Envisioning Online Learning Spaces in Higher Education as Spaces of Radical Openness: A Philosophical Scaffold for Design

Abstract A persistent challenge in educational technology design is the construction of online environments. How might these spaces be constructed so that, rather than reinforcing socially entrenched but distorted norms and institutional interests, they are spaces of radical openness, centring the voices of all students while preparing them to create social change? This paper takes up this challenge by exploring how postphenomenology, assemblage theory, and feminist technoscience could serve as philosophical scaffolding for such design. Postphenomenology contributes to seeing how learning spaces can be spaces of radical openness by fostering embodied vulnerability, allowing students and instructors to see one another as persons, and to be in-humanity-with one another. Assemblage theory calls attention to the materiality of online environments, how these spaces are socially situated and shaped by power relations, letting students see these forces and ask how distortive ones might be overcome. Feminist technoscience takes a step further by opening a way for students to see themselves as change agents in the larger social context outside the classroom. We hope this philosophical framework inspires research and practice in educational technology design, a hope made particularly pressing by the growth of artificial intelligence and its influence on higher education learning systems.