Intra‐active entanglements: What posthuman and new materialist frameworks can offer the learning sciences

Abstract

AbstractThis paper examines what new materialist and posthumanist frameworks can offer learning science research in diverse maker learning environments. We explore what is gained by grappling with the entanglements between humans, non‐humans and more‐than‐humans. To do this, we draw on Karen Barad's ethico‐onto‐epistemology and agential realism where she redefines connections to the shared world by attuning to the entangled matter that is created within intra‐actions. We use this framework across four international cases: digital media camps, a university‐level classroom‐based makerspace, a Saturday outdoor makerspace workshop and a classroom‐based museum makerspace. Each case study attends to how intra‐actions enact agential forces in maker education research—forces that posthuman and new materialist frameworks help us see. In so doing, these case studies challenge many of the assumptions prevalent in the learning sciences about mattering and its implications in research sites.