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Taguchi, L. Hillevi. 2016. "The Concept As Method - Tracing-And-Mapping The Problem of Neuro (N) in The Field of Education PDF
Taguchi, L. Hillevi. 2016. "The Concept As Method - Tracing-And-Mapping The Problem of Neuro (N) in The Field of Education PDF
research-article2016
Article
Abstract
For this article, I ask how it might be possible to study the encounter between the practices that involve the concept of
the Neuro(n) and educational practices of teaching and learning. The article aims to experiment by thinking the concept
as method. This entails the doubled and entangled movement of tracing-and-mapping the concept ofin this casethe
Neuro(n). I suggest that the contemporary obsession with the Neuro(n) in the field of education emerges from the desire
to know more about the learning subject, knowledge, and the problem of how something new comes into the world.
Keywords
concept as method, Claire Colebrook, Deleuze and Guattari, the Neuron, neurosciences and education
Introduction
This article enters onto a plane of thinking on which multiple institutionalized practices, social activities, and disciplines of knowledge production encounter and traverse each
other to become productive of various neuro-ontologies
(Rose & Abi-Rached, 2013). In the academy, one discipline
after the other adds the prefix Neuro- from ancient Greek
- (neuro-) as a combining form of (neuron,
sinew, tendon, cord). By adding this cord or nervelike connection between rapidly growing neuroscientific
knowledge production and their own discipline, it is given
new stamina (sinew) and muscle (tendon): neuroeconomics, neuro-marketing, neuro-architecture, neuroeducation, neuro-psychology, and so on (Rose & AbiRached, 2013; Satel & Lilienfeld, 2013).
This phenomenon can be connected to what Deleuze and
Guattari (1994) write on how concepts and practices link up
with each other, support one another, coordinate their contours, articulate their respective problems (p. 18). Even if a
word from a discipline has a completely different history than
that of the concept of, in this case, the Neuro(n), there are, as
Deleuze and Guattari write, usually bits or components that
come from other concepts, which correspond to other problems and presuppose other planes of thinking and practicing1
(Deleuze & Guattari, 1994). In the case of my own academic
discipline, education, one example is how newer theories
of affect revitalize older psychological theories of attachment. In conjunction with recent findings from affectiveneuroscientific research, it now becomes possible to propose
specific educational practices stressing more consistent and
Corresponding Author:
Hillevi Lenz Taguchi, Professor of Education and Child and Youth
Studies, Co-Director of the Division of Early Childhood Education,
Department of Child and Youth Studies, Stockholm University, Frescati
hagvg 16B, Stockholm 10691, Sweden.
Email: hillevi.lenz-taguchi@buv.su.se
214
that exposes the entangled relationship between the life sciences (especially the neurosciences) and the philosophical
problem of vitalism and, thus, how to make sense of the
principles of life, the arrival of being, and how (human) life
can be maintained in the face of extinction.
215
Lenz Taguchi
exemplify with perhaps the most common concept of philosophy and psychology, Descartes Cogito, and the concept of Self. When Descartes constructed this concept, it
would reconfigure some of the available definitions up to
that point. He posed the problem of how a certain type of
living relation, a relation of knowing or sensing, come to
appear and have a sense of itself (Colebrook, 2014b,
p. 62). He then constructed the diagrammatic image of the
I as a composition of other component concepts in the
form of the verbs doubting, thinking, and being:
I think therefore I amMyself who doubts, I think, I
am, I am a thinking thing (Deleuze & Guattari, 1994, p.
25). Above is a copy of the diagrammatic image Deleuze
and Guattari provide in their book. The Cogito condensed at
point I, passing through and coinciding with its intensive
components: I (doubting), I(thinking), and I (being).
(Deleuze & Guattari, 1994, p. 25).
This assemblage constructs the concept of Cogito/Self as
a subjective horizon for knowledge that always starts with
the subject and which we immediately recognize from theories of psychology and phenomenology. When Kant later
critiqued Descartes, he set up his own plane of thinking on
which the Cartesian Cogito does not work without being
reconfigured with the component of time (Deleuze &
Guattari, 1994). What Deleuze and Guattari themselves
question as they set up their specific plane of thinking is
whether or not it is necessary to start from the point of view
of a subjective certainty and if thought as such be the verb
of an I? (Deleuze & Guattari, 1994, p. 27). The Cartesian
Cogito is, however, not only the effect of a subjective I, write
Deleuze and Guattari (1994), but also the always-renewed
event of thought (p. 24). This is an aspect of Cartesianism
that will become a part of their own reconfiguration of the
subject as, instead, a process of series of individuations
(Colebrook, 2014b; Deleuze & Guattari, 1987).
216
217
Lenz Taguchi
Therefore, what are some of the desiring lines of articulation on this particular plane of thinking, and what are the
major battles fought over (cf. Colebrook, 2010)?
question: Do you see this egg? With this you can topple
[overthrow] every theological theory, every church or temple
in the world. (p. 4). With this comment, he refers to both
religious and scientific convictions. He does not ask
DAlembert to observe the egg and turn that observation into
a mathematical formula, which would be an example of classic rational thinking. Instead, Diderot asks him to see the egg
following another line, aiming to a point in another direction,
outside the limits of mathematical logic. Stengers (2007)
notes that Diderot asks DAlembert to accept seeing the egg
using other sensesaffect and emotionand to imagine the
developing embryo and the small chicken that breaks the
shell and comes out. The storys epistemological problem
concerns whether learning is an effect of rational human
thinking or an effect of the human subjects affective senses.
As Stengers notes, choosing to think of learning as affective
and subjective perception risks getting stuck at the other side
of the binary. The point here is to not accept the distinction
that grounds the binary.
What have we put on the map so far? The Neuro(n) has
been traced and mapped to a problem of humanness and
whether or not the human brain, mind, and Cogito/Self in
contemporary neuro-philosophy is understood in terms of a
human and brain-centered ontology or a reductive material
eliminativism ontology of sheer brain matter. Central components of the Neuro(n) that can be exposed in this exercise are
the embodied mind/brain and plasticity in its interaction with
the environment. When Stengers story about Diderots egg is
added on and put on the map, it connects this ontological
binary to the problem of epistemology and the production of
knowledge and learning. The components of rationality and
affect as components of the Neuro(n) are hereby provided.
When we thus connect Stengers story about Diderots egg
to the ontological binary sketched above, the epistemological
binary of rationality (naturalism/positivism) vs. subjectivism
(phenomenology/constructivism) can be put on the map in
the territory that celebrates the unique humanness of the mind
and self rather than in the territory of reductive eliminativism
and a brain of sheer matter. We add to that territory the epistemological problem of how knowing for a human subject is
achieved as an effect of either rational thought and/or affect
as in emotional engagement (Dennett, 2007). However, as we
shall see below, something else will happen as we perform
the move of an asignifying rupture on the map when we make
another reading of Stengers story. Thereby, we follow
another line and desiring force that escapes both these segmentary molar lines and binary regimes.
218
intensities and centers of vibrations (Deleuze &
Guattari, 1994, p. 23), these four components will be seen
to resonate and interact closely with each other. In what follows, I will trace and map the lines of these components in
a singular text featuring what is called neurodidactics to
exemplify the collective enunciations and lines of articulations that form their respective circles of convergence on
the map.
When the Brain Gets to Decide (Olivestam & Ott, 2010)
is the title of this book that uses the prefix of the Neuro- to
outline how educational practices can be transformed into
better practice when embracing knowledge from the neurosciencesto enact neurodidactics. When reading this
book, it is possible to see what Deleuze and Guattari (1994)
mean when they write that the concept speaks the event
and is a function of a problem (p. 18); that is, when it does
the job of a particular problem. In this book, the concept of
the Neuro(n) zigzags rhizomatically on a plane of already
established educational theories to converge with them and
form a new stratified territory and new evidence-based
regimes of practice. When the neurosciences encounter
these educational theories and practices, already stratified
practices transform but are to be immediately re-stratified
into new normalizing didactics. This is the process that
Deleuze and Guattari (1987) refer to as reterritorialization.
Following the intensive force of desiring production in
this book (Olivestam & Ott, 2010), we learn that it is with
knowledge derived from the neurosciences that we have
finally attained the evidence of behaviorisms ideas about
the importance of rewards to achieve optimal learning in the
form of an embodied learning. However, because of the
brains plasticity, this evidence should be combined with
established knowledge from sociocultural theory about the
importance of educational artifacts and the environment in
learning. Olivestam and Ott (2010) note that sociocultural
theory is similarly affected by findings from neuroscientific
research. Cognitive theories have also been proven correct
by evidence-based neuroscience. The authors show how the
brain in a specific mode of rationality organizes and creates
patterns during the learning process (Olivestam & Ott,
2010). Finally, progressivisms idea about learning by
doing, whereby both rational reasons as to why something
is to be learned as well as the significance of emotional/
affective engagement in learning are components equally
supported by neuroscientific findings. The brain is embodied and the body is embedded, as these advocates of
Neurodidactics conclude (Edelman, 2006, in Olivestam &
Ott, 2010, p. 77). The validity of existing developmental
and educational theories are, in this way, not only confirmed
but also updated and given new stamina in their convergence with neuroscientific knowledge.
The theories of neurodidactics are clearly both materialist and reductive in character, but ontologically, they are
still explicitly human-centered (anthropocentric). Hence,
the component of plasticity refers only to the internal plasticity of the brain in this line of convergence. This means
that plasticity here is not understood in accordance with the
more radical materialist and reductive line of articulation
leaning towards the other side of the ontological binary
sketched above; that is, in terms of a brain extended outside
the human skull (e.g., Clark, 2011; Cutler & MacKenzie,
2011; Thompson, 2010). Instead, Olivestam and Ott (2010)
explicitly write that their neurodidactical approach to learning is specified as an intra-cranial field that extends the
brain only as to be affected by social relations to other students, the teacher and the learning-content (p. 111). In the
tracing-and-mapping of the desiring forces in the theory
and practices of neurodidactics, neuroscientific knowledge
can be understood as high jacked to converge with already
established educational practices to form new molar lines
and segmentary practices for teachers to abide by to be
successful.
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Lenz Taguchi
political processes to the will, intent and agency of individuals or subjects, passive vitalism is micropolitical: it attends
to those differences that we neither intend, nor perceive, nor
command (p. 106). With this in mind, let us return to the
tracing of the components of the neurodidactics example
above and trace its vitalizing forces.
220
lines, the tracing-and-mapping exercise needs to include
enactments of asignifying ruptures. This means engaging in
a practice of estrangement by connecting to something different or to something omitted or silenced to get away from
taken-for-granted and common sense significations
(Deleuze & Guattari, 1987).
Let us reread Stengers (2007) example with Diderot
asking DAlembert to see the egg. When Diderot asks
DAlembert to activate a mode of estrangement and follow
what we call a line of flight, he asks that he give the egg the
power to challenge his well-defined categories, writes
Stengers (2007, p. 4). For Stengers, this constitutes a rupture in that it forces DAlembert to think outside or beyond
any already known categories (or temples) of thinking such
as rational scientific thinking or subjective affective relational sensing and knowing. Rather, this is a materialism
that follows a line of thinking that forces us to activate an
ethics of potentialities or political struggle by giving, in this
case, the materiality of the egg itself the power to challenge
us in unforeseen ways. With reference to Haraway (2008),
Stengers (Haraway, 2008) writes, accept seeing the egg and
accept grappling with the messiness of the world (p. 4).
Therefore, following the line of flight from this rupture,
what might that messiness be in relation to educational
practices and how can it be understood to emerge from the
problem of vitalism?
As part of the doubled movement of thinking the concept as method, let us set up a new event on this plane of
thinking where the Neuro(n) connects to educational practices to reconfigure that plane and the problem of vitalism.
This example concerns the event of an interdisciplinary
research event on neuroplasticity showing evidence of differences in selective attention in children from different
socioeconomic backgrounds (Neville etal., 2013; Stevens,
Lauinger, & Neville, 2009). This research, a rare example
of a classical positivist experiment based on a hypothesis
with very strong social justice implications, makes this
event an enactment of an asignifying rupture in the present
tracing-and-mapping of the Neuron. It is by doing research
in this particular paradigm, not to primarily know more
about the brain, but with political hopes of an enactment of
the becoming-child that connects this research event to
the omitted, left out, and silenced (Deleuze & Guattari,
1987, p. 11); that is, children in North American underprivileged housing and schooling areas.
In this neuroscientific intervention study, preschool childrens auditory attention skills were measured with EEG
(electroencephalography) before and after a period of 8
weeks of social-emotional training and changes in their
school and home environments. Significant change was
seen as a result of changes in the brain due to its plasticity.
Changes were more significant in the children from the
groups with the lowest social economic status (Neville
etal., 2013; Stevens etal., 2009).
In this research, neuroscientists and educators collaborate
in unique and rare experiments performed in a micro-political
alliance with the concept of the Neuron to show the process
of differing in its very enactment. They do this byif only
provisionallyproviding children from underprivileged
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Lenz Taguchi
families social-emotionally safer educational and home
environments based on the hypothesis that this will increase
their attention abilities and help them learn better (Neville
etal., 2013; Stevens etal., 2009). As this research event is put
on the map and temporarily captured, we can apprehend and
make sense of these observed differences in the enactment of
a scientific experiment in terms of a performativity of differing. In these experimentations and enactments of new kinds
of learning-brains-environments, children from underprivileged communities increase their potentialities and exceed
what might otherwise be produced in their everyday and
taken-for-granted (unsafe) stratified spaces of educational
practices (Stevens etal., 2009; cf. Colebrook, 2014b).
Moreover, these educational and scientific experiments can,
if effectuated more widely, expose the becoming-child that
becomes different in herself or himself and can thus help
fight poverty and failing democracy as effects of educational
practices. Hence, a queer vitalism, as I understand Colebrook
(2014b, 2010), is neither completely passive nor completely
active. Rather, it transgresses such a binary thinking and
relies on a complex interdependence between active and passive vitalist forces.
Summing Up
Inspired by Colebrooks invitation to begin to think the
concept as method, I have tried to perform the doubled
movement of a tracing-and-mapping exercise of this particular field of desiring production where the neurosciences
connect to the philosophy of mind and educational practices. In this process, I have constructed the concept of the
Neuro(n) and extracted the problem of vitalism from which
this concept has emerged on this particular map that was
set up for this preliminary exercise. Moreover, I have performed an asignifying rupture on this map that has made it
possible for me to set up a new event, which has enabled me
to understand humanness and the learning student in a different way. In this new event, neuroscientific experiments
(Neville etal., 2013; Stevens etal., 2009) have been connected to the problem of vitalism in terms of a queer vitalism of a differential power that makes it possible for us to
think about childrens learning bodies as never striving
toward or taking on a complete or definite form or wholeness, but always being in a creative process of individuation
that might exceed any norm, normality, or majoritarian
form of existence (Colebrook, 2014b). It is my conviction
that this counter-active thinking about the learning subject
can open up and transform educational realities in decisive
ways.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with
respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Notes
1. From translators preface of A Thousand Plateaus (1987),
The word plane designates both a plane in the geometrical
sense and a plan (p. xvii). The authors use it primarily in
the first sense. Where both meanings seem to be present (as
in discussions of the plan dorganisatori), plan(e) has been
used in the translation.
2. The philosophy of mind has, since Descartes, dealt with the
core question about the relationship between mind, brain, and
body and between the mental and the physical. This question
extends into contemporary explorations of artificial intelligence and trying to build a computer that might function as
the human brain. See Chalmers (2002).
3. Although the movements of tracing-and-mapping are dealt
with separately in Deleuze and Guattaris writing on rhizomatics and cartography strategies in A Thousand Plateaus,
I have chosen to construct the simplified, joint expression of
tracing-and-mapping to point to the simultaneity and avoid a
false impression of an antagonistic relationship between the
two. It is due to our tendency to get stuck in the mere critical
aspect of tracing that Deleuze and Guattari (1987) explicitly
tell us, Make a map, not a tracing, as they outline the fifth
and sixth principles of rhizomatics: cartography (mapping)
and decalcomania (tracing; p. 12).
4. The expression of The Concept as Method was suggested by
Claire Colebrook (2013) at an invited conference-symposium
in Stockholm, Sweden in June 2013.
5. I am here using Haraways (1988) concept of the materialsemiotic because I think this expression best captures
the idea of that meaning, and matter, material, social, and
semiotic forces are always already entangled and co-constitutive of each other, central to New Materialisms and New
Empiricisms theorizing.
6. This is exactly what Karen Barad (2007) does with concepts
from physics. They are no longer concepts of physics in her
cultural studies and feminist philosophy/theorizing.
7. This image (or other media file) is in the public domain
because its copyright has expired. This applies to Australia,
the European Union, and those countries with a copyright
term of life of the author plus 70 years. http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Purkinje_cell_by_Cajal.png?uselang=s.
8. Vitalism here relies on Colebrooks (2014b) definition as the
imperative of grounding, defending or deriving principles
and systems form life as it really is, (p. 100) also beyond
humans, which, writes Colebrook, is why also many posthuman and anti-biopolitical models can be vitalist. Vitalism can,
according to Colebrook, be divided in either an active vitalism,
which assumes that life refers to acting and organized bodies.
Poststructural and posthumanist accounts of vitalism can be
active because they refer to either a language system that constitutes bodies in particular ways according to, for instance, male
and female norms, or, in some posthuman accounts, the human
body is seen as part of a systemic organic whole. Referring to
a system or body, they remain at the level of the actual and of
222
active human agents (Colebrook, 2014b, p. 101). Colebrook
writes on the Deleuzian idea of a passive vitalism, which refers
to life as virtual and thus a power without the image of the living body. Life as a differentiating field of powers, expresses
itself in various forms of, for instance, genders, so that every
gender is an individual actualization of a genetic and social/
cultural potential for sexual differentiation (Colebrook, 2014b).
However, as in all of Deleuze and Guattaris philosophy, the
binaries they create are created to show their co-constitutive
nature and the co-dependence between them.
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Author Biography
Hillevi Lenz Taguchi, PhD, (2001) Professor of Education and
Child and Youth Studies and co-director of the division of Early
Childhood Education, Department of Child and Youth Studies,
Stockholm University, Sweden.