speak about those things where we cannot pronounce with certainty and scientific
detachment, we must accept that other intellectual virtues, and specifically, practical
wisdom—“reasoned, and capable of action with regard to things that are good or bad for
people” (Aristotle, 1976 1140a24-b12, 1144b33-45a11)—become part of the requirements
for an effective research practice. For this to occur, we must broaden the basis about what
counts as evidence in educational research, including multiple representations of
educational settings, and an acknowledgement that, as well as data and theories, values
have a role to play.
This shift from a sole reliance on scientific detachment also has implications for how the
findings of research are to be communicated, shared and “disseminated.” Shotter (1993)
proposes that this shift can be characterized as a shift from scientific rationalism to
communicative rationalism, which differs from scientific rationalism in three important
ways. First, rather than regarding the social world as "out there waiting to be discovered,"
the communicative rationalist insists that the world can only be studied from a position of
involvement within it (in the same way that Polanyi insists that knowledge is rooted in an
engagement with, rather than a detachment from, the object of study). Second, “knowledge
of [the] world is practical-moral knowledge and does not depend upon justification or proof
for its practical efficacy” (p. 166). Third, “we are not in an ‘ownership’ relation to such
knowledge, but we embody it as part of who and what we are” (loc. cit.).
Embracing communicative rationalism involves changes in not only in how knowledge is
warranted, but also in what is to count as knowledge. The practical knowledge that teachers
possess about their classrooms—and in particular how to make complex, nuanced
judgments in the face of considerable complexity and absence of complete information—is
to be counted as knowledge even though such knowledge may be tacit, and cannot be
reduced to the explicit formulations of the decontextualized, transcendent, but often
difficult-to-apply “truths” of scientific rationalism.
The complementary roles of tacit and explicit knowledge are brought out clearly in the
model of knowledge-creation in organizations developed by Nonaka and Tageuchi (1995).
The fact that knowledge can exist either as explicit or tacit results in four different modes of
knowledge conversion, as shown in Figure 2. The process of socialization can be viewed as
one in which one person’s tacit knowledge comes to be shared by others, while
externalization involves making previously tacit knowledge explicit. Developing new
explicit knowledge from existing explicit knowledge is a process of combination, and
internalization consists of making explicit knowledge “one’s own.” Nonaka and Tageuchi
(1995) then propose that these four processes typically occur in the following sequence:
First, the socialization mode usually starts with building a “field” of interaction. This field facilitates the
sharing of members” experiences and mental models. Second, the externalization mode is triggered by
meaningful “dialogue or collective reflection,” in which using appropriate metaphor or analogy helps team
members to articulate hidden tacit knowledge that is otherwise hard to communicate. Third, the
combination mode is triggered by “networking” newly created knowledge and existing knowledge from
other sections of the organization, thereby crystallizing them into a new product, service or managerial
system. Finally, “learning by doing” triggers internalization. (pp. 70-71)
<< Figure 2 about here >>