Discourses We Live By Narratives of Educational and Social Endeavour W RIGHT EDITED BY HAZEL R. WRIGHT AND MARIANNE HØYEN Discourses We Live By AND What are the infl uences that govern how people view their worlds? What are the embedded Narratives of Educational values and prac� ces that underpin the ways people think and act? H ØYEN and Social Endeavour Discourses We Live By approaches these ques� ons through narra� ve research, in a process that uses words, images, ac� vi� es or artefacts to ask people – either individually or collec� vely within social groupings – to examine, discuss, portray or otherwise make public their place in the world, their sense of belonging to (and iden� ty within) the physical and cultural space they inhabit. DITED BY AZEL RIGHT E H R. W This book is a rich and mul� faceted collec� on of twenty-eight chapters that use varied lenses to examine the discourses that shape people’s lives. The contributors are themselves from many AND MARIANNE HØYEN backgrounds – diff erent academic disciplines within the humani� es and social sciences, diverse professional prac� ces and a range of countries and cultures. They represent a broad spectrum of age, status and outlook, and variously apply their research methods – but share a common interest in people, their lives, thoughts and ac� ons. Gathering such eclec� c experiences as those of student-teachers in Kenya, a released prisoner in Denmark, academics in Colombia, a group of migrants learning English, and gambling addic� on support-workers in Italy, alongside D more mainstream educa� onal themes, the book presents a fascina� ng array of insights. ISCOURSES Discourses We Live By will be essen� al reading for adult educators and prac� � oners, those involved with educa� onal and professional prac� ce, narra� ve researchers, and many sociologists. It will appeal to all who want to know how narra� ves shape the way we live and the W way we talk about our lives. E L As with all Open Book publica� ons, this en� re book is available to read for free on the IVE publisher’s website. Printed and digital edi� ons, together with supplementary digital material, can also be found at www.openbookpublishers.com B Y Cover Image by Tom Perkins, CC-BY 4.0. Cover Design by Anna Gat . book eebook and OA edi� ons also available OBP To access digital resources including: blog posts videos online appendices and to purchase copies of this book in: hardback paperback ebook editions Go to: htps://www.openbookpublishers.com/product/1110 Open Book Publishers is a non-proft independent initiative. We rely on sales and donations to continue publishing high-quality academic works. DISCOURSES WE LIVE BY Photo by Tom Perkins, CC-BY 4.0 Discourses We Live By Narratives of Educational and Social Endeavour Edited by Hazel R. Wright and Marianne Høyen https://www.openbookpublishers.com © 2020 Hazel R. Wright and Marianne Høyen. Copyright of individual chapters is maintained by the chapters’ authors. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC BY 4.0). This license allows you to share, copy, distribute and transmit the text; to adapt the text and to make commercial use of the text providing attribution is made to the authors (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work). Attribution should include the following information: Hazel R. Wright and Marianne Høyen (eds), Discourses We Live By: Narratives of Educational and Social Endeavour. Cambridge, UK: Open Book Publishers, 2020, https:// doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0203 In order to access detailed and updated information on the license, please visit https:// doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0203#copyright Further details about CC BY licenses are available at https://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by/4.0/ All external links were active at the time of publication unless otherwise stated and have been archived via the Internet Archive Wayback Machine at https://archive.org/web Updated digital material and resources associated with this volume are available at https://doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0203#resources Every efort has been made to identify and contact copyright holders and any omission or error will be corrected if notifcation is made to the publisher. ISBN Paperback: 978-1-78374-851-8 ISBN Hardback: 978-1-78374-852-5 ISBN Digital (PDF): 978-1-78374-853-2 ISBN Digital ebook (epub): 978-1-78374-854-9 ISBN Digital ebook (mobi): 978-1-78374-855-6 ISBN XML: 978-1-78374-856-3 DOI: 10.11647/OBP.0203 Cover design by Anna Gatti. Cover image, and photographs on pages ii, xxii, 22, 114, 206, 284, 378, 460, 544, 620, 634, by Tom Perkins, CC-BY 4.0. Contents Acknowledgements ix Organization of the Book xi Notes on Contributors xiii Narrative, Discourse, and Biography: An Introductory Story 1 Marianne Høyen and Hazel R. Wright I. DISCOURSES WE LIVE WITHIN: FRAMEWORKS THAT 23 STRUCTURE 1. Truth and Narrative: How and Why Stories Matter 27 Janet Dyson 2. From Experience to Language in Narrative Practices in 53 Therapeutic Education in France Hervé Breton 3. Narratives of Fundamentalism, Negative Capability and 73 the Democratic Imperative Alan Bainbridge and Linden West 4. Understandings of the Natural World from a 91 Generational Perspective Hazel R. Wright II. DISCOURSES WE WORK WITHIN: OF THE WORKPLACE 115 5. Opposing Cultures: Science and Humanities Teaching in 119 Danish Schools Marianne Høyen and Mumiah Rasmusen 6. Shaping ‘the Good Teacher’ in Danish and Kenyan 141 Teacher Education Kari Kragh Blume Dahl vi Discourses We Live By 7. Irish Adult Educators Find Fulflment amid Poor 163 Employment Conditions Sarah Bates Evoy 8. Nurture Groups: Perspectives from Teaching Assistants 185 Who Lead Them in Britain Tristan Middleton III. DISCOURSES WE WORK THROUGH: CHALLENGES TO 207 OVERCOME 9. Punishment Discourses in Everyday Life 211 Khum Raj Pathak 10. Irish Students Turning First-Year Transition Obstacles into 225 Successful Progression Vera Sheridan 11. Care Leavers in Italy: From ‘Vulnerable’ Children to 245 ‘Autonomous’ Adults? Laura Formenti, Andrea Galimberti and Mirella Ferrari 12. What Game Are We Playing? Narrative Work that 269 Supports Gamblers Micaela Castiglioni and Carola Girotti IV. DISCOURSES WE WORK AROUND: MANAGING 285 CONSTRAINING CIRCUMSTANCES 13. A Danish Prisoner Narrative: The Tension from a 289 Multifaceted Identity During (Re-)Entry to Society Charlotte Mathiassen 14. Inclusion and Exclusion in Colombian Education, 311 Captured Through Life Stories Miguel Alberto González González 15. Navigating Grades and Learning in the Swedish Upper 333 Secondary School Where Neoliberal Values Prevail Patric Wallin 16. Adult Education as a Means to Enable Polish Citizens to 353 Question Media Coverage of Political Messages Marta Zientek vii V. DISCOURSES THAT EXPLORE OR REVEAL DIVERSITY: 379 FACING CHOICE AND CHANGE 17. Examining a Kazakh Student’s Biographical Narrative 383 and the Discourses She Lives By Rob Evans 18. The Needs of Low-Literate Migrants When Learning the 403 English Language Monica Mascarenhas 19. Uncovering Habitus in Life Stories of Muslim Converts 425 Simone R. Rasmussen 20. Participatory Approaches in Critical Migration Research: 445 The Example of an Austrian Documentary Film Annette Sprung VI. DISCOURSES TO SUPPORT DIVERSITY: PROJECTS 461 THAT EMPOWER 21. Decolonizing and Indigenizing Discourses in a Canadian 465 Context Adrienne S. Chan 22. Embedding Feminist Pedagogies of Care in Research to 485 Better Support San Youth in South Africa Outi Ylitapio-Mäntylä and Mari Mäkiranta 23. From Defender to Ofender: British Female Ex-Military 501 Re-Joining Civilian Society Linda Cooper 24. UK Senior Citizens Learn Filmmaking as a Creative 517 Pathway to Refection and Fulflment Teresa Brayshaw and Jenny Granville VII. DISCOURSES THROUGH A SELF-REFLEXIVE LENS: 545 THOUGHTS FROM RESEARCHERS 25. Diversifying Discourses of Progression to UK Higher 549 Education Through Narrative Approaches Laura Mazzoli Smith viii Discourses We Live By 26. Using Journaling and Autoethnography to Create 569 Counter-Narratives of School Exclusion in Britain Helen Woodley 27. Refections on a Creative Arts Project to Explore the 587 Resilience of Young Adults with a Muslim Background in Finland Helena Oikarinen-Jabai 28. Discourses, Cultural Narratives, and Genre in 609 Biographical Narratives: A Personal Overview Marianne Horsdal Learning from Narratives, Discourses and Biographical 621 Research: An Afterword Hazel R. Wright and Marianne Høyen List of Illustrations 633 Index 635 Acknowledgements As editors, we would like to thank the thirty-fve authors whose work appears in this volume for their collective eforts in making this a successful publication and their patience during the lengthy preparatory stages prior to publication. They have provided us with interesting and well-thought-out chapters, and those whose native tongue is other than English, have translated not only their own texts and their narrative data, but also the literature that they cite, making their material readily accessible in a common language to all our readers. For this, also, we are grateful. We thank Alessandra Tosi and her team of editors and IT experts at Open Book Publishing — particularly Lucy, Luca, Laura and Anna — for helping us to create and disseminate this varied and lengthy coverage of the narratives around discourses in private and professional spaces. Doing this successfully has been a challenging but worthwhile process, and we hope that you will fnd it a stimulating read. Special thanks are due to Tom Perkins (https://tomperkins.info) for taking and editing the photographs that introduce each section, which, as some of you may recognize, pursue a European theme in keeping with the spatial range of the book. We are grateful, too, for permission to use another of his photographs on the cover. Thanks also to Katie Wright for creating the graphic illustrations from the authors’ originals.