How to characterize research and scholarship that matters for the educational field?

Abstract

For many decades, debates about the ‘what’ and ‘how’ have haunted the academic discipline of education. The temptation to rely on methods characteristic of empirical educational research can also be observed in some developments of philosophy of education. Both stances are criticized for neglecting various aspects in their approach as well as in the content studied: the field of education and child-rearing. Starting from the crystalline purity that may be looked for either in content or method, it is argued the research and scholarship that matter for the educational field should envisage research and reflection that attends sensitively and practically to both the particular and the general dimensions of that which one is examining. This requires a pragmatic concept of interpretation, a way of characterizing philosophy that focuses not only on the overview it may offer, and a balance between all the elements at stake. Only thus may it be possible to ask the right questions and to take up personal ownership of one’s own ethical and practical stance towards the people, things and phenomena one is researching, an invitation to find one’s own place within the world, helping us to make sense of life and to act responsibly.