Into the Labyrinth : A PhD Comprehensive Portfolio

Comprehensive Portfolio Presentation

Here is the comprehensive portfolio defence presentation as an openly shared video. There is an opportunity for a back channel conversation to engage with viewers and critical supporters using two unique hashtags on Twitter #JointPhD & #4HDW. By using both of these within any message, I will be able to see and respond to the conversation and feedback. You are welcome to share a message, question, or insight. In this way, your feedback can be gathered together in one place/space across time and geographic locations.

I frame this video before playing it during the comprehensive portfolio defence with these thoughts: 
Today I will share my defence using a pre-recorded video presentation which fits my format and function, as suggested by Literat et al., (2018), as I challenge hegemonic conceptions about legitimate forms of scholarship, analysis, representation, and presentation. Further to this, Covey (2013) calls for pushing open the methods of assessment from the calcified conventions and cognitive bias that constrains the potential for openness. In this presentation, I model the fluidity of digital space/ place/ time to slip within and across the conceptions of synchronous and asynchronous presentation opportunities.
References:
Covey, D. T. (2013). Opening the Dissertation: Overcoming Cultural Calcification and Agoraphobia. TripleC, 11(2), 543–557.
Literat, I., Conover, A., Herbert-Wasson, E., Kirsch Page, K., Riina-Ferrie, J., Stephens, R., … Vasudevan, L. (2018). Toward multimodal inquiry: opportunities, challenges and implications of multimodality for research and scholarship. Higher Education Research & Development, 37(3), 565–578. https://doi.org/10.1080/07294360.2017.1389857











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The script for the presentation is provided below since the citations and references needed to be included in some way.

SLIDE 1: Introduction
I would like to welcome you and thank you for being here as I reach this transitional milestone in my step by step journey into the labyrinth of PhD studies: to Dr. Michael Hoechsmann, my supervisor, to my committee members Dr. Angela van Barneveld and Dr. Bonnie Stewart, and my external reader, Dr. Kamini Jaipal Jamani.
Welcome to my classmates, colleagues, and critical friends who have joined me in support.

SLIDE 2: Defence
When deconstructing and examining the etymology of the term defence, it is rife with references to war and battle. As I contemplated how to “defend” my comprehensive portfolio titled “Step by Step into the Labyrinth”, I reflexively considered the actions I needed to ward off an attack.

SLIDE 3: Labyrinth Metaphor
The metaphor of a labyrinth was intentionally chosen and strategically researched for this comprehensive portfolio in order to provide a framework for my reflective story and the steps I’ve taken in this process of ‘becoming’ a PhD candidate. Deciding on the metaphor of a labyrinth happened organically and is embedded in my Joint PhD experiences. I researched the history and application of labyrinths, and then examined each step of the Joint PhD journey, for connections and insights. Research suggests labyrinths are a liminal space, and a lintel through which to pass from one state to another. I sit here today, metaphorically in the center of the labyrinth and literally on the threshold, anticipating the transition to becoming a PhD candidate.

SLIDE 4: Not a Binary Battle
While my comprehensive portfolio exemplifies a research style that is open, multimodal, and interactive, the preparation of this portfolio defence presentation needed to take a different path. Informed by research in cognitive load theory, and in consideration of the impact of multimedia on cognition, particularly in light of what has recently been named in popular media as ‘Zoom fatigue’, I have strategically limited the content and movement on each slide of my presentation. While this may suggest constraints on the information provided, I attempt to stay true to my methodology by preparing a pre-recorded multimedia presentation as an openly shared component of the final rendering of my portfolio.
This portfolio defence is not a binary battle to be won or lost but an example of becoming, transitioning, of movement through liminal spaces, and taking it step by step toward the fulfillment of a PhD journey.

SLIDE 5: Presentation Plan
I see the next several minutes as a moment to reflexively analyze my skills and competencies as I validate my readiness for PhD research. First I will reflect on the criteria for assessment and evaluation as outlined in the Joint PhD handbook while shining light on evidence found within the portfolio. Then I will share insights gained from the portfolio process that champion my strengths and scaffold my weaknesses. I will conclude with a view forward to the next steps to be taken in order to reach the end of the labyrinthian PhD journey. As Jones in 2013 suggested, the researcher emerges from the immersive experience of both walking the labyrinth and of doing research work “sacrificed, transformed, and wizened …. an empowering force for others’ research journeys”.(Jones, 2013)

SLIDE 6: The Criteria
The Joint PhD handbook identifies three main criteria for a comprehensive portfolio. Evidence for meeting these criteria will be highlighted by reviewing some of the academic and scholarly works found in the portfolio. Ellingson (2009) suggests a process for crystallizing information that is both integrated, being woven and patched together, and dendritic, meaning it is interconnected and rhizomatic. Evidence in the portfolio will reveal connections, linking and interweaving between course work and research directions.

SLIDE 7: Deep Understanding of concepts, theories, and issues
My deep understanding of concepts, theories, and issues in the field of cognition and learning will be highlighted by examining the courses section of portfolio.
In Doctoral Studies 1, I demonstrated an awareness of issues in academic writing, for example my exploration of Foucault’s (Weisgerber & Butler, 2016) conception of hupomnemata. For me, this links to a deeper construct of a technology of self, a generative form of habituated self-writing and as a practice of becoming.
In the Cognition and Learning course I explored the impact of cognitive load theory, and the cognitive load theory of multimedia, specifically for their connection and application to open educational practices in faculties of education. I was particularly interested in the proposition by Kirschner et al. in (2018) of a collective cognitive load theory which may expand on the contested theory of connectivism posited by George Siemens (Siemens, 2018).
It was in the self-directed study course where I examined the conception of literacy within a tangled web of definitions and theoretical stances, which led to work in the Doctoral Studies 2 course, where I attempted to operationalize a conception of digital literacy, based on the DigComp EDU framework developed in the European Union. (Ferrari, 2013). In DS2 I struggled to distinguish between digital competencies, fluencies, and literacies as these terms compound confusion when considering the question “How can I measure media and digital literacies?”.
It was in the Research Colloquium course that I gained clarity in distinguishing between theoretical and conceptual frameworks. It’s in understanding and applying these frameworks that every researcher can seek and write about what is discovered or previously unknown, from a foundation of what is known.

SLIDE 8: Knowledge of current literature and research methods
Knowledge of current literature and research methods relies on an awareness of that which has come before. As exemplified in my portfolio there is evidence of my awareness of current literature in key areas of study such as qualitative research, literacy, open education, teacher education and alternative dissertations.
The first example I’ll highlight comes from the coursework section, specifically in DS1 and again in the Cognition and Learning course, where I discovered Ihde’s early writing on the philosophy of technology (Ihde, 1978), which led me to his 2011 piece on stretching the in-between (Ihde, 2011) and his more recent writing in 2019 (Ihde & Malafouris, 2019) on revisiting the notion of homo faber, suggesting that humanity is evolutionarily constituted and shaped by the technologies we use. This threads back to work by John Seely Brown and his notion of homo faber and sense making (Seely Brown, 2006), as well as connecting to Foucault’s 1988 writing about the technologies of the self (Foucault, 1988).
The second example I’ll highlight is in the literacy section of the literature review where I referenced Gee (2017), Hobbs (2019), Rogow (2019), and Hoechsmann (2019). This research is grounded on earlier writing on literacy, semiotics, and threads back to McLuhan’s notion of medium as message and media as an extension of the individual (McLuhan, 1964).
Likewise, in the field of open education, the conception of opening has philosophical and historical heritage. Current research tracks through the recent past, mostly focusing on the emergence and constraints found in digital and technological openness, as explored by Cronin and MacLaren (2018). Research in the area of open educational practices can conceptually be linked back to Noddings and Enright (1983), Freire (1998) and as far back as Aristotle.
The final example comes from the qualitative research methodologies section of the literature review of my portfolio, when my focus gravitated toward digital ethnography and researchers such as Michelle Fine (Fine, 1994), Postill and Pink (2012), and Christine Hine (Hine, 2015), as well as the notion of crystallization explored by Laura Ellingson (Ellingson, 2009), which in itself is linked back to Laura Richardson’s efforts to think beyond triangulation as a measure of research validity (Richardson, 1999). I draw on Denzin's (2017) writing about critical qualitative inquiry, while also referencing his earlier contributions to qualitative research.
Still more recently, my reading has brought me into deeper explorations of phenomenology, linking me back to Donald Ihde’s work on post-phenomenology (Ihde, 2012) as well as Delueze & Guatarri’s notion of rhizomatically becoming (Ovens et al., 2016).

SLIDE 9: Analyze, synthesize, and critique
There are two sections of the portfolio that I’d like to illuminate as evidence of my ability to analyze, synthesize, and critique research literature and related research paradigms in my field of study. First, in the scholarly publications section of the portfolio, I highlight three current publications in three unique topical areas of inquiry: a book review of Media Literacy education in Latin America; a collaboratively authored article on Intentionally Equitable Hospitality, which has been on this publication’s top most viewed articles list for over two months, (Bali et al., 2019); and the most recently published manuscript on Cross-Cultural mentoring as a pathway to professional relationships and professional learning which I co-authored with a teacher educator in Mumbai India as part of our mentorship through the UNESCO organized project Open Education for a Better World (DeWaard & Chavhan, 2020). Each publication demonstrates my ability to examine current trends in my field of study, synthesize and critique current research, and build on experiences through both academic and scholarly works.
Secondly, I’d like to highlight the Alternative Dissertation section of the portfolio where I apply research technique and critique to defend my decision to present this portfolio in an alternative, multimedia, digitally created format using Scalar software as both medium and message. It was in the Research Colloquium course where I understood my responsibility as author to provide a reading experience, as suggested by McLuhan, that ‘suits the style as much as the matter’ (McLuhan & McLuhan, 1992). I made the decision to break open the bonds of traditional alpha/numeric texts and static PDF portfolio offerings. While recognizing the duality of duty to create a static, frozen in time academic manuscript, I was thus consigned to create two, parallel, portfolio documents. Yet the primary version was rendered in Scalar, as a ‘digitally-first’ edition, allowing for rhizomatic multiplicities and polymorphous, lexico-perversity as Dixon evoked in (2014).

SLIDE 10: What Frames Our Seeing
The criteria for evidence of scholarship and research is multiple, complex, and personal. In this portfolio defence I heed the words of Patti Lather who suggested that it’s “not a matter of looking harder or more closely, but of seeing what frames our seeing” and examining those “spaces of constructed visibility and incitements to see which constitute power and knowledge” (p. 674). Lather also suggested that the “field of practice is a broken and uneven place, heavily inscribed with habit and sediment” (Lather, 1993, p. 674). This portfolio is likewise partial and uneven, heavily inscribed with my habits and the sediments of my personal and professional experiences. The preparation of this portfolio has provided some time to look more closely at what frames my seeing.

SLIDE 11: Issues
As evidenced in my comprehensive portfolio, I am aware of contentious areas in my research, for example that connectivism is not a theory; that open is a contested space; that surveillance capitalism and algorithmic AI may influence my biases; or that cognitive load and long term memory are brain busting barriers.
Further to this, I demonstrate an awareness of the crisis of confidence in qualitative research methodologies, issues of representation and questions of digital identity in my field of study, and finding the space and place for teacher educators in the field of teacher education research, open educational practices research, as well as the research in the field of education more generally.

SLIDE 12: Insights
Next, I’d like to share some insights gained from this portfolio process and product. I sense a transitioning across the lintel from being a PhD student to becoming a PhD candidate. In this threshold moment, I experience the ambiguity of being “neither here nor there, neither this not that” (Ryan, 2020, p. 48). This is not to suggest that this moment is an either/or binary whereby I immediately transform from student to candidate. This liminoidal, resting space, as suggested by Ryan in 2020, is a place of subversion and creativity, where I gain insights into the paradox and paradigms within this PhD portfolio.

SLIDE 13: Paradox
I realize that this portfolio defence is an effort to break the binary by examining research concepts as a continuum of ‘becoming’, as suggested by the post-phenomenology of Ihde (2012). The paradox lies in the binaries alluded to in this portfolio, relating to notions of open vs closed, literate vs illiterate, public vs private, theory vs practice. Evident in this portfolio is the notion that my research will be not be positioned as a binary but as a form of liminality. My portfolio is representative of the comfort I evidence when researching and writing within the tension, while ‘working the hyphen’ as suggested by Michelle Fine (Fine, 1994). With an image of a see-saw, which evokes an ability to balance between paradoxes, I can, in my research, consider the transition teacher educators make to ‘becoming’ media and digitally literate in open educational practices, since recognition of openness is not one of “being open”, but rather becoming open at this moment in time, and living in the tension of ‘becoming’, as a transitional, negotiated, ephemeral, multiple, temporal and ‘crystallizing’ occurrence.

SLIDE 14: Paradigms
While my ontological and epistemological foundations have not shifted, my conceptual frameworks and my understanding of research methodologies continue to iterate. Within the theoretical frameworks section of the literature review, I share a constructivist-interpretive and critical paradigm for my research. In the conceptual frameworks section I “resist attempts to "impose a single, umbrella-like paradigm over the entire project" since, as Denzin stated, the "ethnographer works within 'hybrid' reality" (Denzin, 2017, p. 10).
In order to bring a semblance of understanding to the paradigms for this research, I continue to apply mapping and visualization strategies to creatively express research ideas with media enriched, non-traditional assets. In this way, the conceptual paradigms will crystallize as I apply them to my research and dissertation. The Scalar comprehensive portfolio showcases many of these graphic renderings in the index, under the media tab.
Yet, a weakness I’ve discovered is my continual striving for a paradigm that would fit neatly. I strive for clear boundaries for my research context where none may exist.  While my research approach involves digital ethnography applying a crystallization strategy as a primary means of sense-making, there are other appealing paradigms that may fit better. This may hinder a strong defensible position to verify that I am ready to conduct unique research.

SLIDE 15: Next Steps
While this portfolio primarily examines my past steps and the paths taken to get to this point, I’d also like to look forward to the next steps. This portfolio and it’s defence positions me metaphorically at the center of the labyrinth, in the center of the PhD program, stopping for a moment of reflection. At this point, I can view the path yet to come, as I anticipate the steps yet to be taken, in order to complete my research proposal, work through the Research Ethics Review process, conduct the research as outlined, and discover new insights and knowledge from the research through a deeply reflective, crystallizing process of data analysis, and sharing the research.

SLIDE 16: Conclusion
In summary, Sun Tzu wrote in The Art of War, that in the “midst of chaos, there is also opportunity” and that “opportunities multiply as they are seized” (Tzu, 2000). In the midst of the complexity of research endeavors, there is opportunity for new knowledge to emerge. As a PhD candidate, I will look forward to finding patterns and connections within and between the concepts, theories, issues, and data to find opportunities to crystallize new ideas. This comprehensive portfolio, I believe, has exemplified my ability to seize research opportunities, make connections, identify patterns in a field of study, and reflect on academic and scholarly paths taken.  Thank you.

References

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