Acknowledging doctoral programmes as sites of knowledge transformation
Sharon Walker, University of Cambridge
A response to the blog question needs to address the simple observation that doctoral students’ interactions with their institutions and disciplines shape how they see the world, and by extension, how they act in it. That said, doctoral students do not embark on their programmes as empty vessels waiting to be shaped. They arrive laden with knowledge and perspectives gained through life experience and previous academic study. They are ‘knowledge makers’ in the sense that all of these dynamics — prior learning, life experience and the influence of the institution — jostle together to create new possibilities.
As the blog notes, although doctoral students are studying in institutions across the UK, they are bound to find themselves encountering similar issues that reflect the current politics of the higher education environment — casualisation, strikes, decolonising movements and the marketisation of education, for example. Their institutions will also grapple with issues played out in the broader political sphere such as racism, sexism, homophobia, ableism etc.
As well as experiencing multi-layered political environments, the blog describes doctoral students as ‘political beings’. As with ‘knowledge makers’, this description presents doctoral students as active, making choices about how to engage in the world, and what they need to know in order to do this effectively. By ‘effectively’, I mean in a way that strives for justice and knowledge that liberates. Therefore, there is a purpose to their studies far beyond obtaining a higher degree. Individuals are ‘recast’ and ‘shaped’ to influence the world in whatever future role — personal, social, work — they find themselves in.
So, as we present scenarios of flux and change — political environments and student identities — how can we imagine university settings that don’t fail to engage dynamically with their roles as knowledge producers. This means a continuous reassessment of what is valued as knowledge, including contextualising it within broader spheres of knowledge; engaging with knowledge that addresses the deep factions and inequalities in society; and being open to critique ‘sources’ of knowledge, whatever they may be. Knowledge is not neutral. It has never been, nor ever will be since it involves social actors. This means that we are continually struggling over the ‘truth’. One perspective, representation and interpretation of the world might take precedence for a while, but this cannot be forever. Does anything last forever? Should we not expect a challenge to knowledge as an integral part of doctoral programmes. Should we not expect academic expertise to have the flexibility to approach subjects with a renewed imaginary, questioning what has been left unsaid, and how what we know can be enhanced?
All knowledge is tied up with identity — we are all positioned in relation to different types and fields of knowledge. Because certain ways of knowing the world have become so familiar such that they take on the form of ‘truth’, we are no less positioned in relation to them, even if we no longer recognise it. For some, this ‘truth’ might centre their self-understanding in the world, hence the struggle to keep it in place.
I hear a rebuttal. Something about knowledge from the margins attempting to overturn established knowledge. As I have said, there is not anything that lasts forever. Instead, as we reflect on doctoral programmes and ask questions about how they need to change, we can fix our focus on the goal of developing ‘knowledge makers’ who are open to challenge, suggestion and transformation, whatever their perspective. This can only be achieved through engagement in disciplines and course content open to engaging with the same processes. In this way, new ways of understanding the world can emerge while more established ways are reformed.
