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9/18/2012. 2. Introduction. It is said that life has two stories: a person sets out on a journey, and a stranger comes knocking on the door.. 9/18/2012. 3. Chaos in Literature
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1. 9/18/2012 1 Footprints of Chaos (and Order) Adult Narratives of Growth & Development
CSER 2005
Irene Karpiak, PhD
Adult & Higher Education
University of Oklahoma
2. 9/18/2012 2 Introduction It is said that life has two stories: a person sets out on a journey, and a stranger comes knocking on the door.
3. 9/18/2012 3 Chaos in Literature & Film Film: Butterfly Effect
Film: Changing Lanes
Novel: Elective Affinities
Similarly autobiographies could be analyzed through the lens of chaos and complexity
The idea of turn of events, bifurcations, choices
4. 9/18/2012 4 Outline of the Presentation To explore chaos & complexity
To consider its relationship to adult development
To analyze student autobiographies
Consider dimensions of bifurcation as ‘singular moments’ in these students’ development
5. 9/18/2012 5 Prigogine: Order Out of Chaos A metaphor and a promising model for exploring how being in flux and far-from-equilibrium, can hold the potential for development
“…. once you see that the world is sufficiently complex, then the problem of value becomes different…. ..What we are doing leads to one of the branches of the bifurcation. Our action is constructing the future.” Prigogine
6. 9/18/2012 6 Highlighting Prigogine "the poet of thermodynamics"
Being and Becoming: toward increased complexity and order
Self-transcendence vs. conservative self-organization (or generation vs. preservation)
Bifurcation
Order through Fluctuation
Non-equilibrium properties
7. 9/18/2012 7 Psychological Perspectives Ken Wilber (1995):
Translation--horizontal development
Transformation--vertical development
Schroots (2000): Bifurcation as Branching
Csikszentmihalyi (1993):
Differentiation and Integration
Schachtel (1984):
Embeddedness vs.. Activity Affect
Kegan (1982): Development: a process of emergence from embeddedness
8. 9/18/2012 8 Autobiography Every person has a story to be told
Autobiography transforms story into written text
Being Unique--Autobiography it focuses on the whole of ones life
Provides opportunity for authors to:
Reflect on patterns of life
Discover deeper meanings
Consider the “larger story” revealed
9. 9/18/2012 9 Function of Autobiography (for the author) See inside and to understand more about events
Determine relevance of events and experiences
Learn ‘how I came to be who I am”
Bring the elements of his/her life to consciousness--into the light
10. 9/18/2012 10 Autobiography Reveals (for the Researcher) Life’s turning points
How these redirect lives down one path or another
Moments and Efforts to deal deal with life events
Choices
Decisions
Unique and shared aspects of human aging over the life span
How society, culture or family patterns are reflected in individual lives
11. 9/18/2012 11 The Practice of Autobiography Guidelines “Imagine that a publisher has asked you to write five chapters of your life story. Consider a title for each of the chapters and write two to three pages for each chapter.”