Adult Learning/Werklund School of Education

From a critical cultural studies perspective, this paper acknowledges the tension between culture and materiality, and asserts that opportunities for informal, critical adult learning are present in everyday life. It uses consumerism as an example of hegemonic ideology encountered in daily living, and presents two anti-hegemonic responses to it.

In this paper, I begin with an outline of modern citizenship and a review of feminist and other critical analyses of this concept. I then discuss the role of consumption as a marker of citizenship. The paper closes with the prospect of understanding shopping as a potential process of learning about the links between consumption, citizenship and globalization.

In this article, I have used the 2004 Greatest Canadian contest as an example of media’s educational function. Contrary to mainstream discourse of gender‐neutral citizenship, this contest reiterates a notion of Canadian citizenship as masculinized, classed, and raced. Gramsci’s concepts of “hegemony,” ideology”, and “common sense” and Arnot’s concept of gender and class “codes” anchor this analysis. Drawing on Canadian feminist and critical race scholarship, and contrasting feminist liberal and feminist postmodern perspectives, I have explored the complications of gender and democratic citizenship, and exposed the limitations of liberal democracy for realizing equity and social justice.

Key words: informal education, media, feminism, Antonio Gramsci

This paper presents a gender analysis of information technology (IT) learning and work. It posits that gender continues to function in the power relations of the new knowledge-based society, despite rhetoric of gender-neutrality. Beginning with an overview of demographic and conceptual research, it paints a picture of the IT field of education and work as one gendered as masculine and dominated by men. It further explores gendered styles of learning and problemsolving, specifically in the context of computing, and how these styles can relate to women's learning and career pathways in the IT field.

In this paper the author connects conceptual and methodological development, typically presented as distinct processes. She argues that these processes are—or should be—underpinned by a common philosophical and theoretical stance. Using Gramsci’s The Prison Notebooks (1971), usually considered for its theory of social relations, the author outlines the work’s epistemological tenets. She then discusses the methodological ramifications of Gramsci’s perspective, relating his ideas to contemporary scholarship, especially by those working from feminist, critical race theory, and other critical perspectives. Because social theory and research methodology tend to be discussed as separate spheres and Gramsci’s work generally is taken up for its social theory, much of the methodological work reviewed here is not identified as Gramscian. Nonetheless, Gramsci’s ideas can have currency especially for qualitative researchers. An important message to take from The Prison Notebooks is to consider epistemology, theory, and methodology together rather than sequentially.
Keywords: methodological theory, critical theory, Gramsci

Working from a feminist/critical cultural studies perspective, which perceives culture and society as imbued with political tensions, I pose two central questions in this paper. First, how can community-based, consumer activism be understood as a strategy adopted by marginalized groups to assert rights claims? I focus on British women’s eighteenth- and nineteenth-century abolitionist boycotts as a case study of this understanding. These campaigns drew on women’s socially defined roles as shoppers and consumers both to mobilize and publicize opposition to slavery, and to agitate further for women’s political rights. Secondly, what are the implications of this case for adult education? The learning from this case study is multifaceted. It historicizes the concepts of citizenship, human rights and consumerism so that, today, we can understand them as discourses which have developed to accommodate changing interests, pressures and tensions in civil society. It also illuminates the complications of resistance, and the powerful political “incidental learning” (Foley 1999, 2001) which develops in the course of civic engagement, but is often overlooked precisely because it is unanticipated and embedded in action.

This paper uses the television show Grey's Anatomy to exemplify how popular culture functions as a source of informal adult learning related to work. Identity, ethics and pedagogy are explored as central themes of the show's messages to audience members.

This report is based on a study of the informal and alternative approaches to learning of women who are working in the rapidly expanding and changing IT field. Using their intuition, borrowing and sharing expertise, and through trial and error, study participants describe essential forms of learning often unacknowledged by both workers and employers.

This discussion focuses on the pedagogical function of commentaries on DVD releases of popular cultural products, using the television show Grey's Anatomy as an example. We explore how these commentaries formalize learning for audience members and constrain new understandings of cultural portrayals.

This paper discusses preliminary findings of a study exploring the pedagogical functions of pop culture. We use Grey's Anatomy and Scrubs to explore cultural portrayals of and messages about work-related learning with undergraduate medical and nursing students. Thematically, our analysis emphasizes learning about identity, ethics and pedagogy.

This paper discusses research exploring popular or “pop” culture’s pedagogical function. Interested in how American pop culture is inserted into Canadian policy debates, we are talking to Canadians aged 18 to 30 about how they understand messages concerning healthcare policy in Grey’s Anatomy. We outline our methodology and early findings, according to the themes of the “who,” “what” and “how” of healthcare, before closing with a summary of our next steps and the study’s contributions.

This paper discusses preliminary findings from research into popular c pedagogical functions, namely influences on sociopolitical debates and identities. We are juxtaposing messages and portrayals in the show understandings of and stances on healthcare-related policies and services. We focus here on inter-provincial similarities and differences that emerged in conversations with participants, and suggestions about how healthcare and pop culture are constructed and received across borders.

Using the American medical drama Grey's Anatomy as an exemplar, this paper outlines findings from a qualitative case study exploring impacts of popular culture on adult learning about social issues, particularly healthcare policy. Following a neo-Gramscian perspective, our fundamental premise is that popular culture functions pedagogically within and across borders, and that cultural consumption informs audience members' understandings of current issues and debates. In presenting our findings, based on focus group and interview data with participants in Western Canada, we organize our analysis and discussion to respond to the conference theme of changing configurations of adult education in transitional times. We outline various ways of conceptualizing transition, and explore how our data contribute to understanding contemporary times, places, cultural texts and social debates.

Adult educators talk frequently about learning which occurs during daily living; however, relatively few explore the breadth and depth of such learning. I contend that shopping, as it is commonly understood and practised in Western societies, is a site of everyday learning. Among people concerned about globalization, this learning connects shopping to the politics of consumption, identity and resistance.

This article addresses impacts of neoliberalism on work and life in the academy from the perspective of a junior scholar. I borrow from autoethnographic methodology to analyze personal experiences since launching my academic career at a Canadian university. I am especially attuned to how neoliberalism affects my learning and/at work, and the conditions that I encounter there. Although I recognize that my
personal background and situation, and the sociocultural context in which I live and work are particular, I see neoliberalism as an overarching ideology which increasingly frames life globally. My experiences and analysis, might offer insights into what life and work in the neoliberal academy looks and feels like for novice academics elsewhere.