Title: Learning Theories/Post-Modern Theories - Wikibooks, open books for an open world
Headings: Learning Theories/Post-Modern Theories
Learning Theories/Post-Modern Theories
Contents
Overview
Defining causality (What causes shifts)
Cultural shifts (How it occurs)
The current debate (The basic definitions of PoMo)
Case studies & workplace examples

Content: The learning gleaned from the industrial (modern) era laid a foundation for the world to add new knowledge through a new era - what is now termed as the “post-modern” era. Presently, several post-modern theories exist, but at the core of each of these theories is the basic concept that what was once only understood within the context of reductionism is now beginning to be understood within the context of interrelatedness - an understanding that “things are much more diverse, fluid, illusionary, and contested, including the reality of the world itself” (Merriam & Caffarella, 1999, p. 356) than originally thought. Though truth is central to postmodern thinking, it is not the search for truth that is valued. In contrast, the postmodern mind challenges what is accepted truth. According to Astley (1985) and Gergen (1992), as cited in Dierkes et. al. ( 2003), postmodernists challenge "the conventional wisdom, routines, static meanings, and axioms of 'normal' science, thereby exposing knowledge to non-dogmatic forms of thought" (p. 44). One can see how this philosophy has become embraced in academia and one could argue that it is the primary modus operandi in many institutions of higher learning, especially in philosophy and the humanities. The postmodern approach to learning is founded upon the assertion that there is not one kind of learner, not one particular goal for learning, not one way in which learning takes place, nor one particular environment where learning occurs (Kilgore, 2001). Kilgore (2001) makes several assertions about the postmodern view of knowledge: