Emancipatory action research

Some authors have argued that action research should not just be aimed at improving the technical aspects of educational (or other professional) practice but rather should be aimed towards collaborations that work towards social justice and emancipation.

Carr and Kemmis (1986) identify a role for educational researchers, such that the research activity is recognised - and justified – as a social and political act (p.152). From this view the participants in ‘critical educational science’ should be the teachers and learners themselves (p.158).

“[we] hoped for forms of action research that might help to limit the power of schooling as a tool of domestication of students and teachers to existing social orders (and their unfolding iterations through time) that are—like the social orders in many of our countries today—unjust, unsatisfying, unproductive or irrational.” (Kemmis, 2006: 462).

Kemmis, S. (2006). Participatory action research and the public sphere. Educational Action Research, 14(4), 459-476. doi: 10.1080/09650790600975593

Tripp also sees action research as potentially critical and political:

“when one begins to attempt to change the constraints on action, one has to engage in politics because it means working with or against others to change ‘the system’. One can only do that through the exercise of power which makes such action political. … Some of the constraints that I’ve seen teachers working to change are class size, gendered differentials, the exclusion of parents, and the allocation of teaching staff and time by subject.”

Tripp, 2005: 455.

Index of topics