Critical thinking and disciplinary thinking: a continuing debate

Abstract

I report a study that investigated ideas about critical thinking across three disciplines: Philosophy, History and Literary Studies. The findings point to a diversity of understandings and practices, ones that suggest the limitations of a more generic approach. I argue that a more useful conception of critical thinking is as a form of ‘metacritique’ – where the essential quality to be encouraged in students is a flexibility of thought and the ability to negotiate a range of different critical modes.

Keywords:

• critical thinking
• disciplinary discourses
• graduate attributes

Acknowledgement

I am grateful to my colleagues Rosemary Chang and Janne Morton, and also to three anonymous reviewers for their feedback on an earlier version of this paper.