Material enactments of identities and learning in everyday community practices: implications for pedagogy

In recent years there has been an upsurge of interest in applying actor-network theory (ANT) to educational research and analysis. This article presents an account of how an ANT analysis of socio-material practices with a focus on objects can bring informal learning and identity formation to view. It is based on a doctoral study of the everyday practices of women in voluntary community organisations in a rural town in Victoria, Australia. In the absence of formal representational learning, an analysis of data with a focus on the centrality of objects to learning in practices and processes shows how relations of different entities can be traced in material enactments of learning and identity. The emergence of a new dimension in learning (materiality) changes the whole methodology of learning, and a new understanding of learning has implications for pedagogy and adult education