Dialogue and Difference: The Sorry Story of the Digital native

In this paper we employ Bourdieu’s notion of social field to illuminate the disparities in education concerning the use of ICT in the Australian context. Although the deployment of the myth of the ‘digital native’ suggests cohesion within education regarding the imperative to employ technology, the imposition of ICT is taking place within a contentious field containing multiple players with competing agendas, different hierarchical positions and contested power relations. We attest that while there appears to be harmony within the dialogue concerning the use or adoption of technology within education and its provision through the Rudd government’s ‘Digital Education Revolution’, an examination of the state of play reveals acute difference, culminating with the exploitation of the (digital) native by the (digital) colonialist. We examine the use of the phases ‘digital native’ and ‘the information society’ and conclude that these have become myths in the service of economic and political vested interests.