Learning spaces, context and auto/biography in online learning communities

The paper suggests that Online Learning Communities (OLC) can be considered as learning spaces which participants occupy and at the same time by which individual and collective identities are constructed. Some of the processes that contribute to an OLC learning space becoming experienced as a curriculum and pedagogical learning space of open and participative dialogue are described in the paper. The importance in these processes of participants' establishing an identity and finding a voice within the process of constructing and defining the learning space of an online learning community is identified as a key factor. © 2008, Inderscience Publishers.