Showing papers on "Critical theory published in 2005"

Crafting Qualitative Research: Working in the Postpositivist Traditions

Abstract: Acknowledgments 1. Qualitative Research as Craft: Postpositivist Traditions and Research Styles I. The Interpretive Traditions 2. Symbolic Interactionism: Searching for Self and Meaning 3. Hermeneutics: The Interpretations of Texts 4. Dramaturgy and Dramatism: Social Life as Theater and Stage 5. Ethnomethodology: The Accomplishment of Ordinary Lives 6. Ethnography: Cultural Understandings of Natives II. Traditions of Deep Structure 7. Semiotics and Structuralism: The Grammar of Social Reality III. The Critical Traditions 8. Historical Materialism: Class, Conflict, and Domination 9. Critical Theory: Hegemony, Knowledge, Production, and Communicative Action 10. Feminism: Gender as the Core Social Principle 11. Structuration and Praxeology: Transcending Dualisms Within Frameworks of Power IV. Traditions of the "Post" 12. Postmodernism: Playing with Images and the "Truth" 13. Poststructuralism: Discourse, Discipline, and Deconstruction 14. Postcolonialism: Unpacking and Resisting Imperialism 15. Conclusion: Tradition, Improvisation, and Quality Control References Index About the Author.

Brands A critical perspective

Abstract: This article proposes a critical perspectives on brands based on recent developments within Marxist thought. It argues that brands build on the immaterial labour of consumers: their ability to crea...

The Power of Critical Theory for Adult Learning And Teaching.

Abstract: 'Stephen Brookfield disturbs and enriches the entire field of adult learning with this brilliant piece of teaching' - Robert Kegan, Harvard University, USA. 'Simplifying without eroding the complexity of critical theory, Brookfield traverses the grand themes of ideology, power, alienation, liberation, reason and democracy; showing how they inform the adult education practice of fostering critical thinking and critical reflection' - Mark Tennant, University of Technology, Sydney, Australia. 'I learned more from this book than from dozens of other adult education publications! This book is sure to become a major reference text in the field' - Elizabeth Hayes, University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA. '!A lucid, accessible overview of how critical theory (with its daunting vocabularies and internal debates) illuminates the contexts of adult learning and orients teaching practices' - Michael Welton, Mount St. Vincent University, Canada.'This is a sophisticated and comprehensive treatment of the power of Socratic questioning of dogmas and a prophetic witness against the conservative status quo! A must read for all seriously engaged teachers' - Cornel West, Princeton University, USA. This major contribution to the literature on adult education provides adult educators with an accessible overview of critical theory's central ideas. Using many direct quotes from the theorists' works, Brookfield shows how critical theory illuminates the everyday practices of adult educators and helps them make sense of the dilemmas, contradictions and frustrations they experience in their work.Drawing widely on central texts in critical theory, Brookfield argues that a critical theory of adult learning must focus on understanding how adults learn to challenge ideology, contest hegemony, unmask power, overcome alienation, learn liberation, reclaim reason and practice democracy. These tasks form the focus of successive chapters, while later chapters review the central contentions of critical theory through the contemporary lenses of race and gender. The final chapter reviews adult educational practices and looks at what it means to teach critically. It is essential reading for anyone teaching, working in, studying or researching adult education.

Encyclopedia of social theory

Abstract: "The Encyclopedia of Social Theory", two-volume set, is an indispensable reference source for anyone interested in understanding the roots of contemporary social theory. It examines the global landscape of all the key theories and the theorists behind them and presents them in the context needed to understand the strengths and weaknesses of all the key areas of the discipline.These include: Structural fundamentalism; Marxist theory; Critical theory; Phenomenology; Ethnomethodology; Exchange theory; Rational choice; Feminism; Multiculturalism; and Postmodernism. "The Encyclopedia of Social Theory" draws together a team of international scholars led by the editor, George Ritzer, one of the most prolific social theorists. This is a benchmark reference tool for understanding the development, achievements and prospects of social theory. Key features and benefits include: over 280 entries; a master bibliography; a complete Reader's Guide; extensive biographical coverage of the major theorists; and extensive cross-referencing.

Evidence‐based practice in educational research: a critical realist critique of systematic review

Abstract: The paper argues that a critical realist perspective can contribute to a critique of evidence‐based practice, while at the same time not abandoning the idea of evidence altogether. The paper is structured around a number of related themes: the sociopolitics of ‘evidence‐based’; epistemological roots and a critical realist critique; the debate in action based on the recent systematic review of personal development planning; and theory to practice gaps. The advocacy of evidence‐based practice is currently being used to undermine professional autonomy and to valorise the ‘gold‐standard’ of randomised controlled trials. However, the paper proposes that evidence can properly be claimed for critique and emancipatory projects, and that its current discursive location at the core of New Labour thinking is not the only one available. Moreover, thinking from a critical realist perspective liberates the space for theoretically informed work, whereby arguments about method, and in particular randomised controlled tri...

Critical race ethnography in education: narrative, inequality and the problem of epistemology

Abstract: Data presented in a previously reported ethnographic research project indicated that an urban elementary school regularly subjects its students to dated curricular materials and supplies. As reported, this occurred even though the school had at its disposal updated and even state‐of‐the‐art resources, such as computers, visual aids, curriculum and photocopying machines. The critical race analysis presented in this article demonstrates that these practices are expressions of allochronic discourses that ingrain racial oppression in US schools and society. This article considers the roles of narrative and ethnography as measures to explicate allochronic discourses that inform public education. It also considers what American post‐industrialism and globalization mean for US public education and concludes with a discussion of the implications of critical race theory for contemporary urban school reform.

Engaging Critical Pedagogy: Spanish for Native Speakers

Abstract: This article addresses Spanish for native speakers (SNS) instruction from the perspective of critical pedagogy, including the critical examination of dominant educational paradigms as well as the proposal of alternative models. Emphasizing the inherently political nature of education and the role of language in the production of knowledge, culture, and identities, the author analyzes current models of SNS and argues that appropriateness-based models designed to promote expansion of students' linguistic repertoires may reinforce dominant sociolinguistic hierarchies and deny student agency. An emerging critical approach is considered, and a proposal that emphasizes the political-as well as the formal and social-aspects of language, and the promotion of student agency is presented. Specific suggestions for the implementation of the proposed approach are provided. Introduction Thanks in part to the changing demographics in the general U.S. population, as well as within Spanish language classes, the past few decades have been a period of increased interest in the educational needs of Spanish-speaking students. Of course, the growing attention now being paid to this segment of the school population is also a result of the Chicano and Latino rights movements which gained strength and recognition in the 1960s and 1970s, as well as the (relative) increase in representation of Latino scholars and educators within academia. Consequently, great strides have been made in the description of the linguistic abilities and needs of students who enroll in Spanish classes with some knowledge of Spanish (e.g., Carreira, 2003; Valdes, 1997), as well as in the development of pedagogical materials designed to address these abilities and needs (e.g., Marques, 2000; Roca, 1999; Samaniego, Rojas, & Alarcon, 2000). Despite these advances, as well as the numerous calls for a broader conceptualization of the needs of heritage language speakers (e.g., Aparicio, 1997; Carreira, 2000; Faltis, 1990; Martinez, 2003; Villa, 1996, 2003), many Spanish for native speakers (SNS) programs focus primarily on the linguistic development of students, and in particular, on the acquisition of what has been called "standard" Spanish.1 Such a focus reflects a depoliticized conceptualization of both education and language-a conceptualization challenged by researchers and pedagogues adopting a critical approach to education (e.g., Bartolome & Macedo, 1999; Giroux, 1991, 2000; Walsh, 1991). Critical pedagogues have called for researchers and instructors to recognize the inherently political nature of education and to investigate how certain educational practices socialize students to comply with and uphold existing class and social divisions. Whereas there is a well-established critical research tradition examining the teaching of "standard" English, as well as a growing body of research on critical approaches to second and foreign languages, critical approaches to heritage language instruction have been less common. Thus, there is still a pressing need to critically examine existing heritage language curricula-something the present article attempts to address. In addition to exploring the sociopolitical implications of dominant educational paradigms, critical pedagogues have proposed alternative program objectives, curricular foci, and pedagogical practices. They largely reject assimilation as an educational objective, as well as the construction of students as passive recipients of knowledge, arguing instead that educators should encourage student agency and prepare students to play an active role in the "shaping and reshaping of [their] social world" (Fairclough, 2001, p. 197), including the creation of a more democratic society. In order to develop more just educational programs, educators must pay attention to the specific social and political contexts in which students live and study (Canagarajah, 1999; Pennycook, 2001), and they must strive to bring the life experiences of marginalized students into the center of the classroom (Giroux, 1991). …

African American Spirituality and Cornel West’s Notions of Prophetic Pragmatism: Restructuring Educational Leadership in American Urban Schools

Abstract: Schools in America are facing rapidly changing demographics, and because of those changing demographics, this article makes the following propositions. First, the increasing demographic changes in urban schools demand new leadership approaches. Second, because many of the urban educational demands are shaped by ongoing social and cultural issues for addressing needs of African American students, perhaps the answer to leadership changes lies in African American culture. Third, and finally, one possible feature of the African American culture, the application of personal spirituality to community issues of social change and social justice, may provide a direction for educational leadership. The purpose of this article is to propose a theoretical base for reforming educational leadership in demographically changing public schools. With critical theory and antifoundational tenets of pragmatic thinking and postmodern thought interrogating the traditional canon of educational administration, educational leadership has had to, even if reluctantly, include voices of alternative perspectives into its discourse. This essay applies Cornel West’s notions of prophetic pragmatism along with the tenets of African American spirituality to serve as the foundation for this progressive transformation of leadership especially in urban schools.

Philosophy of the Social Sciences: Towards Pragmatism

Abstract: Acknowledgements. Introduction. Chapter 1. Emile Durkheim's naturalism. Introduction. An uneasy relationship with positivism. How to be a proper sociologist. Application: the study of suicide. Evaluation. Further reading. Bibliography. Chapter 2. Max Weber's interpretative method. Introduction. Transcending the Methodenstreit. Ideal types and different types of action. Application: the Protestant Ethic. Evaluation. Further reading. Bibliography. Chapter 3. Karl Popper's falsificationism. Introduction. What science is about. The controversy with Kuhn. How to make social science scientific. The problem with historicism and utopianism. Methodological individualism. Evaluation. Further reading. Bibliography. Chapter 4. Critical realism. The realist bandwagon. Realism, reality and causality. Creative scientists at work. Contributions to social theory. Application: British politics. Evaluation. Further reading. Bibliography. Chapter 5. Critical Theory. Introduction. The Early Frankfurt School. Jurgen Habermas. Further reading. Bibliography. Chapter 6. Richard Rorty and Pragmatism. Introduction. American pragmatism and Rorty. The myth of scientific method. The new left and the cultural left. Evaluation. Further reading. Bibliography. Chapter 7. A Pragmatist philosophy of the social sciences. Outline of a pragmatist view. Cultural anthropology. Archaeology. History and social sciences. Some concluding remarks. Notes. References and Bibliography. Index

Strategic Practice, 'Discourse' and the Everyday Interactional Constitution of 'Power Effects':

Abstract: This paper responds to the empirical and analytical challenge that surrounds tracing the constitution of 'power effects of corporate strategy discourse' notably documented in Knights and Morgan's seminal contribution. To meet the empirical challenge,interaction is centralized and ethnographies of strategists at-work are extended to include audiorecording their naturally occurring talk-based interactive routines over time/space. To meet the analytical challenge, the paper turns to two distinct social science traditions—Habermas' critical social theory and ethnostudies set against the stance of 'supplementation'. Habermas' schema suggests a re-conceptualization of strategic practice as a process where strategists routinely draw upon four forms of knowledge, which arguably 'makes-up' any 'Discourse'. These knowledges concern the external, social and subjective domain with the overarching knowledge being language use. Each also raises associated validity claims. While brief, the ethnomethodological perspectiv...

The House that Race Built: Critical Pedagogy, African-American Education, and the Re-Conceptualization of a Critical Race Pedagogy.

Abstract: Critical pedagogy has been widely characterized as a crucial construct in challenging the inequalities that have evolved in the context of schooling in the U.S. Evidence of this can be found in critical pedagogy's attempt to offer critique of the analytic connections between race and education within the context of the African-American struggle for humanity. In particular, critical pedagogy has functioned as a discourse on schooling and inequality that has developed in tandem with theories of race and pedagogical practice in ways that reflect the context of African-American education. This work expounds upon our previous scholarship to offer a broadened conception of critical race pedagogy that incorporates central aspects of critical pedagogy but is drawn from African-American epistemological frameworks. Origins of Critical Pedagogy within Critical Theory Critical pedagogy has maintained its status as an important component of educational research and inquiry since the early 1980s when critical educational theorist popularized the concept in academic writing (Bennett & LeCompte, 1999; Sleeter & Bernal, 2004). Since that time, these theorists have continued to struggle with the central question of critical pedagogy: "Whose interests are served?" (Bennet & LeCompte 1999, p. 250). In answer to this query, Gordon (1995) asserts that "Critical theory seeks to understand the origins and operation of repressive social structures. Critical theory is the critique of domination. It seeks to focus on a world becoming less free, to cast doubt on claims of technological scientific rationality, and then to imply that present configurations do not have to be as they are" (p. 190). Not only do critical theorists attempt to discover why oppressive structures exist and offer criticisms of their effects; they also explore the ways in which we can transform our society. In this sense, critical theory is not simply a critique of social structures it is an analysis of power relations that asks questions regarding: what constitutes power; who holds power; and in what ways power utilized to benefit those already in power. Critical theory emanated from "the Frankfurt School" under the auspices of cultural theorists Theodor Adorno, Herbert Marcuse, Eric Fromm, and Walter Benjamin) worked together at the Institute for Social Science Research originally located in Frankfurt, Germany. The group began to form under the leadership of Max Horkheimer in the 1930s but later changed location several times throughout the 1930s and 1940s. Eventually, the group returned to Germany during the early 1950s (Giroux, 1997; Bennett & LeCompte, 1999). Although no single or unifying theory emerged from their work, the Frankfurt School generated a strong set of critiques arguing that social phenomenon could not be understood solely through the use of scientific methods. This was an important challenge because the use of scientific methods in analyzing social phenomenon was widely thought to be scientific, objective, and value-free (Bennett & LeCompte, 1999). Instead, the Frankfurt School researchers felt that both social phenomenon and the scientific research methods used to explore them were tied to social and historical contexts that made neither of them neutral or value-free. Other individual theorists such as Antonio Gramsci, Jurgen Habermas, and Michael Foucault also played important roles in the development of critical theory. Antonio Gramsci (1971) was an Italian theorist and activist who explored the ways in which individuals were active rather than passive agents in the face of even the most oppressive conditions. He coined the term "hegemony" to describe the complex process that allows dominant groups to establish and maintain control of subordinates by using specific ideologies and particular forms of authority that are reproduced via social and institutional practices (Leistyna, Woodrum, & Sherblom, 1996). …

Science in Society

Abstract: PART ONE: EMERGENCE AND INNOVATION An Introduction to Issues and Forebears The Perspective of this Book: Reflexive Epistemological Diversity Risk and Technoscience: The Fusion of Society, Science and Technology Today PART TWO: THEORETICAL APPROACHES Science and Institutional Interests: The Strong Programme and Beyond Science and Language/Interaction: Ethnography and Discourse Science and Capitalism: Critical Theory and Critical Realism Science and Patriarchy: Women as Subjects/Objects of Science PART THREE: CASE STUDIES Second Nature: Genetic Modification and Commodification of the Non-Human Human Nature? Human Behaviour and Genetic Determinism Medical Genetics and Human Health PART FOUR: Conclusions: Reflexive Epistemological Diversity (RED) Tables

Abstract ethics, embodied ethics : the strange marriage of Foucault and positivism in Labour Process Theory

Abstract: In this paper, I draw jointly upon a Foucauldian ethical discourse and the example of the so-called `Manchester school' of Foucauldian labour process theory (LPT) to question the political/ethical ...

Social Choreography: Ideology as Performance in Dance and Everyday Movement

Abstract: Through the concept of “social choreography” Andrew Hewitt demonstrates how choreography has served not only as metaphor for modernity but also as a structuring blueprint for thinking about and shaping modern social organization. Bringing dance history and critical theory together, he shows that ideology needs to be understood as something embodied and practiced, not just as an abstract form of consciousness. Linking dance and the aesthetics of everyday movement—such as walking, stumbling, and laughter—to historical ideals of social order, he provides a powerful exposition of Marxist debates about the relation of ideology and aesthetics. Hewitt focuses on the period between the mid-nineteenth century and the early twentieth and considers dancers and social theorists in Germany, Britain, France, and the United States. Analyzing the arguments of writers including Friedrich Schiller, Theodor Adorno, Hans Brandenburg, Ernst Bloch, and Siegfried Kracauer, he reveals in their thinking about the movement of bodies a shift from an understanding of play as the condition of human freedom to one prioritizing labor as either the realization or alienation of embodied human potential. Whether considering understandings of the Charleston, Isadora Duncan, Nijinsky, or the famous British chorus line the Tiller Girls, Hewitt foregrounds gender as he uses dance and everyday movement to rethink the relationship of aesthetics and social order.

Is a Critical Pedagogy for the Profession of Social Work Possible

Abstract: In this essay, we address the perspective of progressive educators who maintain that academic curricula should be approached through the use of a critical pedagogy. We begin with a review of theories and methods in critical pedagogy and present a set of social and institutional issues that mediate against its use in social work education. We argue that, paradoxically, many of these obstacles in fact make the use of a critical pedagogy indispensable. Basic philosophical, conceptual, and methodological principles of a critical pedagogy for social work are elaborated.

A useful dialogue? Habermas and International Relations

Abstract: It is now more than twenty years since Jurgen Habermas's work was first referred to in International Relations (IR) theory. Along with many other continental philosophers and social theorists, Habermas was initially mobilised in the critique of positivism, and in particular neorealism, in IR theory. As such, the interest in Habermas and IR must be located in the first instance within the context of the fourth debate. This Forum section of the Review provides us with the opportunity to take stock and ask whether the dialogue between Habermas and IR has, thus far, been useful in providing new conceptual and methodological tools to analyse international politics and in inspiring new research agendas in IR. We also ask whether the role that dialogue plays within Habermas's work has been useful in formulating a critical theory of international relations.

Through the Multicultural Glass: Althusser, Ideology and Race Relations in Post-Civil Rights America

Abstract: In 1996, an edited volume devoted to Stuart Hall's work published the essay 'Gramsci's Relevance for the Study of Race and Ethnicity'. Central to Hall's analysis was Gramsci's deployment of the concept of hegemony. This article hopes to accomplish parallel insights on race and multiculturalism by going through the concept of ideology as theorized by Althusser. A thoroughgoing and critical theory of ideology is currently missing from multiculturalism. When ideology is invoked, it either goes through a Marxist refutation of the racial concept or it is posed as a problem that needs to be transcended rather than a constitutive part of the ideological struggle over race. Just as Hall reminds us that Gramsci's theory of hegemony must be taken in the context of Gramsci's Marxist problematic, this article notes that Althusser's theory of ideology must be taken in the context of his commitment to historical materialism. However, in order to analyze the relevance of Althusser's theory of ideology for the study of race and multiculturalism (something which did not appear in Althusser's work), the author appropriates his insights sans his problematic of historical materialism. Althusser's theory is useful for a study of race, which is as much a problem at the ideological as it is at the material level. Furthermore, Althusser's discourse on ideology enriches debates about race and multiculturalism to the extent that his general insights on ideology are appropriate for such an analysis. In this explication, the author presents a brief introduction to the multiple levels of Althusser's theory of ideology. Then, he appropriates Althusser's general insights and relevance, determining the most pertinent moments in his theory for the study of race and multiculturalism. Last, the author poses the problem of color-blind discourses on race.

Kant’s Politics: Provisional Theory for an Uncertain World

Abstract: Kant's brilliant original contributions to political thought cannot be understood without attention to his dynamic concept of provisional right, argues Elisabeth Ellis in this book - the first comprehensive interpretation of Kant's political theory. Kant's notion of provisional right applies to existing institutions and practices that are consistent with the possibility of progress. Ellis traces this idea through Kant's works and demonstrates that the concept of provisional right can be used both to illuminate contemporary theoretical debates and to generate policy implications. In this new interpretation, Kant's provisionalism provides a broad standard for political right that remains deeply responsive to historical and geographical particulars, directing our attention to the dynamism between our world and our ideals. Ellis offers us Kant for our time - worldly, pragmatic, and intensely committed to the everyday pursuit of human freedom. "This book does for Kant's political thought what Manfred Kuhn's magisterial biography did for general Kant studies. Ellis's key contribution is her argument that takes Kant's theory of provisional right as his central political concept. Reading Kant's political theory in any other way from now on will be difficult." Mika LaVaque-Manty, University of Michigan

The critical social theory of the Frankfurt School, and the ‘social turn’ in IR

Abstract: Critical theory in the Frankfurt School mould has made various inroads into IR theorising, and provided many a stimulus to attempts at redressing the ‘positivist’ imbalance in the discipline. Many of the conceptual offerings of the Frankfurt School perspective have received critical attention in IR theory debates, and while these are still ongoing, the purpose of this discussion is not to attempt to contribute by furthering either methodological interests, or politico-philosophical inquiry. Instead, I focus on the near omission of the social-theoretic aspect of the work especially of Juergen Habermas. I argue that a more in-depth exploration of critical social theory has considerable potential in the context of the ‘social turn’ in IR theory. The lack of attention to this potential is arguably due in part to the importance of Habermas' contribution to cosmopolitan normative theory, and the status held by the cosmopolitan-communitarian debate as a key site of critical IR debate for many years throughout the 1990s. The productivity of the Habermasian conception of the discourse theory of morality within this set of concerns has been obvious, and continues.

Critical theories, international relations and the anti-globalisation movement: the politics of global resistance

Abstract: This book explores the interface between social movement resistances to neoliberal globalisation and a range of critical theories in the discipline of International Relations (IR). Since the late 1980s, mainstream theories in IR have come under sustained attack from a range of critical perspectives. Indeed, many commentators see the rise of these perspectives as challenging the very constitution of the discipline (see e.g. Hoffman 1987; Lapid 1989; Linklater 1992; George 1994; Smith et al. 1998; for a more sceptical view see Navon 2001). Critical theorists share the notion that, in Robert Cox's famous phrase, '[t]heory is always for someone and for some purpose' (Cox 1986:207): that is, the act of theorising is always political. Given this, critical theorists interrogate the relation between power and knowledge production; they expose and denaturalise power hierarchies and relations of domination more generally; and they seek out immanent possibilities for disruption, resistance and transformative change. In this context, all acknowledge the importance of exploring social struggles and resistances, whether conceptualised as social movements or not, as crucial sites of world politics.

Modes of rationality in nursing documentation: biology, biography and the 'voice of nursing'.

Abstract: This article is based on a discourse analysis of the complete nursing records of 45 patients, and concerns the modes of rationality that mediated text-based accounts relating to patient care that nurses recorded. The analysis draws on the work of the critical theorist, Jurgen Habermas, who conceptualised rationality in the context of modernity according to two types: purposive rationality based on an instrumental logic, and value rationality based on ethical considerations and moral reasoning. Our analysis revealed that purposive rationality dominated the content of nursing documentation, as evidenced by a particularly bio-centric and modernist construction of the workings of the body within the texts. There was little reference in the documentation to central themes of contemporary nursing discourses, such as notions of partnership, autonomy, and self-determination, which are associated with value rationality. Drawing on Habermas, we argue that this nursing documentation depicted the colonisation of the sociocultural lifeworld by the bio-technocratic system. Where nurses recorded disagreements that patients had with medical regimes, the central struggle inherent in the project of modernity became transparent--the tension between the rational and instrumental control of people through scientific regulation and the autonomy of the subject. The article concludes by problematising communicative action within the context of nursing practice.

Organizational theory as a critical science? Forms of analysis and 'new organisational forms'

Abstract: Management Science and Epistemological Angst – Critical Theory and Habermas's Theory of Cognitive Interests – The Three Knowledge-Constitutive Interests and Their Articulation as Organization Theory – Discussion – Conclusion