Abstract

When we speak of ‘knowing’ something in Education, it can be bewildering. To what are we referring? Is it knowing how young people in our schools learn about civics and citizenship? Or is it knowing of the ways in which the historical circumstances of schooling have developed in different contexts or economies? Or perhaps, is it knowing how to structure school education to meet the new demands of Web2.0 technologies? When we start to scope the nature of professional knowledge-building in as diverse and widespread a practice of education it becomes clear that the field is governed by so many variables as to be vast, with some corners immensely fertile and well cultivated while others are virtually uncharted. I am interested, in this presentation, to explore how knowledge beyond academic knowledge and what has become known as Mode 2 Knowledge has been accumulated, evaluated and subjected to critique and debate. I shall seek to blur the boundaries between those who are understood to be the producers and those who are the users of professional knowledge in terms of their functions and the esteem that is attached to them.