Hi Cathie and all,
This is such a powerful idea, that in offering explanations for our
living practices, from within the practices, we are in fact 'doing
theory', and we can tell our research stories as our living theories of
practice. Brilliant. Louise, maybe you could write your research story
so that your supervisors can see that you are writing with
methodological rigour through showing the processes of theorising
through the writing? Just to note, I used to get awfully stuck with the
idea of 'theory' but now bear in mind what Jack once told me, that the
idea of 'theory' is much the same as the idea of 'explanation', so
whenever I come across the word 'theory' I do an instant translation
into 'explanation', and 'theorising my practice' as 'offering
explanations for my practice'. It usually works.
Cathie, can you give the sources for the Foucault and Mullarkey quotes,
please? I'd like to follow them up. Thank you!
Best wishes,
Jean
On 11 Apr 2008, at 09:46, Cathie Pearce wrote:
> HI All
> This is a very serenpitious e seminar for me! Not only does the topic
> of traditonal scholarships hit home with me, the insights and thoughts
> from some of the emergent threads speak so profoundly to the
> philosophies and readings that I have been immersed in for some time.
>
> Louise, take heart! there are ways of putting poststructalism to work
> that makes it impossible to return to tradtional notions of scholarship
> and research - that helps to gain new perspectives on things and
> abandon
> old habits of thought. Traditonal models that follow narrow goals and
> attempt to homogenize, limits the possibilities for learning and reduce
> them to representational ideologies. It also denies difference and
> locks us into oppressive patterns that repeat and pushes thinking into
> a
> grid, method or formula. Whilst I don't subscribe to theory being
> imposed; I also wouldn;t subscribe to any approach being imposed so
> don't think this is a problem with 'theory' as such but more in the way
> that 'theory' is being used.
>
>
> As Foucault says "In this sense theory does not express, translate or
> serve to apply practice; it is practice. But it is local and
> regional…and not totalising. This is a struggle against power, a
> struggle aimed at revealing and undermining power where is most
> invisible and insidious. It is not to ‘awaken consciousness’ that we
> struggle but to sap power and not their illumination from a safe
> distance. A ‘theory’ is the regional system of this struggle."
>
> And as John Mullarkey says "its doing is its creating" !
> Louise, perhaps you should surprise your supervisors and write your way
> out of it!! The threads here give some multiple suggestions for how to
> use your intuitions, feelings, senses of things as positive energy to
> create and by the same token, to create texts!
>
> Good luck
> Cathie
>
> Dr Cathie Pearce
> Research Fellow
> ESRI
> MMU
>
> tel: 0161 247 2074
>
> Before acting on this email or opening any attachments you should read
> the
> Manchester Metropolitan University's email disclaimer available on its
> website
> http://www.mmu.ac.uk/emaildisclaimer
>>>> Dianne Allen <[log in to unmask]> 04/10/08 8:36 PM >>>
> Hi all,
>
> Maree wrote
> Reading what Louise and Jack wrote reminded me of how I felt when I
> read
> Jane Spiro's wonderful story 'Eye and the Fellow-traveller' for the
> first time. I found Jane's story inspiring and wondered if other people
> might as well. You can find it on
> http://www.jackwhitehead.com/monday/janeepilogue.htm
>
>
> Thank you for sharing that.
> And what is interesting, for me, is to struggle with the bit that says
>
> "Will this do?" I asked.
>
> "Just check in the mirror. What does the mirror say?"
>
> I looked in the mirror. But all I saw was myself, exactly that, just
> the same. I didn't look a bit like Thought Doctor or even like Fellow
> Traveller.
>
> "All I see is myself, unchanged," I said, somewhat disappointed.
>
> "Exactly that, "said Fellow Traveller. "The journey was yourself, so it
> follows that the journey leads to yourself. And your Crown celebrates
> yourself."
>
> "Is that going to be alright, do you think?"
>
> "That's the only way it would be alright. I think you are ready to
> submit your Crown to the Club," said Fellow Traveller.
>
>
> How, when I look in the mirror I still think I look the same, but I
> have
> been changed and by the journey, but so subtly, and with continual
> cross
> checking in a mirror that I can't quite notice the difference; just as
> I
> cannot see the stigmata of mild depression that is likely to
> degenerate.
> The awareness of change comes as I continue the walk with the crown,
> and find that I and my crown can no longer walk comfortably in some
> paths, through some doors; but other doors that have previously been
> closed and locked are now open.
>
> Dianne
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Marie Huxtable
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Sent: Thursday, April 10, 2008 9:46 PM
> Subject: Re: AA Thread 1 07-08 Raising issues, asking questions, and
> making networking available for pr On 8 Apr 2008, at 13:12, Louise
> Phillips wrote:
> "I totally agree about the imposition of theories of others (the
> traditional scholarship model) onto
> the children's responses, but this is the model that my supervisors
> have guided me to follow -
> how do I break free from the traditional scholarship model as a PhD
> student? It's ridiculous really
> - as my supervisors and myself position ourselves as
> post-structuralist - yet they still adhere to
> many features of the traditional academic model - which is so
> positivist...
> Anyway I guess I am asking for strategies/ tips to challenge the
> traditional scholarship - in my
> less powerful position of student."
>
> when you wrote on 9 Ap 2008
>
> "I think I'd learn a lot from sustaining a conversation with a focus
> on Louise's question, 'How do I
> break free from the traditional scholarship model as a Ph.D.
> student?'"
>
> This resonates with me as an educator trying to improve the
> educational quality of what I am doing within a school context
> dominated
> by traditional thinking. I hope that you and others contribute further
> references and material which can be drawn on to develop a more
> authoritative and powerful response to the 'powers that be', and
> enhance
> the quality of scholarship and educational research. Reading what
> Louise
> and Jack wrote reminded me of how I felt when I read Jane Spiro's
> wonderful story 'Eye and the Fellow-traveller' for the first time. I
> found Jane's story inspiring and wondered if other people might as
> well.
> You can find it on http://www.jackwhitehead.com/monday/janeepilogue.htm
>
> Marie
>
>
> ----- Original Message ----
> From: Jack Whitehead <[log in to unmask]>
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Sent: Wednesday, 9 April, 2008 8:52:23 AM
> Subject: Re: AA Thread 1 07-08 Raising issues, asking questions, and
> making networking available for practiti
>
> On 8 Apr 2008, at 13:12, Louise Phillips wrote:
> "I totally agree about the imposition of theories of others (the
> traditional scholarship model) onto
> the children's responses, but this is the model that my supervisors
> have guided me to follow -
> how do I break free from the traditional scholarship model as a PhD
> student? It's ridiculous really
> - as my supervisors and myself position ourselves as
> post-structuralist - yet they still adhere to
> many features of the traditional academic model - which is so
> positivist...
> Anyway I guess I am asking for strategies/ tips to challenge the
> traditional scholarship - in my
> less powerful position of student."
>
>
> On 8 Apr 2008, at 23:50, Louise Phillips wrote:
> "THis is what I understand Brian - that I need to follow the widely
> recognised academic model -
> for success & for recognition. Hence my question to Jack. In the
> hierarchy of academia that Jack
> has reached a point where he has academic freedom but as a student
> this is limited for me."
>
> I think I'd learn a lot from sustaining a conversation with a focus
> on
> Louise's question, 'How do I
> break free from the traditional scholarship model as a Ph.D.
> student?'
> This question feels like a
> really good question that could form the title of a Ph.D. thesis.
>
> Louise - you are asking for strategies/tp challenge the traditional
> scholarship - in your less
> powerful position of student. What you might enjoy doing is to read
> Donald Schon's paper on The
> New Scholarship Requires ad New Epistemology.
>
> Schon, D. (1995) The New Scholarship Requires a New Epistemology.
> Change, Nov./Dec. 1995 27
> (6) pp. 27-34.
>
> You might also browse through some of the contributions to the 2007
> Handbook of Narrative
> Inquiry: Mapping a Methodology, published by Sage. I like Jean's
> contribution on My Story is My
> Living Educational Theory.
>
> I was helped enormously in extending my epistemology capabilities,
> from the limitations in
> traditional scholarship, by Michael Polanyi's book Personal
> Knowledge,
> where he recommends
> taking a decision to understand the world from one's own point
> originality and exercising judgment, responsibly with universal
> intent.
>
> I think you could also gain confidence, in making a contribution to
> the new epistemology of
> educational knowledge, through seeing that there are external
> examiners of doctoral theses who
> have track records of examining theses that have extended/transformed
> the epistemologies of
> educational knowledge from the limitations of traditional scholarship
> and into inclusional and
> relational epistemologies.
>
> I think you'd find Barbara Thayer Bacon's book on Relational
> (e)pistemologies most helpful.
>
> I don't want to overwhelm you with readings but I do hope that we can
> sustain a focus on your
> enquiry 'How do I break free from the traditional scholarship model
> as
> a Ph.D. student?' in this
> thread on Raising issues and asking questions. If you go into Jean's
> website at
> http://www.jeanmcniff.com/papers/reports.html , you will see the list
> of dissertations and theses
> includes 5 doctoral theses that have moved onto the new epistemology
> base. You will find more at
> http://people.bath.ac.uk/edsajw/living.shtml ....
>
> I've also attached Pip's contribution to the March 2008 issue of
> Research Intelligence on Increasing
> Inclusion in Educational Research: Reflections from New Zealand as
> this seems particularly relevant
> to Louise's question.
>
> Love Jack.
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