Time: The Invisible Frame of Experience

Authors

  • Larry John Green City University of Seattle

Keywords:

critical distance, liminality, temporality, transgression,

Abstract

This article is a conversational engagement with Michel Alhadoff-Jones recently published book Time and the Rhythms of Emancipatory Education. The book makes the argument that we live in a milieu of multiple, competing, even alienating, temporalities. This is contrasted with a hegemonic concept of time as objective and measureable — one identical moment following another into eternity. The prevailing dominance of this latter concept elides awareness of multiple temporalities and the impact they have on human experience. Given this state of affairs we remain ignorant of the temporal causes that contribute to incoherent and fragmented selves. This book aims to alleviate that ignorance, while furthering the goals of emancipatory education by teaching us temporal literacy. In this respect, it furthers the work of Mezirow (2000) who encouraged us to critically examine the assumptions that control us. Understanding that challenge, and employing the methods of psychotherapy I outline a process whereby individuals can first understand and possibly author an emancipatory relationship with time. I expand on the author’s thesis by bringing in the notion of liminality to articulate the existential challenges encountered in such a project.

 

Author Biography

Larry John Green, City University of Seattle

Associate Professor, Counselling Psychology

References

Alhadeff-Jones, M. (2012). Transformative learning and the challenges of complexity. In E.W. Taylor, P. Cranton (Eds.), Handbook of transformative learning: Theory, research and practice (pp. 178-194). San Francisco: Jossey- Bass.

Alhadeff-Jones, M. (2013). Complexity, methodology and method: Crafting a critical process of research. Complicity: An International Jouirnal of Complexity and Education, 10(1/2), 19-44.

Bachelard, G. (1931). L”intuition de I”instant. Paris: Stock.

Bachelard, G. (1936). La dialectique de la durée. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France.

Lefebvre, H. (2002). Critique of Everyday Life (vol. 2) (J. Moore, Trans.). London: Verso. (original work published 1961)

Lefebvre, H. (2004). Rhythmanalysis: Space, time and everyday life (S. Elden & G. Moore, Trans.). London: Continuum. (Original work published 1992)

Mezirow, J. (2000). Learning as transformation: critical perspectives on a theory in progress.

San Francisco: Jossey-Bass 2000

Michon, P. (2005). Rythmes, pouvoir, mondialisation. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France.

Michon, P. (2007). Les rythmes du politique. Paris: Les Prairies Ordinaires.

Sauvanet, P. (2000). Le rythme et la raison (vol. 1): Rythmologiques. Paris: Kime´

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Published

2018-09-27

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Section

Essays