ERIC Number: EJ960586
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2012
Pages: 24
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1363-9080
EISSN: N/A
Available Date: N/A
"Docta ignorantia": Professional Knowing at the Core and at the Margins of a Practice
Gherardi, Silvia
Journal of Education and Work, v25 n1 p15-38 2012
The expression "knowing-in-practice" focuses on practical reasoning and organising that takes place is working practices. An empirical analysis of the practice of cardiological teleconsultation allows to illustrate the characteristics of knowing-in-practice and how organising is discursively accomplished. The article illustrates how professional knowing-in-practice has an opaque dimension which is explored in terms of "docta ignorantia", that is, a mode of practical knowledge unaware of its own principles that accommodates a full range of sociomaterial resources and interactional forms according to the logic of the practice at hand. The concepts of "generative model" and "economy of logic" are employed in order to analyse how professionals rely on "docta ignorantia" to accomplish the practice in which they are involved. The generative model of the practice of teleconsultation distinguishes between activities "at the core" of the practice (mobilising professional authority and jurisdiction; performing accountability on professional, legal and bureaucratic bases; enacting a diagnostic community) and activities "at the margins" of the same practice (learning, theorising in practice, performing of a professional self and of a community of professionals). While the former activities are oriented towards the formation of the object of practice, the latter are oriented to the reproduction of the practice itself. (Contains 6 notes and 1 figure.)
Descriptors: Influence of Technology, Consultants, Telecommunications, Medical Services, Legal Responsibility, Interpersonal Competence, Models, Theory Practice Relationship, Praxis, Logical Thinking
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Evaluative
Education Level: Adult Education; Higher Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: N/A