TY - JOUR
T1 - Ethics and the technologies of empire
T2 - E-learning and the US military
AU - Friesen, Norm
PY - 2010/4
Y1 - 2010/4
N2 - Instructional technology, and the cognitivist and systems paradigms that underpin it, grew out of the military-industrial complex during the Cold War. Much as the Pentagon and this military complex defined the architecture of the Internet, they also essentially created, ex nihilo, the fields of instructional technology and instructional design. The results of the ongoing dominance or influence of the Pentagon in these specific disciplines have been traced in research that appeared during the final phases of the Cold War. But this research has not been updated to reflect circumstances now most definitive of the post-Cold War world: the rapid development of Internet infrastructures and applications, and the aggressive expansion of US military spending and activity. Tracing the imprint left by the US military on instructional technology and design, this paper considers how this influence may now extend, like the Internet itself, into schools and the university. It will conclude by stressing that the end of the Cold War, along with more recent developments concerning the US military, presents a juncture offering both opportunity and challenge to the evolving field of educational technology or "e-learning."
AB - Instructional technology, and the cognitivist and systems paradigms that underpin it, grew out of the military-industrial complex during the Cold War. Much as the Pentagon and this military complex defined the architecture of the Internet, they also essentially created, ex nihilo, the fields of instructional technology and instructional design. The results of the ongoing dominance or influence of the Pentagon in these specific disciplines have been traced in research that appeared during the final phases of the Cold War. But this research has not been updated to reflect circumstances now most definitive of the post-Cold War world: the rapid development of Internet infrastructures and applications, and the aggressive expansion of US military spending and activity. Tracing the imprint left by the US military on instructional technology and design, this paper considers how this influence may now extend, like the Internet itself, into schools and the university. It will conclude by stressing that the end of the Cold War, along with more recent developments concerning the US military, presents a juncture offering both opportunity and challenge to the evolving field of educational technology or "e-learning."
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=77950300606&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s00146-009-0244-z
DO - 10.1007/s00146-009-0244-z
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:77950300606
SN - 0951-5666
VL - 25
SP - 71
EP - 81
JO - AI and Society
JF - AI and Society
IS - 1
ER -