Universalism, Normalization and ‘Theory’ in Teacher Education: Insights from Australia

Author(s):

Malcolm Vick

Conference:

ECER 2009

Network:

17. Histories of Education

Format:

Paper

Session Information

17 SES 07 A, Educational Time/ Teacher Professional and Training (Part 1)

Paper Session. Continued in 17 SES 11

Time:

2009-09-29

15:30-17:00

Room:

HG, HS 34

Chair:

frank simon

Contribution

The paper starts from recent interests in spatiality and understandings of the role of place in shaping identities, ideas and practices (e.g., Brenner, 1999; Crang, Dwyer & Jackson, 2003; Geyer & Bright, 1995; Hoogveldt, 2001; Kostogritz, 2006; Martin, 2008; Pickles, 1999; Sassen, 2001; Trimingham-Jack, 2002; Vick & Halbert, 2008), to explore ways in which, historically, core understandings of education have been constructed in universalist terms (i.e., that claim to refer to universal entities, such as 'intelligence', or 'ability') which deny the role of specificities of time and place in their development, circulation and adoption. It focuses on ways teacher education in Australia (1900-1950): (i) articulated universalist constructions of core knowledge; (ii) tensions between such constructions and the specificities of place in its application; and (iii) used the discursive construct ‘theory’ in establishing normal discourses and the normalization of practices; and the relations among these. In doing so, the paper explores issues that directly or indirectly relate to the history of schooling and the development of associated ideas and practices, and ways that ideas about education travelled and crossed disciplinary and national borders in the past, that are grounded in intellectual and professional networks and their associated publications (e.g., Vick, 2007). The paper is framed within a brief discussion of three bodies of literature. The first addresses issues of place, and notes that spatial distributions of knowledge are embedded in complex relations of power (e.g., Brenner, 1999; Crang, Dwyer & Jackson, 2003; Geyer & Bright, 1995; Pickles, 1999; Sassen, 2001). The second addresses the historical constitution of the core knowledge of education and for teacher education, with particular attention to the role of ‘theory’ and a theory/practice binary (e.g., Vick, 2006a, 2006b). The third considers normative understandings of the nature of teacher education (e.g., Vick, 2008, 2007, 2006a). The paper deploys three concepts drawn broadly from poststructuralist theory, in particular within the ‘governmentalist’ strand of Foucaultian analysis: ‘discourse’, ‘regimes of truth’, and ‘power/knowledge’ (e.g., Burchell, Gordon & Miller, 1991; Foucault, 1976, 1977; Gordon, 1980). The theoretical possibilities derived from this work are inflected through a strong sense of the relative autonomy of field-specific knowledges -– in this case, professional educational knowledges -- highlighted by Bourdieu (e.g., Bordieu, 1990; cf., Collins, 1993; Lane, 2000; Postone, LiPuma & Calhoun, 1993).

Method

The paper analyses published and archival documents relating to curriculum and educational theory relating to teacher education programs in New South Wales, South Australia and Victoria) in the first half of the twentieth century, and textbooks used in those programs. This material is drawn principally from the archives of the Universities of Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide, as well as the State Archives of New South Wales, South Australia and Victoria. It documents and describes the core body of knowledge in Australian teachers’ colleges in these states, including the structure of the teacher education curriculum into educational theory, systemic requirements, knowledge of the content of the school curriculum, and ‘teaching practice’ (c.f., Vick, 2006a, 2006b).

Expected Outcomes

It argues that the construction of knowledge in universalist terms allowed teacher educators to position themselves, their students, and the educational knowledge and practices that were core to teacher education as part of a ‘universal’, progressive, scientific body of knowledge and practice; and thus draw on knowledge from elsewhere and treat as applicable locally, by treating specificities (necessarily temporally and spatially located and bound) as instantiations of a general theoretical ‘truth’. This in turn worked to legitimate a particular set of knowledges and the practices associated with them. In this, it drew strength from the similarity of the Australian teacher education curriculum to the contemporary teacher education curriculum in the UK and North America (c.f., Vick, 2007), and from the structure, content and use of textbooks (c.f., Vick, 2006a). It reinforced discursive relations between Australia, at the periphery of the British Empire, to Western regimes of truth and practice.

References

Bourdieu, P. (1990). In other words: Essays towards a reflexive sociology. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Brenner, N. (1999). Beyond state-centrism? Space, territoriality, and geographical scale in globalization studies. Theory and Society, 28(1), 39-78. Burchell, G., Gordon, C., & Miller, P. (Eds.). (1991). The Foucault Effect: Studies in governmentality. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Collins, J. (1993). Determination and contradiction: An appreciation and critique of the work of Pierre Bourdieu on language and education. In C. Calhoun, E. LiPuma & M. Postone (Eds.), Bourdieu: Critical perspectives (pp. 116-138). Cambridge: Polity Press. Crang, P., Dwyer, C. & Jackson, P. (2003). Transnationalism and the spaces of commodity culture. Progress in Human Geography, 27(4), 438-456. Foucault, M. (1976). History of Sexuality vol. 1, trans R. Hurley. London: Allen Lane. Foucault, M. (1977. Discipline and Punish: The birth of the prison, trans A. Sheridan. London: Allen Lane. Gasparini, F. & Vick, M. (2008). Place (material, metaphorical, symbolic) in education history: the Townsville College of Advanced Education Library Resource Centre, 1974-1981. History of Education, 37(1), 141-162. Geyer, M. & Bright, C. (1995). World History in a Global Age. The American Historical Review, 100(4), 1034-1060. Gordon, C. (1980). Power/Knowledge. Selected interviews and other writings 1972-1977. Brighton, Sussex: Harvester. Hoogvelt, A.M.M. (2001). Globalisation and the postcolonial world: the new political economy of development. Basingstoke: Palgrave. Hunter, I. (1988). Culture and Government. London: Macmillan. Hunter, I. (1994). Rethinking the School. Sydney: Allen & Unwin. Kostogriz, A.P. (2006). Putting ‘space’ on the agenda of sociocultural research. Mind, Culture and Activity, 1(3), 173-190. Lane, J. (2000). Pierre Bourdieu: A critical introduction. London: Pluto Press. Martin, K. (2008). Please Knock Before You Enter: Aboriginal regulation of outsiders and the implications for researchers. Brisbane: Post Pressed. Pickles, J. (1999). Social and cultural cartographies and the spatial turn in social theory. Journal of Historical Geography, 25(1), 93-98. Postone, M., LiPuma, E. & Calhoun, C. (1993). Introduction: Bourdieu and social theory. In C. Calhoun, E. LiPuma & M. Postone (Eds.), Bourdieu: Critical perspectives (pp. 1-13). Cambridge: Polity Press. Sassen, S. (2001). Spatialities and temporalities of the global: elements for a theorization. In A. Appadurai (ed). Globalisation (pp. 215-232). Durham: Duke University Press. Trimingham-Jack, C. (2002). Reproducing an English sensibility: landscape and schooling in the southern highlands of New South Wales, 1944-1965. History of Education Review, 31(2), 1-15. Vick, M. (2008). Imagine (like) this: the work the representation of teachers’ work does. In Teacher Educators at Work: what works and where is the evidence? Papers from the 2008 ATEA Conference, Sunshine Coast, 8-11 July 2008. Vick, M. & Halbert, K. (2008). ‘Home and away’: Constructions of ‘people’ and ‘place’ in the world in history curricula in Australia, 1850-2000. Bildung und Erziehung, 61(1), 53-72. Vick, M. (2007). Australian teacher education 1900-1950: conspicuous and inconspicuous international networks. Paedagogica Historica, 43(2), 245-255. Vick, M. (2006a). Texts and contexts: international sources and universalistic discourse in Australian teacher education 1900-1950. Australian Journal of Teacher Education, 31(1), 12-18. Vick, M. (2006b). “It’s a difficult matter”: historical perspectives on the enduring problem of the practicum in teacher preparation. Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education, 34(2), 181-198.

Author Information

Malcolm Vick

James Cook University

School of Education

Hermit Park

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