Exploring Practical Knowledge: Life-World Studies of Professionals in Education and Research

Exploring Practical Knowledge investigates professional practices from a hermeneutic perspective. The book presents, discusses and applies notions such as practical knowledge, practical wisdom, tacit knowledge, and normativity to the professional lifeworld. These contributions focus on both specific practices and more general questions concerning theories and investigations of practice.

This volume comes as the result of a cooperation of three research centres: The two Centres for Practical Knowledge in Bodø, Norway and in Södertörn, Sweden, as well as the Research Group Value-Oriented Professionalisation at the University of Applied Sciences in Utrecht, the Netherlands. It offers empirical studies of professionals as well as discussing the underlying theories, approaches and methods of exploring practical knowledge – including the limits to any articulation of these aspects of professional action.

In contrast to the objectivist paradigm that otherwise dominates professional studies, each chapter presents central perspectives and possibilities drawing from humanistic and interdisciplinary research traditions. The book explores professions in a style accessible to scholars and practitioners alike. It is interesting for those studying practices within these professions and for vocational studies in education, social work, health care, police work, journalism, etc.