Learning as dwelling

Abstract

Drawing on insights offered by anthropologist Tim Ingold, this article argues that the phrase ‘learning as dwelling’ (a phrase indebted to Martin Heidegger) is a particularly powerful way of characterising human learning processes. Rather than positing humans as isolated subjects who can conceive of the world prior to acting upon it, the dwelling perspective suggests that, from the outset, humans are inextricably entwined in the processes of reality. Learning for dwellers is not a process of incorporating external knowledge into their minds. Rather, learning is best conceived as a process through which learners forever weave themselves into the fabric of their natural, social and cultural worlds. The article suggests that thinking of learning as dwelling not only provides a basis for escaping the strictures of dominant cognitivist and individualistic notions of learning but also enables us to avoid the relativism and abeyant liberalism of postmodernism. Learning as dwelling accords strongly with the emergent and naturalistic ontology of critical realism. As such, it provides a particularly productive basis from which to critique a range of other perspectives on learning (such as self-directed learning, transformative learning, and learning in communities of practice) promoted in the adult education literature.

Keywords:

• adult learning
• Tim Ingold
• critical realism
• practice-based theories of learning
• Margaret Archer
• communities of practice