‘Tele-education’ in the COVID-19 pandemic process in Turkey: A mental diaspora research specific to Turkish Language Teaching students

Abstract

This study tries to map educational processes that have to be transformed into the extraordinary history of the COVID-19 pandemic and adapt to the ‘new normal’ with a relational and metaphoric approach. In the study, the existing physical and mental conditions of the students who are "scattered/dispersed" geographically due to the mandatory "return home" in the pandemic process are conceptualized with the metaphor of the "diaspora". The study aims to draw attention to student-centered social problems by questioning the functionality of tele-education processes, which are designed to compensate for interrupted educational relationships and make them sustainable again. It is aimed to measure the effects of online consciousness that were deterritorialized by human-computer interaction and computer-mediated communication on student performances and to understand student motivations during the tele-education process. Therefore, a survey was conducted at ten universities in Turkey and reached 150 students through the snowball sampling technique. The results of the study show that the student self-perception of the tele-education process coincides with the diasporic identity and this unusual technology integration that cannot be fully compensated triggers mental diaspora feelings.