Clarifying this confusion is especially important because it helps to avoid the intrinsic attribution of the emancipative properties of storytelling to digital technology while disclosing the ideological implications of the digital turn in the politics of education.īy changing the rituals associated with the practices of storytelling, the digital turn frames the role of storytelling in education within the myths associated with digital technology and, in doing so, enforces the performative control of digital institutions on the subversive potential of the culture, if not the content, of storytelling itself. In this chapter I discuss the power of storytelling and the implications of the “digital turn” separately, in order to avoid confusing the two. The potential of this combination seems to exceed the mere sum of its parts. In much of the relevant literature, digital storytelling is credited with all the functions of traditional storytelling in addition to the alleged virtues of digital ← 13 | 14 → technology. The question of control is rooted in this ambivalence and in the efforts to resolve the uncertainty it generates in one direction or another. The political ambivalence of this capacity reflects the broader ambivalence of education: necessary but dangerous. The dual and perhaps contradicting nature of storytelling functions poses a very practical problem for those forces in society that are in apprehension of the intrinsic capacity of storytelling’s meaning-generation ability to subvert existing relations of power. It is elusive because storytelling is everywhere, present in numerous forms and shapes, public and private, and mediated and non-mediated communication. It is crucial because storytelling is the activity through which the meaning of the world and the social world itself are created. For the actors participating in this competition, mastering the functions of storytelling is both crucial and elusive.
The politics of education is a key dimension in the competition for control over the future of society. The Politics of Education, the Functions of Storytelling and the Problem of Control The chapters in this collection aim at supporting the efforts in this direction.ġ. The possibility for the digital turn in education and storytelling to open up emancipative opportunities depends on the extent to which educators are aware of and able to develop countermeasures against the oppressive tendencies associated with technocentrism and its myth.
The ideas that images “have power”, that digital community can compensate for the isolation of the individual and that the digital “revolution” brings about the “end of history” and politics are influential manifestations of these myths. The uncritical endorsement of the digital turn in storytelling, however, makes education vulnerable to the influence of technocentrism and its myths.
Education and storytelling are influential practices in the social construction of reality. While the emancipative affordances of this turn are given much visibility in academic and corporate discourse, the risks are neglected. The digital turn in education affects the educational functions of storytelling in ambivalent ways. The Politics of Education and the Digital Turn in Storytelling : A Critical IntroductionĪbstract Storytelling is an activity with important social and political functions.