Concepts of teacher knowledge as social strategies

Abstract

This article reviews didactical and psychologically based research on teachers’ work and teacher thinking, narrative educational inquiry and studies of change in teachers’ work and places them in the context of sociological theory about expert work and symbolic capital. The work of Abbott on the structure of expert work and knowledge, and Bourdieu on the importance of epistemic reflexivity of researchers, is applied to educational research. In the article, it is argued that the research findings on teachers’ work, teacher thinking, and teacher identity generated as abstractions about expert knowledge of teachers become discursive themes that teachers and researchers of teaching employ as social strategies in symbolic struggles within the field of education. © 2006 Pedagogy, Culture & Society.