Experiential Learning and Its Critics: Preserving the Role of Experience in Management Learning and Education

In this article, I consider John Dewey's dual reformist-preservationist agenda for education in the context of current debates about the role of experience in management learning. I argue for preserving experience-based approaches to management learning by revising the concept of experience to more clearly account for the relationship between personal and social (i.e., tacit/explicit) knowledge. By reviewing, comparing, and extending critiques of Kolb's experiential learning theory (ELT) and reconceptualizing the learning process based on poststructural analysis of psychoanalyst Jacque Lacan, I define experience within the context of language and social action. This perspective is contrasted to action, cognition, critical reflection and other experience-based approaches to management learning. Implications for management theory, pedagogy, and practice suggest greater emphasis on language and conversation in the learning process. Future directions for research are explored.