In my confirmation report (2011) I wrote:
While negotiating the nature and content of my professional learning courses, I have recently come to understand that this study cannot
remain apolitical, if it ever aspired to do so. Teacher education is involved in politics and as I have discovered through my readings (e.g. Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 2009; Kincheloe, 2003; McWilliam, 2004; Price-Dennis, 2010) teacher practitioner research is in essence a political practice, even if its participants didn’t intend it that way at the outset. Teachers who critically explore their professional environment and their practice, teachers who reach out to their peers and share experience in search of collaborative learning,
are making a statement about who they are as professionals and how they wish to be seen by others.
This morning I read an article in preparation for the lecture by Professor Bar Shalom that I will hear tomorrow at Mofet. The authors, Bar Shalom and Krumer-Nevo, claim that all research is political in nature. This is indeed interesting, as it is a far broader way of relating to the political goals and influences of research. The authors explain:
“Research is a political act since it not only reflects existing reality, but also influences and creates reality, whether by supporting, affirming, and reinforcing existing reality, or by criticizing it and advocating change. The researcher’s position regarding reality influences their choice of subject and the questions they raise, as well as the selection of research procedures to be applied. The words the researcher chooses in order to describe their findings and conclusions structure the object/subject addressed by their research and the balance of power between these (Ife, 1997)” (p. 237).
It seems that if this is the case, then a distinction must be made between those researchers who acknowledge this political side to their work and those who do not. Researchers setting out to achieve social change are usually more open and explicit about the way they are hoping that their work will influence the lives of their participants and their communities. In my study I write explicitly about my intention to sound the voices of classroom teachers whose knowledge is often overlooked in the educational research arena. The political nature of my own study is a theme I need to explore more thoroughly in the coming year. .