"Reflections about Existentialism, Pedagogy and the Internet" (ECER)

The Internet has been discussed as a “virtual space” of potential beings: disembodied selfs in a digital world of endless possibilites (eg. Lévy 1998, Welsch 2000). To this effect pedagogical approaches ask for commitments, authenticity and inwardness in online communities. According to Dreyfus (2002) and Prosser & Ward (2000) due to the absence of these at least existential categories in online communities education and literacy reach its limits in computer mediated communication. But is it thinkable that the huge influence of online social media networks to everyday life has not a part in subjectivity? Personalisation, social communication and relationships are concepts applied to the Internet in context of pedagogy. These concepts lead to Personal Learning Environments (PLE) and Social Learning Management Systems, to communities of practice as online communities and to similar schemes. In how far is the personal and the social – as it is applied to the internet within these concepts – an authentic and existential category? Dreyfus as well as Prosser & Ward refer to the existential philosophy of Søren Kierkegaard to pose the inauthenticity of online networks. The philosophy of existence as developed in Denmark, France and Germany often serves to expose aspects of subjectivity in literacy and learning. Marotzki (1990) allude to Jean Paul Sartre in order to exhibit the acceptance of discontinuity as a property of subjectivity. Bollnow (1977) is influenced by Martin Heidegger in showing that risk and failure belongs to the character of education. But what is the role of the Internet in existential anthropology? Is another approach of applying these categories to the Internet possible? In consideration of the everyday occurrence of online enriched communities and social encounters through computer mediated communication the Internet seems to play a role in authenticity. Online communities for example can be interpret as a phenomenon of sympathy (Hölterhof 2012) and sympathy in this case is constitutional for the subject and its basic needs. In this sense the Internet today is not a duplication of apparently existential aspects as a “virtual” opposites without commitment or consequences. The authentic self is interfused by online communities and one can identify authentic existential aspects. In this sense the present investigation suggests points of contacts between the Internet and existential anthropology and applies corresponding existential pedagogies to educational media and online communities.