Knowledge and Identity: Concepts and Applications in Bernstein’s Sociology

What in the digital era is knowledge? Who has knowledge and whose knowledge has value?

Postmodernism has introduced a relativist flavour into educational research such that big questions about the purposes of education have tended to be eclipsed by minutiae. Changes in economic and financial markets induce a sense that we are also experiencing an intellectual credit crunch. Societies can no longer afford to think about the role of education merely in relation to national markets and national citizenry. There is growing recognition that, once again, we need big thinking using big theoretical ideas in working on local problems of employability, sustainability and citizenship.

Drawing on aspects of Bernstein’s work that have attracted an international following for many years, the international contributors to this book raise questions about knowledge production and subjectivity in times dominated by market forces, privatisation and new forms of state regulation.