1177-threshold-concepts-and-transformational-learning

LAND ET ALModePreliminalLiminalPostliminalFeature• Encounterwithtroublesomeknowledge• Integration• Discarding• Ontologicaland epistemicshift• Transformation• Irreversibility• Crossingconceptualboundaries• ChangeddiscourseType ofFeatureInstigative Reconstitutive ConsequentialFigure 1. A relational view of the features of threshold concepts.xiiTRANSFORMATIONIt is the nature and process of this transformation or reconfiguring which thisvolume particularly seeks to address. A number of resonances can be identifiedbetween the thresholds approach and work undertaken in the field of transformationallearning. The first seminal paper identified correspondences with Mezirow’swork (1978, 1990) on ‘perspective transformation’.Perspective transformation is the process of becoming critically aware of howand why our presuppositions have come to constrain the way we perceive,understand, and feel about our world; of reformulating these assumptions topermit a more inclusive, discriminating, permeable and integrative perspective;and of making decisions or otherwise acting on these new understandings.(Mezirow, 1990, p. 14)Mezirow saw transformation being triggered by what he termed a ‘disorientingdilemma’. In his analysis the meaning schemes that we hold concerning a particularphenomenon or situation are unsettled by the disorienting dilemma or challengingperspective and occasion a series of phases, often involving a phase of withdrawalor disengagement prior to a re-engagement in which the integration of the differentperspective is integrated. We recognise a number of correspondences here with theinstigative effect of threshold concepts, the liminal phase of thresholds theory andthe process of integration it entails.A recurring critique of Mezirow’s work on perspective transformation, however,has concerned its continued emphasis on the rational and analytic nature of thecritical reflection that is seen as a primary driver. Boyd and Myers (Boyd, 1989,1991; Boyd and Myers, 1988) offer an alternative approach, originating in depthpsychology, which balances rational reflection with an emphasis on affective