EMMA: New Ground

Emergent Thoughts

Thanks to Norah for sending the links on Emergent Structure. I think that it is very important that we recognize the radical shift that this way of structuring a class entails in the thinking/awareness/working habits of its participants. I sense that Norah and Matt did not expect the experimental structure to throw us for such a loop, but I believe that it has, in practice, become the most dominant force in the room. Perhaps if we talk more in depth about emergent structures and why Norah and Matt chose to experiment with them in the context of this class, we will be more forthcoming with our own ideas and directions.

I wonder if this class is not more of an experiment in Self-Organization than Emergence, at least as the two related ideas are outlined and distinguished by their respective Wikipedia articles. This quote in Wikipedia’s entry on Self-Organization helped me to discover what I believe to be the source of the discomfort that I expressed in Tuesday’s class:

“The ancient atomists (among others) believed that a designing intelligence was unnecessary, arguing that given enough time and space and matter, organization was ultimately inevitable, although there would be no preferred tendency for this to happen.” (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-organization)

Following a perusal of the materials on Emergence and Self-Organization and our discussion on Tuesday, I now believe (and would love clarification, if I am wrong) that Norah and Matt were operating the class under the assumption that if they provided enough time (Tuesdays and Thursdays plus individual lab hours), space (Emma), and matter (readings from 1st quarter? interactive technology? the collaborators themselves?) that the class would organize itself. But I don’t feel that this expectation was ever clearly articulated until Tuesday.

At the end of last quarter, I was under the assumption that we would move forward with studies based on our proposals and eventually collaborate on a culminating interactive performance focusing on one or more of the projects that emerged from the proposals. As we began this quarter it was clear that we were not focusing on any one of the proposals – but creating something new that pulled on what seemed to be a somewhat shared interest in surveillance.

I think that this turn away from my original expectations that was the beginning of a kind of creative souring for me. What seemed to me to have been very strong, thoughtful, directed ideas proposed by each member of the class were watered down into a very open, flexible, and unfixed palate of ideas from which we were going to construct… something. What the “something” was none of us seemed to know – and in the midst of the larger context of our event-filled lives (birth, death, and Mark Morris), engaging in this undefined “something” became more and more difficult.

Returning to the quote, I feel that what we’ve been missing (or at least unclear about) is the “matter,” the “third great thing” as pedagogical scholar Parker Palmer describes it, the subject of our course, the content. Are we studying interactive performance? Are we studying emergent structures? Are we studying composition in the context of new media? Are we studying theories of the body? Is our focus process? Product? Content? Form?

In the first quarter we read about a huge array of topics – the body and technology, computer interface, improvisation, responsive environments, agents as performers in computer games, robotics, artificial intelligence….

I don’t believe that the class has to be about only one of these many great things (I’d like to think that I could handle a more complex, polycentric model of teaching/learning), but I do think we need more direction than we’ve had up to this point. I would love to know why Norah and Matt wanted to introduce this class. Maybe understanding your investment as teachers will give us a fresh perspective – will help us understand/formulate/derive our own “why” for this class.

I recognize and appreciate the openness with which we are able to discuss the structure of this class. We are looking a fascinating pedagogical and artistic dilemma square in the eye. What are the differences between a truly “emergent” structure and a classroom modeled on an emergent structure? What does self-organization mean within the context of the classroom? What can a class modeled on emergent structures offer that a more traditional collaborative, discussion based class cannot? As someone who is intimately invested in both collaborative art-making and experimental teaching methods, I am intrigued by the discoveries that our struggle to answer these questions will inspire. Looking forward to an hour-long performance on Friday for the Open House and a final culminating performance, I also feel like it’s important for us to come to some degree of comfort with the structure of the class relatively quickly in order to make productive work within it.

posted by Annie @ 6:51 PM