Michael Kroth & Patricia Cranton 
Stories of Transformative Learning 

‘Stories of Transformative Learning is intended to encourage people to explore the potential for transformative learning in their lives, practices, and communities. This book illustrates the transformative learning process through ten stories of individuals from both inside and outside of the classroom. Adult educators and adult learners will find the book to be personally insightful and professionally useful. There have been many accounts of transformative learning experiences, but it is not often that we have the opportunity to hear first-hand personal stories of transformative learning. Here, ten stories are told directly by the people who experienced them, with additional commentary from the authors. These stories are intended to resonate with readers and to inspire people to create the conditions where transformative learning can occur in their lives and professional practice. Storytelling is one way in which both educators and learners can understand the process of transformative learning. Telling stories, reading others’ stories, and contemplating our own stories all help us to become aware of alternative perspectives, a process that is at the heart of critical reflection and critical self-reflection, which is, in turn, central to transformative learning. We hope to increase readers’ sense of agency and more self-directed, self-fulfilling lives. By demonstrating how others have examined and reconsidered otherwise hidden assumptions that constrained the quality and potential of their lives, we show readers how they may do the same.’

Table of Content

‘Acknowledgements; Preface; About the Authors; About the Storytellers; Chapter 1: Fostering Transformative Learning; Making a Difference; Overview of Transformative Learning Theory; Toward a Unified Theory of Transformative Learning; What a Unified or Integrated Theory Means for Adult Education Practitioners; The Role of Storytelling and Narrative Learning in Fostering Transformative Learning; Summary; Chapter 2: Understanding Self and Society through Storytelling; Narrative Learning; Storytelling; The Storied Life; Storytelling in Organizations; Embodied Narrative; My Day In Italy; Summary; Chapter 3: Transformative Learning through Storytelling; Stories Leading to Transformation; Individuals Making Meaning through Stories; Stories That Facilitate Transformative Learning; Positioning Ourselves in Stories; Using Stories in Education; Summary; Chapter 4: Transformative Learning based on Psychological Dilemmas; Jumping into the Void – by Art; Transformation Following a Traumatic Disability – by Susan Stuntzner, Assistant Professor, University of Idaho – Coeur d’Alene; Commentary; Chapter 5: Transformation in Response to Loss and Trauma; Opening the Doors of Transformation – by Alyssa Nota; Falling into Transformation – by Laurence Robert Cohen; Commentary; Chapter 6: Transformation through Educational Experiences; The Good Road – by Jose; A Story of Transformation of a North Korean Student – by Nayoung Kim; Commentary; Chapter 7: Transformative Learning and Social Change; My Story – by Olutoyin Mejiuni, Department of Continuing Education, Obafemi Awolowo University Ile-Ife, Nigeria; My Story – by Mike Kim, Columbia University Doctoral Student, Iraq War Veteran, and Psychoanalyst; Commentary; Chapter 8: Transformative Learning and Spirituality; Freeing the Kimono – by Kelly Anderson; We Make the Way by Walking: Spiritual Pilgrimage and Transformative Learning While Walking the Camino De Santiago – by Elizabeth J. Tisdell, Professor of Adult Education, Penn State University Harrisburg; Commentary; Chapter 9: Discussion: Stories and Transformative Learning; Collecting the Stories; Developing Chapter Categories; The Stories We Were Told; Formation and Transformation; Traumatic Events Optimism and Hope; The Webs of Death and Loss; Educational Experiences; Relationships; Social Change; The Role of Adult Educators; A Journey; Developing Agency; Summary; Chapter 10: What We Have Learned; Storytelling and Transformative Learning; Implications for Practice; Implications for Theory Development; Implications for Research; What We Learned from Each Other; Summary; References; Index;’