IDEAS, NEWS AND RESOURCES | March 2021
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The Taos Institute's mission is to bring together scholars and practitioners concerned with the social processes essential for the construction of reason, knowledge, and human value, and their application in relational, collaborative and appreciative practices around the world. |
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The Many Ways to Get Involved! |
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Brief Encounter with The Taos Institute |
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How can you turn back if you have no idea how to move forward? |
Made from a distance, methodologies may lack sensitivity to the political, economic, cultural, and relational complexity of each unique research context. |
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Dialogic Social Inquiry
University of Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
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The invitation to write this piece took me back to an adventure in 1990, the last year of my mom’s life. I returned to my parents’ small town to teach piano lessons every Monday, all day and into the evening. A young adult at the time, I had hoped my car, a brown 700-dollar Plymouth Horizon, was fit for the weekly trip. Its hatchback opened at random intervals and rain and fog seemed to cause it to slowly and completely lose power. There were no cellphones and my travel was often delayed by mechanical dilemmas at the side of the road.
I dreaded the winter fog, but the most challenging Mondays involved late evening snow storms. After my last student and a tasty late supper, I’d wave goodbye to my mom’s silhouette in the living room window and head off into the night. If you’re not from the northern prairies you might not know that winter conditions in cities and towns often differ drastically from conditions in the open country. By the time you realize you shouldn’t be driving, it might be too late to change plans. How can you turn back if you have no idea how to move forward? I remember some desperate moments, like the time I stopped the car and stepped out onto the blizzard-ridden highway to look more closely for the painted dotted line that would give some idea of my whereabouts, a hint of how to continue on.
Recently, my Kanankil Institute colleagues Cynthia Loreto Sosa Infante and Christian Israel Lizama Valladares wrote a book with me about finding our way as thesis and dissertation writers. Usually a scholarly research process is determined by a research methodology, a map outlining a step-ordered series of tasks and procedures. Methodologies automate inquiry, assuring funders and other overseers. But produced outside their sites of application, methodologies set research agendas apart from participants, as academic Shawn Wilson (2008) cautions. Made from a distance, methodologies may lack sensitivity to the political, economic, cultural, and relational complexity of each unique research context. As non-living things, methodologies cannot sense inevitable shifts such as emerging constraints or opportunities.
In a dialogic social inquiry process, it’s the living changing social ecology at the center of each inquiry project that produces its own inquiry processes and practices. The process isn’t mobile—something to be rolled-out anywhere—but is instead intricately connected with its community of participants. Local and familiar dialogic strategies generate understanding and possibility instead of analytic tactics produced elsewhere. The research then becomes dialogically structured instead of methodologically driven.
There’s no need to denigrate efficient mechanized processes, ask any Plymouth Horizon owner! And let’s not assume that dialogue is inherently benevolent or that local processes are necessarily innocent. But it matters where an inquiry process comes from and to whom it belongs. Some of the most crucial indicators of how to proceed, however subtle or fleeting, might only appear within the developing inquiry effort itself.
Reference
Wilson, S. (2008). Research is ceremony: Indigenous research methods. Fernwood Publishing.
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Dialogue with the Authors |
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Section 4: Practices in Organization Development
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About the Dialogue
This dialogue with Taos Institute co-founder and Board Member Diana Whitney, Ph.D. explores the ideas in Section 4 - Practices in Organization Development of The SAGE Handbook of Social Constructionist Practice. This new book is a celebration of voices from the Taos Institute and offers a major review of social construction. It showcases the latest theory and application of social construction across a range of disciplines. This review of the field is timely while also pointing to future directions in practice. The focus in each chapter is on real-world practice in addition to theoretical work, thus making it useful for advanced students, scholars, and practitioners alike.
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Future Dialogues with Authors of The Sage Handbook of Social Constructionist Practice:
April 23 – Section 5: Practices in Educational with Thalia Dragonas (Register)
May 20 – Section 6: Practices in Healthcare with Murilo Moscheta (Register)
June 24 – Section 7: Community Practices with Marie Hoskins (Register)
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Professional Development Opportunities |
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A Taos Institute Online Course
April 19 - June 6, 2021
This course introduces the framework of Social Constructionism, presenting cutting edge ideas and concepts on the collaborative construction of realities, reason and value. It introduces common premises and orienting ideas central to dialogue and meaning making. The course provides the groundwork for understanding how groups and organizations can work in the context of continuous, and sometimes radical change, and how innovation takes place by embracing dialogic approaches. Modules feature videos and writings of Ken Gergen, Mary Gergen, Sheila McNamee, Harlene Anderson, Barnett Pearce, John Shotter, Saliha Bava and more. Weekly live calls supplement the students' activities in the online community space to promote maximum engagement and dialogue.
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The East Side Institute presents
March 27, 2021, 11:00-2:00pm EST
A workshop with Marian Rich & Don Waisanen
There are increasing concerns about the state of democracy worldwide. A lot has been written about what democracies should look like. Far less has covered how to actually train citizens in democratic skills. As the world becomes increasingly polarized, we need to develop caring and decent ways to engage disagreements, debate contentious and difficult issues, build collaborative dialogue and strengthen democracy. Building on Don Waisanen’s new book Improv for Democracy: How to Bridge Differences and Develop the Communication and Leadership Skills Our World Needs (SUNY Press, 2021) and Marian’s upcoming chapter “Playing Around with Changing the World” (Bloomsbury, 2021 co-authored with Carrie Lobman), this workshop will explore how humor, improvisation and play are essential tools in the creation of a new movement for radical democracy.
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The announcement just came out! The Taos Institute and Relational Research Network are excited to launch this video series exploring research from a relational perspective. Each month, watch an inspiring interview with a relational research practitioner and learn about related values, concepts, and practices. For now, we invited you to watch the Relational Research Network coordinating team's welcome message.
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Featured Podcast
In this episode, Taos Associate Gail Simon Ph.D. and Leah Salter Ph.D. invite us to acknowledge that we are merely co-inhabitors of this planet and introduce the concept of transmaterial worlding.
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Announcing a new Taos Focus Book!
by Jan N. DeFehr, Cynthia Loreto Sosa Infante,
& Christian Israel Lizama Valladares
This book draws on social construction theory, collaborative-dialogic practices, and the particularity of two master’s degree theses to show how dialogic social inquiry can produce its own unrepeatable process. Dialogic social inquiry comes from, and remains connected with, the participant community at the core of the inquiry effort. When a research process derives from its own living social ecology, it can more sensitively and boldly do justice to the dynamic requirements and transformative possibilities embedded in the work.
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Appreciative Inquiry Practitioner - Call for Papers for the November 2021 AI Practitioner
Topic: Virtual Technology - The Wholeness Principle Accelerator.
For more information about this issue and the call for papers, click here.
This issue will explore how the capacity to integrate technology into AI has evolved since the
2008 issue of AI Practitioner which focused on the digital shift, and how you are using technology today
to enhance and improve your ability to engage the “whole system.” The emergent Appreciative Inquiry (AI) Wholeness Principle will be fundamental to this issue: “Wholeness brings out the best in people and organizations. Bringing all stakeholders together in large group forums stimulates creativity and builds collective capacity.” We want to know how you are considering race, global inclusion, class, generational differences, and access when choosing your technology partners and tools, and what has worked the best in your work.
This is a great time to learn more about how AI practitioners are using technology and how they are incorporating the wholeness principle in their work. You may send submissions through this link - https://forms.gle/eyUT2yAMUvjGZz6x7,
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ISSUE 10 Available Now!
This free journal brings together members of a growing international community of practitioners, scholars, educators, researchers, and consultants interested in postmodern collaborative practices.
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FREE downloadable books in 12 different languages. Like all of the Taos Institute Publications, WorldShare Books represent significant contributions relevant to social constructionist theory and practice. With over 30 books in English and many more from around the world, you will enjoy reading about education, spirituality, organizational life, community building, group dynamics, leadership and more.
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By focusing on the positive aspects of aging, and the availability of resources, skills, and resiliencies, research not only brings useful insights into the realm of practice but creates hope and empowers action among older people. By moving beyond practices of repair and prevention, to emphasize growth-enhancing activities, practitioners also contribute more effectively to the societal reconstruction of aging.
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Access hundreds of articles and papers on topics such as:
- Appreciative Inquiry
- Collaborative Practices
- Dialogic Practices
- Creativity and Change
- Narrative Practices
- Relational Learning
- Relational Research
- Qualitative Research
- and so much more!
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Donate to the Taos Institute
Given the current global context, the work in which we are engaged is more important than ever. You can make a difference by supporting our mission to create promising future through social construction. Read more
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John Shotter Memorial Fund
John Shotter's death on December 8, 2016, was a profound loss for the scholarly world, for the Taos Institute, and for many of us personally. Read more
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Jane Magruder Watkins Memorial Fund
We remember Jane as an avid educator. This fund will support students who apply for a need-based scholarship to attend the various Taos programs. Read more
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Peggy Penn WorldShare Fund
Supports the publication of new WorldShare Books on topics related to the work and interests of Peggy Penn, Ph.D. Read more
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