Skip to main content
  • 558 Accesses

Abstract

This chapter explores the informal learning dimensions of ‘learning to become an academic’. I explore in detail the process of becoming a scholar with particular emphasis given to the supervisory relationship as a process of apprenticeship and learning community. My Ph.D. focussed on the informal and social learning practices of two groups of activists, so this paper also covers the journey of the research, the methodology and the methods chosen for the research. I outline the early corporeal learning experiences that constituted my own educational experience as a young woman growing up working class, who turned to ideas and theory for a language of resistance to educational discourses about class. This paper has a particular focus on the role of ‘identity’ formation in learning to become an academic. I outline the processes of apprenticeship through supervision and the role of a learning community in the Ph.D., as key in developing ‘mastery’ or a ‘feel for the game’ of academia.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 49.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

References

  • Adorno TW. The Authoritarian personality. New York: Norton; 1969.

    Google Scholar 

  • Armstrong P, Miller N. Whatever happened to social purpose? Adult educators’ stories of political commitment and change. International Journey of Lifelong Education. 2006;25(3):291–305.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Beckett D, Hager P. Life, work, and learning; practice and postmodernity. New York: Routledge, London; 2002.

    Google Scholar 

  • Boud D, Garrick J. Understanding Learning at Work. London: Routledge; 1999.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bourdieu P. The weight of the world; social suffering in contemporary society. Oxford: Polity; 1999.

    Google Scholar 

  • Branagan M, Boughton B. How do you learn to change the world? Learning and Teaching in Australian Protest Movements. Australian Journal of Adult Learning. 2003;43(3):346–60.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brookfield S. The Power of Critical Theory for Adult Learning and Teaching. United Kingdom: Open University Press; 2005.

    Google Scholar 

  • Darder A, Baltadano M, Torres R, editors. The Critical Pedagogy Reader. Falmer London: Routledge; 2003.

    Google Scholar 

  • Denzin NK, Lincoln YS. The Discipline and Practice of Qualitative Research. In N.K. Denzin & Y.S. Lincoln (Eds.) Handbook of Qualitative Research. 2nd ed. USA: Sage publishers; 2000.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dewey J. Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education. New York: The Macmillan Company; 1930.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dewey J. How We Think. Boston: Heath; 1937.

    Google Scholar 

  • Engestrom, Y. (2007). Activity Theory and Workplace Learning. Journal of Workplace Learning, Issue 6, Emerald Group Publishing, Bradford.

    Google Scholar 

  • Eraut M. Non-formal Learning and tacit knowledge in professional work. British Journal of Educational Psychology. 2000;70:113–136.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Foucault, M. (1980). Truth and Power. In Power Knowledge: Selected interviews and other writings 1972-1977, Pantheon Books, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foucault M. Truth. Power, Self: An interview with Michel Foucault. University of Massachusetts Press; 1988.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foucault, M. (1983). The Subject and Power. Chicago, University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Freire P. Pedagogy of the oppressed. Harmondsworth, Middlesex: Penguin; 1972.

    Google Scholar 

  • Freire P. Education for critical consciousness. London: Sheed and Ward; 1974.

    Google Scholar 

  • Freire, P. & Freire, P. (2005). Education for critical consciousness. Continuum, New York; London.

    Google Scholar 

  • Freire, P. & Shor, I. (1987). A pedagogy for liberation: dialogues on transforming education. Bergin & Garvey, Macmillan, Southhadley, Mass. Basingstoke.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gramsci, A. (1971). Selections From the Prison Notebooks. New York, International publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Haabermas, J. (1984). The Theory of Communicative Action: Reason and Rationalization of Society, vol. 1. Beacon Press Boston.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hodges, C. (2000). The Falling Scholar - Essays from the outside. Ph.D. thesis, University of British Columbia.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hodkinson P, Hodkinson H, Evans K, Kersh N, Fuller A, Unwin L, Senker P. The significance of individual biography in workplace learning. Studies in the Education of Adults. 2004;36(1):6–24.

    Google Scholar 

  • hooks, b. (1994). Teaching in Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom. Routledge, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • hooks, b. (2003). Teaching Community - A Pedagogy of hope. Routledge, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Horkheimer M. Eclipse of reason. New York: Seabury; 1974.

    Google Scholar 

  • Johnson R. Really Useful Knowledge, 1790-1850: Memories for education in the 1980s. In: Lovett T, editor. Radical approaches to Adult Education. London: Routledge; 1988.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kincheloe, J. & Mclaren, P. (2000). Rethinking Critical Theory and Qualitative Research. In N.K. Denzin & Y.S. Lincoln (Eds.) Handbook of Qualitative Research (2nd ed.). Sage Publications, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lave J. Situated Learning in Communities of Practice. In: Resnick L, Levine J, Teasley S, editors. Perspectives on Socially Shared Cognition. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association; 1991. p. 63–82.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Lave J, Wenger E. Situated learning, legitimate peripheral participation. USA: Cambridge University Press; 1991.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Lave J. Teaching as learning in practice. Mind, Culture, and Activity. 1996;3(3):149–64.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Marcuse H. One Dimensional Man. Boston: Beacon; 1964.

    Google Scholar 

  • O’Loughlin, M. (2006). Embodiment and Education. Springer on line service, http://0-dx.doi.org.library.vu.edu.au10.1007/1-4020-4588-3/ http://w2.vu.edu.au/library/EBookSearch/files/Springer_E-Books Online.pdf

  • Ollis T. ‘The accidental activist’: learning, embodiment and action. Australian Journal of Adult Learning. 2008;48(2):316–35.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ollis T. Learning in Social Action: The informal and social learning dimensions of circumstantial and lifelong activists. Australian Journal of Adult Learning. 2011;51(2):248–68.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ollis, T. (2012, forthcoming). A Critical Pedagogy of Embodied Education: Learning to Become an Actvist. Postcolonial Studies in Education, Palgrave, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Soloman, N. (2003). Changing pedagogy: the new learner-worker. The Australian Centre for Organisational, Vocational and Adult Learning, University of Technology, Sydney.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stake R. The Art of Case Study Research. Victoria: Sage Publications Inc; 1995.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stake R. Case Studies. In: Denzin NK, Lincoln YS, editors. Strategies of Qualitative Inquiry. 2nd ed.: Sage Publications Inc. California; 2003.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stake R. Multiple Case Study Analysis. New York: The Guilford Press; 2006.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wenger E. Communities of Practice. Learning, Meaning and Identity: Learning in doing, social, cognitive and computational perspectives. Cambridge University Press, United States; 1998.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Authors

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2012 Sense Publishers

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Ollis, T. (2012). Learning to Become an Academic. In: Ryan, M. (eds) Reflections on Learning, Life and Work. SensePublishers, Rotterdam. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-6209-025-5_20

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Societies and partnerships