From Anthropocentrism to Post-humanism in the Educational Debate

This paper explores the impact post-human stance has on the study of the learning process. It shows how this new paradigm which focuses upon the relationship between human and non-human modifies our understanding of education. First, we argue that the educational debate is largely inspired by an anthropocentric perspective. It is grounded in the notion of human self-determination and it neglects the role of non-human factors in the learner’s development. Furthermore, non-humans (both animals and machines) are usually considered as something to be used: in other words, they are instruments. This fact notwithstanding, there is a small minority of contemporary learning theories that investigate the relationship between human and non-human from a non-anthropocentric point of view. An overview of these theories is offered in the second part of the paper. Finally the use of Latour’s ActorNetwork Theory (ANT) in educational research will be explored to show one of the possible non-anthropocentric methods of conceiving and investigating the learning process. According to ANT, learning can be interpreted as the effect of a network made up of heterogeneous elements, both human and non-human.