Forum: Qualitative Social Research (May 2009)
Spaces, Times, and Knowledge for a Reflective Subjectivity in the Bellaterra Primary School
Abstract
In this article we present the results of a narrative inquiry into the construction of subjectivity in primary schools. In this study the researchers' own subjectivities came under the same scrutiny as those who were the focus of the research, and were placed in relation to them. We will discuss the doubts that arose as we carried out our research as well as how our positions as researchers changed over the course of the study. We will also describe our attempts to give voice to teachers and learners through our narratives. This goal led us to produce an account of subjectivity that was relational, process-based, and, sometimes, fragmented. Our interpretation of the representation of childhood/learners and learning in school is based upon how the teachers we have worked with shared a reflective, integral, cooperative, and community view of learning. We will also discuss how learners develop forms of positioning, identification, and differentiation depending on their relationships with others. In this way we have been able to reconstruct the way in which learners' subjectivities are formed by narrating scenes observed in classrooms with different groups of peers, and in other areas of the school where these groups carry out different activities. URN: urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs0902273
