SLA RESEARCH ON SELF-DIRECTION: THEORETICAL AND PRACTICAL ISSUES

With a different perspective on autonomy but still looking for the authentic side of it,
some authors consider the issue of autonomy from another angle. They are not interested in
the relationship of the individual and her inner cognitive processes (although they do not
deny it)ɪɜ but her relationship with the outside world (social vs psychological awareness)
(Benson; 1997,22). In other words, instead of focusing on the individual's abilities and
attitudes to be able to self-direct her learning processes, they emphasise the rights that the
individual has to express her own voice, to find her own means of articulation
(Pennycook; 1997,48). According to Littlewood, this means that autonomy provides the
learner with the tools for the expression of her personal meanings and the own creation of
her personal learning contexts. Here, the individual is defined not in psychological but in
social and political terms.

Autonomy is....the struggle to become the author of one's own world, to be
able to create one's own meanings, to pursue cultural alternatives amid the
cultural politics of everyday life (Pennycook; 1997,39)

This critical view of autonomy implies developing a language of critique and a
capacity to question our present reality and to consider different cultural alternatives
(Pennycook; 1997,46). However, this author faces the fact that "we can never step
completely outside the cultural and ideological worlds around us" (ibid).

4.3.5 The cultural dimension of autonomy and self-direction

The point made by Pennycook and Benson is also important for realising that there is
a third factor that mediates between the two extremes already discussed (universal and
individual). This is the cultural dimension. On the one hand, we have seen how even the
political views of autonomy acknowledge the restrictions and constraints of the social
context. No matter how autonomous a learner is, the rules that she establishes for her, have
to be in agreement with the rules established by the cultural context in which she interacts
(If we are thinking about self-direction within a formal learning scheme, there are always
rules set by the institution of the teacher). On the other hand, from a psychological point of
view, learning, either self-directed or other-directed, is not related to individualism. On the
contrary, according to Little,

IlO

<<   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   >>

More intriguing information