“It’s not a laptop project. It’s an education project”: The discursive construction of the OLPC and the thorny issue of technological determinism.

Dr Marcus LeaningUniversity of Winchester

Introduction

Ongoing research project. Examine OLPC programme in relation to

the idea of technological determinacy.1. Background to the OLPC;2. Examine the technological determinist

critique;3. The discursive construction of the

OLPC’s impact by Negroponte;4. Theorise the model of technological

determinacy.

The OLPC XO-1 Educational netbook

produced for the developing world.

High spec. Super tough. Very cheap about

$100 off the shelf. Goal was global

saturation, to get one in the hands of every primary school aged child.

Theoretical background

Ideas of using the laptop in education is based upon Papert’s constructionism (a derivative of Piagetian informed constructivism). We learn by building ‘things’.

Kay’s 1971 ‘Dynabook’ the educational computer.

Also healthy dose of e-book optimism.

History and Numbers Launched in 2005 at Davos with prototype at

WSIS in Tunis. Released in November ‘06. As well as success, lots of problems: distribution;

countries not committing in sufficient numbers; rivals; economic downturn.

OLPC claims over 1.8 million in the field as of August ‘10.

Countries

Numbers May – August 2010 (some updates slower)

Peru >590,000 plan to reach 850,000 by July 2011

Uruguay > 480,000 more on way…

Rwanda 120,000

Argentina

60,000

Mexico 50,000

Haiti 13,700

Nigeria 6,000

Countries

Numbers May – August 2010 (some updates slower)

Ethiopia 5,900

Afghanistan

5000

Nicaragua 5000

Iraq 1150

China 1000

Thailand 505

India 31

DistributionGreen = OLPC Deployments (5000+, saturation)Purple = OLPC PilotsBlue = Preparing for a pilotMagenta = Give One Get One

Technological determinism

One big criticism has been that the OLPC understands itself as a technology that will result in a specific outcome - technological determinism.

While the OLPC seems to have no problem with this, the description is intended to be a pejorative one (James, 2010; Leaning, 2010; Winston, 2007).

Projects that regard themselves as TD are regarded as problematic.

Why technological determinism is problematic if not ‘faulty’.Technology not discreet –

technology is part of culture, not ‘clean’.

Target environment is downplayed – TD ‘flattens difference’.

Unintended consequences – impact is not linear, technology is an ecosystem, one change impacts many areas.

Technological determinism examined Current research is to examine

the discourse of the OLPC so as to understand OLPC foundation and Negroponte’s model of technological impact.

5 of Negroponte’s speeches and texts from: 2005, 2006, 2 x 2007, 2009 at TED, IADB, Netevents, on Al

Jazeera and in the Economist. Used discourse analysis of:

Fairclough (2001a, 2001b, 2003); Chouliaraki and Fairclough (1999).

Findings: A The narrative arc of the OLPC… Why do we need the OLPC?

1. There are certain fixed, normative, foundational discursive moments – ▪ Aspects of the world, certainties, things that don’t change.

2. But there are also ‘problems’ – villains, false friends.▪ Comparatively bad practices that can be improved.

3. Then there is the solution.▪ A way to improve the bad practices and lead to the goal of

‘education’ and a ‘better world’ – ‘no problem that can’t be fixed with education’.

The OLPC has a narrative arc.

The OLPC story…

Fixed categories - these are certain but ‘un-actualised’:

The problems - things that stop education

The solution

Children: Individualist, creative

Role of education: restrictive, limiting.

Technology:positive, enabling

Teachers: impediments, absent, didactic method, poorly educated

Learning:facilitator of ‘being’

Teaching: rote, limited,

Findings: B

Once these components and story are accepted they lead to a sophisticated two pronged argument.

Findings B: Education of children as a goal in itself Education of children as a goal in

itself- it allows a ‘normal’ or even ‘natural’ state of affairs of education and individual development to resumed or facilitated.

Children will be facilitated by technology to pursue their natural inquisitiveness and achieve their teleological development.

Findings B: the instrumental purpose of education Technology via Education will transform society. Multipart account of domino-transformation of

societies. Children can be ‘leveraged’ to achieve

development.

Technology will

transform education

Children will be

educated in a better

manner and

therefore more fully educated

The children

will lead to social

development and

solve the problems themselve

s

Technological determinism This is a slightly different interpretation of technological

determinism to the usual direct impact - `The hand mill gives you society with the feudal lord; the steam mill society with the industrial capitalist' (Marx, 1847).

Marx and Smith (1996) identify a continuum:

Hard Determinis

m

Soft Determinis

m ‘Machines make history by changing the material conditions of human existence. It is largely machines… that define what it is to live in a certain epoch.’ (Heilbroner, 1996:69).

Technology is ‘prime mover’ but causes change through ‘agents’. Technology has no direct impact unless embedded in social practices and is subject to negotiation and appropriation.

Power of Technology

Conclusion and thoughts

OLPC understands itself in a ‘soft determinist’ sense.

No less problematic, determinism is but one means of understanding technology’s impact.

But does mean evaluation tools need to be more subtle if the validity of the project is to be measured.

But evaluation is a whole other very problematic issue…

ReferencesChouliaraki, L., & Fairclough, N. (1999). Discourse in late modernity: rethinking

critical discourse analysis: Edinburgh University Press.Fairclough, N. (2001a). Critical Discourse Analysis as a Method in Social Scientific

Research. In Wodak, Ruth & Meyer, Michael (Eds.), Methods of Critical Discourse Analysis, Sage.

Fairclough, N. (2001b). Language and power: Longman.Fairclough, N. (2003). Analysing discourse: textual analysis for social research:

Routledge.James, J. (2010). New Technology in Developing Countries: A Critique of the One-

Laptop-Per-Child Program. Social Science Computer Review, 28(3), 381-390.Leaning, M. (2010). The One Laptop per Child Project and the Problems of

Technology-led Educational Development. In I. R. Berson & M. J. Berson (Eds.), High-tech tots : childhood in a digital world. Information Age Publishers.

Marx, K. (1955) [1847] The Poverty of Philosophy, Progress Publishers.Marx, L. & Smith, M, (1996). ‘Introduction’, in M. Smith & L. Marx, eds. Does

Technology Drive History? The Dilemma of Technological Determinism, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Winston, B. (2007). Let Them Eat Laptops: The Limits of Technicism. International Journal of Communication, 1, 170-176.