A Thematic Analysis of the Maker Movement in Cyberspace Across Cultural Contexts

Abstract

The Maker movement in education evokes a spectrum of reactions from it being the panacea for engineering and design education to a fad that will be forgotten shortly. The theoretical inquiry we embarked upon this semester aimed at identifying both the potential opportunities and gaps the Maker movement presents for education. We started the inquiry from a perspective that this sort of approach to education has the potential to democratize engineering and design education through the use of co-working spaces (like Makerspaces). We collected evidence to support such a claim by understanding how Makerspaces are perceived in the United States and other cultural contexts, how academic literature espouses the virtues of Makerspaces, and finally connecting these virtues to developmental and educational theory. The study culminated in making connections between these areas and identifying the gaps that remain. Finally, we recommend lines of investigation that may help us better understand the potential benefits of Makerspaces in education. Introduction & methodology Our three-phased inquiry is driven and motivated by our perception of the power that coworking spaces hold to democratize education. Thus, each of the inquiries answers a pertinent question that can be related back to this perception with the aim of achieving deeper and broader insight into the different aspects involved. Democratizing education is deeply associated to accessibility. This informs our first inquiry which aims at understanding how such spaces are presenting themselves in the United States, and other select cultural contexts. The search and analysis in this phase provides us with an understanding of what is happening in this space from a practitioner’s perspective. A large number of co-working spaces that hold our interest are referred to as Makerspaces. These spaces however are not necessarily affiliated to Maker media. Due to the generalized usage of the word Makerspace, in this paper “co-working spaces” and “Makerspaces” are used interchangeably. Our next phase of inquiry aims at assessing and understanding academic research literature that brings together Makerspaces and education. The search and analysis in this phase provides insight into the ideas and propositions of academic researchers who research in this field. The third phase of this inquiry, we believe is an important incorporation for most new concepts or ideas with claimed educational benefits. We invoke on educational and developmental theory that is cited in academic research literature, and other theories that we believe could be applicable to Making and education. This analysis helps us situate our perception in theory, and also ground our suggestions for future work. At this point, we find it imperative to situate the work done in this study as a thematic analysis. Even though our data does not replicate traditional data used for thematic analysis, this study sits well within the definition of a “method for identifying, analysing and reporting patterns” (p. 79). Particularly as a theoretical analysis, as it renders well our theoretical and analytical interests in the subject matter.