Learning landscapes: prehensions of space in film and their pedagogical implications

Pedagogy, traditionally presented as a cognitive question, is increasingly part of an affective economy in experiences and feelings. The spatial aspects of such affectivity in learning are, consequently, often downplayed, and this presentation highlights how landscape and learning are intertwined.

Drawing on the complex configurations of action and space in cinema from Michelangelo Antonioni (L’Eclisse, The Passenger), Werner Herzog (Heart of Glass, Stroszek) and Bela Tarr (Werckmeister Harmonies; The Man from London) I ask what pedagogy can learn from these attempts to convey the dynamic relationships between non-euclidean space and lived experience. Specifically, I suggest that these representations of space emphasize the emergence of place as a heterogeneous and creative phenomenon or, as A.N. Whitehead puts it, “prehension”. Pedagogically speaking, the prehension of space dramatically shifts our focus of attention from given to emergent knowledge and its implications.

First, this provides us a with a critical perspective on pedagogical developments which fail to release this.

Second, it provides us with a more constructive perspective on the relationships, technologies and practices of learning in these non-euclidean, affective spaces. Ultimately, our understanding of the landscapes of learning is a question of ethics and our role in developing socially just, accessible, education.