A conversation with Etienne & Bev Wenger-Trayner
On August 8, 2021, Dorian was able to meet Bev and Etienne Wenger-Trayner in Portugal, for a conversation on social learning.
Etienne and Bev are both theorists and practitioners. For the past years and decades, following on Etienne’s seminal work on communities of practice, they have been developing a framework for observing, evaluating, and reflecting on learning as a fundamentally social phenomenon.
In this view, learning takes place everywhere and all the time – not just in formal settings – and is driven by a person’s curiosity and sense of agency in the world. As a result, it is intimately linked with creating change (in one’s life, and/or in the world at large) and with the process of becoming a certain person.
To go further into these topics, get your hands onto Bev and Etienne’s latest book, Learning to Make a Difference (Cambridge University Press, 2020), which is highly readable. See also this page to learn more about them.
What happens for you when you hear this conversation? Does it challenge any views you’ve had on learning so far? Does it help illuminate anything for you, as regards what people do in the Deep Adaptation Forum, or in other online communities?
RECORDING TRANSCRIPT
Intro by Dorian:
I recently had the great joy and privilege of being able to interview Bev and Etienne Wenger-Trayner in Portugal. Their work on social learning has come to take a central place in the research that I’m doing within the Deep Adaptation Forum, together with Wendy Freeman.
One of the reasons for this is that I very much appreciate their perspective on learning as a fundamentally social phenomenon, which happens everywhere and all the time, which is driven by people’s curiosity and sense of agency in the world, and therefore intimately linked with creating change – in oneself, and in the world. From this perspective, learning isn’t just transmitting knowledge and skills, but a process of becoming a certain person.
Etienne and Bev describe themselves as practitioner-theorists. For years, or even decades, they have been developing a theory and practice of social learning, which follows in the tracks of Etienne’s seminal work on communities of practice, which he began with anthropologist Jean Lave over three decades ago.
Last October, they released a new book at Cambridge University Press, called Learning to Make a Difference. It is a major milestone in their work, and it is to be followed by two other books in the coming years.
In this interview, we spend some time exploring some of the themes that have come to play a central role in their theory. In particular, we discuss what Bev and Etienne call a “social learning space” – that is, a social situation that has three key characteristics: it brings together people who care to make a difference (big or small, in their own lives or in the world); these people are engaging their uncertainty in trying to make that difference – they are at the edge of their knowing, facing into the unknown; and they pay attention to the feedback they receive from themselves, others, and the world, as a result of their participation. What this means may become clearer to you as you listen to the interview. An interesting conversation between two people meeting on a train can be a social learning space, as can be a group of climate scientists meeting to discuss their feelings around the impacts of global heating.
Etienne occasionally mentions the term “community of practice.” It’s a concept that refers to a history of social learning over time, which results in establishing a repertoire of practice and a regime of competence by which members recognise each other in terms of their ability to engage in their practice. For example, a group of Deep Adaptation facilitators who meet online to share with one another how they hold space for others, listen to feedback, and learn about new formats they could try out, could come to form a community of practice over time. Compared to the notion of social learning space, the focus here is more on a common membership, a common practice, and on the construction of an identity rooted in a competence recognised by one’s peers.
I found it interesting how both Etienne and Bev mentioned the worries they have about the future, including the threat of possible human extinction as a result of our current predicament. While they seem unsure whether social learning can be enough for our species to overcome the huge challenges we have brought into existence, I do believe that social learning on a large-scale is absolutely critical. To me, what we call “Deep Adaptation” in the Forum is nothing but an attempt at fostering a vital kind of social learning.
We also talked about how learning can be an act of “citizenship,” as they call it, which I understand as a way of being accountable to others, as regards the quality of the learning that takes place in our social learning spaces. I’m feeling very intrigued by this notion of learning citizenship. I think it stresses the key role, as enablers of learning, of people who bring others together – for example, facilitators, or initiators of self-organised circles in the Forum – in order for change to happen in people’s lives. How can we become better at enabling ourselves, and others, to learn? How can we better mutually empower ourselves to do what needs doing most? To me, these are key questions.
I also really enjoyed how Bev and Etienne stressed the importance of being open to feedback, and maintaining criticality and reflexiveness as regards the spaces we are in. This reminded me of the dangers of being “too comfortable” with what I think I know.
All my gratitude to Etienne and Bev for accepting to meet me and give me some of their time. I apologise if the sound quality isn’t great, and I hope this interview will be useful to you nonetheless.
Etienne
Well, maybe we should use personal examples. Because, you know, for many people, learning is the transmission of some information from someone who knows to someone who doesn’t. And we think that, while it’s, it happens, it’s not the most interesting part of, of how you’re learning. And if we reflect on our own trajectories, then we see that we visited all sorts of social worlds. And they contributed to the becoming of the person we are. And so we think that this sense of learning as the becoming of a person, but not in a single context, but across contexts, is really a more interesting way to talk about learning than merely the transmission of knowledge and skills.
Dorian
So for example, would you say that your work Etienne as a professor and as a theorist, and your work Bev as a consultant, and as a practitioner – you’re both theorists and practitioners…
Etienne
That’s right. I’m not a professor, really.
Dorian
So by dipping into those different or engaging in those different spheres of activity and with different people, different ways of expressing oneself and engaging with society, has shaped both of you identities, and this is… learning. This is the social learning that you like to focus on. Is that correct?
Bev
Yeah.
Dorian
I find the the kind of learning that is described in the theory that the two of you have constructed to be really useful to me. It’s a way of considering learning that is very different from the one that you just mentioned, as transmission of knowledge and skills. So I guess I was trying to, yeah, to unpack it a little bit. So that it’s, it creates also those links with either with notions of identity and participation, but perhaps we did start from a bit of an abstract place?
Etienne
Well, I mean, it’s also very concrete, that probably the people that you deal with in that forum, are people who want to make a difference.
Dorian
Yes.
Etienne
Right. And so the way we look at learning there is like, “Okay, how do we make the difference we care to make? How do we understand even the difference we care to make?” All that is, for us, core to learning. And really different from the transmission view of learning. We’re going to negotiate, what is the difference we care to make? Do we even understand it? How do we engage our uncertainty with each other, so that we can make progress, so that we can feel we come closer to making the difference? So, for us, we have a hard time separating learning from the difference people want to make.
Bev
And then also in terms of caring to make a difference is, okay, some people want to make a difference. And for many people, being able to articulate the difference you want to make, or for some people it’s quite easy. And very often, that’s because if you’re in a rather powerful position, right, you know, how to articulate the difference, and you’re used to being able to talk about it. But many people aren’t. Right? There are many people in positions… Well, for many people, many women, people who are not in positions of power, don’t find it so easy to articulate the difference they want to make. So also, then it’s like, so how do we enable people to be able to articulate the difference that they want to make, especially among other people, who are well able to articulate that difference? And so that whole power issue comes into it. So there’s a lot of issues at stake in learning, which are way beyond simply transmitting knowledge. They’re about making a difference in the world, and feeling like you could be a person who makes a difference in the world. All of those things are part of learning.
Dorian
Yes, thank you.
Etienne
Yes, I think that where we’ve made progress in this book, related to what Bev was saying is, is really to unpack a little bit the relationship between power and learning. And I think engaging your uncertainty, which is for us, an important part of contributing to a social learning space… You know, for some people, you engage your uncertainty and don’t think twice, because people are not going to think you’re stupid.
Bev
But Etienne is talking about engaging uncertainty, because what we’ve noticed is that learning is often driven – or social learning is always driven, actually, by people’s uncertainty as to how to make the difference in the world that they want to make. And so, if you knew how to do it, it’s not driven by, okay, there are some people who know how to do it, and now they’re going to teach you how to do it! The fact is that we live in a world where we don’t have to do it. The problems are unpredictable, we don’t know how to do it. And so we’ve got to engage uncertainty. The old-fashioned way of learning – being from somebody who knows… the trouble is that nobody knows now. And so when we say engaging uncertainty, we’re saying, “Wow, actually, nobody knows!” So how do we productively engage uncertainty that we can, even if we don’t ever know, we can at least get better at knowing what to do that we can survive as a species? You know? So engaging uncertainty is a big thing, right?
Etienne
But this is really an important shift for many people, you know, to think that learning is driven by uncertainty, as opposed to learning is driven by the certainty of a professor or… You see what I mean? It’s really, it’s really a deep shift. And so, what we’re hoping is that shifting the meaning of learning, is also going to shift the way that people understand how to support learning, and how to foster learning. So, we hope, and we believe that having a different learning theory is also going to make people act differently. But as we were saying at lunch, for us, we are also conscious that, that takes time.
Dorian
Yes.
Etienne
And we don’t know if there is enough time. So we keep producing these theories, because we think they are important. But we’re also not sure that we are making the difference that needs to be made. Because of the time, of the time constraints, the way we’re reaching tipping points, especially in climate change. If time was not an issue, we would think that the theories we’re building are key to the future of humanity. Given the time constraints, we have a certain level of skepticism and uncertainty. Right. But we keep going because, you know, we don’t have a choice. We have to, we have to keep going, we have to keep deepening and developing these things. Because that’s what we know how to do.
Dorian
One of the really key reasons why I’ve… why your your whole learning theory means a lot to me, is precisely because it feels quite empowering. And I think this is also what I’ve heard from the two of you just know, even though humanity is now facing challenges of such magnitude, that it is difficult to know if anything can can help to make things better or to to soften the brunt of catastrophes that keep piling up. To have this lens on learning is empowering, I think, to a person, and to groups also, right? Because we are in those situations of increased uncertainty where people are losing their bearings everywhere. It’s hard to know what is true, and where to get reliable information. And so engaging – uncertainty is like an engine, right? I feel like it drives a person or a group through this curiosity to figure out how to how to grapple with this unpredictable reality.
Bev
But at the same time, you don’t want people engaging in uncertainty as if there had been no history. As if there’d been no research done on it, as if history hadn’t already taught us a bunch of things. Engaging uncertainty does not mean that we start everything afresh. It is definitely not to romanticize that! You have to understand there is already, you know, a lot of stuff that we have learned, as a species in particular. And so it’s like, how do we live on the edge of that? Not go back. Because there is yes, there’s a lot of sort of skepticism now about science or one thing or another. Well that’s great. But that’s not engaging uncertainty, we’d never want anybody to say, “Oh, well, I don’t know if that’s true or not,” or… well in fact nothing in science is “true.” But I mean, it’s like, you don’t want anybody to go to that, because that’s like going backwards. So engaging uncertainty is not an excuse for, I don’t know, vaccine hesitation or something like that. That’s, that’s, that’s not engaging uncertainty –
Etienne
Because we’ve talked about engaging uncertainty in a social learning space. We don’t talk about engaging “in” uncertainty and wallowing in it. You know, it’s, it’s, we talk about uncertainty because of the urgency, the urgency of making a difference. So for us, uncertainly is a place of urgency. But it’s also true that uncertainty can be a weapon. We’ve seen what has happened in politics when we were in the US, how uncertainty has become weaponized to create chaos, you know, and to divide and to, to destabilize, as a, as a political weapon. Abusers also use uncertainty, to gaslight the other person, so they become all uncertain about whether what they feel is right or not. So we’re not romanticizing that.
Bev
And we’re also – we’re talking about the kind of engaging uncertainty, in the sense that that makes you more acutely aware of the need to pay attention, to feedback, to data, to, to information, to science, you know, with all the skepticism that has but you need to pay attention. If you truly want to make a difference, you need to pay attention. And how you pay attention is also very important. If you pay attention through the filter of what you already know, that’s one thing. Paying attention through the filter of really listening, because you sincerely don’t know, not because you’re skeptical of the status quo. Engaging uncertainty doesn’t mean skeptical of the status quo. Engaging uncertainty means you genuinely want to make a difference, and don’t know what that key is. And that is the driver for you paying attention to what’s coming in, that could help you make that difference. Even if, in paying attention, you hear things that don’t fit with who you are, or how you are or what you think is right.
Dorian
I’m hearing in almost like an ethics of care here, in what you just said. Like it’s caring to make a difference when you want to you care enough that you want to truly listen.
Etienne
The theory is somewhat neutral, on what you care about. You may care about something very evil!
Dorian
True.
Etienne
So yeah. The reason we use the word “care” is because it engages a person. So, to want to make a difference is, can be kind of an abstract thing, but to care to make a difference means that you, as a person, are fully there. You may care to do something very evil and do a lot of learning around it. Right? So that’s, that’s where our theory is not…
Bev
Yes. We may have our own ethics or morals. But the theory in itself is talking about learning per se. Whether or not you’re learning is how to do something…
Dorian
…that is for the common good, or not.
Etienne
But that said, an important dimension of our theory is agency. Because if we’re talking about learning to make a difference, then the development of an experience of agency is essential. Otherwise, you cannot – if you don’t have agency, you cannot make a difference. So, so there again, there’s a big difference there between traditional views of learning, which is a transmission of a curriculum. And this “learning to make a difference” type of theory. Because, if you, if the purpose of learning is just to transmit a curriculum, and you have an exam to make sure it’s made it into the head, the agency of the person is irrelevant. You know, in our learning theory, what you learn with agency, or without agency, is not the same thing. And it’s something a test will not be able to detect. It’s a very subtle difference when you learn something that feeds your sense of agency. And maybe that’s what you mean by “empowering.” But at a deep level, it’s a sense of agency, even if you don’t have a whole lot of power, but you need to have a sense of agency. So, so I think that’s, that’s where… I don’t know if it’s ethical. Because you could have a sense of agency doing something very evil perhaps. But it has to do, it has to do with a sense of the person, the importance of the person. For better or for worse.
Dorian
This makes me think of the idea of identity, I know that it also plays quite an important role in the whole theory of social learning that you’ve been exploring and developing. It feels quite closely related to this idea of agency, and also caring to make a difference, no matter what the difference is. Would you like to speak a bit about this importance of becoming a person, or becoming “via learning,” so to speak. I think those are quite intertwined, right? Agency and identity and becoming?
Etienne
Yeah, I don’t know if we would say that agency… identity does not necessarily entail agency, I don’t think…
Bev
But I think it does entail caring to make a difference. I think that… somehow… actually it’s a little bit of a feeling rather than part of the theory so far, but it’s a bit of a feeling is, it’s like, being able to articulate the difference you care to make in the world is part of your identity, like being able to hook it onto that. And then to bring it back to what you were talking, what you asked at the beginning about landscapes and walking through landscapes, etc. It’s like… I think one of the difficulties of traversing a landscape is that you never quite hook your identity onto any one thing. So you’re never very clearly this, you’re never very clearly that. And especially if you’ve had a life, like many of us have had, of like going through different cultures, through different countries… “Oh, oh, is that where I want? Is that where I get to make a difference? Is that who I want to be? Oh, I don’t know. Or, it’s that?” and it’s very hard to articulate the difference you want to make, which is very tied into who you are in the world. And so caring to make a difference, it seems to be, I would say, a lot easier for people who have a clearer identity. Or the two go together, the two shape each other. And so I think there’s something there about, yeah, being able to articulate the difference you care to make and your identity. It’s almost like once you can articulate that, then your identity becomes clearer. Or you can shape your identity…
Etienne
To yourself and to others, you would say?
Bev
Yeah, and shaping your identity – as you shape your identity, it may become clearer. So for me, the two things are very tied together. And I think that for many of us, I include myself, but you know, for many of us, there’s a little tension, there, between “Who am I in this world? What difference do I care to make? Am I going to learn there? Am I going to channel it through there?”
Dorian
And then would you say that participating in communities can be very enlightening as to the difference that you’re caring to make? So by interacting with certain people, it’s almost like you get the feedback, you pay attention to the feedback, and that helps you to figure out who you want to be, and what you want to do, right?
Bev
Absolutely, yeah, absolutely.
Etienne
But I think it’s only to the extent that you create social learning spaces. Because when I was when I was younger, I was a member of a cult for a few years. And there was a lot of community there. But I’m not sure there was a sense of a social learning space, you know what I mean? So I don’t think we can assume that a community will always have that positive effect. I think it’s to the extent that it acts as a true social learning space.
Dorian
Would you like to say a bit more about what you mean by social learning space, because maybe some people who listen to us might not be so clear about what the term covers?
Etienne
Well, I think that’s a progress we’ve made in this, in this last book, in the theory, is to try to articulate the mechanisms of how mutual engagement can become social learning. So we call it social learning space, because the term “community of practice” really suggests a history, to build a practice together. But this kind of engagement can happen, even when that history is not there. So that’s why we need a new concept in the theory, to talk about a certain mode of engagement in social learning… that may not, never be a common community of practice, or that is across different communities of practice with no intention of making a new practice out of it, simply engaging. But what is the quality of that engagement, that gives a sense that there’s some magic happening? And this is how we came up with the three things that we were just talking about, that are: Caring to make a difference; engaging uncertainty; and paying attention. These three elements, we felt were a good characterization of the social spaces we have seen, that were productive of learning.
Dorian
And then communities of practice may emerge from such social learning spaces, or not.
Etienne
Yes.
Dorian
But so those are spaces which are stimulating to people, because they care to make a difference. And they find that other people are with them, who also care to make a difference, and are paying attention and engaging their uncertainty.
Etienne
Yeah, and so a community can come out of a social learning space, if it continues, and develops a practice. But you can also ask, if a community of practice has become so ossified, and codified, and everything, that there is no, that there are no more social learning spaces anymore. So you can also ask of a community of practice, “Where are your social learning spaces? Do you still have them? Or is it simply following this recipe and that recipe?”
Dorian
So it’s about keeping the flow going, right, keeping the curiosity kindled, if people are so comfortable with one another, and their practice, their domain, their repertoire of activities… then they might not be learning anymore, they might just be hanging out and confirming their own identity as people and as a group, and there’s no change.
Etienne
So in the same way that the concept of community of practice asks a question of a social learning space – “Do you want to become more than a social learning space?” – the concept of social learning space asks a question of a community of practice: “Are you still moving?” Because the community of practice may not be moving anymore.
Dorian
So this makes me think of the notion of “learning citizenship,” which you’ve also explored in some of your recent papers. I feel that it may be connected to what you were just saying? So I don’t know if any of you would like to say more about what you mean by “learning citizenship” – this sense of accountability that comes with participating in, in a social learning space, or in a community of practice?
Bev
To some extent, the concept of social… of learning citizenship, we still haven’t articulated properly, so it’s not… So we’re still…
Etienne
That’s the third book!
Bev
So we’re still working on it, yeah. But yeah, I mean, our learning citizenship in a way is a … a channel to agency. And it is a way to say, “How can I, as a person, make some kind of intervention? Or what is it that I’m doing, that’s making an intervention that is making the social learning capability of the whole… function in a way that will ensure our survival. that will…? So is there something I can do along that?” And so learning citizenship, yeah, it could be to create social learning spaces. I mean, when you’re around the dinner table with your family, right? How are we allowing people around the table, you know, to articulate the difference they care to make? Because often when people are talking, unless it’s about the food, you know, but if people get into a discussion, what is it, that they’re imagining the differences that they want to make? Am I sitting here engaging uncertainty? How, what am I doing to encourage a conversation, whereby our uncertainty is a contribution to the discussion? Not my opinion, not my feeling, but my uncertainty – and not that my uncertainty gets filled up with everybody else’s certainty? And, you know, how am I making… How, what are we doing here to make sure that we all pay attention to what we’re hearing, rather than just like jump in? So there’s, you know, a social learning space could be around the dinner table. But it also could be in a company discussion, or whatever, but how do we get good at creating social learning spaces as, as people?
Etienne
And how do we develop a sense of accountability to that? You know that’s, that’s the difference between just being a person and being a learning citizen. You feel an accountability, to the quality of learning, that happens when you when you’re involved in something. You use your identity, you use who you are, you know. Perhaps you use your identity, as a, as a French, Chinese, you know, maybe you can…
Bev
Artist, Chinese teacher…
Etienne
Who you are can, at some point, be a trigger to a new kind of learning, because of who you are, because of your trajectory, because of where you’ve been. So learning citizenship is also recognizing our own identity as something that can function as a learning lever.
Dorian
I have this image, listening to you, of an orchestra, and almost as if each person is an instrument, and the identity we have and the uncertainty we have, are different ways of making that instrument contribute to the melody which is being created.
Etienne
You could view it that way.
Bev
But there’s often a lot of disharmony. How do we persist when there’s disharmony? How do we recuperate when there’s disharmony? When do we know when to give up, when there’s disharmony? When do we know when to fight? You know.
Dorian
It also makes me think of what you were mentioning earlier, Bev, about power. For example, would you say that this learning citizenship, and accountability to the social learning space, also involves making sure that all voices are heard – can be expressed, and that there is… is diversity important for the functioning of a social learning space?
Bev
Well, diversity is always important, because you’re likely to get some different and innovative ideas and perspectives. So I wouldn’t say that diversity is important for ethical reasons, or because “it’s important for diversity.” Right? And, you know, there’s also a judgment call about when is diversity too much for this problem at hand. So being able to manage the boundary between just enough diversity and not is going to be a hard one. So learning to tread, right? How do I do it in a way that I don’t lose all diversity because I’m going to lose, I’m going to need that diversity for other things. Right. So It’s not just diversity or not, it’s like diversity on the whole is good for addressing a problem.
Etienne
Actually in our more recent work, in this next book, we really want to dig into the question of social learning capability. And I think what, what Bev was saying is actually, exactly what we’re trying to dig into, is, is that there is almost like, an ethic of learning capability, which is different from the ethic of “everybody should be heard!”, because you need to feel good or something. It’s not. It’s not like that.
Dorian
So when you say “learning capability,” you’re you’re talking about the learning space, which is created by all the people, or are you talking about the capability of individuals?
Bev
Learning capability, to be honest, is about survival. It’s actually a Darwinist, a Darwin perspective, that – how do we survive as a species? We survive because we learn, and we adapt. And so we have to get good at learning capability, otherwise we die out, it’s that simple! You know, and we might be overtaken now. But we’ve got to, you know, we’ve got to get good at developing a way to learn to stay ahead of the game. If we’re not out of the game, that’s it Buns! You know? So it’s like, learning capability is, yeah – How do we get better at learning to be a functioning civilization?
Etienne
And your question of whether it’s in the individual or in the group for us is, we would like our theory to make this a moot question. Because we think that the two are so interrelated, that you cannot ask one or the other, you will never have an answer by saying, “Okay, what is the learning capability of all the individual?” Or, you know, “What is this group, abstract from individuals” – groups are made of individuals, but individuals, but identity for is a social thing. So what we call social learning capability is a sort of an interesting way of thinking about not individuals, but not groups. But the learning that happens, when those two things work together, something like that. But we’re still working on these concepts.
Dorian
So this, this idea of, or remembering the huge challenges that our species is facing at the moment, that you just mentioned Bev, makes me think about the idea of leadership. How do you view leadership as connected to learning in order to make a difference that might, you know, benefit the whole species? And it seems like this whole idea of fostering learning capability, and being a learning citizen, implies that leadership can be taken by any citizen, right? And it’s a form of distributed leadership?
Bev
Well, also, I mean, because what we see is that leadership really happens at all levels of scale, from the most micro to the most macro. So wherever you are, you can take leadership in the sense that you lead the learning. In other words, you bring people together to address an issue, and you discuss it and you think of what works and you check if it works or not. You pay attention. And if it works then that’s great, you add it to your repertoire. And if it doesn’t, it doesn’t it’s like, again, coming back to Darwin. It’s like, mutation works or it doesn’t work, you know. So yeah, I mean, leadership. The word distributed – Yeah, we use the word distributed, but it is like, yeah, who’s ready to take leadership in this? Not leadership in the sense of telling other people what to do, but leadership in bringing people together? And not just bringing people together and saying, “Hey, dudes, this is all nice. This is great. And we’ve got a nice community,” but it’s like really driving the learning, not driving the community, but driving the learning. How do we get better at knowing how to do what we’re doing?
Dorian
So that, that places a big emphasis on the role of conveners or facilitators, right, from what you say, bringing people together, there’s this idea that noticing the potential in various people and the sparks that could happen in conversations and interactions between people who might come from very different backgrounds, very different communities, right, so there’s…
Bev
I mean, some people do that just like instinctively, they can’t help themselves. They’re just like, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, there’s a spark here, I got to get them together!” There are other people who are fixed in their ways, but are really open to – “Oh, well, no, no, that would be a better way.” And then there are others who are like, “No, leadership is this!” but you know, it’s like, having a sense of who’s there, what the landscape is, and being able to cultivate that kind of leadership in places that you can.
Etienne
And it’s a gray area, you know, like, we would say that a hope of the theory is that everybody would start thinking of themselves as learning citizens. But not everybody needs to become a leader. But where does citizenship end and leadership starts? Maybe, maybe, maybe leadership is just citizenship on steroids or something? So, so for us, we see those two things that exist as coexisting. But when do you start becoming a leader? It’s, it’s, we don’t feel that it’s important to say, “Okay, at 55, you are a leader. Before that, you’re just a citizen!”
Dorian
It’s like the individual in the group, right? The two are so intertwined. So maybe one, one last thing we can touch on, perhaps… What would be your key learning advice, or advices, to anyone who might want to make a difference, in the face of everything that is happening? The global predicament. If you had to, to, to encourage people to become learning citizens or something like how, how would people do this?
Bev
Mine… Well, no, mine is, I think, quite abstract. But I’m just thinking also, of somebody who I know very close me, how old are you?
Dorian
35.
Bev
Okay, around the same age, who cares very much to make a difference. But I think, really, those things that we touched on, it’s like, my final piece of advice would be here really getting good at – there’s three pieces, but they’re all tied together – is: Be ready to re-articulate, reframe the difference you want to make, is one important thing. And another is: Really, really engage your certainty. It’s not about like… it may be that you’re absolutely certain that yes, for example, climate change is here. And, you know, it’s not about being uncertain, that that’s not here. It’s just like, how do we make that difference? Find the space where you don’t know. And really operate from the space that you don’t know, not from the space you do know. But from the space you don’t know, because that’s where you… that’s what you need to leverage in order to make that difference, not on what you know, but on what you don’t know. And then truly pay attention to the data, to the feedback, to the information that comes that helps you also reframe the difference you want to make, reframe your, the uncertainty that you’re engaging and even reframe your listening. So I mean, it’s a little bit abstract, but it’s, it’s yeah, get good at those three things: Caring to make a difference. Engaging uncertainty, and making a difference and being able to reframe those because as you do it, you’re going to learn. Reframing is learning.
Etienne
I would say find those spaces, social spaces, where that caring to make a difference is nurtured and maybe kept alive. So seek those spaces, and be very suspicious of them. Because the problem with learning is that it’s its own enemy. Once you think you’ve learned, poof! You may not be able to learn anymore, know what I mean? And so it’s like seeking the social spaces, the communities, the partners, the learning partners, to help you function as a learner, but also be very very suspicious, because community, identity all have a dark side, you know? And the dark side is when they close, when they become ossified.
Dorian
Beautiful. So I heard the importance of being self-critical or very reflexive from you, and never being too comfortable in your identity or in what you think is right. And the same with the social setting, right? It’s also… Engage with the right people in the right spaces, but also always be aware of whether they are really fostering your learning, and the learning of the group…
Etienne
… or if they become self confirming.
Dorian
Yeah. Fantastic, thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and your wisdom, with me and with us.
Etienne
We talked for a long time. I don’t know if anybody is gonna want to listen to all that!
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