History
The consolidated research group Esbrina — Subjectivities, Visualities and Contemporary Learning Environments (2021 SGR 00686, 2017 SGR 1248, 2014 SGR 632) — Subjectivitats i entorns educatius contemporanis (2009SGR 0503) before — has evolved from the consolidated research group founded in 1995, Formació, Innovació i Noves Tecnologies — 1995SGR 354, 1996SGR 111, 1998SRG 44, 2000SGR 14, 2001SGR 37, 2005SGR 431. The name change responds to a need to more clearly reflect the type of research, studies and knowledge transfer carried out by an interdisciplinary group that is deeply interested in the conditions and current changes taking place in education, and is associated with different departments from the faculties of Fine arts and Education at the Universitat de Barcelona.
The group’s research program is based on the evidence that putting into practice those pedagogical proposals that respond to current educational needs (at times contradictory and paradoxical) demands an awareness of the processes involved in the construction of subjectivity–in a world that is complex, changing and heavily mediated by digital technologies–of subjects who move between different formal or informal educational environments.
Research Areas
1.
The structural, experiential, relational and technological dimensions of contemporary socio-educational environments.
2.
The role of visual, art and material cultures in learning processes and knowledge production.
3.
The roles of digital and visual culture in teaching and learning in contemporary society.
4.
The processes of digitization and datification in educational transformation.
5.
The dimensions of inequality and social inclusion in educational experiences from a gender and intersectional perspective.
Research Approach
- We are guided by frames of reference that allow us to approach the experiences of others without objectifying them, or accommodating them to our agenda of interests.
- We maintain the tension in the limits of the relationship between who does the research and with (or about) who is doing it.
- We consider the intrinsic relationship between ontology, epistemology, methodology and ethics when exploring the complexity of educational, artistic and social processes.
- We maintain a research ethic based on the reciprocal relationship with the other
Que implica
- A way of knowing that is not (pre)determined, but that is articulated in the relationship with: others; what is generated in Esbrina; the references we place as a counterpoint to the dialogue; and the inferences that this multi-voice conversation provides us.
- Ways of investigating where we sometimes know how they start, but not where they will take us. On this path we do not look for shortcuts to answer what we already know, but rather try to surprise ourselves with new questions and findings that we did not imagine existed.
- A political position (a praxis) that leads us to recognize that all research is ideological, in the sense that it projects –-and fixes-– a story about the parcel of so-called reality that it approaches to describe or understand. We work from the principle that there is no neutral and value-free science.
- A conception of research and the construction of knowledge from a decolonial and emancipatory perspective that allows us to unlearn what is imposed and what is assumed.