Context: Public universities in South Africa are currently facing the challenge of decolonising knowledge. This change requires a review of curriculums, as well as teaching and learning with the goal of embracing the epistemology of the learners, addressing issues such as social justice and transformation. Problem: Human communication is subject to several perceptual errors in both listening and seeing, which challenges the success of the communication in the education system. The ability of the teacher and the learners to effectively communicate with one another is a factor for the success of each reaching their goals. The teacher imparts her knowledge in the classroom, but according to von Foerster, “[i]t is the listener, not the speaker, who determines the meaning of an utterance,” for the listener contextualises this information based on her own past lived experience. Thus, the student’s epistemology and her expression of her understanding is integral in the classroom context and should be actively included into the education system. Method: I present a cybernetic approach to the teacher-learner system, challenging traditional ideas about the role of each actor within the system, with special attention given to Pask’s conversation theory. Results: Early empirical findings suggest that a conversational contextual approach results in higher student involvement and better memory retention among the learners. Conversational approaches that are epistemologically inclusive diffuse social problems where the student groups require their individual worldviews to be reflected within the curriculum. This reduces the friction of competing epistemologies within the education system, moving toward a co-created contextually-driven knowledge system. Implications: Many educators would like deeper engagement from their learners but have not found a way to successfully engage the student group. A cybernetic approach is one method that can be adopted to remedy this. This is particularly useful in contexts where there is cultural diversity and impending social change. Constructivist content: I address von Glasersfeld’s points on human cognition, linking it to Austin’s speech acts.

Key words: Contextual approach, conversation theory, decolonisation of knowledge, education, epistemology, teaching and learning.

Context: South African public universities are currently undergoing a transitional period as they traverse the sensitive road of curriculum redesign that achieves an inclusive approach to education for the goal of the decolonisation of knowledge. Problem: Many classrooms have students from several cultural backgrounds yet in these spaces there is often a single dominant discourse on offer. An ethical question is raised in terms of what content should be addressed in the classroom. Method: An approach to curricula design as a conversation is presented. The philosophical aspects underlying shifts in epistemology are presented following an eclectic approach to curricula design that embraces second-order science in achieving the ongoing goal of decolonisation. The method used to achieve this goal is conversational heterarchical curriculum design assuming non quidem tabula rasa. Students can act as reference points (Nunataks) for curricula design, thus reducing the abstraction in the syllabus. Results: A heterarchical conversational approach offers a platform whereby social justice may be addressed in the classroom by providing a means by which the students’ own epistemology is embraced within the curriculum as the students provide the trajectory for the course content based on their own epistemology. A dynamic curriculum is then available that has immediate use in the communities that the students reside in. Students demonstrate understanding of the content as it is tied to their own way of knowing. Implications: The benefits of this approach include moving away from defining science according to a realist view. Educators may accept the idea that knowledge is not impartial and that method is tied to epistemology. When the observer is included in science, an awareness arises that theories (at least in the social sciences) affect what is studied, which in turn affects society. Constructivist content: The approach builds on von Foerster’s ideas on reflexivity. Pask’s conversation theory is a vehicle for the attainment of reflexive conversational teaching and learning.

Key words: Adaptation, curriculum design, conversation theory, cybernetics, decolonisation, ethics, heterarchy, nunatak, reflexivity, second-order science, ubuntuism.

Purpose: There is a lack of epistemological considerations in religious studies methodologies, which have resulted in an on-going critique in this field. In addressing this critique, the researcher’s observer effect needs to be actively accounted for owing to the influence of the researcher’s epistemology in the author’s research. This paper aims to answer the question of why a researcher should address one’s epistemology in the research. Design/methodology/approach – Using second-order cybernetics as an approach, observer dependence is exemplified and justified in the context of religious studies research methodology. The research activity is shown as a relational temporal coupling that introduces inter-subjective aspects to the research. The research process is analysed showing the need to provide scope for the researcher’s epistemology in one’s research. Findings: A relational observer-dependent approach to research embraces the epistemology of the researcher and the participants providing equality in the relationship. The research results are thus framed according to the nature of the relationship and are thus not detached. This addresses social justice and reduces troubling truth claims. Research limitations/implications – This first paper focuses on the question of why epistemology should be included in scholarly research. A detailed framework for how scholars may achieve this goal is to be part of the future study and is not presented in this paper. Practical implications: In many positivist approaches there is a motivation to hide the researcher; however, recently there has been a move towards including authors in the first person, realising that science is tied to politics, which does not reach its ideals of objectivity. Cybernetics is presented as an approach to addressing the move from “objective” to “subjective” research. Social implications – Researchers cannot get into the minds of their participants and thus an authorial privileged presentation by the researcher of the participant’s experiences is fraught with epistemological weaknesses. Attempting to own one’s own epistemology could address social justice in research by personalising the research and accounting for the observer effect and the inter-subjective attributes of the research relationship. Originality/value – The principle of observer dependence in cybernetics is not new; however, a research approach that focuses on the nature of knowing and how this may influence one’s research in religious studies is uncommon. It is thus presented here as a viable option to address the critique of epistemologically weak research methodology in religious studies.

Key words: intersubjectivity, research methodology, second-order cybernetics, epistemology, observer dependence, religious studies

This paper makes a comparison between enactivism and Levinas’ philosophy. Enactivism is a recent development in philosophy of mind and cognitive science that generally defines cognition in terms of a subject’s natural interactions with the physical environment. In recent years, enactivists have been focusing on social and ethical relations by introducing the concept of participatory sensemaking, according to which ethical know-how spontaneously emerges out of natural relations of participation and communication, that is, through the exchange of knowledge. This paper will argue first that, although participatory sensemaking is a valuable concept in that it offers a practical and realistic way of understanding ethics, it nevertheless downplays the significance of otherness for understanding ethics. I will argue that Levinas’ work demonstrates in turn that otherness is significant for ethics in that we cannot completely anticipate others through participation or know-how. We cannot live the other’s experiences or suffering, which makes ethical relation so difficult and serious (e.g. care for a terminally ill person always falls short to a certain extent). I will argue next that enactivism and Levinas’ philosophy nevertheless do not exclude each other insofar they share a similar concept of subjectivity as a quality of naturally interacting with the external world to gain knowledge (Levinas speaks of dwelling). Finally, I will argue that enactivism’s notion of participatory sensemaking also offers something which Levinas’ insufficiently defines, namely a concept of social justice, based on equality and participation, that emerges out of natural relations.

Key words: enactivism, levinas, otherness, social justice, naturalism

Open peer commentary on the article “Constructing Constructivism” by Hugh Gash. Upshot: Gash describes some very interesting and exemplary work using RC-influenced research and practices. I worry that his third stage of a three-stage emergence of constructivist epistemology in the study of cognitive development is consistent with a distinction between focus on individual cognitive development and focus on knowledge not in the mind but in the group, inconsistent with RC. An alternative is given and the issue of an RC perspective on social justice is discussed.

The actions of the mathematics teacher are bound up in ethical decisions that impact the learner and teacher, both within and external to the formal school curriculum. This paper argues that the principles of a radical constructivist theory of knowing underlie a model for an ethics of liberation. A learner’s active construction of their experiential reality, including the construction of the independent existence of the other and resulting social implications, frame guidelines for actions that are liberatory. To demonstrate this point, the paper develops the ideas of responsibility of the self, unique directions of learning, and socially-generated disequilibrium. When teachers and their students act according to such guidelines, they are freed to know mathematics and hence themselves in ways that allow them to work toward social justice and democratic ideals.

This case study investigates the development of the understanding of constructivist theory among students in a Masters level elementary teacher education program within a particular course. The focus of the study is a seminar entitled ‘Advanced Seminar in Child Development’. The questions explored include: How do students’ ideas of teaching, learning and knowledge develop within the context of their experience in this course? How do they come to understand constructivism? What are their definitions of constructivism? What is the course of the development of this understanding? The nature of the students’ learning processes is examined through three sources of data: dialog journals, videotaped sessions and the instructor’s reflective teaching journal. The study looks both at student development and instructional practice to further understanding of how student-teachers can learn to apply constructivist theory to their teaching and to understand the learning process, both within themselves and their students. Their development is placed in the context of Korthagen and Kessels’s model of teacher understanding and practice, and within a broader context of principles of practice that emphasize a belief in equity and social justice. The case illustrates how the way student-teachers are taught theory can help them integrate their own ideas of learning and teaching with constructivist theory in order to think critically about their own practice in an ongoing developmental manner.

From the inception of the American Society for Cybernetics in 1964, its members have asked periodically, ‘Why this society? What is its purpose? What should it do? ’ Most pointedly, these questions arise in the face of today’s global challenges: energy and global warming, water and food, health and social justice. Designing for these challenges demands systems literacy as well as cybernetics, the science of purposive systems, to help society steer toward a world that it wants. Most recently, these questions arise after a significant increase in strength for the ASC under the leadership of Ranulph Glanville, president of the society from 2009 through 2014, and his executive team. As a scholar and as the society’s president he emphasized the theme of ‘living in cybernetics, ’ that is, embodying cybernetic ideas and ethics in everyday life. As designer and teacher he beautifully articulated the relationships of cybernetics to design. With tribute to Glanville’s contributions to our community and our discipline, I call upon the ASC to move beyond shared interests and accumulated knowledge to become a force of action. From first-hand history with the society since the 1980s, I highlight specific ‘clarities’ expressed by the society’s participants from that time, while calling for greater currency for our time, in the form of new members and new actions. I propose a rationale for using second-order cybernetics for the design of a better world, the Designers’ Imperative. Lastly I encourage every member to approach today’s vast design challenges by tackling focusing problems through which progress can be made.

Key words: cybernetic curricula, design, focusing problems, global challenges, second-order cybernetics, variety

This volume addresses cutting edge issues in constructivist psychology dealing with theory, practice, and social justice. The volume begins by delving into thorny issues of meaning and communication from both radical constructivist and social constructionist perspectives. Building on this, prominent practitioners share advances in research and practice related to constructivist therapy - including work exploring grief, love, and narrative. From there, the volume pays special attention to constructivist conceptions of social justice as they relate to working with torture survivors, mentoring graduate students, and dealing with the objectification of women; it even uses constructivist theory to reflexively examine the limits of social justice counseling as a theoretical orientation. Finally, the volume comes full circle by revisiting theory - this time exploring the value preferences that often infuse research on epistemological beliefs, the metaphor of the psychotherapist-as-philosopher-of-science, and the contentious status of individualism within pragmatism and constructivism. In sum, Studies in Meaning 4 highlights constructivism’s multiplicity through fourteen stimulating and, at times, controversial scholarly contributions intended to sharpen the implications of constructivism for social critique and psychological practice.

Open peer commentary on the article “Heterarchical Reflexive Conversational Teaching and Learning as a Vehicle for Ethical Engineering Curriculum Design” by Philip Baron. Upshot: Social justice frameworks for higher education are increasingly emphasized. However, their implementation requires that lecturers take on new roles in the classroom. These new roles require creativity and courage and may place many lecturers in positions of discomfort. This discomfort might be minimized through more focused research into the value of heterarchical, conversational approaches to teaching and learning.