Session Information
23 SES 08 B, The Teaching Occupation in Learning Societies: Concepts for a Global Ethnography of Occupational Boundary Work
Symposium
Time:
2009-09-30
08:30-10:00
Room:
HG, HS 7
Chair:
Terri Seddon
Discussant:
Ken Jones
Contribution
This symposium presents the phase 1of a transnational research project investigating teaching as an occupation in learning societies. We approach teaching as part of a global division of labour in human service work (teaching, nursing, social work). From this perspective, ‘teaching’ transcends established institutional settings (eg. schools, universities, vocational colleges) and exists as work practices across all workplaces and community settings.
We investigate the way teaching is reconfigured in these global-local work-related settings. What changes? What persists as an anchorpoint for occupational identities and teacher agency? In particular, what kind of ‘educational work’ takes place in boundary zones, where different occupational identities engage with one another to contest and negotiate expertise and professional knowledge, work practices and cultures.
Teaching as an occupation (like nursing, social work) was framed by 20th century welfare states, but is now subject to significant reform. Patterns of coordination and joined-up governance are disrupting established occupational boundaries and creating new boundary zones in which inter- and intraprofessional relations are being negotiated. Work practices, established expertise, professional knowledge and networks, occupational jurisdiction and mandate, and career horizons are all challenged
These changes reframe occupational identities and agency in ways that are more globally networked than in the past. There are new flows and new barriers in and between occupational demarcations that determine the capacity of local and national communities to get teaching work done. Eg. worldwide demand for teachers creates flows from South to North, periphery to centre, which impact on global justice.
We argue that in learning societies teaching is re-ordered across diversified learning spaces that exist between the worlds of education and work. Lifelong learning reforms have unsettled geographical, sectoral and disciplinary boundaries. Teachers are expected to cross boundaries and navigate new work-learning contexts, although this was not required in the past and these changes simultaneously endanger established working conditions and employment security.
This symposium elaborates the methodological approach that informs our research. Each paper addresses a key concept in the research and explains how it contributes to analysis of occupational boundary work in teaching. In clarifying these concepts, participants will outline their contextual and disciplinary anchoring, its link to our previous collaborative research on ‘Work, identity and politics of working life’ (Henriksson, Seddon, Niemeyer, forthcoming) and, where possible, provide empirical example(s) to reveal their application.
Method
The global scale of the changes in work and occupations justify the project’s methodology – a global ethnography of occupational boundary work in teaching based upon a ‘grounded globalisation’ research strategy. This will incorporate cross-national comparison and theorising, building on national cases from Australia, Finland and Germany.
The process of research involves cross-national reading and analysis to problematise empirical case studies. This approach reveals the discursive framing of each case and its underpinning research, which are, inevitably, embedded within national contexts and research traditions. Opening up these discursive dimensions of research for scrutiny through cross-border dialogue and theorising creates the conditions to develop new understandings and conceptualisations of teaching within a global division of human service work.
Expected Outcomes
This symposium will lay out the conceptual framework for the project for peer review. The symposium is an identified milestone in our research project timetable It will also (a) consolidate the conceptual platform for empirical research, while also reflecting and critiquing our prior conceptual and empirical work; (b) open a window on the challenges of transnational theorising and its implications for understanding teaching today. These outcomes provide an evidence base for our contention that research on teaching should acknowledge its place within the global division of labour that operates within and between scales (local, national, regional, global).
References
Connell, R. W. (1985). Teachers' Work. Sydney: Allen and Unwin. Henrikkson,L., Seddon, T. & Niemeyer, B. (forthcoming) Learning and Work and the Politics of Working Life, London, Routledge Henriksson, L. Wrede, S & Burau, V. (2006). Understanding professional projects in welfare service work: Revival of old professionalism? Gender, Work and Organization 13(2), 174-192. Kuhn, M. (2007). New Society Models for a New Millenium. New York: Peter Lang.
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