Finding Theory through Collaborative Research

This chapter provides a discussion on how Michel Foucault’s (1982) notion of power/knowledge was engaged with, developed and applied in a project that involved three researchers who were exploring the experiences of teaching assistants who support teaching and learning in a number of British schools. In this research, a Foucauldian lens was cast on the data collected to interrogate how connectivities between knowledge and power create a ‘regime of truth’ (Foucault, 1995: 131) that informs an ‘art of existence’ (Foucault, 1990a: 238). This regime can be conceived as orientating teaching assistants in how they come to identify or know themselves as such and become ‘subjects’. The key focus for this chapter will be on how theory was engaged with by three researchers to facilitate alternative ways of thinking about the data and how, through collaboration, they dealt with the problems encountered, and the limitations of particular ideas when engaging with theory.