In between hyperboles: forms and formations in Open Education

ABSTRACT

Captured under the umbrella term Open Education, a wide range of educational initiatives has been popping up in the educational landscape. This study aims to offer empirical ground for understanding how Open Education introduces new forms of education. It does so by focusing on one initiative, namely the Interactive Open Online Courses included in the Erasmus+ Virtual Exchange. Social topology is taken up as a theoretical vantage point, with a dedicated focus on infrastructuring practices. The empirical accounts show how infrastructures stabilize forms of practices, while interplays with infrastructuring practices enact formations, i.e., constantly changing practices. The study finally discusses these interplays, labeled as bouncing and enfolding, as typical to this Open Education initiative. The study concludes by emphasizing how studying this initiative through a social topological lens enabled a position in between positive and negative hyperboles on Open Education, and how this allowed theorizing this movement in terms of continuity and change.

KEYWORDS:

• Open Education
• social topology
• infrastructures
• forms
• formations

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank all the interviewees for their time and for giving insight into their practices in relation to the E+VE programme.

Disclosure statement

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

Notes on contributors

Karmijn van de Oudeweetering is a PhD researcher at the Methodology of Educational Sciences Research Group (KU Leuven, Belgium). Her research focuses on Open Education initiatives in Europe and beyond, drawing on social topology to understand what sorts of spaces-times these initiatives bring into existence. The research is furthermore interested in developing innovative qualitative methods to scrutinize these online phenomena.

Mathias Decuypere is an Assistant Professor at the Methodology of Educational Sciences Research Group (KU Leuven, Belgium). Primary research interests are in developing and making use of qualitative research methods through a sociomaterial and social topological lens; new educational technologies and heavily digitized educational environments; higher and regular education policy; open education; and education for sustainable development.