“Those in the know”: primary school literacy as a corporate field of knowledge?

ABSTRACT

Using our re-readings of Margaret Meek Spencer’s work and career, we connect her scholarship to our mapping of contemporary changes in knowledge and our investigations of so-called “knowers”: those mobilising knowledge to underpin and control professionals’ enactment of policy in primary school literacy. Working from the theoretical resources of Basil Bernstein, we develop an analysis of these knowers’ production of knowledge, navigating from his conceptualisations of “official” and “pedagogical” fields into what we define as a “corporate” field of knowledge. Presenting data from our research into two groups - (i) commercial consultants, retailing policy solutions to professionals; and (ii) a Chief Executive officer and leaders within multi-academy trusts - we argue that working in a corporate field, these knowers have influence on professionals’ knowledge and positioning. We draw out speculative implications for readers of this journal concerning potential contributions to resistance as well as developing a reflexive approach to our own work.

KEYWORDS:

• Primary school literacy
• knowledge actors
• teachers’ knowledge
• policy scholarship
• Basil Bernstein
• Margaret Meek Spencer

Acknowledgments

Data from three research projects are drawn on in this article. (i) focuses on the work of a Chief Executive Officer and literacy leaders carried out by Mark Innes as a part of his doctoral work, The Literacy Policy Project, part funded by the University of Manchester Institute of Education. (ii) is part of a larger project, Curriculum Change in a Multi-Academy Trust: Colin Mills’ work on literacy in that project is funded by Newman University, Birmingham through a ‘seedcorn’ development fund. These two projects were subject to the ethical protocols of University of Manchester Institute of Education (i) and of Newman University (ii). Data on the work of commercial consultants was drawn from (iii) a project funded by the British Academy and Leverhulme Trust, Consultancy and Knowledge Production in Education (CKPE), directed by Professors Helen M. Gunter and David Hall, with Joanna Bragg and Colin Mills as research assistants. Both Mark and Colin acknowledge the support and help of Helen Gunter in the thinking that underpins this article; Colin thanks Professor Margaret M. Clark and colleagues at Newman for access and support.

We are grateful for the support and kindness of Margaret Meek Spencer’s daughter (Sophie Howson) and son (Jo Spencer) in allowing us to quote from some of her unpublished papers, including the notes for her 1990 valedictory lecture at the University of London Institute of Education 1990.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Manchester Institute of Education.

Notes on contributors

Mark Innes

Mark Innes is a Lecturer in Education at the University of Manchester Institute of Education where he teaches on teacher education courses and Masters level courses. His previous work has entailed teaching and leadership in schools. His research focus is on new patterns of leadership and knowledge production in literacy, in particular on the shifts in knowledge and authority within Multi Academy Trusts (MATs).

Colin Mills

Colin Mills has worked as a teacher and advisory teacher in schools and at the Universities of Exeter, Central England and Worcester. He has published widely in the fields of children’s literature and literacy and has been a NATE member since 1972. His current research focuses on literacy policy and new forms of authority and knowledge in primary schooling.