we made it ok, humbled at the power of nature, all that was damage can
be fixed others were not so lucky. Thanks for the kind thoughts, yes a
Phd viva seems to sudddenly be placed into a different perspective!!
love to all, Je Kan
Quoting Susan Goff <[log in to unmask]>:
> How are you going Je Kan? I have been thinking of you over the weekend -
> wild weather in the vacuum of pending doctoral judgement - been there myself
> all year.
> Warmest
> Susie Goff
>
>
> On 13/7/07 2:53 PM, "Rev Je Kan Adler-Collins" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
>> Hi Alan, its been a while. I am in the tense no mans land of awaiting
>> the internal readers response to my thesis, an experience that seems to
>> go on forever. I understand your words and resonate with them. Living
>> action research is exactly that, it is lived on a daily basis in the
>> context of one's life grounded in actual practice. In the sharing of
>> our educational narratives, it matters not if all believe, understand
>> or follow. In the inclusional sense of the other, offering your
>> thoughts with a non attachment of power but with complete ownership of
>> the process of the thoughts actions would not violate any webs of
>> connectedness. I guess I have to ask the question:¹ ³How important to
>> you is it that others understand you? I have the choice to engage
>> with your words, seek your meanings and if I so choose I will integrate
>> them as part of my wholeness. I recently presented at two different
>> conferences in Asia. I was so surprised to see different understanding
>> of the concept of qualitative was between the western view point of
>> reflection on the ³I" as being central or singular to understanding
>> and the absence of the researchers "I" in presented papers. Every
>> paper presented by an Asian delegate was presented in the western model
>> of medical research reporting. There was not one single account from
>> the experience of the researcher as being part of the research process.
>> There were no nursing narratives, stories of practice, just tables of
>> data that was said to qualitative as it reported on feelings. My
>> experiences in Asia have brought home to me just how far ahead the BERA
>> practitioner postings are in terms of reflection and philosophy
>> grounded in western thinking are. They are light years away from my
>> world of practice and experience. I have said many times that your
>> thoughts are the closest I have heard to Buddhist teachings. My concern
>> is as ever, the lack of actual working accounts of teacher practice to
>> balance the articulate and informed scholarship of reflective
>> practitioner thinking. Therefore in true reflective mode I have to ask
>> myself: ³Why is this so important to me?² If I answer with my heart
>> instead of my head, I have the need to listen and learn from my peers,
>> are they experiencing the same classroom, power, political games that I
>> am? How do others deal with the student from hell? Do others
>> experience horizontal violence from peers, how do they cope? The
>> unspoken connectedness of shared experience that could enrich so many
>> echoes in the ghostly presence of its absence.
>> Love and respect, Je Kan
>>
>>
>> Quoting "A.D.M.Rayner" <[log in to unmask]>:
>>
>>> Dear Barra,
>>>
>>> I notice no-one else has replied to you as yet, so I will try to respond,
>>> because I think your message raises some key issues with regard to
>>> understanding what I understand as the evolutionary nature of living theory
>>> and what gets in the way of such understanding.
>>>
>>> From where I am, as a relative outsider, the very nature of living
>>> theory is
>>> that it is non-prescriptive and non-impositional, but holds open the
>>> possibility of learning co-creatively in receptive-responsive
>>> practice. This
>>> is why it is impossible to state in advance what its standards for
>>> assessment of quality are, because these evolve in the process of enquiry
>>> due to learning. Fixed standards of judgement based on objective,
>>> numerically measurable outcomes, restrict this process when imposed as the
>>> sole basis for evaluation
>>>
>>> Following from this, a key 'living' (evolutionary) standard of judgement
>>> (principle) may be lie in the ability to show evidence of learning, by way
>>> of deepening understanding, in the process of enquiry, and furthermore to
>>> show how this deepening understanding produces new ideas and concepts upon
>>> which to found further enquiry. This ability was very clear to me in, for
>>> example, Eden Charles' recent thesis, an accomplishment well worth
>>> celebrating (but not, by its very nature, 'triumphalizing'). Eden's record
>>> of his emerging practice, for me, clearly provided an example of
>>> evolutionary enquiry in practice from which others could learn and apply to
>>> their own learning practice. Most fundamentally it is about influencing the
>>> 'other as oneself' through love and care, NOT imposing one's authority,
>>> which is understood to be counter-productive. It illustrated the
>>> transformational 'exercise of humility' not the coercive 'exercise of
>>> authority'. And Jack's role in this was very clearly that of consultative
>>> 'Sherpa Guide', not vampiric 'cloner in his own image'. I accept that the
>>> latter caricature might well apply to many kinds of academic
>>> research within
>>> the currently dominant, domineering paradigm (within the framework of which
>>> we still have to find our way). But it does not and cannot apply to the
>>> INTENTION (I appreciate your concern that this intention may not always be
>>> followed, caught up as we all are in a world view that opposes it) of LET,
>>> whose very hope is to transform hegemonic power structures. So I feel your
>>> concern is better directed towards current orthodoxy, not LET, and I would
>>> also ask what the basis is for your 'second order' categorizations?
>>>
>>> Here a short story from my own learning experience as a child may be
>>> relevant. I was out walking in the countryside with my parents. In my
>>> obsessive-compulsive way I had in my mind pre-determined the exact
>>> footsteps
>>> I was going to make. For some reason I felt especially attracted to a patch
>>> of grass about 20 metres distant. To my consternation my father pointed to
>>> that very patch of grass and said 'Don't step there!' My blood boiled
>>> briefly at this authoritarian, paternalistic infringement of my right to do
>>> as I pleased. Then I registered the loving concern in my father's voice. I
>>> veered from my predetermined course and avoided stepping on the viper. My
>>> father hugged me and thanked me for listening to him. What if I hadn't
>>> listened? What if my father hadn't noticed the viper? What if he
>>> had noticed
>>> the viper but decided not to inform me about it, so I would be free
>>> to 'make
>>> my own choices'?
>>>
>>> I think that the illusory kind of freedom that you speak about below is
>>> actually the source of, not the remedy for oppressive theory and practice -
>>> as was also borne out by the recent BBC TV series, 'The Trap - whatever
>>> happened to our dream of freedom?. It is the kind of freedom or
>>> 'independence' that dislocates the self from natural neighbourhood and
>>> blocks the possibility of loving receptivity. A receptivity that is
>>> impossible to impose, but which we can all appreciate and wish to help
>>> others develop (at the risk of appearing to impose authority to those who
>>> assume authority).
>>>
>>> So, which is primary and which is 'second order' - the water or the ice? Or
>>> is that an inapt question?
>>>
>>> Meanwhile I have noticed a venomous 'snake in the grass', which our present
>>> culture seems predominantly to accept without question. It's called 'IT',
>>> the singular object upon whose physically impossible independence objective
>>> rationality depends. And I keep trying to point it out, and saying how it
>>> can be transformed into a more benevolent orientation. But does anybody
>>> listen or appreciate what I am saying and why I am saying it? Or do they
>>> think I am just out for my own advancement?
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Warmest
>>>
>>> Alan
>>>
>>>
>>> PS I am attaching an essay on this theme fypi. It can also be found at
>>> http://people.bath.ac.uk/bssadmr.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>> From: Barra Hallissey <[log in to unmask]>
>>> To: <[log in to unmask]>
>>> Sent: 29 June 2007 16:32
>>> Subject: Terra Incognita
>>>
>>>
>>> As a follow on from my previous posting, I have no problem with the
>>> strengthening of the Living Educational Theory (LET) knowledge base once it
>>> is strengthened on the basis of the free will and informed choices of
>>> researchers in the field. I think problems arise when researchers are
>>> coerced into adopting imposed research methodologies via
>>> relationships where
>>> a power differential exists between the parties e.g. between a lecturer and
>>> a student, a supervisor and a supervisee.
>>>
>>> The problem may be more apparent to practitioner researchers from below,
>>> than to academics from above. As the problem is somewhat insidious in
>>> nature it will manifest itself not in a blatant grab for power but perhaps
>>> in more subtle ways e.g. in blindness to potential conflicts of interest.
>>>
>>> I spoke in my previous posting about students being used as fodder,
>>> programmes of study churning out LET research 'sausage factory' like,
>>> research pyramid schemes, hidden will to power etc. Let me illustrate my
>>> concern by way of an example.
>>>
>>> Please indulge me as I take the example of a research opportunity that
>>> arises in the context of a post-graduate programme for practitioner
>>> researchers. Let's say the research project is a kind of 2nd order action
>>> research that involves facilitating first order practitioner research.
>>> Let's say this research proposal restricts practitioner researchers
>>> in their
>>> choice of methodology by coercing / strongly encouraging them / influencing
>>> them (take your pick) to adopt a LET methodology in line with the
>>> methodology of the overall 2nd order research project.
>>>
>>> In the scenario outlined we have a happy marriage of interests in the
>>> academy. The research project if successful will serve the
>>> interests of the
>>> LET community by strengthening the LET knowledge base with some higher
>>> degrees. The well placed academic may even gain a PhD recognition
>>> for their
>>> efforts. However one might reasonably question how the interests of
>>> practitioner-researchers are being served when the research
>>> interests of the
>>> lecturer dominate their course of study. Are the gains in the
>>> academy being
>>> achieved at the expense of practitioner researchers academic freedom of
>>> choice with respect to research methodology? The researchers 2nd order
>>> research project and the practitioner-researchers' course of study have
>>> effectively become one and the same thing. I believe potential conflicts of
>>> interest should be taken seriously in terms of not so desirable values
>>> (authoritarianism leading to compliance / docility) embedded in such
>>> research scenarios.
>>>
>>> There are examples of 2nd order LET research (one currently active) that I
>>> consider vulnerable to this conflict of interest critique.
>>>
>>> Do any other contributors to this list think there might be a problem here?
>>>
>>> If you love someone (pratitioner-researchers), set them
>>> (pratitioner-researchers) free.
>>>
>>> _________________________________________________________________
>>> Tell Hotmail about an email that changed your life!
>>> http://www.emailbritain.co.uk/
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Rev Je Kan Adler-Collins
>> Assistant Professor of Nursing
>> Fukuoka Prefectural University Faculty of Nursing
>> Tagawa City
>> Fukuoka Prefecture
>> Japan
>
Rev Je Kan Adler-Collins
Assistant Professor of Nursing
Fukuoka Prefectural University Faculty of Nursing
Tagawa City
Fukuoka Prefecture
Japan
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