Understanding How Students' Worldviews Develop Online: Teaching Cosmopolitanism

• In Event: Transformative Practices in Higher Education: Promoting Data Literacy, Collaboration, and Criticality Online

Abstract

Objectives
This paper builds on emerging literature on the development of cosmopolitan worldviews (Appiah, 2008; Hansen, 2010) in the context of an online course at a public university in California. In a range of disciplines, cosmopolitanism is being reimagined and interrogated as a means to reconcile “the tensions inherent in a vastly interconnected yet deeply divided world” (Author, 2010, p. 86), thereby juxtaposing local commitments with broader contexts of concern (Hansen, 2010). We trace in our research how students shift their senses of self in relation to local and global others as they participate in an online undergraduate course that leverages interaction, engagement, and learning through multiple media in conjunction with interdisciplinary studies.

Theoretical framework: cosmopolitanism
Cosmopolitanism, or the notion that all individuals are citizens of the world, and that we have an ethical responsibility to promote human welfare (Appiah, 2008; Hansen, 2010), is both the theoretical framework that we use for our research and the core theory that students explore in their online course. We also draw upon the capabilities approach, which provides a basis for a theory of justice and quality of life assessment (Nussbaum, 2011).

Methods
We collected the following data across four semesters in this qualitative case study: (1) Interviews, (2) observations of student discussions and analysis of student work, (3) surveys and course evaluations, and (4) students pre- and post- course essay responses. Interviews were transcribed and coded with inductive and deductive codes and data displays to explore emergent themes.

Findings
The data reveal that students in the course began to demonstrate an incipient understanding of cosmopolitanism, consistent with the theorists whose work they read, made possible through collaboration with their peers in small groups, opportunities to make “real-world” connections, and the use of the host of digital tools that were a part of the course. Although students seemed to benefit from and enjoy the online affordances, in particular self-led discussions, they came up short when asked to imagine how the theoretical constructs related to cosmopolitanism could be applied to actual schools and learners. Importantly, this difficulty appeared to be a curricular and conceptual one rather than a shortcoming of the online space and tools.

Significance
This paper unveils the possibilities and challenges of asking students to shift their understanding of self in relation to local and global others in the context of an online course. The importance of such shifts is magnified in today’s world, where our understandings of local and distant others are increasingly mediated by online tools and social media practices. Our research suggests the value of positioning students to be reflective about such shifts in educational settings, both online and in person, where they can engage in conversations with peers, leverage a range of digital technologies, explore current events, and draw on interdisciplinary perspectives. In this way an undergraduate course can become a space for fostering understandings about social interaction, identity, and social justice.

Authors

• Devanshi Unadkat, University of California - Berkeley

• Erin Murphy-Graham, University of California - Berkeley