Robin Usher

Disciplining the Subject: the Power of Competence

(1994). Disciplining the Subject: the Power of Competence. Studies in the Education of Adults: Vol. 26, No. 1, pp. 1-14.

Re-examining the theory-practice relationship in continuing professional education

ABSTRACT The aim of continuing professional education courses is generally considered to be that of helping the practitioner improve practice. Yet in emphasising the transmission of theoretical knowledge, the improvement of practice often becomes ineffective. The focus of this paper therefore is the theory-practice relationship. The conventional formulation of this relationship in terms of the application of theory to practice is examined and found to suffer from serious weaknesses. These arise from the underlying technical rationality model which sees practice as mere technique subordinate to theory and lacking the status of true knowledge. Using Donald A. Schons alternative model of ‘reflection-in-action˚s it can be shown that practice can generate its own theory which is both experiential and rigorous. Theory is not necessarily remote from practice and need not be intuitive and unsystematic. This therefore suggests an alternative conceptualisation of the theory-practice relationship. However such an a...

Locating Experience in Language: Towards a Poststructuralist Theory of Experience.

Experience, although a key concept in adult learning, tends to be conceptualized within the framework of humanistic psychology and thus to be seen as asocial and subjective. This article argues that the relationship between meaning and experience should not be grounded in subjectivity. The insoluble problems of such a grounding are illustrated by the deconstructive analysis of a text (Jarvis, 1987) centered on a humanistic approach to meaning and experience. An alternative theorization is presented that stresses the constitutive role of language in experience. This shows how the meaning of experience is located in the play of language and the power of discourse. Experience, therefore, potentially has no single, fixed, and invariant meaning. Seeing experience in this way allows for a reconceptualization of adult learning which more readily takes account of the neglected social dimension.

What stories do I tell now? New times and new narratives for the adult educator

Globally, the world of adult education has been much transformed in recent years. While there has been an expansion in the provision made available to adults, the profile of that provision has shifted with a greater emphasis placed on work‐related and certificated education and training, and an increased diversity in learning settings. This has led to a sense of crisis over the meaning of adult education as a specific form of provision and what it means to be an adult educator. This article examines the ways in which these changes have found expression in the narratives through which adult educators construct their practices and experiences as meaningful. We argue that there is an interaction between the impact of contestation and change in the field of adult education and learning, its narrative or story‐telling practices and the processes by which the identities of adult educators are formed. We examine the significance of this interaction by drawing on three inter‐related themes‐‐the so‐called turn to ...

“Moving” Experiences: globalisation, pedagogy and experiential learning

Abstract Globalisation is a process of great significance in the contemporary moment but its implications for education are still being explored. In this paper, we examine the impact of this process on education, concentrating particularly on its implications for reconceptualising pedagogy. Thinking differently about pedagogy is helped by the use of “location” as an interpretive metaphor since it foregrounds a notion of “(dis)location” — of positioning and being positioned, identifying and disidentifying — which suggests the “moving” quality of any location. We consider the part globalisation has played in recasting the boundaries of knowledge and the implications of this for the adult learner. A pedagogy which takes account of (dislocation) leads to a retheorisation of “experience” and enables experiential learning to be practised in a more open and less managerial way.

From process to practice: research, reflexivity and writing in adult education

The greater involvement by adult education practitioners in research poses the need to locate and problematise research as an activity. By seeing research as a social practice rather than a process it becomes possible to highlight the vital and neglected dimension of reflexivity. The paper argues that there is a need to recognise the place of writing in adult education research. Research can then be understood as a textual practice where it is impossible to ignore the workings of reflexivity and the need for researchers to be reflexive. The different forms reflexivity can take are considered in order to show that reflexivity does not refer exclusively to the effects of the researchers psychological make‐up or personal values. It is argued that there is a need for adult education researchers to become critical writers and readers of research texts and a framework is outlined which makes it possible to highlight the workings of reflexivity as a movement away from the purely personal to an awareness of the ...

Final frontiers? globalisation, pedagogy and (dis)location

Abstract In recent times, spatial metaphors such as border crossing, border pedagogy, speaking from the margins, spanning the abyss, occupying in-between spaces and diaspora space have emerged to characterise educational and other cultural practices. This is particularly the case in critical, feminist and postcolonial pedagogy influenced by poststructuralist and postmodern theory. This article argues that the increased emphasis given to spatial metaphors can itself be located in contemporary globalising trends where forms of location also and inevitably entail forms of dislocation – of disidentifying and being positioned as other. We suggest that the term ‘(dis)location’ provides a useful, non-essentialising metaphorical resource through which to analyse, understand and develop changes in pedagogy in conditions of globalisation. A pedagogy of (dis)location signifies an ambivalent pedagogy or a pedagogy of ambivalence in the uncertain reconfigurations taking place under contemporary conditions.

Lo(o)s(en)ing the Boundaries: from “education” to “lifelong learning”

Abstract In this paper, we survey the contemporary movement away from traditional educational forms to the new discourses and practices associated with the term “lifelong learning”. We relate this movement to the sense of crisis which seems to be present in the post‐compulsory and higher education sectors. We locate it in the technological, economic and cultural changes which characterise the postmodern condition and the questioning of the grand narratives which have sustained education in modernity. We examine how these changes are effecting education in terms of trends such as vocationalisation, marketisation, the commodification of knowledge, the individualising of learning and the challenging of the monopoly position of universities. We ask what “education” means when it is not a bounded field and what “learning” means in the more loosely bounded spaces of lifelong learning. We argue that the current situation is both exciting and troubling for educators requiring a redefinition of roles and purposes ...

Theory and metatheory in the adult education curriculum

Adult education has failed to theorize itself adequately as a field of knowledge in its own right. The professional curriculum required by adult education must selectively relate curriculum content to its world of practice. Andragogy represents the most consistent attempt so far but is inadequate because it uncritically reduces theoretical knowledge to learning theory. This paper aims to provide an alternative theorization, in effect a metatheory, of knowledge for the adult education curriculum. This involves examining the location of adult education as a field of knowledge in the ‘practical’. First, a critique is presented of the dominant professional model of technical rationality in order to show that the knowledge found in practice is not merely derivative. Second, the situated, interpretative and social characteristics of practical knowledge are discussed. Third, given these characteristics, the claim is made that a full understanding of the nature of practical knowledge requires an understanding of ...

Re‐examining the place of disciplines in adult education

With the evolution of new forms of adult education practice there is a need to re‐examine the place of disciplines in adult education as a field of study. In this paper the place of disciplines as epistemological foundations is explored and rejected. Instead, a case is presented that disciplines are already ‘in’ adult education in the form of power‐knowledge discourses which constitute adults as ‘objects’ of investigation, intervention and regulation. The most influential contemporary discourse of this kind in adult education is based on the disciplinary knowledge of psychology. It is argued that adult education as a field of study cannot be located in disciplines without negating its own aims of empowerment. To reject disciplines as foundations does not however imply that disciplines have no place. If their knowledge claims are approached critically, disciplines can be empowering in so far as they provide a means of countering the subtle regulation of ‘self‐centred’ discourse. Adult education as a field ...