Understanding learning cultures

Abstract

This paper sets out an explanation about the nature of learning cultures and how they work. In so doing, it directly addresses some key weaknesses in current situated learning theoretical writing, by working to overcome unhelpful dualisms, such as the individual and the social, and structure and agency. It does this through extensive use of some of Pierre Bourdieu's key ideas—seeing learning cultures operating as fields of force. This makes clear the relationality of learning cultures, and the fact that they operate across conventionally drawn boundaries of scale. The paper argues that this approach also paves the way for the full incorporation of individual learners into situated learning accounts.

Acknowledgements

Transforming Learning Cultures in Further Education (TLC) was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council within its Teaching and Learning Research Programme (Award No. L139251025). The authors are grateful to the other members of the TLC project team for their contributions to the development of this article. They are: Graham Anderson, Helen Colley, Jenny Davies, Kim Diment, Denis Gleeson, Wendy Maull, Keith Postlethwaite, Tony Scaife, Mike Tedder, Madeline Wahlberg and Eunice Wheeler.