Hosted by The research program ENGAGE - (Dis)Engaging Children and Young People, DPU.

Organized by
Associate Professor Dorte Kousholt, School of Education, Aarhus University, Denmark
Professor MSO Line Lerche Mørck, School of Education, Aarhus University, Denmark
Professor Jean Lave, UC Berkeley, US
Professor Ana Gomes, Coordinator of the Anthropology of Education group, UFMG, Brazil

Theme
In continuation of previous collaboration about similarities and differences of societal, theoretical and methodological issues that shape research on situated learning - among children and young adults in Brazil and Denmark - this seminar takes on theoretical discussion of historical, dialectical, cultural, conflictual dimensions of social practice and marginalized positions as part of everyday life and learning.
The Anthropology and Education Group in the Faculty of Education at the UFMG is at the center of developments in relation to Childhood Studies, and learning of young adults on the margins as well as new vision of indigenous education emerging in collaborations of indigenous educators, indigenous students at the university, and anthropologists of education in Brazil.

Danish researchers presenting (from Aarhus University) have carried out research projects following children and young adults’ situated learning across different social practices and developed methodology in relation to such research processes (e.g. Kousholt, 2016). The participants in the seminar share an interest in working theoretically and analytically with conflicts, dilemmas, processes of exclusion, marginalization (e.g. Mørck 2011) – and developing research collectives that can support the development of alternative understandings of situated learning as well as practices of learning. This may involve taking up critical discussion of learning through apprenticeship (Lave & Nielsen in prep).

This second seminar further investigates similarities and differences between the different research projects and environments with the aim of developing theory and methodologies regarding historical, conflictual, cultural practices and situated learning. In that way the aim of the seminar is to explore common grounds through “focus on heterogeneity, complexity, and conflicts as generative in (and of) communities of practice” (Lave 2008. p.294)

Program:
May 2: Auditorium D174
10-12.30 am: Opening of the seminar by organizing committee, Jean Lave& Ana Gomes, Dorte Kousholt & Line Lerche Mørck

Opening lecture by Professor Ana Gomes in dialogue with Associate Professor and Head of Research and Development, RMC, Lars Brinck:
Conflictual, productive and creative practice and situated learning in and across cultures.

Opening lecture by Professor Jean Lave in dialogue with Professor Klaus Nielsen, AU, and Professor Roberta Bonetti, Univ. di Bologna:
Situated learning as Apprenticeship - revisited

LUNCH – Grafisk Cantina

Research Dialogues, reflected by Jean Lave and Ana Gomes
1.30-4 pm: Auditorium - D170 Danish and Brazilian researchers are ‘paired’ and interview each other about research interests and projects. The mutual interview will serve as an opener for discussions with the rest of the participants.

Associate Professor Dorte Kousholt is at present involved in a collective research project concerning conflicts in relation to children’s school life. Her research concerns investigating children’s communities, parental collaboration and home-school relations as dealing with contradictory concerns related to the school as conflictual practice.

Dorte Kousholt and Lærke Testmann together with Professor Ning de Coninck-Smith will exchange with Professor Maria Cristina Soares de Gouvea, Coordinator of the Research Group on Childhood Studies, UFMG, about historical and conflictual aspects of situated learning among children.

May 3: Auditorium D170 – all day
Research Dialogues, reflected by Jean Lave and Ana Gomes
10-12.30 am: Danish and Brazilian researchers are ‘paired’ and interview each other about research interests and projects. The mutual interview will serve as an opener for discussions with the rest of the participants.

Professor Line Lerche Mørck is at present researching major identity formation as continuity and change of mo(ve)ments and belongings – young men’s movements into and across criminal, radical, or extremist communities, and movements beyond them. Line will reflect on situated learning ‘from the societal margins’ with visiting professor Marina Franca who will present her work among sex worker in red-light district zone of apprenticeship in the "Bohemian zone" of Belo Horizonte, Brazil. The dialogue will involve discussions of social practice ethics and goals of “changing the world”.

Line Lerche Mørck and Maj Sofie Rasmussen, Phd. Student AU will participate in exchange with Fernanda Vasconcelos Dias, associate researcher, at the Observatory of Youth Program, UFMG, Brazil. They will discuss methodological approaches, research findings and teaching-learning experiences within the program, dedicated to youth education and based on the concept of Youth Pedagogies (Pedagogias das Juventudes), focusing on young Brazilians, the meanings of school, (dis)engagement in school as well as school exclusion. Furthermore, Fernanda will take up issues from her more recent research interest in Brazilian immigrant youth and issues of schooling experiences, immigration, and race relations in the U.S.

LUNCH – Grafisk Cantina

1.30 -4 pm: Panel, workshop and plenum discussion debate:
‘Situated learning theory revisited – where do we go from here’.
Introduction by Dorte Kousholt and Line Lerche Mørck ‘Situated learning theory revisited’ – framing and introducing questions for panel debate and workshop discussions
Panel debate: Professors Klaus Nielsen, Charlotte Højholt, Venka Simovska and Erik Axel
Workshop – participant discussions
Final reflections by Jean Lave and Ana Gomes: Where do we go from here?

See the program here.