Trauma narratives and nomos in teacher education

Abstract

The present article draws on data from a three-year study of pedagogy in teacher education that attempts to disrupt normative structures of reading and being in the teacher education classroom. The author uses Bourdieu’s work to emphasize the ways in which academic fields become ruled by unspoken rules and practices – “nomos” – and demonstrates a use of trauma narratives in teacher education that can disrupt such unspoken rules and practices. The article challenges taken-for-granted assumptions in teacher education that students must be positioned as future teachers; that reading educational research and texts should be a priority; that writing assignments should be privileged; and that a cognitive approach to learning in teacher education should be privileged.

Keywords:

• justice-oriented teacher education
• teacher education pedagogy
• literature
• Bourdieu
• trauma narratives

Notes

1. Hilary Hughes-Decatur was a research assistant during one semester of the study and constructed a narrative about this particular event in the classroom.