With What Kind of Science Should Action Research Be Contrasted?

"Action research is often criticized for not being properly based in objective facts or for not formulating testable theories, in short, for not being properly scientific. But with what kind of science should it be contrasted? Hanson (1958) distinguishes between finished, (classical) sciences and research sciences. Unlike a finished science that can be conducted by us as individuals within an already well formulated disciplinary discourse, a research science cannot. If it is to inquire into possibilities not yet actualized, it must be conducted in a much more situated, conversational manner. Thus as researchers, instead of functioning as detached observers, seeking to discover the invisible or ‘hidden’ causes of an observed event, we must operate in an ongoing realtime situation in a much more dialogical manner. For such dialogicallystructured activity can, within the dynamics of its unfolding, give rise to transitory understandings and action guiding anticipations of a ‘situated’ kind, thus enabling all those involved in such activity to ‘go on’ with each other in unconfused ways. It is this participation in a shared grammar of felt, moment by moment changing expectations that are – in the interests of a decontextualized objectivity – precluded (or ‘lost’) within the disciplinary discourses of a finished science. Thus, guided by Wittgenstein’s (1953) writings in his later philosophy, I want to show in this article that, not only is it more accurate to compare action research with research sciences than with classical sciences, but that action research can find its intellectual legitimacy in the same sphere of human conduct as all of our sciences – in people being responsibly accountable for their own actions to the others around them in terms of their immediate relations to their shared surroundings." (author's abstract

Movements of Feeling and Moments of Judgement: Towards an Ontological Social Constructionism

"What is involved, in practice, coming to a judgement? The Norwegian family therapist, Tom Andersen, characterized himself as “a wanderer and worrier,” he was constantly reflecting on his ways of ‘going on’, on his own practice, to further develop and refine them. Each new way came to him, he said, on reaching a ‘crossroads’, a point when he felt unable to continue any longer in the same way. But once he stopped doing what he had come to see as ethically wrong, he found, he said, that the “alternatives popped up almost by themselves” (Anderson/Jensen, 2007: 159). What I want to discuss is the fact that, while we can say that we can quite self-consciously and deliberately decide not to do something (perhaps never again) at a particular moment, in a new and particular situation we cannot be said to decide at any particular instant in time, positively what to do. New ways of acting cannot be planned; they have to emerge. As Lehrer (2009) suggests, coming to act in a way that seems to be for the best in a particular situation is not something we can decide upon simply within ourselves – judgmental work, in which we go out bodily, to relate ourselves imaginatively and feelingfully to various aspects of our current circumstances, aspect-by-aspect, sequentially, over time, seems to be required. It is what the nature of this imaginative judgmental work feels like, looks like, and sounds like that I want to discuss in this paper." (author's abstract

Instead of Managerialism: From What Goes on Inside Our Heads to What Our Heads (and Bodies) Go on Inside of – the World between Us

"Theodore Taptiklis is a former McKinsey & Company consultant who, over the course of a 40 year career in business and organizations, undertook a wide variety of roles, including board member, senior executive, strategist and change manager, business development manager, and worked also in a variety of line-management positions as both an employee and as a professional advisor. He characterizes his professional life during that time as a progression from, not only a position of arrogant certainty to one of increasing ignorance, but also as one from realizing the all-consuming pervasiveness and insidiousness of traditional management doctrine (managerialism) to the possibility of more authentic and liberating ways of experiencing organizational life. The starting point for this process of ‘unmanaging’ ourselves, he suggests, is what we can notice each moment in our experience of the activities occurring between us in our everyday lives – a move from understanding our own practices as outside observers of them to engaged participants within them." (author's abstract

Inside processes: Transitory understandings, action guiding anticipations, and withness thinking

"To talk and to think, not about process, but in relation to it, is not easy. Many brilliant writers and thinkers in the recent past have helped us to think about process from the outside, about processes that we merely observe as happening ‘over there’, but few have helped us to think in terms of our own, spontaneously responsive involvement in ongoing processes from the inside. Yet practitioners need a style of thought and talk that allows them uniquely to affect the flow of processes from within their own unique living involvements with them. Crucially, I will argue, this kind of responsive action and understanding only becomes available to us in our relations with living forms if we enter into dialogically-structured relations with them. It remains utterly unavailable to us as external observers. I will call this kind of thinking, thinking-from-within or “withnessthinking,” to contrast it with the “aboutness-thinking” that is more familiar to us. In articulating its nature, I will draw on the work of Bakhtin and Wittgenstein, along with Vygotsky, Merleau-Ponty, and Polanyi. Central to it and quite unavailable to us in aboutness-thinking, is our subsidiary awareness (Polanyi, 1958) of certain “action guiding anticipations” and “transitory understandings” that become available to us within any ongoing processes in which we happen to be engaged, such that we can always have an anticipatory sense of at least the style or the grammar of what next might occur." (author's abstract

Subfossil statoblasts of Lophopodella capensis (Sollas, 1908) (Bryozoa: Phylactolaemata: Lophopodidae) in the Upper Pleistocene and Holocene sediments of a montane wetland, Eastern Mau Forest, Kenya

Lophopodella capensis (Sollas, 1908) is only known from a limited number of palustrine and lacustrine sites in southern Africa and single sites in both Kenya and Israel. Statoblasts of L. capensis were found preserved in the Upper Pleistocene and Holocene aged sediments of Enapuiyapui wetland, Eastern Mau Forest, western Kenya. The wetland is a headwater microcatchment of tributaries that feed into the Mara River and the Lake Victoria Basin. Bryozoan taxa were not surveyed in a 2007 macroinvertebrate biodiversity assessment. The presence of L. capensis at this site marks the second observation of this taxon in Kenya, 65 km from Lake Naivasha, where observed prior, and in a location some 1000 meters higher. The results suggest Bryozoa should be included in aquatic biodiversity surveys that target these wetlands and that bryozoan remains should be incorporated into palaeoecological studies as useful palaeoenvironmental indicators

Zooming in and out : studying practices by switching theoretical lenses and trailing connections

This paper contributes to re-specifying a number of the phenomena of interest to organisational studies in terms of patterns of socio-material practices and their effects. It does so by outlining a vocabulary and strategy that make up a framework for theorising work and organisational practices. The vocabulary is based on number of sensitising concepts that connote practice as an open-ended, heterogeneous accomplishment which takes place within a specific horizon of sense and a set of concerns which the practice itself brings to bear. The strategy is based on the metaphorical movement of "zooming in" and "zooming out of" practice. The zooming in and out are obtained through switching theoretical lenses and repositioning in the field, so that certain aspects of the practice are fore-grounded while others are bracketed. Building on the results of an extended study of telemedicine, the paper discusses in detail the different elements of the framework and how it enhances our capacity to re-present practice. The paper concludes with some considerations on how the proposed approach can assist us in advancing the research agenda of organizational and work studies

The formation of professional identity in medical students: considerations for educators

<b>Context</b> Medical education is about more than acquiring an appropriate level of knowledge and developing relevant skills. To practice medicine students need to develop a professional identity – ways of being and relating in professional contexts.<p></p> <b>Objectives</b> This article conceptualises the processes underlying the formation and maintenance of medical students’ professional identity drawing on concepts from social psychology.<p></p> <b>Implications</b> A multi-dimensional model of identity and identity formation, along with the concepts of identity capital and multiple identities, are presented. The implications for educators are discussed.<p></p> <b>Conclusions</b> Identity formation is mainly social and relational in nature. Educators, and the wider medical society, need to utilise and maximise the opportunities that exist in the various relational settings students experience. Education in its broadest sense is about the transformation of the self into new ways of thinking and relating. Helping students form, and successfully integrate their professional selves into their multiple identities, is a fundamental of medical education