The ambivalence of reflection – rereading Schön

Abstract

There are two sides to the concept of ambivalence. One concerns contradictory attitudes, expressions or feelings that are simultaneously directed toward an object, person or action, the other concerns undecidability and a fluctuation of meaning between a thing and its opposite. Both of them concern an aspect of uncertainty. In this article we argue that reflection and reflection projects are caught up within ambiguity between two discourses on human thinking and action: one which conceives humans as rational intellectual beings who elaborate practical actions by following certain procedures and one where human practice is changeable, complex and follows its own logic (or rather un‐logic). These discourses have different genealogies and social agendas. However, they also meet, not only in different reflection projects in education but also in classical reflection texts. The example we are going to use to illustrate this is Schön’s The reflective practitioner. We claim that the discursive struggle over reflection makes the theoretical basis for the reflection projects confusing and even fragile, as well as potentially dynamic, creative and productive.

Keywords:

• reflection
• practice
• teacher‐education
• epistemology
• Schön

Notes

1. For further exemplification of this second aspect of reflection‐in‐action we recommend Newman (1999) and Erlandson (2006). These texts disucss an example with a baby’s interaction with her mother presented by Schön (1987) in Educating the reflective practitioner.