Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Collaborative life history narratives: heroes in reading teachers’ tales

1991; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 4; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/0951839910040104

1366-5898

James R. King,

Global Education and Multiculturalism

Interesting perspectives emerge when teachers interview other teachers about their shared profession. The narratives reveal common themes. Interviewed subjects are cast as heroes born to the task, subjected to trials, and strengthened through their tolerance and balance. In this study, a model is offered for a student centered workshop approach to oral history and for narrative accounts of teachers. Several paradigms are presented which may account for some of the thematic consistencies in the teachers’ narratives. In particular, inside learning, narrative framing, and teachers’ professionalism are used as critical lenses. When you tell about a life, everything changes; only it's a change that nobody notices: the proof is that people talk about true stories. As if there could be true stories; events take place in one direction, and we tell about them in the opposite direction. You seem to start at the beginning... but in reality you have begun at the end.... The end is there, transforming everything. Sartre, 1972, pp. 58‐59)