{"id":410,"date":"2021-04-18T11:21:44","date_gmt":"2021-04-18T18:21:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0162\/?p=410"},"modified":"2021-04-20T05:54:40","modified_gmt":"2021-04-20T12:54:40","slug":"identity-in-an-online-learning-environment-facilitated-through-discord","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0162\/identity-in-an-online-learning-environment-facilitated-through-discord\/","title":{"rendered":"Identity in an Online Learning Environment Facilitated Through Discord"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Photo by Alex Iby<\/a> on Unsplash<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\nhttps:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0162\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/178\/2021\/04\/Indentity-in-an-OLE.wav<\/a><\/audio>\n

As part of my on-going education in learning technology, I\u2019m currently at the beginning of a deep dive into research surrounding the development of student and educator identity in an Online Learning Environment (OLE), examined through the lens of a Community of Inquiry (COI).\u00a0 I\u2019m specifically interested in how this might be achieved through the adoption of a community building platform called Discord.\u00a0 Discord was launched in early 2015 as a platform designed to create online communities for video game users and is \u201cjust now realizing it may have stumbled into something like the future of the internet\u201d (Pierce, 2020, para. 4).<\/p>\n

This platform allows for robust interactions between participants including text chat, voice, and screen sharing moderated through granular permission controls and divided into topics controlled through communities (referred to on Discord as \u201cservers\u201d) and discussions (referred to as \u201cchannels\u201d).\u00a0 How might the use of a Social Networking Site (SNS), like Discord, impact the development of student and educator online identities to facilitate social, teaching, and cognitive presence in a COI, and how might that both positively and negatively impact learning?<\/p>\n

A few areas of concern related to identity development in an OLE are context collapse, miscategorization, and othering.\u00a0 Dennen and Burner (2017) asserted that context collapse occurs when two or more separate identity fragments converge, either intentionally or otherwise.\u00a0 An example of this might occur when a student has developed a personal identity on an SNS and is then required to use it for educational purposes, forcing the collision of both the personal and student identities.\u00a0 This collision could have both positive and negatives outcomes.\u00a0 One negative outcome could be a possible identity miscategorization. \u00a0Lowenthal and Dennen (2017) observed that while we can communicate qualities of our identity online, we do not have complete control over its development and interpretation by others.\u00a0 As a result, a student\u2019s identity can be interpreted differently than how they see themselves which can result in a reduced social presence.\u00a0 Finally, othering, is the concept of isolating individuals from discourse as a result of their incongruence with the dominant ideas of the community.\u00a0 This can negatively impact social presence, as Phirangee and Malec (2017) observed, when learners can\u2019t identify with the majority of their classmates and may find themselves with a reduced capacity to interact with the learning community.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s been my observation with my exploration of Discord, that it may be well positioned to reduce the likelihood of the aforementioned concerns surrounding online identity.\u00a0 Primarily, as it provides infrastructure which can be used to maintain separation between personal and educational identity fragments, through the use of servers and multiple accounts, it may reduce the possibility of context collapse.\u00a0 This fragment separation may also reduce miscategorization and othering, but I need to explore this further.<\/p>\n

I would love to hear your feedback on what I\u2019ve explored so far and any possible questions or recommendations you may have.<\/p>\n

References<\/h1>\n

Dennen, V. P., & Burner, K. J. (2017). Identity, context collapse, and Facebook use in higher education: Putting presence and privacy at odds. Distance Education<\/em>, 38<\/em>(2), 173\u2013192. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1080\/01587919.2017.1322453<\/a><\/p>\n

Lowenthal, P. R., & Dennen, V. P. (2017). Social presence, identity, and online learning: research development and needs. Distance Education<\/em>, 38<\/em>(2), 137\u2013140. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1080\/01587919.2017.1335172<\/a><\/p>\n

Phirangee, K., & Malec, A. (2017). Othering in online learning: An examination of social presence, identity, and sense of community. Distance Education<\/em>, 38<\/em>(2), 160\u2013172. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1080\/01587919.2017.1322457<\/a><\/p>\n

Pierce, D. (2020). How Discord (somewhat accidentally) invented the future of the internet<\/em>. Protocol. https:\/\/www.protocol.com\/discord<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As part of my on-going education in learning technology, I\u2019m currently at the beginning of a deep dive into research surrounding the development of student and educator identity in an Online Learning Environment (OLE), examined through the lens of a Community of Inquiry (COI).\u00a0 I\u2019m specifically interested in how this might be achieved through the … Continue reading Identity in an Online Learning Environment Facilitated Through Discord<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":184,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-410","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lrnt526"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0162\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0162\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0162\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0162\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/184"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0162\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=410"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0162\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":413,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0162\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410\/revisions\/413"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0162\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0162\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=410"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0162\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}