Promoting Emergent Understanding and Knowledge: Computer-mediated Communication from a Complexity Theory Perspective

In this paper I focus on data taken from two different graduate seminars at the University of Arizona in which the classroom activities and curriculum have been meaningfully supported by the use of a computer-mediated learning environment. I analyze transcripts from postings made throughout both of the courses and relate this data to dynamic systems theory. I argue that the data supports the suggestion that computer-network based tools offer a useful communicative space for establishing and fostering interdependence and collaboration amongst students. In doing so the computer network also offers the possibility of capturing aspects of learning as a dynamic open system, the central idea in dynamic systems theory (also known as complexity or chaos theory) as discussed by Gleick (1988) and Larsen–Freeman (1997, 2002). This framework provides potentially useful ways of understanding the complex and non-linear aspects of learning as interactive social processes and practices.