The article proposes that the objects of study in the social sciences are built into routines of interactions that we named interpretative communities. These adopt different qualities from those of an interview, because they are beyond the negotiations and agreements established by individuals to point out their positions in the development of knowledge. Moreover, from the perspective of interpretive communities, it becomes possible to identify biases that occur in the absence of epistemological vigilance in the task of specifying the (...) theoretical objects to achieve interpretive models, and promotes the use of reflexivity in community processes that report ontological security and reintegrate daily life. To develop these arguments a narrative axis is presented of the social scientist movements from a methodical solipsism towards a collective construction of knowledge. On this trajectory, life story helps to broaden the interview, also the dialogue facilitates the recognition of operational consensus that secures a sense of belonging and opens up the possibility to review the community appropriation by two perspectives, one of the subject co-producer of knowledge and one of the operating groups. El artículo propone que los objetos de estudio en las ciencias sociales se construyen dentro de rutinas de interacciones denominadas comunidades interpretativas, las cuales adoptan calidades distintas a las de una entrevista porque están más allá de las negociaciones y acuerdos que establecen los individuos para precisar sus posiciones en la elaboración de conocimientos. Además, desde la perspectiva de las comunidades interpretativas se hace posible identificar los sesgos que se producen por la ausencia de la vigilancia epistemológica en la tarea por especificar los objetos teóricos para lograr modelos interpretativos, y se promueve el uso de la reflexividad en los procesos comunitarios que reportan seguridad ontológica y reintegran el mundo de la vida. Para desarrollar estos argumentos se fija un eje narrativo en los desplazamientos del científico social desde un solipsismo metódico hacia la construcción colectiva de conocimiento. En su trayecto la historia de vida ayuda a ampliar la concepción de la entrevista y el tratamiento del diálogo facilita el reconocimiento de los consensos operativos que fijan un sentido de pertenencia y abren la posibilidad para revisar su apropiación comunitaria mediante dos perspectivas, la de los sujetos coproductores de conocimiento y la del grupo operativo. (shrink)

Naomi Scheman argues that the concerns of philosophy emerge not from the universal human condition but from conditions of privilege. Her books represents a powerful challenge to the notion that gender makes no difference in the construction of philosophical reasoning. At the same time, it criticizes the narrow focus of most feminist theorizing and calls for a more inclusive form of inquiry.

The existence of objective knowledge and the possibility of communicating it by means of language have traditionally been taken for granted by educators. Recent developments in the philosophy of science and the historical study of scientific accomplishments have deprived these presuppositions of their former plausibility. Sooner or later, this must have an effect on the teaching of science. In this paper I am presenting a brief outline of an alternative theory of knowing that takes into account the thinking organism''s (...) cognitive isolation from reality. This orientation was proposed by Vico at the beginning of the 18th century, disregarded for two hundred years, and then propounded independently by Piaget as a developmentally grounded constructivist epistemology. The paper focuses specifically on the adaptive function of cognition, Piaget''s scheme theory, the process of communication, and the subjective perspective on social interaction. In the concluding section it then suggests some of the consequences the shift of epistemological presuppositions might have for the practice of teaching. (shrink)

The existence of objective knowledge and the possibility of communicating it by means of language have traditionally been taken for granted by educators. Recent developments in the philosophy of science and the historical study of scientific accomplishments have deprived these presuppositions of their former plausibility. Sooner or later, this must have an effect on the teaching of science. In this paper I am presenting a brief outline of an alternative theory of knowing that takes into account the thinking organism's (...) cognitive isolation from 'reality'. This orientation was proposed by Vico at the beginning of the 18th century, disregarded for two hundred years, and then propounded independently by Piaget as a developmentally grounded constructivist epistemology. The paper focuses specifically on the adaptive function of cognition, Piaget's scheme theory, the process of communication, and the subjective perspective on social interaction. In the concluding section it then suggests some of the consequences the shift of epistemological presuppositions might have for the practice of teaching. (shrink)

The lever appears to be a very simple object, a tool used since ancient times for the most primitive of tasks: to lift and to balance. Why, then, were prominent intellectuals active around 1800 in areas as diverse as science, philosophy, and literature inspired to think and write about levers? In The Lever as Instrument of Reason, readers will discover the remarkable ways in which the lever is used to model the construction of knowledge and to mobilize new (...) ideas among diverse disciplines. These acts of construction are shown to model key aspects of the human, from the more abstract processes of moral decision-making to a quite literal equation of the powerful human ego with the supposed stability and power of the fulcrum point. (shrink)

Education and the collective construction of knowledge. An overview -- Teaching modality : a corpus analysis of the use of must by university Spanish learners of English -- Motivation and anxiety towards mathematical learning in primary education -- Criteria for the sequencing of contemporary music in education -- Sustainability training evaluation of Spanish university students -- Art as a means of fostering peace, communication and freedom of expression from childhood -- Culturemes vs. humoremes as translation problems in practice (...) exemplified in the German Cabaret of Marc-Uwe Kling and his Kangaroo stories -- Is there homogeneity among business students regarding the level of concern towards the sustainable development goals? A cluster analysis -- Use trends and methodological pertinence of Delphi within educational research in IberoAmerica : a systematic review in Scopus -- Gamification in the improvement of speaking competences in the English as a foreign language classroom : a case study -- Quality management in the Spanish university : an analysis of the success and performance rates in communication degree programs -- Teacher stories from the future : technology for the language and literature classroom. (shrink)

In this lively and accessible book Lorraine Code addresses one of the most controversial questions in contemporary theory of knowledge, a question of fundamental concern for feminist theory as well: Is the sex of the knower epistemologically significant? Responding in the affirmative, Code offers a radical alterantive to mainstream philosophy's terms for what counts as knowledge and how it is to be evaluated. Code first reviews the literature of established epistemologies and unmasks the prevailing assumption in Anglo-American philosophy (...) that "the knower" is a value-free and ideologically neutral abstraction. Approaching knowledge as a social construct produced and validated through critical dialogue, she defines the knower in light of a conception of subjectivity based on a personal relational model. Code maps out the relevance of the particular people involved in knowing: their historical specificity, the kinds of relationships they have, the effects of social position and power on those relationships, and the ways in which knowledge can change both knower and known. In an exploration of the politics of knowledge that mainstream epistemologies sustain, she examines such issues as the function of knowledge in shaping institutions and the unequal distribution of cognitive resources. What Can She Know? will raise the level of debate concerning epistemological issues among philosophers, political and social scientists, and anyone interested in feminist theory. (shrink)

This original article outlines a theoretical path and posterior critical analysis regarding two relevant matters in modern nursing: patterns of knowing in nursing and commodification contexts in contemporary health systems. The aim of our manuscript is to examine the development of basic and contextual nursing knowledge in commodified contexts. For this purpose, we outline a discussion and reflexive dialogue based on a literature search and our clinical experience. To lay the foundation for an informed discussion, we conducted a literature (...) search and selected relevant articles in English, Spanish, and Portuguese that included contents on patterns of knowing, commodification, and nursing published from 1978 to 2017. Globalization, commodification, and austerity measures seem to have negative effects on nursing. Work conditions are worsening, deteriorating nurse–patient relationships, and limiting reflection on practice. Nurses must develop knowledge to challenge and participate in institutional organization and public health policies. Development of nursing knowledge may be difficult to achieve in commodified environments. Consequently, therapeutic care relationships, healthcare services, and nurses' own health are compromised. However, by obtaining organizational, sociopolitical, and emancipatory knowledge, nurses can use strategies to adapt to or resist commodified contexts while constructing basic knowledge. (shrink)

O objetivo desse artigo é analisar a hipótese de que a educação escolar se constitui por diversas práticas que se encontram para além de qualquer princípio educativo. O “processo educativo” é uma tentativa de o educador delimitar uma interação com o educando e circunscrever modos específicos de transmissão do saber. No caso desse estudo temos como método a revisão bibliográfica em autores que permitem conceituar aquilo que se pode conceituar como “educação sem fundamentos”. Portanto, em nossa conclusão partimos da suposição (...) oposta com grande parte dos educadores que buscam estabelecer o controle no campo das relações humanas que se estabelecem em sala de aula. Grandes partes da transmissão dos conteúdos podem ocorrer sem muita clareza teórica por parte dos educadores e o educandos aprendem por mecanismos adversos – para além de qualquer princípio educativo. (shrink)

This work uses microgenetic study of classroom learning to illuminate (1) the role of pre-instructional student knowledge in the construction of normative scientific knowledge, and (2) the learning mechanisms that drive change. Three enactments of an instructional sequence designed to lead to a scientific understanding of thermal equilibration are used as data sources. Only data from a scaffolded student inquiry preceding introduction of a normative model were used. Hence, the study involves nearly autonomous student learning. In two (...) classes, students developed stable and socially shared explanations (“causal schemes”) for understanding thermal equilibration. One case resulted in a near-normative understanding, while the other resulted in a non-normative “alternative conception.” The near-normative case seems to be a particularly clear example wherein the constructed causal scheme is a composition of previously documented naïve conceptions. Detailed prior description of these naive elements allows a much better than usual view of the corresponding details of change during construction of the new scheme. A list of candidate mechanisms that can account for observed change is presented. The non-normative construction seems also to be a composition, albeit of a different structural form, using a different (although similar) set of naïve elements. This article provides one of very few high-resolution process analyses showing the productive use of naïve knowledge in learning. (shrink)

The commodification of health care, particularly primary care, presents challenges to care and knowledge development. The purpose of this study is to examine how nurses perceive and develop their knowledge in a commodified context. A mixed‐methods study was conducted that included a closed‐question survey and in‐depth interviews with nurses in public primary care in Catalonia. There were 104 valid responses to the questionnaire and 10 in‐depth interviews. The main findings of the survey were related to workload and limited (...) time for nursing care. Six themes emerged from the in‐depth interviews: (1) limited time for nursing, (2) feelings of burnout, (3) awareness of patient and family satisfaction, (4) organizational factors that favor nurses' needs, (5) organizational factors that hinder nurses' needs, and finally (6) public administration requirements. Participants perceive excessive workload and time constraints and feel that this affects their nursing care and their physical and mental health. However, nurses purposefully use knowledge patterns to cope with the problems associated with commodification. Nurses have multidimensional, contextualized, and integrated knowledge that allows them to optimize their care based on the needs of their patients. This research examines many challenges related to nursing practice and the nursing discipline and opens the door for further research that encompasses all areas of nursing. (shrink)

This book reformulates the sociological subdiscipline known as the sociology of knowledge. Knowledge is presented as more than ideology, including as well false consciousness, propaganda, science and art.

The paper analyzes current situation in epistemology that is characterized by the appearance of the so called alternative epistemologies opposing the classical epistemology. The ties between alternative epistemologies and Karl Marx’ class consciousness concept and its development in the neo- and postmarxist works (by A.Gramsci, E.Laclau, Ch.Mouffe) is demonstrated. The research is focused on the concept of “false consciousness” that serves as a basis of the concepts of ideology and hegemony. The concept of hegemony in neo- and postmarxism is analyzed, (...) it is shown how its application is reflected in the research of scientific knowledge: some authors claim that science is an agent of hegemony and it helps to maintain the illusion of the objectivity of the existence of certain phenomena. The proponents of this position – social constructionists, feminist philosophers et. al. – suggest to accept the equal value of the positions of different social groups each of which holds its own special discourse that helps to express the “knowledge” specific to this certain group. It is shown that such position sees “knowledge” as no longer universal, the knowledge is equaled to local understanding of the world. The conclusion is drawn that the position of K. Marx that gives basis to many claims of postmarxists and social constructionist is more favorable in comparison to them, because Marx whilst speaking of class consciousness assigns an important role to the individual subject. It allows to combine both universalistic understanding of knowledge and account not only for group differences, but for each individuality. (shrink)

What Russell regarded to be the ‘chief outcome’ of his 1914 Lowell Lectures at Harvard can only be fully appreciated, I argue, if one embeds the outcome back into the ‘classificatory problem’ that many at the time were heavily engaged in. The problem focused on the place and relationships between the newly formed or recently professionalized disciplines such as psychology, Erkenntnistheorie, physics, logic and philosophy. The prime metaphor used in discussions about the classificatory problem by British philosophers was a spatial (...) one, with such motifs as ‘standpoints’, ‘place’ and ‘perspectives’ in the space of knowledge. In fact, Russell’s construction of a perspectival space of six-dimensions was meant precisely to be a timely solution to the widely discussed classificatory problem. (shrink)

Upshot: This is a deceptively profound, compact book that can be inscribed in the grand tradition of philosophical dialogue. It confronts naive realism and radical constructivism, arriving at a seemingly workable conciliatory position.

This book highlights the philosophical and creative basis of knowledge co-production by all citizens regardless of socio-economic background in contrast with neoliberal ideology. Exploring beginning, transitional and theorised practices, the book is a memoir of the author's extensive personal and educational experience. Each topic is discussed in relation to a number of pragmatist themes that run throughout to illustrate how the process of dialectical emergence underpins and substantiates meaningful human living. Building on the work of American Pragmatism, this is (...) a systematic and detailed reintroduction of pragmatism to educators worldwide for progressive educational change. (shrink)

International legal scholars tend to think of their work as the interpretation of rules: the application of a law 'out there' to concrete situations. This book takes a different approach to that scholarship: it views doctrine as a socio-linguistic practice. In other words, this book views legal scholars not as law-appliers, but as constructing knowledge within a particular academic discipline. By means of three close-ups of the discourse on cyberwar and international law, this book shows how international legal (...) class='Hi'>knowledge is constructed in ways usually overlooked: by means of footnotes, for example, or conference presentations. In so doing, this book aims to present a new way of seeing international legal scholarship: one that pays attention to the mundane parts of international legal texts and provides a different understanding of how international law as we know it comes about. (shrink)

In his popular first book, The Spell of the Sensuous, David Abram (1996) calls on us to recognize the encompassing earth "in all its power and its depth, as the very ground and horizon of all our knowing." By re-emphasizing the connection between knowing and the earth, Abram hopes to encourage a more engaged existence with the flora, fauna, and landscapes among which we reside. Given that the earth is literally the ground and horizon of all our knowing, it makes (...) sense—in fact, it is good for the senses—to consider for a while how the places in which we know come to exert their influence upon the constructions that we call knowledge. This paper is a sketch of a larger project to illustrate the epistemic significance of geography. (shrink)

Feminist epistemologists who attempt to refigure epistemology must wrestle with a number of dualisms. This essay examines the ways Lorraine Code, Sandra Harding, and Susan Hekman reconceptualize the relationship between self/other, nature/culture, and subject/object as they struggle to reformulate objectivity and knowledge.

El dualismo de propiedades y los qualia han sido problemas heredados de la teoría cartesiana. ‘Problemas viejos con nuevas vestiduras’ que se han traslapado en el discurso de las ciencias cognitivas, en especial en el de la filosofía de la mente. Para algunos pensadores contemporáneos dichos «problemas» están en el marco de las cuestiones metafísicas. Esta investigación tuvo como objetivo develar la génesis del problema ocasionada por el uso inadecuado del lenguaje, con el fin de mostrar que tales cuestiones a (...) la larga no son más que pseudoproblemas. Problemas de orden lingüístico y lógico disfrazados con ropaje metafísico. El método usado en este estudio fue el método analítico. Por lo cual, en la primera parte del escrito se analiza el discurso que da origen al problema ; posteriormente, se revisa el discurso cartesiano —por ser la doctrina oficial que hereda el problema a la filosofía de la mente—. Como conclusiones, se presentan las razones por las que se afirma que dichos problemas no son más que errores heredados por el uso del lenguaje. Por último, se presentan de manera breve cómo las posturas eliminativista y emergentista de Dennett y Searle no son realmente la superación del dualismo como ellos lo sustentan. (shrink)

Polanyi’s post-critical philosophy contains a tension between the personal commitment of the knower to the apprehension of knowledge and the understanding of the incomplete, or potentially mistaken, nature of current understanding. This essay addresses this tension, both theoretically and practically, by drawing parallels between Polanyi’s theory and George Kelly’s Personal Construct Psychology. The two approaches share many similar assumptions about the development of knowledge. Application of Kelly’s perspective may assist us in developing direct awareness of our active participation (...) in creating knowledge, and helping us to articulate some of our underlying assumptions. Such activities facilitate movement toward more comprehensive understanding. (shrink)

Volume 28, Issue 4, July 2020, Page 851-853.

Open peer commentary on the article “Amusement, Delight, and Whimsy: Humor Has Its Reasons that Reason Cannot Ignore” by Edith K. Ackermann. Upshot: Ackermann tackles “humor” as an agentive participant in the process of knowledge construction. Performing her thesis in her writing, she give a reflective account of how oblique ways of knowing have always been present in debates concerning epistemology, albeit not given equal status as rational ones. As such, her endeavors in this text are geared towards (...) lifting up the position of “humor” to a much deserved higher level in educational and learning practices. Consequently, our endeavors in this commentary are targeted towards a little more in this direction by focusing on how “humor” becomes a way of accessing the process of knowledge construction and of unraveling its significance. (shrink)

The contributors to _Constructing the Pluriverse_ critique the hegemony of the postcolonial Western tradition and its claims to universality by offering a set of “pluriversal” approaches to understanding the coexisting epistemologies and practices of the different worlds and problems we inhabit and encounter. Moving beyond critiques of colonialism, the contributors rethink the relationship between knowledge and power, offering new perspectives on development, democracy, and ideology while providing diverse methodologies for non-Western thought and practice that range from feminist approaches to (...) scientific research to ways of knowing expressed through West African oral traditions. In combination, these wide-ranging approaches and understandings form a new analytical toolbox for those seeking creative solutions for dismantling Westernization throughout the world. Contributors Zaid Ahmad, Manuela Boatcă, Hans-Jürgen Burchardt, Arturo Escobar, Sandra Harding, Ehsan Kashfi, Venu Mehta, Walter D. Mignolo, Ulrich Oslender, Isiaka Ouattara, Manu Samnotra, Aram Ziai. (shrink)

El principal objetivo del presente artículo es el de remarcar la importancia de la interdisciplinariedad en la construcción de conocimiento, se reflexiona acerca del origen de la interdisciplinariedad como respuesta a los cuestionamientos filosóficos de la ciencia del siglo XX frente al positivismo. Se reflexiona acerca de la necesidad de investigaciones interdisciplinarias para abordar sistemas complejos. También se abordan problemas que se han dado debido al exceso de especialización a la hora de estudiar los diferentes objetos de estudios y se (...) aclarará la relación existente entre la especialización y la interdisciplinariedad. (shrink)

Recent developments in the psychological and social sciences have seen a surge of attention to concepts of embodiment. The burgeoning field of embodied cognition, as well as the long-standing tradition of phenomenological philosophy, offer valuable insights for theorising how people come to understand the world around them. However, the implications of human embodiment have been largely neglected by one of the key frameworks for conceptualising the development of social knowledge: Social Representations Theory. This article seeks to spark a dialogue (...) between Social Representations Theory and embodiment research. It outlines the position the body occupies in the existing theoretical and empirical social representations literature, and argues that incorporating concepts gleaned from embodiment research may facilitate a more comprehensive account of the aetiology of social representations. The value of analytic attention to embodiment is illustrated with reference to a recent study of social representations of neuroscience, which suggested that embodied experience can shape the extent to which people engage with certain topics, the conditions under which they do so, and the conceptual and affective content of the ensuing representations. The article argues that expanding Social Representations Theory's methodological and conceptual toolkit, in order to illuminate the interplay between embodied experience and social communication in the development of common-sense knowledge, promises productive directions for empirical and theoretical advancement. (shrink)

BY THE middle of the nineteenth century, serious difficulties in carrying out the Cartesian project of explaining through attention to our ideas how we may know things as they really are had become evident. A satisfactory account of the connection between occurrences of ideas in us and the properties of things apart from our ideas of them, an account promised by Descartes in the Meditations, had not been forthcoming. Descartes' claim that God's omnipotence guarantees that the members of some recognizable (...) class of our ideas, the class of clear and distinct perceptions, represent things as they really are became clearly unsatisfactory as part of a realist theory of knowledge as soon as Hume and Kant had shown the unsoundness of Descartes' proofs of the existence of God. Whether or not God's omnipotence guarantees that we can know things as they are, it had become evident that we lack adequate grounds for claiming to know that this is the case. Consequently, there developed by the middle of the nineteenth century a consensus that we lacked a satisfactory account of how our ideas enable us to know things. (shrink)

This book is born out of two contradictions: first, it explores the making of meaning in a musical form that was made to lose its meaning at the turn of the nineteenth century; secondly, it is a history of a music that claims to have no history - absolute music. The book therefore writes against that notion of absolute music which tends to be the paradigm for most musicological and analytical studies. It is concerned not so much with what music (...) is, but with why and how meaning is constructed in instrumental music and what structures of knowledge need to be in place for such meaning to exist. From the thought of Vincenzo Galilei to that of Theodore Adorno, Daniel Chua suggests that instrumental music has always been a critical and negative force in modernity, even with its nineteenth-century apotheosis as 'absolute music'. (shrink)

: Eastern Learning, which is an important part of modern new learning, refers to the Western natural science and socio-political thought that was assimilated by Japan from the end of 19th century to the beginning of 20th century. From the end of Ming Dynasty to the period before and after the revolution of 1911, China’s intake of new learning went through four stages. In the first three stages, a large number of Western books translated into Chinese were also introduced into (...) Japan, which became the basic literature and language medium of Japanese Dutch studies, English Studies and later the whole foreign studies. At the beginning of the 20th century, exiles, students studying in Japan and Japanese teachers introduced Eastern Learning into China, which had a profound impact on China’s modernization process. Eastern Learning is a new learning system with East Asian characteristics constructed by China and Japan in the process of Western Learning spreading to the East. (shrink)