Exploring Professional Memory

This chapter proposes a collectivist conception of ‘Professional Memory’ as a way of complementing the work of Ivor Goodson. Drawing on several of Goodson’s ideas, the chapter encourages a critical approach to life history research in educational contexts. It offers a theoretical and methodological discussion of what I have called ‘Professional Memory’, and it stresses the crucial importance of tracing discourses and ideological perspectives to social and historical origins. ‘Professional Memory’ is located into the broader contexts of collective memory, and the influence of ‘historical’ and ‘autobiographical’ memory on narrative, representation and identity are explored. In this way, the chapter promotes ‘Professional Memory’ as a model for contributing to the kinds of critical probing into teachers’ lives and conjunctural circumstances that Goodson calls for.