The field of educational media – or educational technology (edtech) – is rife with euphoric statements about the potential of “new” media to revolutionise education. At the same time, there are widespread fears about the influence of these media on children and young people.
During the Corona pandemic in 2020, the project was extended to observe and analyse the public discourse about education, digital technology and "home schooling"
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Aims
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Methodology
The “Discourse of EdTech” project analyses contemporary discourse about digital educational media using an array of discourse analytical tools, including critical discourse analysis, corpus linguistics and ethnographic approaches. Focus lies on EU and national policy texts, scholarly publications, journalism and social media. This document analysis is flanked by interviews with edtech developers, data scientists, designers, publishers and policy makers in Germany and North America. Analysis zooms in on central concepts in the field today, such as disruption, interactivity, personalization, big data, and revolution.
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Video/Podcast
- Presentation and Discussion: “What Follows for Students & Society in the 2020s? 3 Speculative Futures for Education & Technology”, TiM seminar, Universität Utrecht, 13. Mai 2020. Video online here.
- Podcast on the same issue: “What Follows for Students & Society in the 2020s? 3 Speculative Futures for Education & Technology”, TiM seminar, Universität Utrecht, 22. Mai 2020, here.
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Publications
- Macgilchrist, F., Allert, H., & Bruch, A. (2020). Students and society in the 2020s: Three future 'histories' of education and technology. Learning, Media and Technology, 45(1), 76-89. doi:10.1080/17439884.2019.1656235
- Macgilchrist, F. (2019). Digitale Bildungsmedien im Diskurs: Wertesysteme, Wirkkraft und alternative Konzepte. Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte, 69(27-28), 18-23.
- Macgilchrist, F. (2019). Cruel optimism in edtech: When the digital data practices of educational technology providers inadvertently hinder educational equity. Learning, Media and Technology, 44(1), 77-86. doi:10.1080/17439884.2018.1556217
- Macgilchrist, F. (2018). Stirbt das Buch aus und kommt das Tablet? Über die Zukunft des Schulbuches in digitalen Zeiten. Vier Viertel Kult, Frühling/Sommer, 8-9.
- Macgilchrist, F. (2018). The “digital subject” of twenty-first-century education: On datafication, educational technology and subject formation. In P. P. Trifonas & S. Jagger (Eds.), Routledge Handbook of Cultural Studies in Education (pp. 239-254). New York: Routledge.
- Macgilchrist, F. (2017). Die medialen Subjekte des 21. Jahrhunderts: Digitale Kompetenzen und/oder Critical Digital Citizenship. In H. Allert, C. Richter, & M. Asmussen (Eds.), Digitalität und Selbst: Interdisziplinäre Perspektiven auf Subjektivierungs- und Bildungsprozesse (pp. 145-168). Bielefeld: transcript.
- Macgilchrist, F. (2017). Backstaging the teacher: On learner-driven, school-driven and data-driven change in educational technology discourse. Culture-Society-Education, 12(2), 83-103. doi:10.14746/kse.2017.12.4
