Using the Viable System Model to Understand the Roles of Non-Human Actors in Online Communities

Introduction

Myriad communities exist in online places. These online communities can and do operate as venues in which learning occurs. While research examining the role of people in online places exists, less research pertaining to the role of non-human entities in online places exists. This study provides insight into the non-human actors that form the cybernetic ecosystems which sustain these types of online spaces. It uses post-humanism, actor-network theory (ANT), and the somewhat underutilized viable system model (VSM). The findings of this study could be used by curricularists who design online courses, educators who teach in online places, and researchers who study cybernetic ecosystems.

While some research into teacher-education programs treat communities as a resource to inform the practice of classroom teachers who strive to confront neoliberal policies and teach children equitably (Koerner & Abdul-Tawwab, 2006), other programs have utilized “community knowledge, goals, and perspectives on education” to inform liberatory research (King, 2008, p. 1120). While the latter type of approach strives to have community stakeholders function as “full-fledged partners in ongoing collaborative practice-based community-mediated inquiry” (King, 2008, p. 1120), both take place in physical, face-to-face settings, and neither frame teachers as operating in a way that is transformative. Ukpokodu (2007) has examined teacher-education programs using the community as a resource for transformative education and pedagogy. Her study found that teacher-candidates benefited from “deepened perspectives and new understandings”, “a new sense of responsibility”, a “redefinition of [the] teaching role”; and an “emerging sense of social critique” (p. 1).

Teacher-education programs’ framing of teachers-as-transformative-intellectuals is not limited to community-oriented resources from face-to-face, physical interactions. Groenke and Maples (2009) examined a teacher-education program that operates in conjunction with the Web Pen Pals project to explore how online chat technology can create a place where transformative teachers can create a safe space for critical race discussions. They hinted at the potential of online communities as places where teachers can operate as transformative intellectuals who understand and take action to address social inequalities while striving to teach students equitably. It also creates a safe space where transformative teachers can have a critical ongoing discussion, share resources and information, and develop solidarity with like-minded educators.

By virtue of the inherent nature of social media, particularly the microblogging website Twitter, much of the content posted to social media is optimized for keyword internet-database searches, especially in the case of a Twitter chat or a teach-in centered on a hashtag. When this happens, it makes sense to view the collective content shared and generated during a Twitter chat and/or a teach-in as a form of crowd-sourced, self-published research that can be accessed by other teachers and teacher educators.

This study provides insight into our posthuman experience, as both physically embodied and symbolic beings, which is inextricably situated in a cybernetic ecosystem with both living and non-living beings, human and non-human entities, and embodied and symbolic actors. By researching the non-human entities in which people live, this study provides more insight into our place in the world. It also calls into question and challenges the notion of anthropocentrism by decentering humans. This study also contributes to the field of e-learning.

In this study, the authors briefly explore pertinent existing literature. Next, the authors describe the methods used to analyze data. Then, the authors provide an explanation of the online places in which the study took place and explain the findings from the perspective of a hashtag as a viable system, a weekly Twitter teach-in as a viable system, and hashtag communities such as #SaturdaySchool and #EduColor as viable systems. Lastly, the authors describe the findings of the three aforementioned types of systems and address possibilities for future research.