Movement Learning: Pedagogy and Agentic Realism

ABSTRACT

Pedagogies for movement learning have been affected by a gap between natural science and social science. The gap has meant that pedagogy tend to focus relatively more on either product, material context, and normative ways of moving, or process, learners, social context, and non-normative ways of moving. Here, I suggest that philosopher and physicist Karen Barad’s agential realist perspective may offer a theoretical approach that can contribute to enact pedagogies for movement learning that go beyond the gap between “the natural” and “the social.” Such an approach does, however, not entail a “mixture,” or “blending,” of natural and social science theory. Rather, the perspective is based on a particular notion of discursive practice as (re)conceptualized by Barad. This approach is illustrated in the article by an empirical example.

KEYWORDS:

• Movement learning
• Barad
• agential realism
• discursive practice

Introduction

The interest in movement learning in pedagogical contexts seems to have increased lately (Barker et al., 2017), including a particular interest in new perspectives of movement learning (Barker et al., 2021; Larsson, 2021). In this paper, I outline a perspective of movement learning that, at least to my knowledge, has not been previously presented in the literature. The perspective is based on philosopher and physicist Karen Barad’s (2007) call to “meet the universe half-way,” which briefly means that what is conventionally taken to be either “natural” (the study objects of natural science) or “social” (the study objects of social science) does not have to be seen as opposites. Rather, they are resulting from “contingent separations” (Barad, 2014, p. 175) within the same phenomena. Perhaps such a perspective can contribute to new understandings of movement learning. Meeting the universe half-way is not tantamount to a “mixture,” or “blending,” of natural and social science theory. Rather, it is enacted in and through practice, where “the natural” and “the social” are at the same time separate and the same.

I will address the question of movement learning from the point of view of pedagogy, that is, practices where learning is the explicit purpose (Tinning, 2009, p. 18). In relation to movement learning, such practices are conventionally called teaching, coaching, or instruction, although my intention here is not to differ between physical education, sports, or fitness. Any attempt to support movement learning, whether as a teacher, coach, or instructor, is linked to assumptions about learning (Mosston & Ashworth, 2008; Rink, 2014). Although a diversity of perspectives exists within research on movement education, recent research also illustrates that natural science perspectives still dominate this area (Barker et al., 2017) as well as various attempts to assess movement abilities among children (Tidén et al., 2017). Thus, based on this research, it seems that pedagogical thinking and practice aiming at movement learning is predominantly influenced by natural science perspectives at the same time as it assumes that if movement learning belongs to “the natural,” then it does not belong to “the social.” This is not to suggest that social theory has not had any impact on research about learning in sports, physical education, and fitness contexts. However, this research focuses, for example, on cooperative learning (Dyson & Casey, 2012), the learning of game sense (Light, 2012), or how “the social” affects movement learning (Barker-Ruchti, 2019), not specifically on movement learning.

To pave new ways for pedagogies for movement learning beyond the conventional dualism between “the natural” and “the social” I turn to the concept of discursive practice, which has had a central position within social theory, but which is here conceptualized in new ways based on Barad’s (2003) notion of agential realism. The purpose of the paper is to explore how agential realism can spur new pedagogical thinking about movement learning. My ambition is to “plug in” (Jackson & Mazzei, 2013) the concept of discursive practice, as elaborated by Barad, into pedagogies of movement learning. According to Jackson and Mazzei (2013, p. 262), the notion of “plugging in” can be seen as “a constant, continuous process of making and unmaking” with the help of concepts. Rather than an analytical process in which researchers submit to concepts with fixed meanings, “plugging in” points to a creative analytical process in which researchers explore new interpretations based on concepts which function as heuristic devices in creative processes.

In the following, I first offer a comprehensive perspective of how natural science and social science have influenced the broader field of what Kirk et al. (1996) call human movement studies, and particularly how they have influenced pedagogies for movement learning. Next, I move on to elaborate on the concepts of discourse and discursive practice. Here I draw specific attention on different ways in which discursive practice have been conceptualized. In the following section, I outline Barad’s agential realist elaboration of discursive practice. Finally, I offer an empirical example of how Barad’s approach to discursive practice can inform pedagogy for movement learning.

Movement learning between ‘the natural’ and ‘the social’

More than twenty-five years ago, in a textbook called The Sociocultural Foundations of Human Movement, Kirk et al. (1996, p. 3) stated that “[t]he field of human movement studies consists of two major parent discipline focuses: the biological sciences and the sociocultural sciences.” Such a statement reflects a fundamental epistemological and ontological gap between what is taken to belong to respectively “the natural” and “the social.” Drawing on the work of Sage (1992), Kirk and colleagues also assessed that the social sciences and the humanities of physical activity and their “allied professions are becoming dominated by the natural science oriented branches of physical activity” (p. 3). More specifically, what maintains the supremacy of natural science perspectives seems to be their contribution to performance enhancement. Kirk et al. (1996, p. 4) suggest that it may even:

be difficult to see the relevance of the sociocultural sciences to enhancing performance in sport, relative to other subdisciplines such as exercise physiology, biomechanics and motor control. Most of us would probably struggle to say how sociology or philosophy might be relevant to enhancing sport performance.

(emphasis added)

The above quote crystallizes the often-implicit assumption that sport performance is the aspect par excellence that makes science relevant to the field of human movement and its associated professions. This could be because sport, or physical, performance, is conventionally interpreted as anchored in “the natural (or material) body,” which is the primary scientific object of natural science. Rather than assisting in thinking about pedagogies for movement learning, practitioners sometimes even sense that social science troubles or criticizes an (over)emphasis of performance enhancement. Much like Kirk et al. (1996) portrayed the role of the situation twenty-five years ago, social science research still mainly contributes with knowledge about how “the social” affects practices that target sport performance, sometimes in harmful and inequitable ways (Barker-Ruchti, 2019). To my knowledge, there are no attempts based on social theory to analyze how movement learning related to performance enhancement happens or is done.

In their review of literature on what physical educators would know about movement education if they consulted research, Barker et al. (2017) conclude that a “motor programming and information processing perspective” (see also Fusche Moe, 2005) is the dominating perspective. Within this perspective:

computer programming is used as an analogy. Learning is equated with acquiring sets of cognitive instructions, or “schema” […] that learners can “run” at the appropriate time […]. The brain is seen as a type of hard drive and program acquisition is an internal process that takes place through the central nervous system via a process of encoding […]. Encoding is initiated through a demonstration of the desired outcome and achieved through repetition and practice […].

The motor programming and information processing perspective has wide implications for pedagogy. Barker et al. (2017) point out that in this linear approach to movement learning, it is assumed that learners must first learn “fundamental” movement skills before they can proceed to more “advanced” movement patterns. Pedagogically, this means that the movements of activities are broken down into smaller components which are practised in decontextualized exercises before being merged into a whole. In such an arrangement, focus is on the content of learning (the movements as such), and it is the task of pedagogues to design training according to linear principles where learners proceed from fundamental movement skills to advanced or applied skills. In this pedagogical process, teachers appear mainly as technicians or engineers. “They essentially modify learners’ programs: removing errors so that step-by step, observable outcomes more closely match the ideal program represented in an initial demonstration” (Barker et al., 2017, p. 424). Thus, there is a clear normative element in the practice, and pedagogues may utilize the same equipment and measuring instruments as natural scientists use in the natural science laboratory, where standardized methods of measuring objective dimensions of movements are prioritized over subjective experiences because the latter are perceived as unreliable. Such instruments may include measuring tapes, clocks, and various forms of stationary and wearable sensors to ensure that the exercises lead in the right direction. The technological progress of the last decades has contributed to a development of digital aids, which can be placed in wristwatches or mobile phones, and which can offer a comprehensive amount of measurement data. In this context, both movements and measuring instruments typically acquire a fixed meaning as superior to subjective experience, which is necessary if the results are to be valid and reliable in a natural scientific sense (see also Raiola, 2014).

Barker et al. (2017) identify a few perspectives which challenge the dominance of the motor programming and information processing perspective. These perspectives are linked to pedagogical practices which in some respects differ from linear pedagogical approaches to movement learning, but which are similar in other respects. Strongest among the contenders is the “neurobiological systems and non-linear pedagogical perspective.” While pedagogy based on the motor programming perspective tends to start in troubleshooting and how learners can proceed toward “correct” movements through providing information (feedback), the neurobiological systems perspective starts in the assumption that the way learners move is an appropriate response to how the environment is structured. “This means that if the environment and task are structured correctly, learners will naturally tend toward the ‘right’ way of performing” (Barker et al., 2017, p. 425). Thus, this perspective, more than the previous one, highlights the environment and its relationship to learning processes. In the research, however, focus is mainly on the objective (material) environment. Less emphasis is placed on learner experiences (subjective environment) and social (symbolic) constraints. Pedagogical practice based on non-linear pedagogies include, however, a normative element much like practice based on linear pedagogies. The goal of the practice seems also here to lie in “correct” (or appropriate) movement patterns (e.g., Davids et al., 2012; Renshaw et al., 2022; Rudd et al., 2021). Correspondingly, natural science measurements can be used also in pedagogical approaches based on this perspective.

A second contender, although not identified by Barker and colleagues, is the phenomenological approach to movement learning (Standal, 2021). In this approach, unlike in previous perspectives, attention is drawn primarily to learners’ experiences of movements and the learning process. The practice seems here to be aimed foremost on embodied processes, for example, in terms of “soma” (lived body). Rather than focusing on external outcomes with normative connotations (“correct” or “functional” ways of moving), emphasis here lies often on what could be called “sharpening of the senses” (see, e.g., Nyberg, 2015; for a phenomenographic exampleShusterman, 2011; Standal, 2021; see also), which means that learners’ capabilities to paying attention to and assessing/appreciating movements and their participation in movement practice are in focus. Arguably, therefore pedagogical approaches based on this perspective do not conventionally use scientific measurements. In focus instead is the body’s own ability to discern and appreciate movements (Nyberg, 2015, provides an example of what she calls a “somatic velocimeter”).

In summary, there is a tendency that various perspectives of movement learning gravitate toward either product (content/skill), material context, and normative ways of moving, or process, learners, social context, and non-normative ways of moving (Raiola, 2014), as if “the natural” and “the social” are mutually exclusive. It should be mentioned in this context that there is a range of learning theories that have had marginal impact on pedagogical practice with a focus of movement learning. Such theories include, but are not limited to, constructivist, sociocultural and situated approaches, which have all been introduced in both physical education (see, e.g., Kirk & MacPhail, 2002; Rovegno, 1998; Ussher & Gibbes, 2002) and sports coaching (e.g., Light & Wallian, 2008; Vinson & Parker, 2019). While there may be many reasons to why these perspective have a hard time finding their way into pedagogical practice in sport, physical education and exercise activities (Kirk & Houssin, 2021), most of them draw attention to how concepts are formed, either as individual constructs (as in constructivist learning theory) or collectively through verbal communication (as in sociocultural learning theory), for example, in communities of practice (as in situated learning theory) (Macdonald, 2013). Now, just as “the body” is not necessarily just a physical entity, “concepts” are not necessarily only abstractly formed in the minds of people. My point is rather, as I emphasized earlier, that while sociocultural learning theory may well have inspired research about learning more broadly in various educational contexts, it has so far had only limited importance for the understanding of movement learning, at least compared to theory that originates in the natural sciences. I interpret this to mean that movement learning is chiefly taken to be a process belonging to “the natural” and “the material body,” rather than “the social” and “the socially constructed body.” Even though examples of theoretical approaches that seek to move beyond dualisms such as body and mind, thinking and doing exist, I believe there is room for developing perspectives that more directly can contribute to bridge the gap between “the natural” and “the social,” that is, where it is possible to meet the universe half-way.

Discourse and discursive practice

I will now zoom in specifically on the concept of discursive practice, which has primarily been used within social science research. Conceptually, discursive practice is based on the notion of discourse, which is conceptualized in various ways in the literature. Oftentimes, focus is placed on the thoughts and ideas that words represent, and which are communicated in and through practice. This understanding is noticeable, for example, in Ball’s (1990, p. 2) suggestion that “(d)iscourses are about what can be said and thought, but also who can speak, when and with what authority.” Here, emphasis is placed on the practices of thinking and talking. In a previous article (Larsson, 2014), I noted that this interpretation of the concept is common also when critical commentators refer to publications where in fact a more elaborate, and sometimes also slightly different, conceptualization of discourse is forwarded. Some confusion about the meaning of the concept of discourse may come from that it appears in different research traditions within the social sciences, where it is conceptualized in slightly different ways. For example, in critical discourse analysis (CDA) and discourse psychology, the meaning of discourse is essentially limited to “texts, talk and language in use” (McGannon, 2016, p. 230). Moreover, in CDA, researchers differ between “social practice,” summarily what people do, and “discursive practice,” how people talk about what they do.

“Texts, talk and language in use” is indeed included also in how Foucault elaborated the concept of discourse, but that is not all. In his biography over Foucault’s thought and character, Veyne (2010, p. 6) makes an enigmatic remark that Foucault chose an “ill-settling word” to designate his research interests. Perhaps it was ill-settling because it is commonly understood to be “about” reality, or how reality is perceived, not pointing to how reality is brought into existence. In relation to movement learning, a conventional view of “discourse” could stand for how this learning is shaped linguistically and who is attributed with authority to speak about it. Indeed, such research exists (Rossi et al., 2009; Tidén et al., 2017; Wahl, 2006). To my knowledge, however, there is no research that has explored the possibilities to base analyses of how movement learning happens or is done based on the concept of discourse.

In The Archeology of Knowledge, Foucault (1969) defined discourse as “practices that systematically form the objects of which they speak” (p. 54). In this definition, practice is primary, but possibly the emphasis of “the objects of which they [the practices] speak” could be taken to mean that focus is still on how objects are “languageised” in practice (and thus primarily an epistemological matter), not on the objects themselves (an ontological matter). However, as Veyne (2010) has pointed out, according to Foucault, “the object, in all its materiality, cannot be separated from the formal frameworks through which we come to know it” (p. 6). In this sense, the division between epistemology and ontology collapses, as does the division between language and matter. In a later publication, Foucault extended the definition of discourse to include:

the ensemble of more of less regulated, more or less deliberate, more or less finalized ways of doing things, through which can be seen both what was constituted as real for those who sought to think it and manage it [i.e., objects; author’s note] and the way in which the latter constituted themselves as subjects capable of knowing, analyzing, and ultimately altering reality. These are the “practices,” understood as a way of acting and thinking at once, that provide the intelligibility key for the correlative constitution of the subject and the object.

(Foucault, 1998, p. 463)

Practice, or the ensemble of regulated, deliberate, and finalized ways of doing things, is key also in this definition. Practice, that is, “acting and thinking at once,” is constitutive of both objects and subjects. Through practice, objects and subjects are forged in one and the same motion. This conceptualization makes discourse and discursive practice relevant not only for analysis of text and talk about educational practice; it can also inform pedagogy. Despite attempts, however, to go beyond distinctions between language and matter, realism and constructivism, epistemology and ontology, the concept of discourse seems to evoke assumptions about that its proponents argue for a kind of linguistic idealism. One vivid example of this was provided by Butler (1993), who, writing about how gendered bodies materialize in and through discursive practice, noticed that some of her critical interlocutors assumed that she believed “that words alone ha[ve] the power to craft bodies from their own linguistic substance” (Butler, 1993, p. xi). To this critique, Butler (1993, p. xi) countered by asking: “why is it that what is constructed is understood as an artificial and dispensable character?” It thus requires an attentive reader to discern that in Foucault and Butler’s work, discourse is not limited to “talk about reality.” Discourse includes talk about reality, yes, but at the same time it produces reality (where talking about is part in the process). On the other hand, there are also commentators who suggest that Foucault and Butler are not radical enough in their conceptualization of discourse and discursive practice.

Barad’s agential realism

Despite attempts made by Foucault and Butler to go beyond binary divisions of discourse and materiality, their work has faced criticism from Barad’s (2003, 2007) who proposes an agential realist elaboration of discursive practice. It can be debated in what ways and to what extent Barad’s elaboration differs from Foucault’s and Butler’s account, but in “Posthumanist Performativity,” Barad shares with Foucault and Butler the basic notion that “[t]he move toward performative alternatives to representationalism shifts attention from questions of correspondence between descriptions and reality (e.g., do they mirror nature or culture?) to matters of practices/doings actions” (Barad, 2003, p. 802). As I stated above, this is important if the theory is to become relevant for pedagogical practice. Barad’s (2003) contends, however, that although Foucault links discursive practice to the materiality of the body, “his account is constrained by several important factors that severely limit the potential of his analysis and Butler’s performative elaboration, thereby forestalling an understanding of precisely how discursive practices produce material bodies” (p. 808). According to Barad, Foucault fails to acknowledge that “materiality plays an active role in the workings of power” (p. 809; original emphasis). I understand these quotes in the sense that even if Foucault and Butler stress doing, Barad holds that they place greater emphasis on the agential role of social forces in the process of materialization. Barad, on the other hand, wants to emphasize the agential role of matter in the process of materialization.

To solve this problem, Barad turns to Danish theoretical physicist Niels Bohr and his work about quantum physics. As stated by Bohr, Barad’s (2003) points out, matter does not have inherently determinate boundaries or properties, just as words do not have indeterminate meanings. Matter is not a thing. It is a doing. Or in Barad’s terms, “[m]atter is a stabilizing and destabilizing process of iterative intra-activity” (Barad, 2003, p. 822, original emphasis). I understand this to mean that what is by humans experienced as “solid matter,” is rather the result of ongoing activity in microcosm. That what comes to matter in this “process of iterative intra-activity,” Barad calls phenomena, which are ontologically primitive relations without preexisting relata. In the context of movement learning, perhaps it is reasonable to exemplify phenomena with bodily matters, such as nerve fibers, motor neurons and perceptual sensors, or with material properties of the movement practice, such as running tracks, ice rinks, and equipment. These “objects” are conventionally taken to exist a priori of engagement in practice. According to Barad’s perspective, however, they are brought to existence as phenomena (rather than objects) in processes of intra-activity, that is, ontologically, they do not exist prior to the practice in which they are brought to existence, hence “without preexisting relata.” Conversely, it is through process of intra-activity that they become distinguishable as motor neurons, sports equipment, and so on. Barad prefers to speak of intra-action rather than inter-action because the phenomena “produce each other” in the process of intra-activity.

Intra-action, in turn, takes place in apparatuses, “dynamic (re)configurings of the world, specific agential practices/intra-actions/performances through which specific exclusionary boundaries are enacted” (p. 816; original emphasis). Somewhat simplified, I take this to mean that the worldly reality is always in the process of becoming, and what Barad calls apparatuses provide the frameworks for what, more precisely, is enacted. Linked to Foucault’s notion of how discursive practice forge subjects and objects, Barad’s notion of intra-action emphasizes how discursive practice forge subjects and objects in a very real sense, hence agential realism (ontology), and not only as subjects and objects of knowledge (epistemology). According to Barad, discursive practices are: “specific material (re)configurings of the world through which local determinations of boundaries, properties, and meanings are differentially enacted” (p. 821; original emphasis). This means that

materiality is discursive (i.e., material phenomena are inseparable from the apparatuses of bodily production: matter emerges out of and includes a part of its being the ongoing reconfiguring of boundaries), just as discursive practices are always already material (i.e., they are ongoing material (re)configurations of the world). […] The relationship between the material and the discursive is one of mutual entailment. Neither is articulated/articulable in the absence of the other; matter and meaning are mutually articulated.(p. 826)

I take this quote to mean that discourse affects not only how people perceive and relate to practice, as is the case when discourse is understood as talk about practice, but that the mutual entailment of the material and the discursive produce reality in a very real sense.

The notion of discursive practice as specific material (re)configurations of the world can also be linked to learning. Viewing learning as a changed (“increased”) ability to participate in a discursive practice to produce a certain reality is not new. The idea was presented by Wickman and Östman (2002), but their study informed by pragmatism concerned science laboratory work (Wickman & Östman, 2002). Drawing on Barad’s agential realism, I propose that also movement learning can be seen as discourse change. Within a “flat ontology” (DeLanda, 2002) of becomings, movement learning is not the result of a preceding “acquisition” of, for example, motor programs or skills, but is rather a continuously ongoing process of discourse change. The idea that movement learning is resulting from an acquisition of separate skills that are taken to “precede” the capability in its entirety probably comes from an implicit assumption that “capability” designates the mastery of finalized movement skills in competitive sports which are, explicitly or implicitly, governed by strong standards of excellence (which are sometimes called “sport specific demands”). Thus, rather than becoming a process of experimentation and exploration with a value in and of itself, the learning process becomes more of a matter of troubleshooting and correction of errors. This has huge pedagogical implications. Since a flat ontology might be mistaken for an “everything-can-be-anything” approach, Barad emphasizes that agential intra-actions are causal, yet nondeterministic:

intra-activity is neither a matter of strict determinism nor unconstrained freedom. The future is radically open at every turn. This open sense of futurity does not depend on the clash or collision of cultural demands; rather, it is inherent in the nature of intra-activity – even when apparatuses are primarily reinforcing, agency is not foreclosed.

(p. 826)

My interpretation of this passage is that while certain action cause other action, the nature of the causality is not pre-determined. Barad’s (2003) contends that “[a]gency is the enactment of iterative changes to particular practices through the dynamics of intra-activity” (p. 827). This is not learning as discourse change in the sense that the learner adds finalized “pieces” of knowledge or skills to a being that otherwise remains un-altered. Nor is it an internalization, through “interaction,” of the norms and meanings that culture and society offer. Instead, agency/learning “is “doing”/’being’ in its intra-activity” (p. 827), and the learned capacity is “a congealing of agency.” (p. 822; original emphasis). That is, learning is an ongoing re-structuring of reality, where new meanings are performed and experienced by learners.

The focus of this article is on the possible pedagogical implications for movement learning of an agential realist account. However, since in the next section, I will present an empirical example based on a video film, I will say a few words also about Barad’s analytical approach. Barad (2014) calls this approach diffractive analysis. The verb to diffract means, basically, “to break apart, in different directions (as in classical optics)” (p. 168). However, the breaking apart does not mean, necessarily, that what is broken apart becomes something entirely other: “there is no moving beyond, no leaving the ‘old’ behind. There is no boundary between here-and-now and there-and-then. There is noting that is new; there is nothing that is not new” (Barad, 2014, p. 168). Different interpretations of an empirical material are, in this sense, not mutually exclusive; they are not either or, but rather both and. Diffractive analysis can also be likened to “the rolling, pushing and transformation of waves in the sea” (Taguchi, 2012, p. 270), that is, “the way waves combine when they overlap, and the apparent bending and spreading of waves that occurs when waves encounter and obstruction” (Barad, 2007, p. 74). In the empirical example, various aspects of movement learning are brought to light, which accommodate a diversity of interpretations, which are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

An empirical example

The example is based on a video film about how French former hurdler Guy Drut approached his hurdle practising. It should be noted though that the video was not produced for the purposes of this article, which means that it does not provide an exhaustive answer to how agential realism can inform pedagogy for movement learning. However, I hope to be able to point out a few characteristic aspects of learning as discourse change as elaborated through Barad’s (2003) agential realism.

Drut, who won an Olympic gold medal in Montréal in 1976 and for a time held the world record on 110 meters hurdles (manual timing, 13.0 sec), is one of the most technically proficient hurdlers of all times. He appeared in textbooks about hurdling well into the 1990s, where his technique was scrutinized in detail. However, technique is not all. His way of hurdling has by some also been portrayed in aesthetic terms, where his “graceful movements epitomize hurdling as an art form” (hurdler49). In 1975, he was involved in the production of a video film about his own efforts to reach the “dream limit” 13 seconds flat on 110 meters hurdles. The video is interesting because besides the conventional biomechanical account displayed through the footage, the video also includes a narrative (which exists both in an English and a French version, where I have used the English version) expressing Drut’s first-hand perspective (to what extent this perspective is really Drut’s or not I leave unsaid, at least this is how it is presented in the video), and footage with Drut both practising hurdle-racing in its everyday context and participating in competitive races against other hurdlers.

The narrative of the video, which is accompanied by psychedelic 1970s music, is framed as a practice session. It starts with a warm-up, where the speaker voice articulates Drut’s perspective:

I like to warm up slowly; to get the feeling of my body … to limber-up every articulation … hips … knees … ankles … I like my legs to play together, so to speak … in total freedom … Muster up my energy, calmly, intimately almost … a sort of concentration of oneself.

While this account could be interpreted as a conventional warm-up, where the “machine-body” is prepared for work, Drut highlights some aspects that may diffract the analysis. He does not prepare for the encounter with the hurdles as a closed and separate machinery. On the contrary, he wants to “get the feeling of” his body; he likes his “legs to play together … in total freedom.” Although talking about various body parts, these body parts and Drut’s whole being are neither given nor closed. It is almost as if he, in preparation for the encounter with the hurdles, dissolves or opens his body/being in a playful way. He prepares to reassemble, to become anew in the process of intra-action of the hurdle practise. After the warm-up, Drut

establish[es] contact with the hurdles … True, they are obstacles, but above all, they are indispensable instruments to the forthcoming 13 second allegro. Tune up to the hurdles, harmonize with them … thus, I allow my legs, both of them, a certain autonomy … hind leg in its own rhythm, with the knee well high …

In this part, Drut articulates that he and the hurdles (and more) intra-act to become a ’13 second allegro.’ While this could be taken as a mere aestheticization of the practice, being mindful of that Drut’s hurdling capabilities were highly praised, not only in terms of technical efficiency, but also in terms of aesthetic appreciation, could diffract the initial interpretation. Resembling hurdling with (an) allegro (which can be both adverb, adjective, and noun) offers a strong movement metaphor, with lively movements in a brisk tempo (having been a hurdler myself, I strongly recognize my own practice in this description). In a rationally guided process, arguably, the body would have come out as a sort of machine that the runner “steers” or “drives.” Perhaps a phenomenological analysis would instead concentrate on how Drut experiences his encounter with the hurdles. Drut, however, places much emphasis of an open attitude toward what he describes through a movement metaphor: the 13 second allegro, which is not (only) something that he experiences, but something that he actively seeks to enact. In this allegro, for example, the legs need (not only “have”) “a certain autonomy,” where one leg moves “in its own rhythm.” It can certainly be argued that focusing on the beauty of Drut’s hurdling is merely instrumental in relation to the “true” aim of crossing the 13 second barrier. However, also the opposite interpretation is possible, where the hurdles and the 13-second limit mainly gives Drut an opportunity to refine his art form. It is noteworthy that such an interpretation is mainly obscured by the dominating logic of competitive sports. Indeed, many athletes have reported that they have few performance goals, but that they are “searching for the perfect movement.”

The video goes on to emphasize that Drut’s success has not come by itself. Specifically starting and picking up speed proved to be particularly challenging to him. Here, he wanted to move differently, and he “worked very hard at it. A compact start, straightening the legs to absorb landing momentum.” In this learning process, the open attitude is supplemented more explicitly by experimentation and exploration. Or in Drut’s words: “Search of perfect balance, straightening up fast enough to deal with that first hurdle in the best possible position […] Feeling the intention, as it were, of the following movement, which can be sensed in the left leg and the right arm” (author emphasis). Worth noticing is that the exploration is not only directed toward movements per se, but also toward the nondeterministic causality of movements; or in Drut’s words, “the intention, as it were, of the following movement.”

After a while, the film starts to complement Drut’s first-hand account and footage of himself practising in a real-world context with slow-motion footage against a black background. This filming technique contributes to a decontextualization of the movements. Sometimes the film goes back and forth—which is impossible in real life but is possible in the abstract world of biomechanical motion analysis—to emphasize visually what Drut is talking about: balance, positioning, speed. When the speaker says, “the head is the helm, the pelvis the springboard,” this is supplemented in the footage by lines which emphasize the straight line of the head (the helm) and the slightly curved trajectory of the pelvis (the springboard). This is to say that, since the hurdles are higher than Drut’s crotch, he needs to elevate the pelvis slightly to pass the hurdle, but in order not to elevate the center of gravity unnecessarily (which would otherwise slow down forward momentum), the head is kept at the same height, and the lead arm pushes forwards-downwards at the same time as the lead leg kicks forwards-upwards. The emphasis on biomechanics may seem abrupt in a presentation that otherwise emphasizes experience and aesthetics. However, although the video was produced decades before Barad’s Meeting the Universe Halfway (Barad, 2007), it can still be seen as a call not to choose either or, that is, not to gravitate too much toward either objective or subjective analysis.

Toward the end of the video, when the context in which the hurdling is taking place is back in the film, the narrator again turns to arts to articulate what hurdling is about:

Economy, efficiency … a sort of living fresco … a living harmony … as if the body glided over the obstacle … erased it, as if there were no obstacle … only: the race.

In my interpretation, likening hurdling to a painting that becomes a moving part of a wall that is alive, illustrates the material-discursive (or discursive-material) “nature” of (learning) hurdling. The account displays a situation where intra-action enacts hurdler(s), hurdles, and context in splendid unity: the race. Hurdle-racing is the apparatus, or the discursive practice, that allows intra-actions to enact the race, where “the material and the discursive are mutually implicated in the dynamics of intra-activity” (Barad, 2003, p. 822) to produce the material bodies of hurdles, hurdlers and more.

Learning to hurdle, or learning the capability of hurdling, then, is not about learning to “interact” with hurdles appropriately, where hurdles, hurdler (human body/movements), and more are given beforehand. Rather, learning to hurdle is about enacting “iterative changes to particular practices through the dynamics of intra-activity” (Barad, 2003, s. 827). Such iterative changes to a particular practice cannot be forced upon a person; they must be at the same time found and brought to existence.

What is missing in the video is a pedagogue (or in conventional terms: a coach). This is of course a weakness in relation to the purpose of the article. To remedy this shortcoming, some imagination and consultation with the perspective in question, and a recall of the pedagogical approaches discussed above in the section Movement learning between “the natural” and “the social,” is required. I will dedicate some space to this matter in the concluding section.

Conclusion

The purpose of the article was to explore how agential realism can spur new pedagogical thinking about and practice aiming at movement learning. My ambition was to “plug in” (Jackson & Mazzei, 2013) the concept of discursive practice, as elaborated by Barad, into pedagogies for movement learning. The purpose was borne out of indications in research that such pedagogies seem to gravitate in different directions depending on whether influence comes from the natural sciences (a focus of product [content/skill], material context, and normative ways of moving) or the social sciences (a focus of process, learners, social context, and non-normative ways of moving) (Barker et al., 2017; Larsson, 2021; Raiola, 2014). In extension, based on these perspectives, the pedagogical practice becomes centered relatively more on either pedagogue (where learners ask: “how was I doing?” “did I do it right?”) or learner (where pedagogues ask: “how did you do it?” “what would you like to change?”). I also concluded that many of the learning theories that emanate within social science have had only limited impact on pedagogies for movement learning (Kirk & Houssin, 2021). To move beyond this divide between “the natural” and “the social,” I turned to the concept of discursive practice (Foucault, 1998; McGannon, 2016). I presented an agential realist elaboration (Barad, 2003, 2007) based on which I conducted a diffractive analysis (Barad, 2014) of the video “13 seconds – Guy Drut.” This analysis engendered some features that I believe can show a way toward an agential realist pedagogy for movement learning.

The features of the diffractive analysis included an open, explorative, and experimenting approach toward the practice. In this practice, bodies, hurdles, and other aspects of the practice do not constitute pre-established meanings but are open and always in the state of becoming. Movement metaphors that are at one and the same time explored, experienced and sought-after may provide guideline to the practice, as does a clear aim, however, one which does not appear one-sided or oppressive, but which contribute to enact both technical proficiency and aesthetic appreciation. A use of various scientific techniques and knowledge, such as biomechanical movement analyses based on measurements and filming can be used in tandem with experiential and aesthetic exploration and appreciation. Measuring instruments do not need to be ascribed a given meaning (in terms of validity and reliability) but can be used for exploration and experimentation. What was missing in the video, however, was the presence of a pedagogue, and a more explicit emphasis of the social context and matters of power and norms.

Regarding a pedagogue, this person could participate in the exploratory and experimental practice, however not just as someone who troubleshoots errors and helps learners to “correct” their movements, but also as one who offers a sounding-board for learners to discuss ways of moving, verticality, and how movements are experienced (cf. Barker et al., 2022). In this role, pedagogues can contribute with scientific knowledge of various kinds (e.g., biomechanical movement analysis as well as critical inquiry into social norms that may contribute to specific ways of moving), but which is not brought to bear on the practice in any given way. In this explorative and experimental venture, pedagogues may also use various measuring instruments to bring certain aspects of movements to the attention of the learners. As “critical friends,” that is, trusted persons who ask provocative questions, provide data to be examined through another lens, and offer critiques of a person’s work as a friend (adapted from Costa & Kallick, 1993, p. 50), pedagogues can also contribute to learners developing new perspectives and ability to look critically at their own practice and learning. For example, they may in more explicit ways address social aspects, including power orders (for example the relationship between learner and pedagogue) and norms regarding how movements “should” be performed perhaps in relation to the identities (e.g., male, female, disabled, etc.) that are typically ascribed to participants of the practice.

In conclusion, my assessment is that Barad’s agential realist perspective of learning as discourse change could be a relevant approach not only in sports contexts, as my choice of empirical example would suggest, but also, for example, in physical education contexts. In fact, my appreciation is that the perspective offers a truly educational approach to movement learning, considering its emphasis of exploration, experimentation, and the open approach to the (educational) practice. Obviously, a practice of this kind does not come to fruition only based on a theorizing about what movement learning entails and how pedagogies that stimulate such movement learning can be enacted. What I have offered in this article is primarily a thought experiment; an experiment in which the purpose was to investigate what Barad’s agential realist elaboration of discursive practice could mean for the view of movement learning—and thereby also what it could mean to pedagogies for movement learning.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).