Promoting Transformative Learning Through Reading Fiction

Abstract

This article is a report on research into the role of fiction in promoting transformative learning in higher education settings. Participants were 131 undergraduate and graduate students from two universities in the United States. To determine the type of learning promoted by reading fiction, we performed qualitative analyses on participants’ written reflections following a learning activity that included the reading of a fictional short story. Our major findings consisted of the following three categories: promoting change (with subcategories of promotes desire for change and stimulates change), new perspectives (with subcategories of opens eyes to new perspectives and opens new/more holistic perspectives), and fosters critical reflections. Supplementary findings were connections with personal experiences, emotional responses, and role models in the story. The types of learning described by our participants coincide with processes that promote transformative learning.

Keywords

transformative learning personal transformation transformative pedagogy

Introduction

The reading of fiction has been a mainstay of education for a long time, especially in the liberal arts tradition. Although there are certainly many different benefits from and reasons for reading fiction, one argument is that it promotes types of learning that “cultivate humanity,” or develop the whole human being as a better world citizen and, in general, one who lives more fully and well (Nussbaum, 1997).

According to Nussbaum (1997, pp. 10–11), one of the three capacities necessary to cultivate humanity is narrative imagination or “the ability to think what it might be like to be in the shoes of a person different from oneself, to be an intelligent reader of that person’s story, and to understand the emotions and wishes and desires that someone so placed might have.” Further, the only way to exercise this ability is through the use of imagination that includes the envisioning of possibilities, as well as an emotional and sympathetic connection with the lived experience that would exist within those possibilities. Reading fiction is especially important in developing this capacity for narrative imagination. By allowing the reader insight into the lived reality of characters and worlds different from one’s own, literature is uniquely capable of expanding one’s sympathies in a way that real life cannot do. It can “transport us, while remaining ourselves, into the life of another, revealing similarities but also profound differences between the life and thought of that other and myself and making them comprehensible, or at least more comprehensible” (p. 111).

In addition to developing the capacity for narrative imagination, fiction prompts transformative types of learning through the use of metaphor. The education literature is rich with examples of ways that metaphors are involved in learning. Building on the work of Lakoff and Johnson (1980), the literature on metaphors conceives of metaphors as more than figurative or comparative devices through which an unknown entity is made clearer by comparison to a known entity. Rather, metaphors are conceived of as mental constructs that shape one’s thinking and by which we live our lives (Saban, 2006). In a review of the literature on metaphors in teaching and teacher education, Saban lists 10 distinct functions that metaphors serve as portrayed in the research literature. Three of the functions in this list are particularly relevant to this study: (a) as a medium of reflection, (b) as a mental model, and (c) as a springboard for change (p. 301).

The first of these functions, as a medium of reflection, is similar to Deshler’s (1990) discussion in the transformative learning literature on analyzing the metaphors tacitly used in one’s meaning-making process. The metaphors we use contain personal, cultural, and organizational worldviews and values; realizing and analyzing those metaphors can be a powerful tool for critical self-reflection.

As metaphors are used in fictional literature, their roles as a mental model and as a springboard for change are important. Metaphors serve as mental models in that they shape our thinking about new concepts by relating them to something already experienced or understood. As a springboard for change, metaphors can help us understand and clarify what it is we want to become or to avoid becoming (Saban, 2006).

A potentially promising concept by which to understand the power of metaphors in fiction is Turkle’s (2007) “evocative objects.” Evocative objects are tangible items that serve as intellectual and emotional catalysts. Building on Piaget’s assertion that “objects help us think about such things as number, space, time, causality, and life” (p. 308), Turkle asserts that everyday objects become part of one’s inner life. They are an integral part of our experience of and interaction with the world around us. They engage us intellectually and emotionally, and we use them to make the abstract concrete. In so doing, we form an active partnership with these objects in inventing and reinventing ourselves.

One example Turkle offers is a common datebook. We instinctively think that we simply own an object with which to organize our time. However, referring to Foucault’s notion of the objectification of state power, we can conceive of the datebook as concretizing—even enforcing—our modern notion of time. “You think you have an organizer, but in time your organizer has you” (p. 308). The organizer serves to produce a time keeper and a time manager.

Turkle points to many other objects and their role in co-constructing who we are, most of which are not so ominous sounding as the datebook. The central message is that the objects with which we interact shape us in ways that are not entirely conscious because they engage us intellectually and emotionally in making sense of the abstract and of our everyday experiences.

If we apply the concept of evocative objects to elements of fiction, such as characters and metaphors, we can understand a little better the power that fiction has for its readers. These elements can serve as evocative objects that stimulate readers intellectually and emotionally, that concretize abstract concepts, and that potentially shape the way readers make sense of themselves and their experiences. In this way, the reading of fiction has the potential to contribute to the process of transformative learning.

It was our intent in this study to explore the role of fiction in promoting transformative learning in content-based courses and, through this process, to contribute to the practical issues related to fostering transformative learning as well as the theoretical understanding of transformative learning. The study can be viewed as a case study of fostering reflection through the reading of fiction.

Our study consisted of a qualitative analysis of students’ written reflections following their reading and discussion of a short story. We hoped that by exploring the learning that emerged through reading fiction, we could provide educators and theorists with a research-based grounding from which they could make purposeful decisions about how and when to use fiction in their teaching.

Our objective as educators was for the reading and the ensuing reflections and discussions to have the potential to encourage critical reflection and to promote transformative learning. In our analysis of students’ reflections, we looked for evidence of critical questioning, becoming more open to alternative perspectives, increased self-awareness, becoming more discriminating, and so forth, using the traditional definition of transformative learning. Based on our teaching experiences and our understanding of transformative learning theory, we assumed that for some students, the work of fiction selected for our study might problematize certain tacit ways of being and thus spark the beginnings of a disorienting dilemma, whereas for others it might reaffirm conclusions previously drawn, provide alternatives for making sense of their experiences, or even, simply, to seem irrelevant. We used transformative learning theory as a theoretical framework, as it most closely represented the type of learning we felt is promoted through reading fiction; that is, we were interested in understanding how reading fiction fostered critical reflection, openness, and self-awareness. However, we were quite conscious of the possibility that the reading of one short story was not enough to stimulate transformative learning.

In this article, we connect reflection and narrative, especially the role of fiction (short stories) and transformative learning. There has been growing attention paid to arts-based transformative learning (e.g., Lawrence, 2008) in the literature. There has also been an increased interest in narrative learning through storytelling, autobiography, journals, and case studies (Clark & Rossiter, 2008). However, those who are interested in arts-based transformation tend to focus on the visual arts as a way of overcoming the “limits of language” (Lawrence, 2008, p. 67) and those who write about narrative learning tend to focus on the telling of stories rather than the reading of stories. We have chosen to focus on learning through reading fiction, especially how reading fiction leads learners to recognize themselves in stories and to generalize that recognition to taking a critical stance on their own perspectives and assumptions. What intrigues us is how we recognize ourselves in stories and what that means to us.

Theoretical Framework: Transformative Learning

Although we do not expect the reading of one short story to foster transformative learning, we do expect that it has the potential to set up some of the processes that may lead to transformative learning (e.g., creating a disorienting dilemma, leading to critical reflection, or looking at oneself or the world through a new lens). According to transformative learning theory, we interpret our experiences in our own way and how we see the world is a result of our perceptions of our experiences. Transformative learning is a process of examining, questioning, and revising those perceptions. Mezirow (1991) describes how we develop habitual expectations based on past experiences. We uncritically assimilate perspectives from our social world, community, and culture. Those perspectives include distortions, stereotypes, and prejudices. They guide our decision making and our actions until we encounter a situation that is not congruent with our expectations. At that point, we may reject the discrepant perspective or enter into a process that could lead to a transformed perspective. Learning often occurs when an alternative perspective calls into question a previously held, perhaps uncritically assimilated, perspective.

Since Mezirow’s seminal work, many authors have written about transformative learning in a way that goes beyond cognitive and rational processes. Boyd and Myers (1988) defined transformative education within the context of small group learning. They drew on Jungian concepts such as individuation, which led them to describe transformation as “an event which moves a person to psychic integration and active realization of their true being” (p. 262). Jung (1921/1971) describes individuation as a process by which people become aware of the psychic structures of anima, animus, ego, shadow, and the collective unconscious, as they differentiate from the collective of humanity, realize the wholeness of their psychic nature, and reintegrate into the collective in a new way.

Dirkx (1997, 2006, 2012) contributed extensively to the beyond rational interpretation of transformative learning theory by elaborating on and extending Boyd and Myers’ work. Dirkx (2006) writes about emotion-laden images “as a means of … working through unconscious psychic conflicts and dilemmas associated with the learning task or content, and of fostering opportunities among our learners for meaning making, deep change, and transformation” (p. 16). Outside of depth psychology, other writers contribute to a beyond rational understanding of transformative learning. O’Sullivan (2012), for example, writes from a planetary and ecological perspective; Schapiro, Wasserman, and Gallegos (2012) describe transformative learning as occurring within and through relationships. Lawrence (2012) sees transformation as a product of arts-based experiences, and Jarvis (2012) focuses specifically on the role of romantic fiction as an art form that can stimulate transformation.

Cranton and Taylor (2012) call for the development of a unified or integrated theory of transformative learning, one in which these perspectives are brought together rather than viewed as dualisms. To put it simply, the argument is that transformative learning in different contexts can fall into one or more of the current “categories” at different times. Accepting one way of understanding transformation does not deny the existence of another type of understanding. A transformative learning experience related to one’s work may be cognitive and rational, but that same person may experience the death of a child as an extrarational process. In our research on the role of reading fiction in setting up the potential for transformative learning, we deliberately stayed open to all perspectives, as we asked questions and analyzed data. As far as we could, we framed the research with a unified theory of transformative learning. Although this perspective is new to the literature on transformative learning, it provides a meaningful framework for our research.

The Role of Fiction in Promoting Transformative Learning

Rossiter and Clark (2007) provide an excellent overview of narrative learning and narrative knowing with a focus on the practicalities of facilitating narrative learning in the classroom. Clark and Rossiter (2008) describe the essential features of narrative learning, namely, hearing stories, telling stories, and recognizing stories. They see stories as a way of understanding our experiences, a means by which we form our identity, and a method for making sense out of larger social and cultural issues. What comes closest to meeting our research goal of understanding how fiction can foster transformation is the notion of recognizing stories; that is, recognizing that we are positioned within a particular culture with certain privileges and power relations. This recognition can lead to reflection and in turn to the questioning of previously unchallenged values and assumptions.

Jarvis (2006) says that fiction can be used to encourage “particular kinds of transformation” (p. 76). It can offer disorienting dilemmas, encourage dialogue where contradictions can emerge, lead to imagining alternatives, and allow for the trying on different points of view. Jarvis derives her ideas from research she conducted in a college classroom using popular romantic fiction. Her participants were women from different ethnic and social backgrounds and women of different ages who were preparing for entry into higher education. Extending the concept of “fiction” to include film and television, Tisdell and Thompson (2007) found that viewers of the movies Philadelphia and Crash were positioning themselves in the movies to live through a variety of characters—a process that challenged their cultural values and assumptions. Jarvis (2012) suggests several ways that fiction and film can have the potential to engage people in transformative experiences: They can connect with others who live very different lives from their own, they can have intense emotional responses and fears, they can stand back and see the world from a distance, they can identify the discourses that shape their lives, they can be led to ideology critique, and they can actively construct their role as a reader. Jarvis’s work provides a platform for our research, as does the work on narrative imagination, metaphor, and the evocative object.

Method

The guiding research question for this study was “How does reading a metaphorical short story contribute to students’ potential engagement in transformative learning?” To address this question, we led students through a learning activity in which they read and discussed a short story and then asked them to write their reflections on the learning experience. In this, we followed the work of Jarvis (2012) and Tisdell and Thompson (2007), both of whom used short interventions (reading fiction, watching films) in order to promote critical questioning and self-awareness as precursors to transformative learning. We used a qualitative, open-coding approach to interpret and analyze their reflections.

Participants

The participants in the study were students enrolled in courses being taught by the researchers. Both researchers have experience in using fiction and other arts-based activities in their teaching. We also felt that the diversity in our student populations (undergraduate, graduate, different areas of study, age, professional experience, and cultural differences) would strengthen the study. Although students were enrolled in different levels of educational programs (undergraduate and graduate), all participants were adult learners. There were 131 students participating from two universities in the United States. One group was comprised of 87 undergraduate and 14 graduate students enrolled in four sections of an introductory leadership course at a 4-year state university in the Midwest. Most of the undergraduate students in the first group were enrolled in an Organizational Leadership program. Approximately a quarter of the students were enrolled in other degree programs and were taking this course as an elective. The graduate students in this first group were all enrolled in a Leadership Development masters program, and this course was their introductory course. The students were almost exclusively from the Midwest United States. The ratio of females to males was about 60:40, and the ages ranged from early 20s to late 50s.

The second group of participants was comprised of 30 graduate students enrolled in two sections of a transformative learning course at an elite private university in the Northeast. They were enrolled in masters’ and doctoral-level programs in adult education, leadership, music education, instructional technology, and organizational psychology. For some students, this was their first exposure to adult education; others were studying adult education and doing their theses in the field. There were participants from the United States, Japan, China, Korea, and some European countries. The ratio of females to males was about 70:30, and their ages ranged from late 20s to early 60s. Previous to the research activities, students were informed of the study and given a consent form.

Learning Activity

The learning activities used for this study were based on a short story that incorporated metaphor and symbolism to explore the concept of the personal construction of knowledge (Hoggan, 2011). The story consists of a dialogue between two college students, Calliope and Joshua. In the story, people are born with lenses over their eyes that can change in their shape and color and that dictate how people see themselves and the world around them. The story was written from a constructivist perspective by one of the researchers. The intent of the story was to engage readers in reflection. As teacher-researchers working in the interpretive paradigm (Pine, 2009), our goal was to encourage reflection rather than to objectively prove that reading fiction affects reflection, as would be the case if we were working in the empirical–analytical paradigm. Following the model used by other researchers with a similar goal (e.g., Jarvis, 2006, 2012), we deemed it was appropriate to use a story that directly tied into the purpose of our research. That the story was written by one of the researchers and that the story was clearly tied to the objective of the study may have encouraged students to engage in critical reflection, but this was what we hoped to achieve.

In the first group, participants were assigned the reading of this short story as part of their course curriculum. In the second group, this was an optional activity in relation to the topic of using arts-based learning strategies. The learning activity was designed slightly differently for each group because of the variation in the learning contexts. The first group was allocated class time (20 min) in which to read the story. Immediately after the reading, students were formed into six-person groups and invited to engage in a discussion about the story within those groups (20 min). Following the small group discussions, the instructor facilitated a discussion with the entire class (25–30 students) to explore the students’ reactions to the story. At a later time, students were allocated 20 min to write their personal reflections on the readings and discussion themes. The prompts for the written reflections were as follows: (1) What was your reaction to the story? (2) Did you think about your beliefs or values in a different way after reading the story? If so, please describe this. (3) How was your learning enhanced or deepened by the story? These anonymous written reflections were collected and used for this study.

In the second group, the story was offered as an illustration of an arts-based learning strategy designed to encourage critical reflection and imagining alternative perspectives. The educator informed the group about the research he or she was engaged in and asked for volunteers to participate in responding to the same written reflection questions as for the first group. An online forum was created wherein participants could make anonymous posts. Those who agreed to do this responded with their written reflections, which were then discussed in the whole group.

Methodological Issues

We acknowledge the limits of self-report data collected in this way, but we are also conscious of the problems involved in assessing transformative learning through techniques other than self-report. Transformative learning is based on interpretive (or communicative) and emancipatory assumptions, and in those paradigms, knowledge is intersubjective (Cranton & Hoggan, 2012; Ewert, 1991).

It is important to acknowledge how the work of fiction selected for use in this study played an integral role in the outcomes of the learning activity and in the study’s findings. This particular story, written by one of the researchers several years prior to the study, was designed to convey concepts related to the personal and social construction of knowledge. Therefore, it is not surprising that the ensuing discussions and reflections centered on the same topic and that some learners engaged in critical self-reflection about their own habits of knowledge construction. The story had been used many times in similar learning activities, and its usefulness in promoting productive dialogue and reflection was one of the primary reasons this study was initiated. Any short story that we would have chosen for our learning activity would have influenced the findings simply by the way it focused attention on certain topics and ignored others. Given that we were working in the interpretive paradigm with its underlying assumptions of constructivism, this subjectivity was central to our methodology. There is no story we could have chosen that would not influence the outcomes of the learning activity and the study; this is what we wanted to happen.

It is also important to comment on the issue of power inherent in conducting research with students. As educators, we exert power and influence in the courses we teach, and students may often say what they think we want to hear. Both educator-researchers were conscious of power issues and worked to establish an atmosphere of trust in our groups. In addition, we minimized the impact of students’ tendency to want to please their instructor by making the written reflections anonymous. In the classroom activities, students were provided a form with the reflection questions listed and space for their written reflections. There was no prompt for them to provide a name, they were asked to keep the written reflections anonymous, and they were neither rewarded nor penalized based on whether or not they submitted anything. The number of participants reflected in this article represents only those students who chose to participate by submitting their reflections. Our estimate is that 5% of the total students chose not to participate and were not counted as participants. Similarly, the students in online classes were asked to post their reflections and to discuss them, and although they were given the option to post anonymously, no students chose to do so. Also, the entire activity was voluntary, and no points were awarded for it. Our estimate is that 30% of the total students chose not to participate and were not counted as participants in the study.

Data Analysis

We used an open coding strategy to code the data, creating categories to describe participants’ descriptions of their learning. We copied the data from the first and second groups into two separate Word files. We first read through the files independently and highlighted words, phrases, and sentences that appeared to address our research question but without labeling them. We then went through the two files and wrote comments in the margins to indicate how we saw the relevance of the highlighted material. We commented on each other’s comments and gradually formed categories that captured the data. We corresponded by e-mail and occasionally spoke by phone to refine the categories. In this iterative process, we expanded, delimited, subdivided, and merged categories in an effort to accurately depict the data and provide justifications for any generalizations we would draw from that data. One of our greatest challenges was to distinguish between overlapping categories or themes, as there were some fine nuances of meaning among them. When we were finally satisfied with our themes, we went through the data files again and relabeled and checked each code we used. At every stage, we checked each other’s coding. We did not find any meaningful differences between the graduate student and the undergraduate student responses, so we did not proceed to analyze them separately. Also, it was not a goal of our research to make comparisons between the groups.

Findings

Our major findings consisted of the following three categories: “promoting change” (with subcategories of “promotes desire for change” and “stimulates change”), “new perspectives” (with subcategories of “opens eyes to new perspectives” and “opens new/more holistic perspectives”), and “fosters critical reflection.” Supplementary findings—those that seemed important to us but were not mentioned as often in participants’ reflections—included “connections with personal experiences,” “emotional responses,” and “role models” in the story. We now provide detailed descriptions of the findings, illustrating each with quotes from the participants’ reflections.

Promoting Change

Of the 131 participants, 55 included comments in their reflections that fell into the category of promoting change. For inclusion into this category, we were looking for indications that the learning activities provided an impetus for change in the student. Comments in this category fell within two subcategories. Most of them (41) described the story as promoting a desire for change, whereas some (14) described actual change that the participants attributed to the story.

Promotes desire for change

Comments in this category spoke of the role of the story in making the participants want to make changes in their lives. For instance, one student said, “I thought about various types of people that it may be harder to relate to—and how challenging—and interesting—it would be to try to think like them—to see though their eyes—and what I might learn about them—myself—and the world.” Similarly, another participant said, “It made me aware of how closed minded an individual can be without meaning any harm or malice. It made me want to start listening closer to others’ opinions and thoughts.”

Some participants distinguished between the desire for change and significant learning. For example, whereas one student said that her learning was “definitely deepened” because she now wants to “actually learn about what other people believe,” another student explicitly said that her learning was “not really deepened by this story but it does make me want to open my mind to new things and opinions.”

In some cases, the participants implied that they already knew or believed in the message of the story, but that it reminded them of the importance of that message. Students wrote that the story “reinforced (their) willingness to think outside the box” or that the story “refreshes my feelings of my need to be aware of others.”

Similarly, some participants’ comments referred to the role of the story in bringing prior learning to their attention and focus: “I am thinking much more about the need to consider the possibility that my values are only formed from my experience and understanding comes from seeing through others’ eyes.”

Stimulates change

Significantly fewer participants described actual change rather than a desire for change as a result of the learning activities. In most cases, the students described an increased awareness of their own epistemology and a resulting openness to diversity: “My way of thinking about and reacting to other’s beliefs and values changed. This story challenged me to acknowledge that my perception and worldview is not always the right way, especially when it comes to different people.” Similarly, other students said, “I … believe that I am more self-aware, and think more critically about my current beliefs” and “(I have) been more open to others’ ways of thinking and not thinking of everything ‘my way.’”

One participant wrote about an increased capacity to be more objective in challenging social situations: “The story also allows me to step back from it. As a result, I can look at the situation without necessarily feeling threatened and from there try to adjust my perspective.”

New Perspectives

Fifty-five participants included comments in their reflections that fell into the category of new perspectives. For inclusion into this category, we were looking for indications that the learning activities helped participants conceive of or become aware of new ways of seeing and existing in the world. Comments in this category fell within two subcategories. Most of them (40) described ways of thinking and being that were different than the participants’ habitual ways, whereas some (15) described their new ways of thinking and being as not only different but wider or more holistic.

Opens eyes to new perspectives

Participants commenting in this category described their learning as becoming aware of new ways of seeing the world, often in a generalized way. For instance, one student said, “My reaction was more of an epiphany. It opened my eyes.” And another described, “I think that it opened my eyes to a different way of understanding.”

Some participants wrote of new perspectives in relation to how they see other people: “This story really opens up your eyes to all the judgments that are placed on people.” Some students wrote of an increased awareness of how and why people develop different worldviews; for example, “It opened my eyes even more to how different people view things so very differently.” More explicitly, another participant wrote:

(The story) opened my eyes to how perspective can change a lifestyle. Based on our views and beliefs we can all live very different lives. If we were taught to believe something at a young age that can affect our life perspective as we mature into adults. This story taught me about life perspectives. It taught me how we all see life through different color lenses, and how the past plays a large role in the future.

Some participants wrote about new perspectives as new capabilities: “(The story) opened my eyes to another way of thinking and allowed room for creativity.” “My learning was enhanced by the story because it taught me to view situations from a different paradigm.” “It just allowed me to open my eyes and think out of the norm.”

Opens up wider, more holistic perspectives

Some participants described new perspectives that were not only different but wider or more holistic. In some instances, the reflections described a transition to a multiplistic worldview: “This story … made me think about what is the right thing. I’ve come to the conclusion there is not a right way, just a million ways to look at one solution.” Similarly, “The story brewed a conflict within me. It showed me that there are many different types of worldviews and each one is right in its own way but one cannot say that just one single view is THE right way.”

Some participants wrote about becoming more able to see the “big picture.” One student wrote, “I think now that I have read this article I feel like there are some things in my life that I believe in and I looked at that and only that. This article made me open up my eyes and see everything as a whole.” Similarly, another student wrote, “Sometimes I find myself viewing everything from one ‘lens’ and not looking at the big picture. Being able to see the big picture really makes a difference in life because you have a larger perspective of what is happening around you.”

Fostering Critical Reflection

Fifty-one participants made comments that we saw as being related to the theme of fostering critical reflection. That is, participants indicated in some way that reading the short story led them to engage in critical questioning of themselves (critical self-reflection) or the world around them (critical reflection). Many of the critical self-reflection comments were simple statements such as “Yes, this story made me think about my beliefs,” “This reading really made me think about how I see things in my own life,” or “I was able to reflect back on my life and realized that I had a distorted view of looking at life.” However, participants also went into more detail about what they meant, for example, “It helps you look at stereotyping and the way you view others in a different light. I thought about my beliefs a little. I thought about my friends back home and the people that I associate myself with here and how they influence the way I see people,” and “It was an interesting way to get a person to think about what influences your thinking. There is no doubt that we all have filters or lenses that color our perceptions. The real question is, are we aware of them and do we know where we got them. If so, do we still agree with them?” Some experienced the kind of conflict that is often a part of transformative learning: “While in many ways I feel like I left dogmatism behind a very long time ago, the fact is subtle forms of it can creep into my thought processes without my awareness. Maybe not the shape of my lenses, but perhaps the color. Maybe not the color but perhaps the tint ….”

A broader form of critical reflection, that is, reflection on the world outside of the self was evident in the data but not as common as critical self-reflection. Some of these comments were brief: “because it made me think about how I look at the world. Do I have tunnel vision? Do I leave myself open to new experiences?” and “I started to think about the pageantry of rituals and believing in what my family has believed and I found myself concerned that I do tend to ignore what does not fit with what I believe.” Other participants followed a more complex kind of meta-cognition, in which they were reflecting on how their thinking is shaped by their experiences in the world:

Am I like Joshua? Do I refuse to see through other lenses? How can I start to see through other lenses if the only tools I have came from my own experiences which are framed by my lenses? How can my own writing help me to see through others’ lenses rather than reaffirm my own? What values and beliefs and assumptions am I passing to my daughter?

Similarly, another participant said, “As a metaphor, ‘eye lenses’ enabled me to consider my own culturally relative underlying assumptions without much of the anxiety that is attached to the terminology of cultural relativism.”

Supplementary Findings

The three themes presented as major findings (promoting change, new perspectives, and fosters critical reflection), each had a similar number of comments (55, 55, and 51), and each is integral to transformative learning theory, as we explore in the Discussion section. There were, however, findings that we did not want to dismiss, even though fewer people made comments in these areas: connection with personal experience, emotional responses, and finding role models in fiction. Our lens for interpreting data was a holistic theoretical framework, one where these areas are included.

Connections With Personal Experience

Twenty participants wrote that the story helped them to relate to previous life experiences and to think about those experiences in new ways. Many of these reflections were general in nature, such as “My learning was deepened by the sheer reality of putting a personal experience for me into words,” “This helped me to understand my situation better,” and “This got me thinking about a series of experiences that I am having repeatedly with someone I work with.” Some students described the connection with their personal history in more detail.

To me this story has an “ah ha” moment. I had this same moment happen to me about 7 years ago. I was raised in the south and mixing races is something that is frowned upon and not even discussed. Same thing with homosexuality. I have changed my southern views to a more modern view of “be and let be … ”

In some cases, the students saw themselves in the story’s characters. For example, “Maybe I have acted like the square or circle lens guy. He thought he knew what was right and everyone needs to be like that. I still think it is OK to think my beliefs are right and true; however my approach to others cannot be that they are wrong and must change and be just like me.”

Stimulated an Emotional Response

Twelve participants noted specific emotional responses that the learning activity elicited. In most instances, the reaction was attributed to the antagonist in the story: “I had a strong reaction to Joshua’s desire to change other people’s lenses. His behavior and attitude about having the ‘right’ lens and everyone else’s was wrong immediately annoyed me.” Additionally, students expressed cynicism, anger, frustration, amazement, and being offended and bothered by the antagonist.

Other students wrote about their reaction to the learning activity as a whole and its influence on their course experience. “It brought my guard down and set the tone. I knew this was a class that I could share my views and opinion.” Also, a student wrote how the story “enhance(d) my learning because it leaves me unsettled with work to do and a need to keep learning to understand more.”

Provides Role Models

Eleven participants wrote about the characters in the story as role models. In most cases, students referred to the protagonist as a source of inspiration. “I want to be able to change my lens shape and color as Calliope did” and “I found myself drawn to Calliope—not because I am like her but because I want to be like her.” Some students used a character as an anti-role model. “The (antagonist) moved me to consider alternative ways to believe, ways different than the (antagonist).”

Some participants wrote about using the characters as a comparison with which to understand themselves. “I think I am similar with (the antagonist)” and “I was never as bad as Joshua, but I was far from as accepting as Calliope.”

Discussion

We have presented the findings in relation to three major themes, namely, promoting change, new perspectives, and critical reflection. Supplementary results, where fewer participants responded but where the themes seemed important in relation to transformative learning theory, were also described. Each theme was illustrated with direct quotes from the participants’ reflections. We now turn to a discussion of the findings and possible implications for theory and practice.

The purpose of this study was to explore the potential role of reading fiction in creating an environment that could be conducive or consistent with promoting critical reflection, and therefore, potentially, transformative learning. Since we could not assume that reading a short story would, in itself, cause an epochal shift in meaning perspectives, we focused on the kinds of learning that may be aspects of transformative learning. Also, we assumed that the role of reading fiction is not limited to the cognitive process of reflection. Dirkx (2012), for example, proposes that the meaning making in transformative learning comes from “more unconscious, imaginative, and extrarational processes” (p. 116). Willis (2012) extends this further by using a narrative phenomenological approach—a change in “being,” or becoming different, which he describes as a “deep sense of enrichment, of becoming somehow bigger and brighter, more potent and alive” (p. 213). We have seen in this study that the role of fiction in fostering transformative learning is as likely to position individuals on the edge of these kinds of changes as it is to lead to reflection.

Rather than discussing our findings further using the disparate perspectives on transformative learning, it may be useful to offer a framework to illustrate the ways that reading fiction promotes transformative learning. Based on our findings, we suggest that the power of fiction lies in its potential to provide an intellectual and emotional catalyst by which readers can fully engage in processes that are at once empathic, as well as reflective and imaginative. We concur with Nussbaum (1997) that reading fiction helps readers envision possibilities, including emotional and sympathetic connections with the lived experience that would exist within those possibilities. Similarly, the characters and metaphors within fiction can serve as evocative objects (Turkle, 2007) in that they provide an interactive “object,” albeit a virtual object, with which readers shape their understandings and interpret their lived experiences.

Our findings demonstrated several ways that fiction serves as an intellectual catalyst. Two of the major findings were that it opened readers’ eyes to new perspectives and that it prompted critical reflection. These roles are not particularly new to transformative learning theory. Implicit in most of the literature is the assumption that learners are able to conceive new perspectives or new possibilities of thinking and being in the world. Mezirow (2000) alludes to this necessity when he says that transformative learners have to explore options for new roles, relationships, and actions (p. 22). Our research demonstrated that for some students, fiction prompted new perspectives that were more holistic and better able to recognize their individual positionality within larger systems. Again, many approaches to transformative learning theory assert that new perspectives must be more than merely new; they must also be somehow better (Kegan, 2000; Mezirow, 2000; O’Sullivan, 2012; Taylor & Elias, 2012).

Similarly, critical self-reflection and critical reflection have long been considered core concepts in transformative learning theory. Our research data confirm the centrality of critical self-reflection and, to a lesser extent, critical reflection, though we do not know the extent to which this reflection went on to lead to transformative learning. This latter point is a limitation of the study. Our study showed that reflection was related to emotional responses, as suggested by Kreber (2012) and Dirkx (2006); this connection is explored more fully subsequently.

Relatively little has been written about the value of role models in the transformative learning process. Mezirow (2000, 2012) speaks about the value of educators modeling a way of learning. In our study, modeling showed up as participants found themselves wanting to be or to not be like certain fictional characters, as well as in the characters exemplifying particular ways of thinking and being. The study demonstrated that fiction can provide role models, and it can do so in a way that includes a volitional component, whereby readers may desire to be like or unlike certain characters. It is precisely this volitional component that has the potential to convert the overall experience from simply a cognitive understanding to a more holistic catalyst for deep learning and change.

Of more importance to our understanding of the value of fiction in promoting transformative learning is the way that it serves as both an emotional and an intellectual catalyst. In the transformative learning literature, emotions are usually addressed primarily, as they arise during the process of self-evaluation and deep change (Mezirow, 2000; Taylor & Elias, 2012). Most likely due to the design of our study as a short-term classroom activity, emotions did not show up in this traditional way. However, our study demonstrated different yet interrelated ways that fiction serves as an emotional catalyst.

Through fiction, emotions can disturb and motivate. Participants wrote of the ability of the story to arouse strong emotions. As mentioned previously in relation to role models, readers felt angry or frustrated or offended by a character in the story, and those emotions led them to a desire to change and prompted them to engage in critical self-reflection and other processes that contribute to transformative learning. It is generally accepted that individuals need to be open to change and willing to engage in the activities that promote change. In our research, reading the short story led participants to a desire for change and also in many cases, put them on the path toward change. As described previously, the story helped people to conceive of other possibilities, and when these new possibilities combined with a desire to change, it prompted transformative learning processes. Relatively little attention has been paid in the literature to emotions as instigators of transformative learning processes. A notable exception is Dirkx’ (2012) notion of “soul work,” whereby emotion-laden images provide the catalyst for deep introspection and learning. This research demonstrated that fiction can elicit emotions as a catalyst for transformative learning processes, regardless of whether those processes otherwise resemble “soul work.”

Fiction also allowed for an emotional distancing that made it easier for readers to question deeply engrained ways of thinking and being. One of the ways that participants described their emotional responses to the story was that it set them at ease. Participants were able to grapple with new concepts using the “evocative objects” in the story rather than immediately applying those new concepts to their own deeply engrained ways of thinking and being. In this way, the story served as a medium in which readers could explore and question new ideas, thus allowing a gestation period. For some participants, this exploration of new ideas led to a desire for change, thus leading to critical self-reflection and other potentially transformative processes such as emulating role models and practicing new ways of thinking and being.

Conclusion

Our data confirm that students who read fiction in the form of a short story can become involved in critical reflection and critical self-reflection which has the potential to lead to transformative learning. They felt a desire for change, felt that the story stimulated actual change in their behavior, opened their eyes to new perspectives, experienced their meaning perspectives as more holistic, and critically reflected on their values and beliefs. In addition, though not as strongly represented in the data, they were inspired to connect the story to their personal experiences, they responded emotionally to the story, and they found role models in the fictional characters.

The distinguishing role of fiction in promoting transformative learning is that it serves as an intellectual and emotional catalyst. The reading of fiction has the potential to arouse strong emotional responses and to encourage critical reflection on habits of mind, both of which are central to a transformative learning experience. We also saw evidence that the new perspectives arising from the reading of fiction were more holistic than participants’ previous perspectives. Through the identification with the characters in the short story, people became more open to alternative ways of viewing themselves and the world around them. At the same time, the reading of fiction allows for a distancing of self from experience—“this is happening to some character in a story, not me”—and this creates the space to instigate meaningful critical reflection without threatening the sense of self.

We suggest that a broad range of fiction or short stories could act as a catalyst for transformative learning. We used one particular story in this study, a story that was written by one of the researchers with the purpose of fostering critical reflection and self-reflection, but there are numerous short stories that could be utilized in the same way. We both have used a variety of short stories in our teaching; one of us facilitated a doctoral-level course entitled “Transformative Learning through Fiction” in which participants read a selection of stories from a Canadian collection (Urquhart, 2008) and analyzed them in relation to how their perspectives were challenged. This is typical of the ways in which fiction can be a means of promoting transformative learning. We hope that our exploration of using fiction to promote transformative learning will encourage educators and researchers to continue to investigate the potential of fiction in teaching for transformation.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

References

Boyd

R. D.

Myers

J. G.

(1988). Transformative education. International Journal of Lifelong Education, 7, 261–284.

Clark

M. C.

Rossiter

(2008). Narrative learning in adulthood. New Directions for Adult & Continuing Education, 119, 61–70.

Cranton

Hoggan

(2012). Evaluating transformative learning. In Taylor

Cranton

(Eds.), Handbook of transformative learning. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Cranton

Taylor

(2012). Transformative learning theory: Seeking a more unified theory. In Taylor

Cranton

(Eds.), The handbook of transformative learning: Theory, research, and practice (pp. 3–20). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Deshler

(1990). Metaphor analysis: Exorcising social ghosts. In Mezirow

(Ed.), Fostering critical reflection in adulthood (pp. 296–313). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Dirkx

J. M.

(1997). Nurturing soul in adult learning. In Cranton

(Ed.), Transformative learning in action: Insights from practice (pp. 79–88). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Dirkx

J. M.

(2006). Authenticity and imagination. In Cranton

(Ed.), Authenticity in teaching. New directions for adult and continuing education, no. 111 (pp. 27–39). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Dirkx

J. M.

(2012). Nurturing soul work: A Jungian approach to transformative learning. In Taylor

Cranton

(Eds.), The handbook of transformative learning: Theory, research, and practice (pp. 116–130). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Ewert

G. D.

(1991). Habermas and education: A comprehensive overview of the influence of Habermas in educational literature. Review of Educational Research, 61, 345–378.

10.

Hoggan

(2011, December 8). Lenses. Retrieved August 15, 2012 from http://www.booksie.com/other/short_story/chad_hoggan/lenses

11.

Jarvis

(2006). Using fiction for transformation. Fostering transformative learning in the classroom. Challenges and innovations. New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, 2006, 69–77.

12.

Jarvis

(2012). Fiction and film and transformative learning. In Taylor

Cranton

(Eds.), The handbook of transformative learning: Theory, research, and practice (pp. 486–502). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

13.

Jung

C. G.

(1971). Psychological types, collected works (Vol. 6). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published in 1921)

14.

Kegan

(2000). What “form” transforms?: A constructive-developmental approach to transformative learning. In Mezirow

(Ed.), Learning as transformation: Critical perspectives on a theory in progress (pp. 35–70). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

15.

Kreber

(2012). Critical reflection and transformative learning. In Taylor

Cranton

(Eds.), The handbook of transformative learning: Theory, research, and practice (pp. 323–341). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

16.

Lakoff

Johnson

(1980). Metaphors we live by. Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press.

17.

Lawrence

R. L.

(2008). Powerful feelings: Exploring the affective domain of informal and arts-based learning. In Dirkx

J. M.

(Ed.), Adult learning and the emotional self. New directions for adult and continuing education, no. 120 (pp. 65–78). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

18.

Lawrence

R. L.

(2012). Transformative learning through artistic expression: Getting out of our heads. In Taylor

Cranton

(Eds.), The handbook of transformative learning: Theory, research, and practice (pp. 471–485). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

19.

Mezirow

(1991). Transformative dimensions of adult learning. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

20.

Mezirow

(2000). Learning to think like an adult. In Mezirow

& Associates (Ed.), Learning as transformation: Critical perspectives on a theory in progress (pp. 3–34). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

21.

Mezirow

(2012). Learning to think like an adult: Core concepts of transformation theory. In Taylor

Cranton

(Eds.), The handbook of transformative learning: Theory, research, and practice (pp. 73–96). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

22.

Nussbaum

M. C.

(1997). Cultivating humanity: A classical defense of reform in liberal education. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

23.

O’Sullivan

(2012). Deep transformation: Forging a planetary worldview. In Taylor

Cranton

(Eds.), The handbook of transformative learning: Theory, research, and practice (pp. 162–177). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

24.

Pine

G. J.

(2009). Teacher action research: Building knowledge democracies. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

25.

Rossiter

M. J.

Clark

(2007). Narrative and the practice of adult education. Malabar, FL: Krieger Publishing.

26.

Saban

(2006). Functions of metaphor in teaching and teacher education: A review essay. Teaching Education, 17, 299–315.

27.

Schapiro

S. A.

Wasserman

I. L.

Gallegos

P. V.

(2012). Group work and dialogue: Spaces and processes for transformative learning in relationships. In Taylor

Cranton

(Eds.), The handbook of transformative learning: Theory, research, and practice (pp. 355–372). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

28.

Taylor

Elias

(2012). Transformative learning: A developmental perspective. In Taylor

Cranton

(Eds.), The handbook of transformative learning: Theory, research, and practice (pp. 147–161). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

29.

Tisdell

E. J.

Thompson

E. I.

(2007). Seeing “from a different angle”: The role of pop culture in teaching for diversity and critical media literacy in adult education. International Journal of Lifelong Education, 26, 651–673.

30.

Turkle

(2007). What makes an object evocative? In Turkle

(Ed.), Evocative objects: Things we think with (pp. 307–326). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

31.

Urquhart

(2008). (Ed.). The Penguin book of Canadian short stories. Toronto, Canada: Penguin Books.

32.

Willis

(2012). An existential approach to transformative learning. In Taylor

Cranton

(Eds.), The handbook of transformative learning: Theory, research, and practice (pp. 212–228). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.