The Learning Adviser as Go-Between in
Global Knowledge
Michael Paton
University of Sydney
Introduction
• Language & learning advisers = go-betweens
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Definition
Examples from history of science
English as an academic lingua franca
Comparison – learning centre & institute for
teaching & learning
– University of Sydney
– University of Sydney Business School
• A story of redundancy
Definition
• ‘the go-between possesses the crucial skill of
mapping one linguistic universe onto another’
although their function is very much seen as
ephemeral by those who see only production
and consumption as the basis of human
activity. (Subrahmanyam, 2009, p.432)
Spatiality of knowledge
• (Scientific) knowledge moves – people,
practices & places linked → knowledge space.
– Presumption of centres & peripheries
– Centre – Australia colonised for reasons of
commerce, technology, science & empire (Miller &
Riell, 1996; Mcleod & Rehbock, 1988) – linear
‘objective’ socio-historical account.
– Periphery – go-betweens.
Examples from history of science
• Tupaia
– Tahitian high priest and navigator
– James Cook & Endeavour – 1769
– Expedition leader – mediator, interpreter & gobetween
– Helped chart Polynesian islands, New Zealand &
Australian East coast.
• ‘Thank heaven I have sufficiency and I do not
know why I may not keep him as a curiosity, as
well as some of my neighbours do lions and
tygers at a larger expense than he will put me to.’
Joseph Banks
• Cultural chauvinism?
– tendency for powerful cultures to usurp the
knowledge systems of less powerful cultures and
claim them as their own.
• King Bungaree (D. 1830)
– Intermediary on 5 early European settlement voyages,
including Flinders' circumnavigation of Australia
– Used broken English as a language of last resort when
encountering aborigines not understanding his
language
– Agent of change
• Introduced boomerang to Port Jackson
• Introduced woomerah to northern Australia
• Learnt netting techniques from aborigines near Glass House
Mountains
• But ‘othered’ by the Europeans as a fool and a jester. – ‘a hopelessly
unreformed savage foolishly assuming English manners and attire’
(Turnbull, 2009, p. 423)
William Buckley
• Convict - December 1804 – Port Phillip Bay –
absconded
• 32 years living with the Wathaurong
• Batman’s arrival – attempted to act as
intermediary by ‘seeming’ – seeming to agree
with both sides while trying to mitigate the
behaviours of both.
• Colonists no interest in common ground → acts
of seeming and translation – actually betrayal.
• ‘Messengers are attached to every tribe, and are
selected for their intelligence and their ability as
linguists. They are employed to convey
information from one tribe to another, such as
the time and place of great meetings,
korroboraes, marriages, and burials, and also of
proposed battles; for if one tribe intends to attack
another, due notice is always honourably given.
Ambuscades are proceedings adopted by civilised
warriors. As the office of messenger is of great
importance, the persons filling it are considered
sacred while on duty; very much as an
ambassador, herald, or bearer of a flag of truce is
treated among civilised nations.’ (Howitt, 1904)
English as an academic lingua franca
• 11th international conference on the history of
science in China.
• ‘I speak English, therefore I know’.
– 1997 international fengshui tour
• Cultural chauvinism.
– Chinese female undergraduate student – top
university.
Learning adviser as go-between
• Globalisation of knowledge
• English as the academic lingua franca
• Generally have no power & are easily
discarded.
Comparison – learning centres & institutes for teaching
& learning
University of Sydney
• Institute for Teaching & Learning
– 9 academic staff: 1 professor; 1 associate professor; 3
senior lecturers
– 4 research associates
– 9 general staff
• Learning Centre
– 7 academic staff: 3 senior lecturers
– 1 general staff
Context:
51,435 students – 11.8 L&L staff
3,067 academic staff
Learning & Teaching in Business
University of Sydney Business School
• Teaching academics – 4
– 2 associate professors (no PhD); 1 senior lecturer
(redundancy)
• Learning academics – 2
– 1 senior lecturer (redundancy) + PASS
Context:
- 2010 – 3,647 international students, 70% from
China
‘Voluntary’ Redundancy
• Secondment - English Support Unit – UNSW - late 1995.
• Teaching Quality Fellow - help with academic communication
skills - especially NESB students.
• positive feedback - my work → second year of secondment →
tenured position at senior lecturer level.
• Research - history and philosophy of science in China.
• interview committee - agreed to this research focus -HPS
background - enhance my work in the Faculty.
• (Snowden (2011) Storytelling in organisations and communities: A new
methodology for capture and analysis)
‘Voluntary’ Redundancy
• 2001 - research profile - began to wax.
• 1st sabbatical - Hong Kong, Oxford, Cambridge, Pennsylvania &
Institute of History of Natural Sciences (Chinese Academy of
Sciences)
• very well received colloquium - School of East Asian Studies
(Penn.) → invitation to lunch at the Benjamin Franklin Club +
book manuscript Princeton Uni. Press.
• Vice-president (Asia) Australasian Association for the History,
Philosophy & Social Studies of Science.
‘Voluntary’ Redundancy
• 2002 - Faculty moves towards business education.
• Concurrent issue - undergraduate international students
progressing 10% worse than local students.
• Meeting - April 2002 - Pro Vice Chancellor (Teaching and
Learning), Pro Vice Chancellor (College of Humanities and
Social Sciences), and the Dean, Associate Dean
(undergraduate) and Associate Dean (postgraduate) –
– establish a Faculty Centre for Teaching and Learning in the Faculty →
Office for Learning and Teaching (OLTEB)
– address language/culture issue.
‘Voluntary’ Redundancy
• OLTEB director - finance/accounting academic - eLearning
background.
– questioned my research focus - only business education.
• Assurance by Dean - never try to affect any academic’s
research profile.
• 2004 study leave application - invitation to present seminar Needham Institute for the History of Science in China,
Cambridge University.
• application refused (+ 3 times since)
• 2006 – receive letter from Dean – only research business
education (after front page SMH disagreement).
• offered ‘voluntary’ redundancy
Involuntary redundancy
2011
- change management proposal
- Learning & Teaching in Business
- 3 or 4 high level academic development
general staff + PASS + elearning
- academic literacy → Business
Professional Development Unit (embedded) +
1 language academic.
Conclusion
• English – academic lingua franca
University learning & language a staff – gobetweens in the globalisation of knowledge
Like previous go-betweens ‘caught between a
rock and a hard place’ (Subrahmanyam, 2009,
p. 429)