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Critical Social Research and theAcademy: the role of organicintellectuals in educationalresearchIram Siraj‐Blatghford a

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To cite this article: Iram SirajBlatghford (1995) Critical Social Research and the Academy:the role of organic intellectuals in educational research, British Journal of Sociology ofEducation, 16:2, 205-220, DOI: 10.1080/0142569950160205

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British Journal of Sociology of Education, Vol. 16, No. 2, 1995 205

Critical Social Research and the Academy: the role of organicintellectuals in educational research

I R A M S I R A J - B L A T G H F O R D , Institute of Education, University of London

ABSTRACT This paper is presented in two parts. The first part explores the methodological and

epistemological implications of working as a black, female researcher studying issues of social justice and

equality in a faculty of education. It is argued that many of those researching social issues and motivated

by the desire to facilitate change are faced with an apparent contradiction between a commitment to

producing objective, value free research and their commitment to equality and justice. This apparent

contradiction haunts them in their negotiations with gate keepers, research funders, employers, the academic

community and with policy makers and other practitioners. It is argued that the contradiction is indeed

only apparent and that it is based on mistaken notions of 'objectivity' and 'universal values'. I argue that

as 'committed' researchers we need to move beyond such false contradictions while at the same time

accepting a dual role, of empowerment and critical engagement. In part two of the paper, it is suggested

that a radical humanist, critical and reflexive form of action research, one that is informed by a concern

for social justice and emancipation, may be constructed that is grounded on Habermas's conception of a

'pathology of communication'. Such research would be directed at the dominant mode of academic and

educational production itself. The Gramscian conception of the 'organic intellectual' is invoked in

elaborating a research model that might go beyond the kind of 'simultaneous-integrated' action research

that has been described by researchers such as Alison Kelly while being radically distanced from work

being carried out under the rubric of 'teacher as researcher' or other possibly technicist and managerial

action-research models.

Introduction

In a paper in the Harvard Educational Review, Beverley McElroy-Johnson (1993) arguedthat African-American pupils continue to be faced with an educational environment thatprovides little motivation or validation and fails to promote their self-esteem and abilityto succeed. In a previous edition Maria de la Luz Reyes and John Halcon described theirown and other reported experiences of racism in American higher education faculties.

0142-5692/95/020205-16 © 1995 Carfax Publishing Ltd

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Their paper entitled 'Racism in academia: the old wolf revisited' (1988) described acontinuity between the authors' experiences of racism in school and in higher education,a continuity in tracking, low expectation and stereotyping. Luz Reyes & Halcon describean academic 'etharchy' where the best educated members of minority communities, arethemselves unable to gain access to faculty positions. In this paper I shall argue that itis essential that we recognise that throughout education, and in the UK as well as in theUS, it is indeed that same animal we are dealing with. The 'wolf inhabits theeducational research environment as much as the classroom and this paper focuses uponthe freedom of Black and ethnic minority academics to engage in research concernedand committed to overcoming social injustice and inequality. While the image of a wolfsuggests a wild beast quite removed from daily social practices, something external, wildand even dignified, we must remember that racism is a human creation and aphenomenon to be eradicated.

In the UK, as in America, Black intellectuals have been in danger of choosing betweenprofessional success achieved through uncritical capitulation to what bell hooks (1991)has referred to as the 'prevailing paradigms and research programs of the whitebourgeois academy' (p. 135), and marginalization and professional failure. As hooksargues, there is a need to ground Black intellectual activity in a discernible intellectualtradition. For hooks such an intellectual tradition is needed to provide 'accepted rules ofprocedure', 'criteria for judgment', 'canons for assessing performance', 'models of pastachievement and present emulation' and an 'acknowledged succession and accumulationof superb accomplishments' (p. 136). There is undoubtedly a need to provide asupportive Black intellectual infrastructure to aspiring Black writers and academics, andin the UK this role has been greatly served by some Black American women, with bellhooks' own contributions being particularly significant.

My research into the experiences of Black and ethnic minority students in initialteacher education (ITE) (Siraj-Blatchford, 1991) showed that action was required by ITEdepartments to analyse, monitor and promote racial equality. The students whoresponded to my questionnaire describe their experiences of racism in ITE and theseexperiences were presented for publication. Papers have since been published in thoseterms. However, it is significant and symptomatic of a wider malaise, that one of ourprestigious refereed educational journals insisted that only the students' perceptions ofracism could be reported upon. I shall argue that the way in which student voices andthe demand for equality have been received by 'traditional intellectuals' (Gramsci, 1971)in the academic community, suggests the need for a critical review of the academic modeof production itself. If this is to be achieved it will be important to understand thedominant methodological and epistemological discourse and the means by which thatdiscourse may be influenced. If we aim to influence and challenge mainstream notionsof what constitutes good research and valid knowledge production, we need to explorethose research methods and epistemologies which highlight the contradictory andproblematic nature of the claims that are made by the established research community.

The first part of this paper begins by considering the popular research methods andepistemologies and the implications that the adoption of these paradigms have for aBlack, anti-racist and anti-sexist researcher. Following a brief discussion of critical socialresearch and the role of 'committed' researchers I engage in an extended discussion ofthe 'insider-outsider' research problematic. I conclude that Gramsci's notion of theorganic intellectual provides a powerful model to define the role of critical andcommitted educational researchers.

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Critical Social Research 207

Methodology and Epistemology in Educational Research

In educational research, methodologies are sometimes considered in terms of a simpledichotomy between qualitative and quantitative approaches. But while quantitativeapproaches may be favoured by positivist researchers and qualitative by interpretivists,both qualitative and quantitative methods are sometimes used by researchers workingwithin either tradition. In the case of my study of Black and ethnic minority studentexperiences in ITE I used both strategies. We therefore need to look beyond the methodsemployed to the epistemological frameworks favoured in academia. While all re-searchers, if they are to be persuasive, whether positivist, functionalist, radical structural-ist or interpretivist need to be equally critical in terms of the validity andrepresentativeness of their data, I shall argue that each of these approaches presentsspecial difficulties for the researcher concerned with social justice.

A positivist approach involves the researcher in the development of a hypothesis drawnfrom the existing body of knowledge, along with the survey instruments and proceduresneeded to test the hypothesis. Positivism assumes that 'objective truths' lie somewhere outin the 'real world' and that our best approximation of these truths is presented in thebody of published and accepted academic knowledge. A traditional criticism of thisapproach emphasises the fact that researchers' values and understandings inevitablyinfluence their choice of appropriate theory from which the research hypothesis isdeduced. These values and understandings also have a continuous influence upon theinterpretation of data. A general argument can thus be made, for instance, against whiteresearchers studying racism. From this perspective it is clear that the 'oppressors' valuesand understandings would certainly influence the study. Such an argument can be seenas representing a specific case of the critique of positivist methods in general. However,such arguments are somewhat simplistic and complicated by the recognition that a Blackor ethnic minority researcher may or may not have an 'anti-racist' or an 'insurgent'(West, 1985) Black or ethnic minority perspective in just the same way as a woman mayor may not adopt an anti-sexist or feminist approach; and whatever the case, theacceptability of their findings may be assessed by some according to their shared orexcluded membership of such a group.

For a Black, ethnic minority and/or feminist researcher the adoption of a positivistapproach, producing 'hard scientific evidence' {sic.) has the instrumental merit of beingpersuasive to liberal academics and to administrators. One is faced however with a majordifficulty in the development of an adequate anti-racist and/or feminist hypothesis fromthe body of established research knowledge. Much of the analysis of established researchrelevant to social justice issues has been inadequate and concerned with deficit perspec-tives, such as those emphasising intelligence and cultural deprivation. I shall argue laterthat such pragmatic approaches may also invite a contradictory reception from anacademic world where positivism may be increasingly unacceptable (Gipps, 1992); theymay also invite politically inappropriate critique and inhibit personal career developmentand influence. I will also attempt to show that there are difficulties with adopting suchan epistemological grounding, even where it is one only considered relevant to one's own'value' group.

Interpretative Methodologies

Interpretative studies involve the analysis of respondents' own interpretations. But given thehegemonic nature of discourses and structures of racism and sexism, the interpretative

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frameworks of most respondents in a predominantly white, male dominated society areoften inadequate in providing a basis for explanation. A common criticism of suchapproaches refers to the difficulty the 'outsider-as-researcher' may have in understandingthe meanings insiders give to events. Such research by, for example, Black and ethnicminority researchers is therefore often restricted to the study of Black and ethnic minorityperceptions, and in critical theory, to studies concerned with the transformative potentialof oppressed groups and institutions, who are to be 'empowered' by researchers (Fonow& Cook, 1991), teacher-researchers (Garr & Kemmis, 1989) or radical pedagogy(Ellsworth, 1989; Shor, 1992).

Some anti-racist and feminist researchers might argue that it is more acceptable toacknowledge a group of 'victims' perceptions of racism than to accept uncritically thetheories of researchers expressing the value systems of oppressive groups. But as I havestated earlier, both positivist and interpretative researchers need to be critical in termsof the validity and representativeness of their data if their aim is to be academicallypersuasive; and both demand the use of triangulation. Interpretive methods stem by andlarge from the phenomenological, historical and hermeneutic traditions and usually aimto understand social phenomena without influencing them. But in researching issues ofsocial justice in white, male dominated contexts we clearly need to provide explanationsthat go beyond the immediate intentions of the actors. Our avowed aim is also to achievechange. The question is; can we do this without imposing theory?

We are left with a daunting set of associated dilemmas. If we impose theory fromoutside are we corrupting the data? Are we selecting and rejecting theory to suit ourcase? If we accept that we necessarily impose theory and disclose our values we areopening ourselves up to be discounted by the established research community asexcessively subjective. We are likely to be accused of conducting the kind of researchassociated with 'rape' by Reinharz (1979). If we fail to keep the confidence of ourrespondents, the administrators and managers, the gatekeepers and ultimately thoseresponsible for the inequality we are studying, we will also fail to influence them. Whatis needed then, is a set of firm dependable 'foundations' from which such a methodologycan be developed.

Critical Social Research

Much of the writing dealing with similar problems, such as Patti Lather's (1986), assumesresearch directed at the struggles of oppressed groups themselves rather than theiroppressors. Unfortunately there is little grass-roots transformative potential in mostpredominately white male dominated institutions such as schools and universities andconcepts of 'empowerment' cannot be simply applied. On the other hand, arguably,there are real opportunities for intellectual engagement between researcher and re-searched and these opportunities can be optimised. In his guide to critical social researchmethodology, Lee Harvey (1990) recognises that knowledge should be considered adynamic process ratiher than as any static entity. As he argues:

For critical methodologists, knowledge is a process of moving towards anunderstanding of the world and of the knowledge which structures ourperceptions of that world, (p. 4)

As researchers we must recognise that objective knowledge in these terms will always bebeyond our grasp, that our 'findings' will inevitably be just another set of 'perceptualstructures', themselves open to critical enquiry. Unfortunately, while clearly acknowledg-

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Critical Social Research 209

ing this Harvey fails to discuss in, any detail, the actual process of engagement withdominant ideological constructs and presuppositions. Apart from references to conventionalresearch reporting, the only hint that we are given is in Harvey's discussion of thehierarchically structured relationship between researcher and respondent in conventionalresearch:

The retention of control by the interviewer/researcher and the compliance ofthe respondent/subject is intended, conventionally, to ensure minimum con-tamination by the researcher, thus maintaining the validity of the researchsituation. This view is contrary to the aims of critical social research for anumber of reasons. First, it subverts the critical process presupposing theprimacy of the researcher's frame of reference (even if it is subsequently shiftedthrough reflexive accounts). Second, it presupposes a one-way flow of infor-mation which leaves the respondent in exactly the same position after havingshared knowledge and ignores the self-reflective process that the imparting ofinformation involves. Third, the direct corollary of the self reflection is theinevitable engagement in dialogue where information is required or perspec-tives need to be discussed. The involvement of the researcher in this realdialogue involves her/him in; the critical process. Fourth, the critical ethnogra-phy interview (in whatever its form) is not neutral but directs attention atoppressive social structures and informs both researcher and respondent, (p. 12)

A 'Committed' Perspective

In the field of 'race' and gender related educational research, researchers have beenconcerned with either the assessment, development and delivery of curriculum or 'race'and gender related policies and practices. What is distinctive about this field of activityis that in all cases research is aimed at reducing inequality. As researchers we are thusfar from merely 'objectively interested' observers. John Rex (1991) has made the pointquite clearly in a review of Zygmund Bauman's study of the holocaust. Rex writes:

Very few of us working in this field are simply social scientists. We work in itbecause we are concerned about the apparently irrational and evil fact ofracism, (p. 166)

A committed researcher will actively seek a rational consensus about the nature of socialphenomena through critical research and discussion. Where such a consensus isachieved, in however limited a degree, it functions to cement together groups strugglingfor power in society. C. Wright Mills (1978) argued that it is the political, andeducational, task of all social scientists to continually translate personal troubles intopublic issues and public issues into their human meaning for a variety of individuals. Thecommitted anti-racist researcher, for instance, may thus be engaged in politics in boththe widest and the narrowest senses (Siraj-Blatchford, 1994). For some social scientiststhere might appear to be a conflict between those who seek 'value neutrality' and thosewho argue for politically committed research. What I shall go on to argue is that allresearch is inevitably politically committed and yet it is not equally valid. I conclude thatits validity is ultimately dependent upon communicative competence.

The 'Outsider Within'

Many progressive anti-racist insights and actions have been promoted by researchers and

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policy makers who have sought and in some cases claim to have adopted 'Black' or'ethnic minority perspectives'. The significance of the term might best be understood byconsidering an equivalent 'woman's perspective'. Ball (1992) has explored the implica-tions of gender on researchers and other research participants, and she cites Oakley(1981) and Finch (1984) who have stressed the positive effects of feminist sociologistsresearching women, where the researchers share the subordinate positioning of theresearched in a patriarchal society. But as she argues we must accept that social class,age, sexuality and professional status are also relevant. Pat Hill-Collins (1991) has arguedthat Black and ethnic minority working class women have:

a clearer view of oppression than other groups who occupy more contradictorypositions vis-a-vis white male power, (p. 41)

And:

unlike white women they have no illusions that whiteness will negate femalesubordination, and unlike black and ethnic minority men, they cannot use aquestionable appeal to manhood to neutralise the stigma of being black andethnic minority, {op. cit)

There are, of course, white female researchers who have no such illusions and somewhite males who would argue they have achieved a credible anti-sexist/anti-raciststandpoint or perspective. As bell hooks (1989) writes:

While I think it a meaningful gesture for young white women in a white-supremacist culture to seek to hear from black women, to wish to listen andlearn from black women, I caution(ed) them against turning the spheres ofdiscussion on racial topics into yet another area where we as black people arecalled upon to take primary responsibility for sharing experiences, ideas andinformation. Such a gesture places black and ethnic minority people onceagain in a service position, meeting the needs of whites, (p. 47).

She goes on to stress that:

the ideal situation for learning is always one where there is diversity anddialogue, where there would be women and men from various groups, {op. cit)

Hooks criticises Joanna Rus for arguing that as a white women she was unable to writeabout important Black women's literature. Hooks suggests that this is particularlydisturbing in implying that Black literature is 'so removed from that of white women thatthey cannot address such work critically and analytically', {op. cit)

Hooks goes on to say that such a view 'may very well reinforce racism'. What is crucialhere, I think, is an assumption about commitment to finding truth through dialogue. Thisis a subject to which I will return but it is worth mentioning at this point that Merton's(1972) germinal paper on 'Insiders and Outsiders' which discussed many of these issues20 years ago came to the same conclusions; quoting Polanyi, Merton asserts that:

People who have learned to respect the truth will feel entitled to uphold thetruth against the very society which has taught them to respect it. They willindeed demand respect for themselves on the grounds of their own respect forthe truth, and this will be accepted, even against their own inclinations, bythose who share these basic convictions.

One's position on this issue will be determined to a great extent according to the degreethat one shares this optimism for the academic community. For my own part I wouldfind it hard to justify my professional position without believing that there were asignificant number of liberal elements at large to be contested and influenced.

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Critical Social Research 211

Merton (1972) considered the claims made by some Black intellectuals in the US thatonly Black ethnologists could understand Black culture. The status of 'insider' and'outsider' knowledge has also been considered by Clifford Geertz (1983) in discussingwhat he self-consciously terms the 'natives point of view' in interpretative anthropology.Geertz concludes that the hermeneutic circle is as central to ethnographic interpretationas to other disciplines. He argues that the anthropologist needs to penetrate the 'natives'mode of thought, to reconstruct their projects, or intentions, through studying the actionsthat actualise them. He argues that the actions may thus ultimately be understoodthrough the projects that motivate them. Yet the researchers in these accounts are notconsidered in any way actors in the respondents drama, let alone as central dominantfigures. In the case of racism, colonialism, paternalism and imperialism, white men mayoften be quite incapable of recognising or acknowledging these dominating relationships.I shall argue that what is important here is not whether one is 'outside' or 'inside' aparticular group, but rather whether one is a party to, 'inside' or 'outside' a particulardiscourse.

In rejecting the relevance of racial identity to social research, Merton's discussion isrestricted largely to structural status categories and entirely to a concern with interpreta-tive sociology. While Merton argues that the multiplicity of 'status sets' to which actorsbelong is such as to lead those guilty of 'insiderism' to methodological solipsism, we needto recognise that this would only be true if we were first attempting some form ofmethodological individualistic analysis. Where research is focused upon 'holistic' issues ofsocial policy and practice, some 'statuses' will be seen as more significant than others.Beyond the interpretative frame, these statuses may provide credentials that are poten-tially valuable rather than necessary. To take a practical example, the essential mannerin which racism is expressed in education may well be understood without recourse togender analysis. While no effort would be made in such a study to describe how racismwas experienced by Black female pupils, parents and teachers, this should not be seen asa problem in itself. While studies of Black womens', and mens', experiences of racism wouldclearly complement the study, racism is expressed predominantly by white people, and itis their practices and understandings that are the primary object of analysis. The point iseven clearer with regard to social research carried out beyond the ethnographic,interpretative and regulative frameworks of Merton and Geertz. Burrell & Morgan(1982) usefully differentiate between such 'regulative' social research and that founded oncommitments to 'radical change':

The 'sociology of radical change' stands in stark contrast to the 'sociology ofregulation', in that its basic concern is to find explanations for the radicalchange, deep-seated structural conflict, modes of domination and structuralcontradiction which its theorists see as characterising modern society. It is asociology which is essentially concerned with man's emancipation from thestructures which limit and stunt his potential for development. The basicquestions that it asks focus upon the visionary and Utopian, in that it lookstowards potentiality as much as actuality; it is concerned with what is possiblerather than with what is; with alternatives rather than with acceptance of thestatus quo. (p. 17)

What Merton failed to take on board was the full implications that the historical fact ofwhite racial chauvinism has had in American and European societies. Traditionally it hasbeen white researchers who have suffered the myopia of the 'dedicated insider' and notBlack intellectuals. The 'universe of discourse' that one is 'within' or 'outside' should not

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be seen so much as some essentially limiting individual perceptual universe. But ratheras a semi-autonomous social discourse that individuals and groups may enter or leaveaccording to their understanding and inclination. As Hill-Collins (1991) has suggested,the experiences of African-American women in domestic employment with white familieshave led to the development of an 'outsider-within' stance, a peculiar marginality thathas stimulated a special Black women's perspective (p. 11). As outsiders-within dominantwhite cultures, Black people in general have a distinct advantage in identifying thecontradictions between the dominant group's actions and their ideologies. While Blackintellectuals have shown that they are thus particularly able and sometimes willing toenter into and engage with white racist discourse, many white intellectuals have been lessinclined to engage with anti-racist perspectives (Ladson-Billings & Tate, 1994; Siraj-Blatchford, 1994).

As has been argued, not all women are committed to some strand of anti-sexism orfeminism, and not all people from ethnic minority groups are anti-racist. Membership ofan ethnic minority group may, however unpalatable a fact this may be to the majorityof professional researchers, be a necessary qualification for the adequate study of thatsame group's reality, but it is not sufficient in studying racism and sexism. For instance,if we are to adequately study white supremacy (hooks, 1989), to study white racist realityin white racist institutions then we need a 'Black and ethnic minority' perspective in thesense of adopting an anti-racist standpoint. However, while our ethnic group backgroundor gender status may provide a qualification, the arguments presented so far do notsuggest that this would represent a necessary or sufficient quality in its own right.

It is important in this context to recognise what Giddens (1991) and others refer to asthe 'reflexive' nature of modern society where most aspects of social activity and materialrelations with nature are susceptible to chronic revision in the light of new informationor knowledge. Edward Said, in the first of his 1993 Reith Lectures on Representationsof the Intellectual, pointed to the contemporary and historical role of traditionalintellectuals as purveyors of knowledge and servants of government:

... who could be called upon not to lead but to consolidate the governmentspolicy, to spew out propaganda against official enemies, to devise euphemismsor on a larger scale whole systems of Orwellian new speak in order to disguisethe truth of what was occurring in the name of institutional expediency ornational honour. (Said, 1993)

It is sobering to recall what Gramsci referred to as the origins of the traditionalintellectual:

The formation of Traditional intellectuals is the most interesting problemhistorically. It is undoubtedly connected with slavery in the classical world andwith the position of freed men of Greek or Oriental origin in the socialorganisation of the Roman Empire, (p. 17)

The accommodation, appropriation or 'passive revolution' of oppositional discourses, toadopt Gramsci's (1971) phrase, rule the day. As Giddens (1980) has argued, thereflexivity of the social sciences inevitably plays a basic role in this process.

Fonow & Cook (1991) have shown that many feminist researchers have embraced thisreflexivity in their epistemology and methods. However, this often takes the form of aconsciousness raising and can at times be restricted to the community of feministscholars, which, while representing a valuable form of self-help, is often unduly restricted.At other times it has been the direct result of explicit attempts to reduce the difference

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between researchers and female subjects to provide empowerment. What we need is amore radical acceptance of reflexivity, one that addresses the need to raise theconsciousness of the oppressors as well as the oppressed in a research context. While thismay be considered by some to be unduly optimistic, any failure to accept such aimswould bring in to question the very intellectual involvement of a committed individualin the academy.

The 'Organic Intellectual'

According to the 'committed' perspective that has been offered, the only necessaryqualification for social justice and anti-oppression research is a genuine knowledge andunderstanding of the experience of that oppression. Gramsci (1971) argued that while anintellectual member of the dominant group, a 'traditional intellectual', may onlyunderstand, an 'organic intellectual', committed to the interests of an oppressed group,will simultaneously^/ and act accordingly. In common with Gramsci, the term intellectualis not used here to denote any intrinsic nature of intellectual activity but rather to identifythose who have a specific social function as producer of knowledge. As Said (1993) hassuggested, organic intellectuals are actively involved in society, constantly struggling tochange minds and to expand the power and control of the group to which they arecommitted.

Gramsci (1971) argued that traditional intellectuals put themselves forward as auton-omous and independent of the dominant social group. However:

This self-assessment is not without consequences in the ideological and politicalfield, consequences of wide-ranging import. The whole of idealist philosophycan easily be connected with this position assumed by the social complex ofintellectuals and can be defined as the expression of that social Utopia by whichthe intellectuals think of themselves as 'independent', autonomous, endowedwith a character of their own, etc. (p. 8)

All research contributions must of course be open to critical scrutiny and it needs to berecognised that such a scrutiny by the 'traditional' research community is liable to bebiased. While, for example, Black and ethnic minority feminist research is marginalisedby white male dominated social science, it is essential that we engage with the dominantresearch paradigms. Organic intellectuals have a dual role to play, to provide socialgroups with 'homogeneity' and an awareness of their economic, social and politicalposition and also to assimilate and defeat ideologically the traditional intellectuals.Organic intellectuals have a crucial role in influencing 'traditional intellectual' episte-mologies. Black, ethnic minority and feminist, just like any other specialist groups canbenefit from the internal constructive criticism of corporate journals, conferences andworkshops, but they must also beware of the dangers of mere defensive introspection. Wecannot wait for the 'cleverest men' as Maria Mies (1991) has suggested, to seek out ouralternative paradigms. No matter how much opposition there may be we must moveforward into the dominant intellectual territory. In this we need to take a central positionrather than any marginal one.

Renate Holub (1992) has pointed to the possibilities for dialogue between individualand group 'backgrounds of feeling'. This is understood as a 'socio-psychic language thatinforms a person's imagistic and symbolic referentiality', which may contradict theirorganic ties in terms of 'race', class or gender. Holub offers an illuminating illustration.She considers Gramsci's dialogue with Gobetti (an Italian liberal, of the early 1920s) and

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argues that what enabled the communicative process between them was the 'dialect' ofenlightenment principles that they shared and which offered a grounding for reason andthe pursuit of freedom for all. Productive, consensual discourse depended on their mutualfacility in the dialect. This may, perhaps, be considered fragile grounding, but such asearch for foundations may be crucial if any new structure of feeling (or intellectualcommunity) is to be created.

Holub's use of the term 'dialect' is a useful tool, and understood as a form of languagepeculiar to a particular group. Apart from Gobetti's Utopian imagery Gobetti sharedanother dialect with reactionary groups in Italy at that time. It was this dialogue thatGramsci had no access to, that, through Gobetti, provided a means of engaging with thedominant hegemony and created vital spaces for ideological struggle.

While Hill-Collins' (1991) account of the role of Black feminist academics as 'outsiders-within' accepts uncritically the notion of methodological individualism, it clearly recog-nises that, in studying racism and sexism, the Black and ethnic minority feministresearcher is no outsider. She is a participant in the problematic and thus represents an'organic intellectual' with a dual role, to effect change in both the specific researchcontext, and in the broader academic field. In the context of this latter role, whatGramsci referred to as influencing the 'traditional intellectuals', it needs to be recognisedthat while the processes of collective and reciprocal consciousness raising borrowed fromthe feminist tradition have been a source of great strength, these processes also representa problem as they reinforce marginalization. What I am arguing here is the need toengage much more closely with the dominant world views in order to contribute towardstheir transformation.

As previously suggested, Gramsci's (1971) conception of the 'organic intellectual' offersa valuable model upon which we might construct a methodology that offers the visionof a committed and critical researcher. In educational research most gatekeepers havebeen generally committed to an assumedly objective and value free research methodol-ogy. What we now need to recognise is that the hegemonic positivism could be usefullysuperseded by anti-foundationalist 'post-modern' theories that provide vital space for thelocation of praxis (Harvey, 1990; Gipps, 1993; Tiemey, 1993; Siraj-Blatchford, 1994).Part two of the paper is thus intended as a contribution towards the development of aframework within which future critical and committed research practice may bedeveloped. I shall first argue, that it is possible to accept the substance of the post moderncritique without embracing postmodernism as an historical project in itself. The essentialcomponents of a 'dialogical' form of action research, founded in 'critical social research'and radically distanced from traditional practitioner or collaborative-action research willbe defined.

A Pathology of Communications

If ideological change is to take place then new interpretations of reality need to be builtupon some common understanding. Any new methodological model must face the realityof addressing the existing ^academic mode of production, it must locate itself withinestablished academic discourse. At the present time the rising tide of postmodernismseems to offer, in its rejection of foundationalism, the greatest potential for such alocation.

The rise of interest in 'postmodernism' has drawn with it a wide recognition that thesearch for absolute foundations of truth in research is no longer tenable. The term 'postmodernity' or the 'post-modern condition' refers to what is considered to be our new

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social order, perhaps most graphically illustrated by the collapse of the Berlin wall andEast European and Soviet Communism, but applicable to all forms of social actionwhere the 'meta narratives' of yesterday, such as Marxism, are being rejected wholesalein favour of consumption and a reliance on the consumer market. As Giddens (1992)asserts, post-modernists consider that they now live in societies where the nation state isin decline and the cohesive totality has been replaced by a multiplicity of sites of socialreproduction, where:

Cultural pluralism is matched by structural pluralism: the post-modern orderis split into a multitude of contexts of actions and forms of authority.

Postmodernism has provided a critique of naive positivism and the recognition of a trendtowards 'Big Brother' manipulation by the media. Trends that have perhaps been mostgraphically described by the cultural theorist Baudrillard, whose excesses have beeneffectively criticised by Christopher Norris (1992) in his book Uncritical Theory: postmod-ernism, intellectuals and the Gulf War. Giddens suggests that there are two possibilities if weaccept that such trends exist; we can adopt one of two courses. The first is to emphasise'the end'; the death of the author; the disappearance of art; the end of history. Thealternative is to start to talk about beginnings, he argues that it is no longer purely Utopianto anticipate:

the possible emergence of a truly global order, a global cosmopolitanism inwhich recognition of pluralism goes along with, and is supported by, theendeavours of collective humanity, {op. cit.)

Moving Towards Equality

Perhaps every good map, ideology or argument should have Utopia in it somewhere. Iwould certainly argue that we are unlikely to move towards any such Utopia withoutrejecting at least the former postmodernist project. If educational researchers want topromote equality they must first engage with the realities of inequality. As Sarup (1988)has argued, in doing this we must reject the work of conservative post-modernists.Significantly Sarup quotes Rorty (1984) who discusses the 'dryness' of Foucault andLyotard:

It is dryness produced by a lack of identification with any social context, anycommunication. Foucault once said that he would like to write 'so as to haveno face', he forbids himself the tone of the liberal sort of thinker who says tohis fellow citizens: 'We know that there must be a better way to do things thanthis; let us look for it together'. There is no 'we' to be found in Foucault'swriting, nor in those of many of his French contemporaries ... It is as ifthinkers like Foucault and Lyotard are so afraid of being caught up in onemore meta-narrative about the fortunes of the 'subject' that they cannot bringthemselves to say 'we' long enough to identify with the culture of thegeneration to which they belong, (p, 40)

In fairness, this may only be applicable to Foucalt's earlier writings, yet it is an enduringtrait in much of the literature. Beverly Skeggs (1991) in her review essay on thepostmodern condition has argued, that much of the rise of post modernism can be seenas an attempt by a group of disillusioned academics (usually white, middle class andmale) to win back credibility and influence. Unfortunately, the novelty of relativism leadsmany postmodernist writers to an essential nihilism or what can only be described as a

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secular fundamentalism, promoting the authority of arbitrary academic consensusgroups. As a major critic of postmodernism, Habermas (1970), by contrast offers atheoretical basis for understanding the 'pathology of communication' which typifiescontemporary research paradigms and institutions. In these terms and in the context ofsocial justice, I would argue that predominantly white educational institutions can beseen to be pathological in the sense that:

1. The 'voices' of oppressed groups are excluded from day to day administration andthus the institutions ontological status itself is precarious in a plural society.

2. They are responsible for cultural reproduction in a society characterised by multipleinequalities.

Morwenna Griffiths (1992) in her paper 'Making a difference: feminism, postmodernismand the methodology of educational research' cites Burbules and Rice who argue that itis possible to distinguish between two modes of postmodernist thought; one which'extends and redefines modernist principles, such as democracy, reason and equality' a n d one that

'deconstructs and rejects these principles'. Clearly the latter is to be rejected, and it may bepolitically advantageous to distance the related concepts through adopting alternativeterms.

As Norris (1992) has put it, Habermas's challenge is to take seriously the claim ofwestern liberal democracies to represent the best interest of a properly informedelectorate:

an enlightened public sphere where issues of truth, social conscience, evaluativepriority etc. could be argued out through the maximum involvement of citizensenjoying free and equal access to the relevant information sources, (p. 144)

As social theorists we are actively seeking a rational consensus about the nature of socialphenomena through critical discussion. Following Habermas it can be argued that sucha genuine rational consensus could only be achieved in an 'ideal speech situation' whereno external constraints prevent participants from assessing the evidence and argument.As Roderick (1986) has put it, from Habermas, a rational consensus is one that is arrivedat in free and equal discussion and:

Since only a rational consensus can ultimately serve as the ground for truthclaims, his argument (at least in his earlier formulations) yields a series ofmutual implications between concepts of truth, freedom and justice, (p. 11)

While an assumption inherent in all communication, this ideal speech situation is ofcourse far from the reality of normal day-to-day political and social interactions. Theseare embedded in power relations. As such the notion can only serve as a standard bywhich truth claims may be evaluated. The ideal speech situation does however providean escape from relativism and a grounding for both social analysis and radical praxis incritical social research.

Towards a Mew Praxis

In recent years there has been a growth of interest given to the concept of 'praxis' in the'practical sciences' and in feminist research (Weiner, 1993; Siraj-Blatchford, 1994) andHoffman (1973) offers an interesting account:

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In demanding that practice should be focused at the centre of our scientificconcerns the champions of praxis insist that we are a part of the world we studyand cannot be expected to theorise in some kind of detached, neutral manner.Where positivism preaches resignation and acceptance praxis demands commit-ment and change: for conformity, it puts criticism, for passivity, it calls forconcrete practice. It rejects therefore—in its manifesto of protest—all the selfdefeating antitheses which are the hallmark of positivism, the supposed 'gulfbetween ideal and real, concrete and abstract, fact and value, the world of isand the world of ought. Thinking is a praxical activity, it insists, and its role isnot to contemplate the universe, but to transform it. (p. 16)

From this perspective, Harvey's (1990) 'Critical social research' and 'Critical ethnogra-phy' need to be seen as more than just additional 'legitimate forms' of academicproduction; they should be seen as providing elements of the only acceptable form, giventhe reflexive nature of the research enterprise. We need to emphasise that while attemptsto provide objective, value free knowledge are mistaken, alternative forms of knowledgeproduction can, and should, be rigorously grounded. As we have seen, Harvey concedesthe relevance of critical social research to conventional research in terms of:

(i) the effect that the presence of the researcher may have on the data collected; and:(ii) the need to critically reflect upon the theoretical structures they have drawn out of

their analysis.

But Harvey goes beyond these concerns to reflect upon what Giddens (1980) has termedthe 'double hermeneut ic ' . As Harvey puts it, 'digging down to reveal the respondents frame of

reference is not meant to be an oppressive hierarchical process but a liberating analogical one' (p. 13).

What Harvey fails to recognise, and what has been a major concern of this paper, isthe importance of commitment and the structural and ideological location of theresearcher. Harvey recognises that what 'may be a radical critique at one moment may, in a latercontext, appear to be superficial? and that critical social research has to be located in the socialmilieu. Yet, the researcher's understanding of the oppressive structure is not problema-tized. If the researcher is to influence her respondents' practice then she must firstunderstand the oppressive nature of that practice and the meanings that the participantsgive to it in their own terms. These common sense understandings need to become thevery basis of open dialogue. The common sense, interpretative data can then be acceptedas the basis of a series of dialogic encounters.

Conclusions

Some form of 'action research' would seem to offer the basis of an adequate modelwithin which to place this task. In fact Richard Winter (1991) also invokes, throughFoucault, the idea of the organic intellectual in arguing his case for 'practitioner actionresearch'. While providing a convincing argument for a democratic educational practice,application of Winter's model will, however, for all of the reasons already rehearsed,rarely be capable of promoting social justice. For this only committed 'practitioners' will do.What we require is something closer to, but not the same as, the kind of researchmethodology described by Kelly (1985), a methodology that is informed by a concern forsocial justice. But this must also be a model that accepts the committed and criticalresearcher as an 'insider' with respect to the phenomenon being studied and a researcherwho is active in effecting change. What would be especially distinctive about thisapproach would be the active ideological engagement with the respondents.

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Much of the criticism of action research has been concerned with the values thatunconsciously or consciously influence the researchers in providing an objective andvalue free account. What is lost in, for example, Kelly's account, is any consideration ofthe influence of the other participants in the research project. We need to allow for theeffects of changes in values and intentions. The effect of this omission is to both overstatethe possibilities for researchers to impose their values and to neglect the implication ofrespondent value impositions.

Of course, researchers do not have the power to forcibly impose their values directlyon their respondents. The respondents would not be committed to them if they did. TheGirls in Science and Technology (GIST) project team aimed to counter traditional sexvalues and the extent to which this was not realised is testimony to the influence of theteachers, pupils and parents with whom they worked. It is interesting to note that in thearea of anti-racism much of the debate surrounding these issues remains in terms ofcurriculum and questions of indoctrination. I would argue that most of that discussiongrossly underestimates both the rationality of pupils and the influence of dominant,hegemonic, gender and racial ideologies (Siraj-Blatchford, 1991, 1993a, b, 1994). Kelly'semphasis on negotiation to justify her intervention is significant. The GIST researcherswere women and the science teachers predominantly male yet Kelly merely suggests that:

the research team worked with the teachers as colleagues, (p. 11)

Further Kelly says that:

It is difficult to tell someone that you think they are a male chauvinist pig oneday, and continue to work with them to eliminate sex stereotypes the next day.[op. cit.)

Kelly usefully concludes that, in retrospect, a better ongoing communication might havebeen worthwhile and that if this had been recorded and analysed some useful insightsand understandings could have been added to the project. What is proposed here is thatthe researcher may enter into an equal, respectful and free dialogic relationship with therespondent and pursue common understandings. This is not to imply that the dialogicrelationship between researcher and researched will not create tensions, conflicts anddifferences, it is the expression and contestation within these discourses that is vital tochange.

The action research model espoused in this paper should not be confused with workbeing carried out under the rubric of 'teacher as researcher' or other essentiallyregulative managerial models (Werner, 1989). What is needed at the present time is notsimply 'practitioner action research' but rather an action research pursued by organicintellectuals. A critical, committed and reflexive process that recognises that we are stillinvolved in an ideological struggle where the new right claims that the age of egalitari-anism is over.

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to colleagues at the ESRC Seminar on Methodology and Epistomology inLiverpool (1993) who commented on an earlier version of this paper. While interviewingelites/managers on the Leverhulme Trust funded project (Ref no f. 215 AE) RacialInequality in Initial Teacher Education (REITE), I developed the ideas in this paperfurther. However, the paper and the arguments presented here are those of the author,and should not be taken to be those of the REITE research team.

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Correspondence: Iram Siraj-Blatchford, Institute of Education, University of London, 20Bedford Way, London WCIH 0AL, UK.

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