SAM: A Language for Education

In this article I present a sociological language—social activity method (SAM)—and illustrate how it’s development and deployment has educational potential. I draw on my experience with postgraduate students and also engage with extant work in anthropology, sociology, and social semiotics, though the principal concerns of the essay are conceptual. I present three ‘relational spaces’, of which two are seeing their first published outing in this paper 1 .

It seems to be common practice to present education and schooling as coterminous, even to use these words interchangeably: this is an error.Schooling is a field (I'll go with Bourdieu, 2015, here) in which education is institutionalized, and in which the habitus generated in teachers and in pupils establishes them as precisely these entities.
The production of habitus of course constitutes education, but this takes place in all fields, not just in schooling: education is a dynamic that occurs when a static state of being is activated as a state of becoming.Furthermore, both the static and dynamic states can be achieved at any level of analysis, so not only that of the individual, institutions, even nations, certainly the planet, can also undergo education (psychology might even take us to sub-individual levels, but I won't go into that here, fascinating though it may be).The mechanisms of education are studied in various fields that each have a tendency to remain at their respective levels, though one suspects that they do well to communicate.In terms of schooling, liberal educators including Dewey (eg 2017Dewey (eg (1910))), Piaget (eg 1972Piaget (eg , 1995) ) and Schön (eg 1987) often seem not to consider the teacher as such to be an essential element, though a teacher may encourage, facilitate or, of course, inhibit learning and the teacher may not necessarily be in advance of the learner.Certainly, the claims frequently made regarding the school closures in the UK during the COVID pandemic that children were missing learning were absurd: schooling within itself kettles learning in subject disciplines, though this does not exhaust learning: most people learn to speak their first language before ever starting school and continue to learn outside of schooling during and after their time in school.The subject disciplines themselves are far more about discriminating between individuals, already stratified by social categories (that is, socially re-categorising them 2 ), than about any other form of use-value (when was the last time you used a quadratic equation or even a formal arithmetic operation?);what one does learn at school is how to bully or be bullied (maybe both).
But how about language?This is a polysemic term, but for the purposes of this paper I'm using it technically to refer to methodological strategies that organize practice, which is, of course, educational.I refer to my, particular language as 'social activity method', SAM, (Dowling, 2009(Dowling, , 2013)).SAM consists mostly of 2X2 relational spaces (more in a moment) and a fundamental principle, that Basil Bernstein would have referred to as SAM's 'internal language' with reference to what he described as a 'language of description': Briefly, a language of description is a translation device whereby one language is transformed into another.We can distinguish between internal and external languages of description.The internal language of description refers to the syntax whereby a conceptual language is created.The external language of description refers to the syntax whereby the internal language can describe something other than itself.(Bernstein, 1996;pp. 135-6) To use this terminology, my 'internal language', my fundamental principle, is: [T]h e sociocultural constitutes and is constituted by strategic, autopoietic3 action directed at the formation, maintenance and destabilising of alliances and oppositions, the visibility of which, in terms of regularity of practice, is emergent upon the totality of such action and is thereby available for recruitment into subsequent action.(Dowling, 2013.No page numbers) The question then is, how might the deployment of this principle in research activity be constituted as education rather than, simply, as communication or representation?Well, in three ways: firstly, in the process of the construction of relational spaces, see below, and, secondly, in the recruitment of these spaces in the analysis of empirical settings/data.
Thirdly in the design of educational programmes.In this paper I shall attempt to illustrate each of these.
In the first attempt at a foreword that I wrote recently I stated that research entails a transaction between theory, methodology, and setting.Almost as soon as I had completed the first version, however, I realised that I had committed a major omission: I had left out the individual characteristics of the researcher-the author 3 .This omission is familiar in the natural sciences, which are frequently written up in the passive mood, obscuring the subject of the research activity.This also used to be common in social research, though is less so more recently now that authors of research are often encouraged to speak in the first person.So, research involves a transaction between researcher, theory, methodology and setting.It occurred to me that this set might be restructured as a two-dimensional relational space: see Figure 1 below.
This of necessity entails a degree of reconceptualising-which is itself an educational process-as follows.For the first dimension I initially recruited Basil Bernstein's (1990) classification/framing binary, defining classification as distinctions between categories and framing as distinctions within categories.I pointed out in Dowling (2009), however, that classification (C) and framing (F) effectively perform the same function, but at different levels of analysis relative to each other.I used the organisation of a school to illustrate this: the room numbers and perhaps subject labels classify spaces, but the lesson that goes on in each space is framed in terms of the specific curriculum subject: the curriculum system of classification provides the addresses, each subject frames the business in each address.Dropping down a level, that which is framed as, for example, mathematics, is itself classified according to topics (arithmetic, algebra, geometry, …) each of which is, in turn, framed in terms of their respective processes and so forth.C/F is, strictly, a fractal dimension 4 .
This fractal nature rendered these concepts unsuitable for my purposes in this article.So, I'll recontextualise an alternative pair of categories from philosophy-I emphasise 'recontextualise'; I wouldn't want anyone running away with the idea I am claiming to be a philosopher!Classification, then, I will replace with 'ontic discourse', referring to the collection of theories -systems of objects and their relations-that may be deployed or built in research.Framing I'll replace with 'epistemic discourse', which is to say the collection of methodological strategies or research processes.Ontic discourse (OD) might be glossed as the 'what' of research activity, epistemic discourse (ED) to the 'how'.
For the second dimension of my scheme, I'll recruit a category distinction of my own (Dowling. 1998), that of discursive saturation (DS): this concept refers to the extent to which the principles of a practice are rendered linguistically explicithigh discursive saturation (DS + )-or not, low discursive saturation (DS -).The cartesian product of these two variables gives rise to the scheme in Figure 1-a new 'relational space'.The scheme enables a theorised distinction and the relation between four sets of research strategies

Epistemic Discourse (ED) methodology author
The terms in the scheme are defined by their position in the table rather than by their more common meanings, hence 'relational space'.So, theory refers to the objects and relations that are defined in the research and are to be contrasted with the regions, objects, relations, and individuals that are presumed, but yet to be defined, in the setting.Similarly, methodology refers to that which will enable an argument to be made, whereas author is that which enables the local form of the argument.This is a fluid space and, in particular, setting is expected to become specified, educationally by OD/ED in the research process; initially, 'setting' simply points to a region of research interest.Similarly, author is expected to become increasingly specified by OD/ED as the style of the particular researcher or team becomes institutionalised (in their own work, if not more widely).These developments progress with the transaction between the four modes; let's start with theory.
Over the years, working with students embarking on their dissertations I have frequently encountered two misconceptions regarding theory: the first asserts that it is necessary to begin any research project with a theoretical framework.Now this position, of course, effectively writes off Grounded Theory (not a theory per se, but a method, or, strictly, a collection of methods 5 ), thematic analysis 6 , and any other approach that seeks to build theory.The theory that is built may be a collection of defined concepts or themes that are relatively independent of each other or maybe a joined-up theory as such.In either case the theory is clearly an output of the research activity-an educational product-not an input to it 7 .A theory might be described as a structured interpretation of the research setting.This being the case, it is clearly reasonable to put this interpretation to the test in an exercise of data collection and analysis, but not all research is of this type.Commonly, we don't know much at all (or are suspicious about what we think we might know) about our research setting and some fields-educational media and technology, for example-are moving so fast that this is almost always the case.Under such circumstances, we should be exploring, not testing.Starting with a theorising of the setting is likely to result in you finding out no more than you (think you) already know.
Sometimes a theory (I'm still in the OD/DS+ quadrant of my scheme) can be asked to do more than it is capable of.Some student dissertations that I've been presented with have begun with the statement that the intention has been to use multimodality theory to analyse a media text or production-a film or a website or a vlog, maybe.One seminal work in the area of multimodality was the 1988 book by Robert Hodge and Gunther Kress, Social Semiotics and another, the 1996 book by Gunther Kress and Theo van Leeuwen, Reading Images: the grammar of visual design.Now essentially the grammar that they introduce in each of these books is descriptive.In terms of semantics, they reveal how meanings might be represented using semiotics or using visuals.All texts, however, are polysemic, which is to say, they are open to diverse interpretations.So as persuasive as these authors' interpretations may be (though I'm not convinced), they are certainly not definitive.Indeed, in Dowling, 2009, c. 2, I have presented alternative and, I argue, a rather more persuasive The authors support their reading by offering a brief description of late thirteenth-century Florence as a 'city-state in turmoil'.They do not attempt an explanation as to why the dominant classes of a chaotic state would be expected to sponsor the production of chaotic cultural artefacts.Dowling, 2009. P. 34 Especially one to be placed in the church of Santa Trinita in Florence, which was associated with the Medici family at the time of the production of Cimabue's painting.
I am not claiming at all that my analysis is definitive, just that it's better than that produced by Hodge and Kress (perhaps because I'm a sociologist and not a linguistician).The contrast, though, does illustrate the polysemic nature of the text and the educational productivity of my theoretical engagement: access to its meaning is not given by social semiotics or by multimodality (see Dowling, 2009. c. 5 in respect of the latter), these simply provide languages through which meaning can be relayed.I should stress that I am not challenging social semiotics or multimodality theory or, for example, film theory generally: these are all able to produce complex and useable languages, but they do not, in the absence of authorial interpretation-an author-grant credible access to meaning.This is the case generally with the relation between theory and meaning, but it's not necessarily the relation between theory and explanation.Many academics, having built or otherwise acquired their theories, will tend to speak in the language of their creation/acquisition.So, when asked to explain a phenomenon they will not present a research argument, but rather summarise an explanation in this language.So, I might claim that the school mathematics curriculum distributes itself in such a way that some students are given access to a region-the esoteric domain-that grants them access to a career and others are denied this access and instead are restricted to an artificial discourse-the public domain-that offers no future either in mathematics or in its potential applications and that, furthermore, the candidates for each group are recognised, principally, in terms of socioeconomic class.The argument in support of this claim is to be found in Dowling (1996Dowling ( , 1998Dowling ( , 2009) ) and see the definitions of 'esoteric' and 'public domains' below.This statement might be further simplified as: schooling contributes to the reproduction of social injustice.The evidence is obfuscated by academic arcana.In respect of the above summary, I could say that those given access to the esoteric may find that this too is a dead end and that, if they take their mathematical schooling further, they are likely to find that mathematics in the University bears little resemblance to the subject that fascinated them at the secondary level (Dowling, 2010;Dowling & Burke, 2012), though they may fare better in physics or engineering.This is my 'expert knowledge': when speaking with each other, academics speak as peers; when speaking to public audiences, we speak as experts; this is not really a healthily 'democratic' situation, nor does it appropriately educate the audience.
The second misconception about theory (still in the OD/DS+ quadrant) has been widespread amongst doctoral students panicking over what to do with the piles of qualitative data that they've accumulated and that seems overwhelming in terms of quantity and opaque in terms of meaning: "where can I find a theory that will help me make sense of my data?"I'll recontextualise another theory to illustrate the difficulty here, Jean Piaget's (1980) first stage of cognitive development: the assimilation/accommodation dialectic.Well, if we're looking for a readymade theory, then perhaps the data is to be assimilated to it.Naturally, the data is going to have to undergo some changes if it's to fit.This would be tantamount to what Barney Glaser (1992) refers to as forcing.This is not an acceptable solution if we are hoping to learn from the research setting.The alternative is that the theory must transform to accommodate the data.This is preferrable, but only if the theory, under transformation, really does fit the data.The approach was adopted by Kanako Kusanagi in her ethnographic-style study of the import of the Japanese teacher development programme, 'lesson study' (Kusanagi, 2022).This is the book for which I was writing the foreword to which I referred earlier.
Kusanagi's study involved interviews with teachers, a teacher survey and classroom observations.Here is an extract from my foreword: [Kusanagi] draws on theory from several sources, but not in such a way as to impose extant theory on her data.
Rather, theoretical constructs introduced by Lev Vygotsky, Basil Bernstein and in my own work are themselves recontextualised in their use in her own analysis.The category 'recontextualisation' itself was initially my recontextualisation from Bernstein and has been subsequently deployed in [Kusanagi's]

Dowling in Kusanagi, 2022
The two pedagogic strategies that Kusanagi identifies are: i) 'elaborated pedagogic strategy' (EPS), which opens a zone of proximal development (zpd) in which support can be provided for the learner; and 'restricted pedagogic strategy' (RPS) that does not form a zpd and so no support is provided for learning.Unlike the case with Hodge & Kress, Kusanagi recontextualises Bernstein, but does not misunderstand or misrepresent it: the theories enlarge their fields of application without undue distortion and without subjecting the data to undue violence.Nevertheless, the data has been theorised, the setting has become recontextualised as theoretical and methodological examples The untheorized setting and the raw data remain in their pristine state, ready for re-analysis by the same or by a different theory/methodology combination.Marcel Mauss (2011Mauss ( (1954))) claimed that: Historians believe and justly resent the fact that sociologists make too many abstractions and separate unduly the various elements of society.We should follow their precepts and observe what is given.The tangible fact is Rome or Athens or the average Frenchman [sic] or the Melanesian of some island, and not prayer or law as such.
Whereas formerly sociologists were obliged to analyse and abstract rather too much, they should now force themselves to reconstitute the whole.This is the way to reach incontestable fact.Mauss, 2011Mauss, (1954)); p. 78 However, I am not aiming to produce 'incontestable fact' and, indeed, doubt that this is a viable ambition in sociology nowadays.Original recontextualisation, whether of theoretical constructs or of empirical settings is a powerful, a creative mode of education.It is not an identification of an essential truth, an 'incontestable fact' but a challenge: suppose you look at it like this, which invites further creative action.The original inspiration for the concept, 'recontextualisation' comes from Basil Bernstein writing on 'pedagogic discourse', which is: …a principle which removes (delocates) a discourse from its substantive practice and context, and relocates that discourse according to its own principle of selective reordering and focusing.In this process of the delocation and the relocation of the original discourse the social basis of its practice, including its power relations, is removed.In the process of the de-and relocation the original discourse is subject to a transformation which transforms it from an actual practice to a virtual or imaginary practice.Pedagogic discourse creates imaginary subjects.Bernstein, 1990;p. 184 I found this to be a potentially powerful idea.Bernstein, however, seems to have limited his examples of 'recontextualisation' to moves from the 'field of production' to the field of 'reproduction', that is the move from a practice to the teaching of that practice.My recontextualization of Bernstein's 'recontextualisation' generalises the concept to refer to any situation in which one practice views another.Simple examples would be media recontextualisations, but it would equally refer to the recontextualising of setting in research or in fiction.Clearly, this process may describe moves at any level of analysis so, again, we have the potential to generate a fractal discourse in an approach that could reasonably be described as more resonant with art than with science, but an art that rigorously follows an explicit method.
Before turning, though, to the category 'method' (DS + /ED-methodology) let's engage in a little 'armchair theorising'.It occurred to me to conceive of problem situations in terms of two variables.The first concerns whether the situation is to be played out according to explicit rules or according to a pre-determined structure that is known or discoverable in play.
Sports and games would generally meet this criterion as would formal debates, democratic elections (there used to be such events apparently) and other competitions.In some cases, the full structure may not be explicitly available at the outset and participants may attempt to discover it experimentally.An example of this situation might be a video game in which the rules or structure are encoded in the environment but may in part or in whole be tacit to begin with; more on this below.There are other situations that do not seem to be rule-based and this may be deemed to be the case in social and humanities research, but not mathematics, which is concerned to explore formal systems having explicit premises.In either case, rule/structure-based contexts and those not having explicit rules or structure may or may not involve opponents.These two variables-rules/structure and opponent/no opponent-generate another new 2 X 2 space as below.
Rules/Predetermined structure

Figure 2. Problem Situations
This scheme presents four strategies that may be deployed in problem situations.These categories are not mutually exclusive, but the headings, opposition/rules are, and generating exclusive, orthogonal categories is itself an educational (so not always straightforward) move in theory building.As I've indicated, though, the four strategies are not mutually exclusive, so an individual or group may deploy more than one strategy at different points in their engagement.I should emphasise, the unit of analysis is the strategy, not the individual agency or agent that deploys the strategy: the scheme does not put individuals/groups into boxes!The determination of whether or not the problem is rule/structure-based or whether there is or is not an opposition is made by the subject of the action, eg the game player, and is not objectively given.We can play around with this scheme to refer to cases beyond those most obviously represented by the category labels.
For example, in research, the distinction between, on the one hand, a realist strategy (that presumes and seeks to discover an underlying structure to the setting) and, on the other, a constructivist strategy involving the claim that the structure of the setting is an artefact of the data collection and analysis itself, is that between puzzle and design, though the language in which findings are presented may be deceptive.I may claim that 'my analysis has revealed that …', which suggests that I have solved a puzzle, when in my methodological discussion I have presented a constructivist methodology and so my solution should be presented as a design!The motive for such misrepresentation may have to do with marketing in the sense that design may be taken to be associated with aesthetic, or even political interests, while the solution to a puzzle may be interpreted as more functional or perhaps more 'scientific'.In the resolution of disputes in a social context, the strategies of one side may be presented in the context of a negotiation, whereas the agency in this case may be recruiting resources relating to a perceived underlying structure to the situation, so a move in competition is being presented as a negotiating strategy.The motive for deception here may be interpreted as relating to a perceived need to show 'fair play'.
I want to present another relational space, 'domains of action', that was originally developed in my analysis of mathematics textbooks (1994,1996,1998), but here I want to deploy it in the context of learning to play video games.In this case the mutually exclusive headings derived from Ferdinand de Saussure's (1972Saussure's ( (1911))) distinction between 'signifier' and 'signified' or Louis Hjelmslev's (1970) corresponding pair, 'expression' and 'content' (the terms used here) each of which may be strongly or weakly institutionalised as represented in Figure 3.The four 'textual strategies' in the scheme are constructed as follows.Esoteric domain refers to the most strongly institutionalised text, institutionalised, that is, in the context of the activity within the field under consideration, so, nonarbitrary expression and non-arbitrary content.Here 'the assemblage of hardware electronics and architecture, game structure and software'.Public domain refers to the weakly institutionalised text that is the game's fictitious setting, so, in terms of the game structure: arbitrary expression and content in the sense that alternative game settings might be selected.Descriptive and expressive are hybrid domains: descriptive domain text models the public domain in the language of the esoteric; expressive domain text models the esoteric domain in the language of the public.Most game players will have no direct access to the esoteric language:

Content
Instead, the player has access to a keyboard or console and a graphic user interface (GUI).There are, of course, many ways to engage with a game, some of which might be described as more destructive than pedagogic.One approach, however, is to attempt to construct the principles of the esoteric domain in the language of the console and GUI, which is to say, in the expressive domain.Dowling, 2013.No page numbers.This is the strategy that is deployed by 'walkthrough' sites (eg https://tombraiders.net/stella/tomb2.html#google_vignette(accessed 13th March.2024).Descriptive domain text might be deployed in the production of the game by gamedesigners.I should emphasise that, of course, public domain text is itself a recontextualization of what might be referred to as the 'real world', it is not in itself 'real', though a student of mine had his playing of Tombraider II interrupted when he was reluctant to dive the Lara Croft avatar into shark-infested water; a squeamishness that was apparently incompatible with the fictional nature of the game and contrasted with the game playing activity of the son of a colleague of mine who delighted in exploring the range of modes of 'avataricide'!I will take this one stage further (maybe a stage too far?).My contention is that all fields might be described as constituting an esoteric that is constitutive of the 'habitus' of subjects, who thereby know how to 'play its game ' Bourdieu (2015).A social researcher investigating a field-their setting-empirically will deploy their own etic language in describing the field.
The habitus of the setting will enable the subjects of the empirical setting to regard the outcome of the research in terms of their own descriptive domain text, so each setting-social research and empirical setting-as opposing fields will constitute the other as its own public domain as in Figure 4.  4 is constituted as methodology, which is the explanation for my description of SAM as a 'method' rather than a 'theory'.The social research and setting recontextualise each other as their respective public domains.This, of course, is why public audiences often misconstrue research outputs.Indeed, even academic audiences can sometimes misrecognise the esoteric discourse of, say, ethnography, here's Martyn Hammersley, describing a point of view that runs contrary to his own: A rather different point of view is that point of view is that the choice of context by ethnographers is necessarily arbitrary, in the sense that a host of different stories could be told about any situation, each one placing it in a different temporal and spatial context.From this perspective, ethnography is simply one means among others for telling stories about the social world, stories that need not be seen as competitive in epistemic terms.Of course, given this orientation, there would be a puzzle as to why anyone would go to the trouble of engaging in ethnographic fieldwork.Why not just write fiction in the manner of novelists and short story writers?Hammersley, 2006;pp. 7-8 Of course not, that which constitutes anthropology and, indeed, the reporting of research in any other academic discipline as distinct from the writing of novels is, first and foremost, that it is expected to foreground its methodology.This is an explicit requirement in respect of any thesis submitted for the award of a doctorate at my institution (and I would imagine most others in the UK at least) and is an empirical feature of writing generally in social research and the humanities, as well as the natural sciences.Novelists may explain their methods, but this is rarely incorporated into their novels.
Furthermore, novels are read differently from anthropology: they may be regarded as artistic expression or entertainment (maybe both), however the author intends them.Of course, anthropology may incorporate these characteristics as well, but these will generally be understood as secondary functions, whereas one or the other is expected (by readers, I'm guessing) to be a primary function of most novels.Another key function of academic writing is education, and this may or may not be in the mind of the novelist 9 .None of this is to diminish the value of novels or of fiction in general.I have, I hope, learned an enormous amount from novels (see example below) and, indeed, from fiction in other media: it provides me with explorations of the ways in which people (and other entities) might be imagined and might imagine, of the creative ways in which language might be deployed and developed, and with metaphorical structures that excite my own imagination.For the most part I will have no truck with the question of absolute 'truth' or 'incontestable fact'.There are, naturally, certain activities for which the question of truth becomes paramount, though perhaps these are not as widespread as is commonly thought.Here is Roy Wagner expressing a view that contrasts with that of those whom Hammersley is challenging: When an anthropologist studies another culture, he [sic] "invents" it by generalizing his impressions, experiences and other evidences as if they were produced by some external "thing."Thus his invention is an objectification, or reification, of that "thing."But if the culture he invents is to have meaning for his fellow anthropologists, as well as other compatriots, there must be a further control on his invention.It must be believable and meaningful in terms of his own "culture."Wagner, Roy. 2016(1975);p. 26 Our symbols do not relate to an external "reality" at all; at most they refer to other symbolizations, which we perceive as reality.Wagner, Roy. 2016(1975); p. 42 So, anthropologists 'invent' their accounts.We might reflect on the proximity between Wagner's ' invention of culture ' and Clifford Geertz's (1973) 'interpretation of cultures ' or, later (1988), 'the anthropologist as author', which begins rather to hint at anthropology as fiction.
'Objectification' or 'reification' are, perhaps, the outcomes of 'mutual interaction rituals' (Collins, 2014) and even established religions do not always or necessarily demand belief in the 'reality' of the constructs of their texts, merely compliance in their rituals (Rappaport (1999; see also Mary Douglas's literary analysis of the biblical books of Numbers (2001) and Leviticus (1999)).Émile Durkheim determined that the origin of the religious idea lay in collective effervescence: … it is in the midst of these effervescent social environments and out of this effervescence itself that the religious idea seems to be born.Durkheim, 2016Durkheim, (1912)) It is, however, the weasel word, 'belief, that grates here.As Rappaport (1999) notes: whilst (the Jewish) religion expects compliance, it does not demand 'belief' in the reality of it's ontology: Judaism does not require the devout to believe, for belief is not subject to command, It does, however, demand of them that they accept the law, and this acceptance is signalled by, and is intrinsic to, conformity to the ritual observances that pervade all of life.Rappaport. 1999. p. 396.though: If liturgical orders are to remain vital they must receive the numinous support of at least some of those who participate in them at least from time to time.

Ibid.
A political, if not a philosophical necessity.
'Collective effervescence' in rituals may be experienced (by the non-autistic), but this experience escapes language, so this is DS -, low discursive saturation.It is clearly constituted in ontic discourse, so illustrates setting in Figure 1, which leaves author, which again, must escape linguistic realisation, by virtue of its DS -nature here.So, this article must stand as my illustration of this category.I have previously used the relational space in Figure 3 to analyse pedagogic texts, including text books Dowling (1998) and public examinations (2013) and demonstrated that i) the UK school mathematics curriculum was differentiated along social class lines and that ii) the curriculum aimed at high socioeconomic status (ses) students moved between public domain and esoteric domain via descriptive or expressive domains, thus constituting an 'apprenticeship' of sorts, both into esoteric mathematics and descriptive mathematical modelling.iii) The curriculum aimed at low ses students was restricted to the public domain.Also, that iv) contrary to the intentions of the National Curriculum at the time (2013) was dominated by non-arbitrary content (esoteric and expressive text).Also, the school topic of probability was taught almost exclusively in the public domain (Dowling. 1995).The latter plausibly explains my own early difficulties with probability despite being confident in other areas of mathematics.
These examples illustrate that the language, SAM, may be deployed in empirical analysis and in the design of educational programmes.One of my former students, Chung (2011) has deployed the language in the analysis of literary studies and another is using it to revisit contemporary school mathematics and modern foreign languages education.The generation of relational spaces is not usually as straightforward as it might appear: each of the two dimensions of the schemes that I've presented in this article must have been established as mutually independent as must the values of their scaling.The schemes in this paper are limited to 2X2, but I have also generated three-dimensional schemes and there is ultimately no limit to the dimensionality of relationality, though representation becomes a problem above 3D or above 2D if we are to be restricted to plane geometry.As I've indicated, the concepts defined in these spaces are not expected to be mutually exclusive so that if the subject of action is carefully considered, they may be deployed plurally.Two of my former students, Russell Dudley-Smith and Natasha Whiteman (2021) have produced a monograph, Diagramming the Social that powerfully historicises, develops and extends the approach very productively.
Suppose you look at it like that?

Figure 1 .
Figure 1.Research Transaction Space Qeios, CC-BY 4.0 • Article, March 13, 2024 Qeios ID: FTG9U1.2 • https://doi.org/10.32388/FTG9U1.2 4/17 interpretation of one of the images that Hodge & Kress analyse: a painting by the Byzantine artist Cimabue 8 .Now my argument there is based on challenges to their interpretations of Durkheim's and also Bernstein's sociologies on which they base their social semiotics.Sociology is necessary to their multimodal/social semiotic analysis because they are claiming to have made sociological interpretations, so linguistics is operating in the wrong space; their discourse is out of joint.Even without recourse to the correction of their sociology, their analysis of the Cimabue painting is suspect, including, for example, the claim that the haloes around the heads of the saints and angels etc fragment the collective rather than, in my analysis, constituting a 'style marker', thus uniting it.They also miss the bold and focal geometric organising structure of the image: the Christian symbol of the cross.Now Hodge & Kress claim that the image constitutes a transparent signifier of a society in turmoil:

Figure 4 .
Figure 4. Social Research/Empirical Setting Fields Regard Each Other Not just 'the Lord', but any object constituted or believed to originate from beyond the here and now: the ultimate cause, the 'external thing'.Now, the failure to experience collective effervescence is arguably a symptom of autism, so the educational generalisation of the experience of collective effervescence would seem to exclude the autistic: well, educational practice is generally concerned with exclusions and the excluded are often deemed to possess special educational needs because of a presumed deficit.An alternative would understand the non-autistic (most of you, I guess) as victims of collective delusion constituting autism as not a mental health problem so much, but at least sometimes and in Rappaport (1999), and( (1967))offman (2017Goffman ( (1967))), RoyRappaport (1999), and Randall Collins (2014)worked with Durkheim's seminal idea, but I want to illustrate it with a brief extract from a recent novel by Elizabeth Strout, whose protagonist's sister, Vicky, surprises sister Lucy by announcing that she has joined a church: But when you really pray-and when you pray with other people-the spirit of the Lord can honest and truly come to you.Strout, 2022.Penguin Books.Kindle Edition.p. 135.disturbingly barking.Might the notion of collective effervescence be experienced by (presumably non-autistic) animals as well as you?I wonder what they think is going on!To return to human animals: here's an extract from an interview with Mary Douglas conducted by Alan Macfarlane in 2006: