The 7 Cardinal Sins of Transformative Learning Scholarship

When the term transformative learning (TL) is used in the literature, scholars are referring either to Mezirow’s theory of perspective transformation (1978) or to the wider range of theories, models, and approaches that arose in response to Mezirow’s work. This duality of usage is mirrored in the history of critiques of TL, which have evolved over the past several decades. Prior to the year 2000, early critiques mostly focused on Mezirow’s theory (see Collard & Law, 1989; Clark & Wilson, 1991; Cunningham, 1992; Hart, 1990; Inglis, 1997). However, in the years following, new, original critiques of Mezirow’s theory have become increasingly rare. Nowadays, when original critiques are offered, they tend to address the broader corpus of literature around transformative learning rather than solely targeting Mezirow’s theory. For instance, Taylor and Cranton (2013) criticized the TL scholarship for: (1) an overreliance on literature reviews rather than grounding research in primary sources; (2) a lack of critique of original research; (3) limited engagement with a plurality of research paradigms (notably positivist and critical); and (4) a lack of involvement in transformative learning by European adult education scholars. (I believe the latter critique is not as applicable today, but all the former still hold). Here, I take a slightly different tack on the same theme, with my own critique of the scholarly literature of TL. For this, I employ the Seven Cardinal (or Deadly) Sins. In a light-hearted way, I want to highlight tendencies that are contributing to “a certain ‘stuckness’ which ... is unproductive” (Hoggan et al., 2017, p. 49). To be clear, in analyzing my own scholarship I can see that I have fallen prey to many of these. That does not, however, justify them. So, in the spirit of self-critique, I offer here seven cardinal sins of the TL literature.