In most cases of collaboration, however, the work progresses through creative
multidisciplinary and/or multi-institutional or cross-sectoral arrangements, whereby
research involves constant dialogue among team members from different disciplines
and sectors, leading to jointly produced outputs. Some of the work on subject
pedagogies provides examples; see the contribution of philosophers of education to
religious education, citizenship education and moral education, with clear signifi-
cance to the education of teachers (illustrated, for example, by theLearning to
Teach in Subjects in the Secondary Schoolbook series, edited by S. Capel and M.
Leask).
36.4.2 The Contribution of Philosophers
to Multidisciplinary Inquiry in Teacher Education
But what can philosophers bring to the mix of backgrounds and knowledge
involved in collaborative multidisciplinary and/or cross-sectoral teacher education
research?
First, they can contribute to developing and refining an understanding, among
the research team and more widely, of the nature of interdisciplinarity, multidis-
ciplinarity and disciplinarity. Such understanding would include not only the
sociological aspects of different arrangements for academic work, but also the
dynamics of knowledge involved in making particular claims about phenomena
situated at the intersection of different areas of expertise or specialisms.
Second, philosophical analysis and the rich and diverse traditions of philo-
sophical argument can provide conceptual and methodological tools to question the
extent to which a multidisciplinary programme has developed a shared language to
sufficient extent for meaningful communication to happen. For example, they may
prompt more systematic and nuanced scrutiny of the claims being made and of the
assumptions that each party brings to the use of inevitably normative terms (such as
‘cohesion’,‘inclusion’,‘development’,‘potential’,‘ability’,or‘assessment’) in the
development of research constructs and measures.
Third, philosophical resources and methods can be mobilised to bring wider
perspectives to bear on these assumptions, for example by exploring and critiquing
concepts such as learning, experience, values, or‘teacher education’itself (Oancea
2014 ), as well as by paying close attention to the ontological aspects of being a
teacher, the ethical aspects of teachers’actions, and the epistemological aspects of
teachers’knowledge (see, for example, the essays in Heilbronn and Foreman-Peck
2015 ). In doing so, philosophical inquiry can not only help increase conceptual
rigour in multidisciplinary communication, but also, and importantly, to introduce
different language or new substantive directions of argument, particularly at points
when debates, research and action may be at risk of stalling.
And fourth, philosophers can draw on traditions of philosophical exploration of
meaning, dialogue and communication (see, e.g. Habermas, Austin, Gadamer), in
552 D. Bridges et al.