Outline of a Theory of Practice.
About: This article is published in Contemporary Sociology.The article was published on 1980-03-01. It has received 14683 citations till now. The article focuses on the topics: Practice theory.
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TL;DR: The authors argue that the shared use of artifacts is supported by latent border resources, which lie beyond what is usually recognized as the canonical artifact, and that designers now need to understand more fully the role border resources play and to work more directly to help users develop them.
Abstract: The shared use of artifacts is, we argue, supported by latent border resources, which lie beyond what is usually recognized as the canonical artifact. These unnoticed resources are developed over time as artifacts are integrated into ongoing practice and stable conventions or genres grow up around them. For a couple of reasons, these resources may now deserve increased attention. First, because they lie outside conventional frames of reference, many new designs and design strategies inadvertently threaten to remove resources on which users rely. Second, because of the increasingly rapid proliferation of new technologies, users have less time to develop new border resources. Consequently, we suggest, designers now need to understand more fully the role border resources play and to work more directly to help users develop them. Meeting these goals will require more than an intensification of user-centered design. It will require a fundamental redirection of the way many designers look at both artifacts and users.
263 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a sociological analysis was conducted into the collective nature of coaching as manifest in the triangular interaction between coach, athlete, and context within English professional youth soccer, showing how an authoritarian discourse is established and maintained, how it is structured by and subsequently structures the coaching context, and how accompanying behaviors are misrecognized as legitimate by both coaches and players.
Abstract: A sociological analysis was conducted into the collective nature of coaching as manifest in the triangular interaction between coach, athlete, and context within English professional youth soccer. The work of Pierre Bourdieu is predominantly used to interpret data collected ethnographically over the course of a 10-month season. Findings show how an authoritarian discourse is established and maintained, how it is structured by and subsequently structures the coaching context, and how accompanying behaviors are misrecognized as legitimate by both coaches and players. We conclude by reflecting on the limits of such work and its implications for future coaching education.
263 citations
01 Jan 2010
TL;DR: Social Learning Systems and Communities of Practice as discussed by the authors is a collection of classical and contemporary writing associated with learning and systemic change in contexts ranging from cities, to rural development to education to nursing to water management to public policy.
Abstract: Social Learning Systems and Communities of Practice is a collection of classical and contemporary writing associated with learning and systemic change in contexts ranging from cities, to rural development to education to nursing to water management to public policy. It is likely to be of interest to anyone trying to understand how to think systemically and to act and interact effectively in situations experienced as complex, messy and changing. While mainly concerned with professional praxis, where theory and practice inform each other, there is much here that can apply at a personal level.
This book offers conceptual tools and suggestions for new ways of being and acting in the world in relation to each other, that arise from both old and new understandings of communities, learning and systems. Starting with twentieth century insights into social learning, learning systems and appreciative systems from Donald Schon and Sir Geoffrey Vickers, the book goes on to consider the contemporary traditions of critical social learning systems and communities of practice, pioneered by Richard Bawden and Etienne Wenger and their colleagues. A synthesis of the ideas raised, written by the editor, concludes this reader. The theory and practice of social learning systems and communities of practice appear to have much to offer in influencing and managing systemic change for a better world.
262 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors introduce marketers to the open source (OS) phenomenon and develop a typology of brand aspects that can be "open" or "closed": physical, textual, meaning, and experience.
Abstract: The open source (OS) movement allows us to re-vision corporate branding from a corporate to a coproducer perspective. Corporations own their brands and unilaterally determine their positioning and evolution. Power and control are centralized and hierarchical: producers produce brands, which customers then consume. With OS, power and control are radically decentralized and hierarchical: producers and consumers coalesce into “prosumers.” The authors introduce marketers to the OS phenomenon and develop a typology of brand aspects that can be “open” or “closed”: physical, textual, meaning, and experience. The authors elaborate new dimensions for brands and revisit the functions that brands perform and link these to the evolutionary trajectory of branding, arguing that OS represents a final phase in the evolution of corporate brands from closed to open brands. The article concludes with a research agenda.
262 citations
TL;DR: The authors argue that the prevailing conceptualisation of the early childhood professional is constructed out of a particular, hierarchical mode of producing and applying expert knowledge that is not necessarily appropriate to professional practice in the field of early childhood education.
Abstract: In many countries, strategies to further develop services and institutions for the education and care of young children are linked to a discourse on professionalism. Ambitious policy goals, it is argued, can only be achieved by a skilled and qualified workforce whose practice is guided by a professional body of knowledge. This article argues that the prevailing conceptualisation of the early childhood professional is constructed out of a particular, hierarchical mode of producing and applying expert knowledge that is not necessarily appropriate to professional practice in the field of early childhood education. However, it is highly effective and contributes to forming a professional habitus that contradicts the relational core of early childhood practice. Drawing on the conceptual framework of hermeneutics, the article explores an alternative paradigm of a relational, systemic professionalism that embraces openness and uncertainty, and encourages co‐construction of professional knowledges and pr...
261 citations