The Technology Environment: Subjectivity, Language, and Machine

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Abstract:

The question raised here is about the extent that liberal individualism and the consumerist ethos is the result of technology and to what extent is it the cultural norm of modernity. There has been a polarization in the way technology is understood. Predominantly it is assumed to be neutral but it can also be argued that technology exacerbates the understanding of people as ‘rational individual utility maximisers.’ C.A. Bowers argues that computer technology amplifies the conduit model of learning. The machine stores information and the student learns how to retrieve it and this constitutes neutral and objective research. Bowers advocates critical enquiry and an awareness of the socio-cultural factors that contribute to the generation of knowledge and community. The physiological parameters of machines are neither neutral nor strictly political. Technology shifts the constraints of phenomenological experience and encourages new and arguably impoverished ways of experiencing the world. However, by insisting on a critical dimension to understanding technology we could be able to transform education from its emphasis on vocationalism and governmentality to a more creative, equitable, and ecological set of factors.