Thoughts on Badges and Anna Karenina

I wrote in a previous post how Anna Karenina relates to finding balance through our digital lives. I wrote:

"But even more than that, Tolstoy provides a useful framework for understanding the change in our world, whether he was addressing yesterday’s problems or the problems of one hundred years ago. His vividly depicted characters, who are torn between right and wrong, and change and tradition, become the watermark for seeing our own culture and its unique problems. Through each difficult, conflicted decision that Tolstoy portrays, the author’s voice reaches across the years with a voice of warning, caution and hope.'

'Now while Tolstoy definitely wasn’t writing about the digital age, I see that he was providing clear guidelines as to how to deal with the social aspects, as well as the other symptoms of change, that occur within our rapidly evolving digital society. The most noticeable of these social aspects is different family and marital relationships around which the book is based. Most obviously is the failing relationship between Anna and her husband, which is contrasted with Levin and his new wife. Interestingly these relationships strengthen or fail in response to the degrees of cultural isolation or over-exposure from the rapidly evolving world of Russia in the late nineteenth century. I think it is very telling that Anna ends her own life through the means of one of the most important technological innovations of her time: the train."

Just as Anna’s tragic fall and ultimate death reflects a need for balance in our relationships with technology, the same could be applied to the need for balance in our methods of education and the use of new forms and mediums of technology.

I really think Neil Selwyn was correct when he said that, “ we know that technology does not determine society: it is society. ”

Society and its influence is a major theme throughout Anna Karenina where Anna, and the other main characters throughout the novel, must learn to navigate an increasing technological and confusing world which is exemplified through their chaotic social lives. When we examine society as a result of technology, and especially the digital age this becomes particularly applicable.

These same problems and challenges can be applied to the need for adapting to our world of education and digital literacy. Through examining how to harness the new digital mediums, whether it is the open education movement or the idea that we’re championing of badges, it is vital to be able to navigate how to learn and connect online. The idea of badges becomes a new way to gain information, without complete immersion in a full traditional educational course that allows for people to explore the digital world without being overexposed.

The need for balance is absolutely crucial as new educational means become part of the increasing digital literacy movement, such as badges, which are an attempt to find the balance between utilizing digital capacities while still harnessing the traditional patterns of education. Within the “society” online, badges are a means of exploring without the overexposure to technology and the changing social world that becomes so fatal to Anna herself in the novel. These new ideas are important as they attempt to bridge the gap of online education and offline traditional school experiences. As we explore these new education ideas and movements, they are a powerful way of avoiding the tragic side effects of overexposure to technology and social change, which ultimately become the downfall of Anna and her social world.