the rhythms that shape educational processes. (DIPF/Orig.

How PETE comes to matter in the performance of social justice education

Background: For over four decades there have been calls for physical education (PE) and physical education teacher education (PETE) to address social inequality and foster social justice. Yet, as numerous studies demonstrate, attempts to educate for social justice in PETE are infrequent and rarely comprehensive. This raises the question why it appears to be possible in some situations but not others, and for some students and not others.    Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the multiple socio-political networks or assemblages in which PETE is embedded and explore how these shape the possibilities for students to engage with the concept of social justice and sociocultural issues when learning to teach PE. Two research questions guided this study: How does an orientation for social justice education within education policy affect the standards for enacting PETE programs? How is social justice education encouraged within PETE programs? Methodology: Methodology: Drawing from a broader study of over 70 key personnel in more than 40 PETE programs, we examined how faculty in PETE understand their professional world, identify their subjective meanings of their experiences, and address sociocultural issues (SCI) and social justice education (SJE) within PETE. Data sources included an initial survey, a semi-structured interview, and program artifacts. We analyze the ways that SJE/SCI was represented in three national settings (England, the United States, and New Zealand) and identified common themes. Results:  Examination of each national setting reveals ways that SJE and SCI were enabled and constrained across the national, programmatic, and individual level in each of the countries. The coherence of explicit National policy and curricula, PETE program philosophies, and the presence of multiple individual interests in social justice served to reify a sociocultural agenda. Conversely possibilities were nullified by narrow or general National Standards, programs that failed to acknowledge sociocultural interests, and the absence of a critical mass of actors with a socio-critical orientation. These differences in assemblage culminated in variations in curriculum time that served to restrict or enable the breadth, frequency, and consistency of the messages surrounding SCI in PETE Conclusion: These findings highlight the importance of acknowledging socio-political networks where PETE operates. The agency of PETEs to enact pedagogies that foreground sociocultural interests is contingent on congruity of the networks. The authors caution that although the ‘perfect storm’ of conditions have a profound influence of the possibility of transformational learning of SCI in PETE, this arrangement is always temporary, fluid, and subject to changes in any of the three network levels. Additionally, the success of PETE in enabling graduating PE teachers to recognize the inequities that may be reinforced through the ‘hidden curriculum’ and to problematize the subject area is contingent on the expectations of the schools in which they teach.   

Political Institutions and Economic Policy: Rural Renter Legislation in Argentina, 1912–1942

The importance of political institutions in the economic performance of developing countries is generally overlooked. Argentine economic development in the 19th and early 20th centuries relied on the production of rural exports. The production structure in agriculture was supported by the widespread use of tenancy contracts. This paper uses spatial analysis and logistic regression to study the role of Congress in shaping tenancy legislation for the period 1912 to 1943. The finding is that legislative reform was a product of how political institutions worked in Congress providing veto power to Conservatives over the proposals of Radicals. Electoral fraud in the 1930s stopped tenancy legislation and gave rise to revolutionary changes in the 1940s

Developing Creativity to Enhance Human Potential in Sport: A Wicked Transdisciplinary Challenge

© Copyright © 2019 Vaughan, Mallett, Davids, Potrac and López-Felip. The challenge of developing creativity to enhance human potential is conceptualized as a multifaceted wicked problem due to the countless interactions between people and environments that constitute human development, athletic skill, and creative moments. To better comprehend the inter-relatedness of ecologies and human behaviors, there have been increasing calls for transdisciplinary approaches and holistic ecological models. In this paper we explore an ecological dynamics rationale for creativity, highlighting the conceptual adjacency of key concepts from transdisciplinarity, dynamic systems theory, ecological psychology and social-cognitive psychology. Our aim is to extend the scope of ecological dynamics and contextualize the application of non-linear pedagogy in sport. Foregrounding the role of sociocultural constraints on creative behaviors, we characterize the athlete-environment system as an ecological niche that arises from, and simultaneously co-creates, a form of life. We elaborate the notion that creative moments, skill and more generally talent in sport, are not traits possessed by individuals alone, but rather can be conceived as properties of the athlete-environment system shaped by changing constraints. This re-conceptualization supports a pedagogical approach predicated on notions of athletes and sports teams as complex adaptive systems. In such systems, continuous non-linear interactions between system components support the exploration of fluent and flexibly creative performance solutions by athletes and sports teams. The implications for practice suggest that cultivating a constellation of constraints can facilitate adaptive exploration of novel affordances (opportunities/invitation for action), fostering creative moments and supporting creative development in athletes. Future models or frameworks for practice contend that pedagogies should emerge from, and evolve in, interaction with the sociocultural context in which practitioners and athletes are embedded

Common activation mechanism of class A GPCRs.

Funder: Young Talent Program of ShanghaiClass A G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) influence virtually every aspect of human physiology. Understanding receptor activation mechanism is critical for discovering novel therapeutics since about one-third of all marketed drugs target members of this family. GPCR activation is an allosteric process that couples agonist binding to G-protein recruitment, with the hallmark outward movement of transmembrane helix 6 (TM6). However, what leads to TM6 movement and the key residue level changes of this movement remain less well understood. Here, we report a framework to quantify conformational changes. By analyzing the conformational changes in 234 structures from 45 class A GPCRs, we discovered a common GPCR activation pathway comprising of 34 residue pairs and 35 residues. The pathway unifies previous findings into a common activation mechanism and strings together the scattered key motifs such as CWxP, DRY, Na+ pocket, NPxxY and PIF, thereby directly linking the bottom of ligand-binding pocket with G-protein coupling region. Site-directed mutagenesis experiments support this proposition and reveal that rational mutations of residues in this pathway can be used to obtain receptors that are constitutively active or inactive. The common activation pathway provides the mechanistic interpretation of constitutively activating, inactivating and disease mutations. As a module responsible for activation, the common pathway allows for decoupling of the evolution of the ligand binding site and G-protein-binding region. Such an architecture might have facilitated GPCRs to emerge as a highly successful family of proteins for signal transduction in nature

Pour une conception rythmique des apprentissages transformateurs

En prenant appui sur la théorie de l’apprentissage transformateur (TAT), développée par Jack Mezirow aux États-Unis, cet article propose une réflexion sur les temporalités qui caractérisent les processus de transformation, susceptibles d’être promus ou accompagnés en formation d’adultes. La réflexion proposée s’articule en trois temps. Premièrement, les fondements de la TAT sont énoncés de manière à situer leur pertinence en formation d’adultes. Ces apports sont repris afin de problématiser la manière dont on conçoit les temporalités impliquées dans un processus de transformation, et plus spécifiquement la nature à la fois continue et discontinue d’un tel processus. Finalement, l’apprentissage transformateur est envisagé à partir d’une perspective rythmologique, démontrant l’intérêt de développer une approche centrée sur les rythmes constitutifs des transformations vécues tout au long de la vie.This paper refers to Jack Mezirow’s contribution to transformative learning theory in order to discuss the temporalities that characterize transformative processes, such as those fostered in adult education. The argument follows three steps. First, the core assumptions of transformative learning theory are introduced in order to locate their relevance in adult education. Such a contribution is then used to problematize the temporalities involved in a process of transformation, especially considering its continuous and discontinuous features. Transformative learning is finally conceived through a rhythmological perspective. Such an approach demonstrates the relevance of analyzing the rhythms through which transformations are lived throughout the lifespan

Zeitliche Komplexität in der Bildung aus einer kritischen Perspektive begreifen

L’étude du temps et des rythmes de l’éducation révèle une complexité particulièrement difficile à analyser dans la mesure où elle renvoie simultanément à des registres hétérogènes de l’expérience (p.ex., physique, biologique, psychologique, social, culturel). Cet article propose de l’appréhender en revisitant certains des présupposés à partir desquels les temporalités de l’éducation et de la formation sont envisagées. Cette réflexion s’organise autour de trois axes: le premier vise à rendre compte de l’hétérogénéité des temporalités éducationnelles, le deuxième explore leur nature dynamique et conflictuelle et le troisième axe interroge plus spécifiquement la portée critique d’une réflexion sur la complexité temporelle, dans le cadre d’une éducation à visée émancipatrice. (DIPF/Orig.)Die Untersuchung von Zeit und Rhythmen in Erziehungsprozessen weist eine Komplexität auf, die besondere schwer zu analysieren ist, weil sie gleichzeitig auf heterogene Aspekte der Erfahrung (z.B. physische, biologische, psychologische, soziale, kulturelle) Bezug nehmen muss. Um diese Komplexität verständlich zu machen, wird vorgeschlagen, einige Annahmen über die Zeitlichkeit in der Erziehung und Bildung zu hinterfragen. Die Betrachtung gliedert sich anhand von drei Achsen: Die erste zielt auf eine theoretische Rahmung der Heterogenität zeitlicher Aspekte von Erziehung und Bildung; die zweite beleuchtet deren Dynamik und Widersprüchlichkeit; die dritte hinterfragt aus einer emanzipatorischen Perspektive kritisch das Ziel der Reflexion zeitlicher Komplexität von Bildung. (DIPF/Orig.

Pour une conception rythmique des apprentissages transformateurs

En prenant appui sur la théorie de l’apprentissage transformateur (TAT), développée par Jack Mezirow aux États-Unis, cet article propose une réflexion sur les temporalités qui caractérisent les processus de transformation, susceptibles d’être promus ou accompagnés en formation d’adultes. La réflexion proposée s’articule en trois temps. Premièrement, les fondements de la TAT sont énoncés de manière à situer leur pertinence en formation d’adultes. Ces apports sont repris afin de problématiser la manière dont on conçoit les temporalités impliquées dans un processus de transformation, et plus spécifiquement la nature à la fois continue et discontinue d’un tel processus. Finalement, l’apprentissage transformateur est envisagé à partir d’une perspective rythmologique, démontrant l’intérêt de développer une approche centrée sur les rythmes constitutifs des transformations vécues tout au long de la vie.This paper refers to Jack Mezirow’s contribution to transformative learning theory in order to discuss the temporalities that characterize transformative processes, such as those fostered in adult education. The argument follows three steps. First, the core assumptions of transformative learning theory are introduced in order to locate their relevance in adult education. Such a contribution is then used to problematize the temporalities involved in a process of transformation, especially considering its continuous and discontinuous features. Transformative learning is finally conceived through a rhythmological perspective. Such an approach demonstrates the relevance of analyzing the rhythms through which transformations are lived throughout the lifespan

Pour une approche réflexive et critique des rapports entre temporalités et professionnalisation

Envisager les déterminants qui influencent, chez une personne ou au sein d’un collectif, le développement de son rapport au temps constitue un enjeu crucial dans le cadre d’une démarche de professionnalisation. Partant de ce constat, cet article propose d’envisager six finalités caractéristiques d’un apprentissage réflexif et critique permettant de concevoir et d’interroger les rapports entre professionnalisation et temporalités. Il propose en particulier d’interroger la façon dont on apprend à discriminer, évaluer, interpréter, argumenter, juger et mettre en crise les temporalités et les rythmes, vécus ou observés, tels qu’ils déterminent la vie quotidienne et l’apprentissage tout au long de la vie. Ce faisant, cette réflexion suggère de concevoir la professionnalisation comme capacité à (ré) organiser une autonomie rythmique.Being able to apprehend the determinants that influence the way a person or a group develops one’s relationship with time constitutes a crucial aspect of a process of professionalization. Based on this assumption, this paper formulates six finalities characterizing a critical and reflective approach in order to conceive and question the relationships between professionalization and temporalities. It proposes in particular to question the way one learns to discriminate, evaluate, interpret, argue, judge and challenge the temporalities and the rhythms, lived or observed, that determine the everyday life and lifelong learning. Doing so, this reflection suggests one to conceive professionalization as a capacity to (re)organize a rhythmic autonomy