Foucault and school leadership research : bridging theory and method

Author(s)

• Mifsud, Denise

Bibliographic Information

Foucault and school leadership research : bridging theory and method

Denise Mifsud

（Social theory and methodology in education research / edited by Mark Murphy）

Bloomsbury Academic, 2019, c2017

• : pb

Note

"First published 2017. Paperback edition first published 2019"--T.p. verso

Includes bibliographical references (p. [242]-266) and index

Description and Table of Contents

Description

Foucault and School Leadership Research illustrates the application of Foucauldian theory to an educational leadership research context, thus staging the ways a researcher negotiates the methodological tensions and contradictions in the conduct of qualitative inquiry within education research. The book draws on an empirical study of a multi-site school collaborative that investigates relations of power within the unfolding network among the various leadership hierarchies in school governance. The book is anchored around a narrative dramatization that the author, Denise Mifsud, crafts from her data, using the dramatic play as a medium to present her research findings so as to show rather than just tell readers about network leadership dynamics. Mifsud's innovative use of dramatization to communicate her findings and analysis serves to problematize the representation of qualitative research, as well as to incorporate researcher interpretation and explicate the intertwining nature of theory and methodology. Through the use of Foucauldian theory, mainly his notions of webs of power, discipline, governmentality, discourse, and subjectification, the research narrative critiques and problematizes traditional understandings of educational leadership. The book focuses on and demonstrates the challenging enterprise of the art of theory application in method by outlining the epistemological, operational and analytical challenges encountered: the application of Foucauldian concepts in education research contexts; the adaptation of methodological and theoretical concerns; in addition to showing how the quality of research outcomes is shaped by social theory.

Table of Contents

1. Introduction: Setting the Stage for the Research Narrative 2. Foucauldian Props for Data Interpretation and Representation I 3. Foucauldian Props for Data Interpretation and Representation II 4. Data Analysis Choices and the Crisis of Representation 5. Data Analysis Choices and the Fictional Representation of Narrative 6. Raising the Curtain on Sunnyside College 7. The Performance of Collegiality 8. The Fluidity in the Emerging Relations of Power 9. The Unfolding of Leadership Distribution 10. Bringing Down the Curtain? 11. Presenting Conclusions and Theorisations: The Quasi-Final Stage References Index

by "Nielsen BookData"

• NCID: BB29381982
• ISBN:
  • 9781350105546
• LCCN: 2017008510
• Country Code: uk
• Title Language Code: eng
• Text Language Code: eng
• Place of Publication: London
• Pages/Volumes: viii, 268 p.
• Size: 24 cm
• Classification:
  • LCC : LB2806
  • DC23 : 371.2001
• Subject Headings:
  • LCSH : Educational leadership -- Philosophy
  • LCSH : Educational leadership -- Research -- Methodology
• Parent Bibliography ID:
  • BB28740547