Considering Convivial Tools: Promoting Democratic Deliberation in an Online Course

• In Event: 66.079 - Roundtable Session 25
  In Roundtable Session: 66.079-10 - (Re)considering Conviviality

Abstract

Institutionalized education systems may promote the passivity, ignorance, intolerance, and inequity they propose to address. Interactive digital technologies offer transformative challenges to traditional practice in education. As institutionalized education moves online, the evolving relationship between education, democracy, and technology demands critical reflection. Convivial tools and spaces foster democratic interaction and deliberation amongst people and ideas. What is growing in the cracks in the foundation of institutionalized education? In an online undergraduate course designed to promote democratic deliberation and agency, this study investigates whether institutional barriers to learning as an engaged, self-directed, interactive, personal activity can be reduced by digital promises.

Author

• Susan L. Meabon Bartow, Miami University