Local Educational Order

Pragmatics & Beyond New Series #73

by David Francis (Editor), Stephen K. Hester (Editor)

The studies in this book take an ethnomethodological approach to educational phenomena. Ethnomethodology’s concern is with the locally accomplished and situated character of social order. With reference to
educational phenomena, this means that ethnomethodology investigates how the ‘natural facts’ of educational life, such as daily activities in school classrooms, are produced as such in the first place, rather than taking for
granted the recognisability of these facts and then theorising their explanation. In this sense, ethnomethodological studies contrast markedly with other approaches to the study of education. Each of the chapters in the book consists of a new and original study. Collectively, they exhibit the continuing vitality of this tradition and demonstrate ethnomethodology’s special commitment to the analysis of educational
phenomena as locally ordered and accomplished.

326 pages, Hardcover

First published February 15, 2000

About the author

David Francis, based in Los Angeles where he works for the Norton Rose Fulbright law firm, spends part of each year back on his family’s farm in Australia. He is the author of The Great Inland Sea, published to acclaim in seven countries, and Stray Dog Winter, Book of the Year in The Advocate, winner of the American Library Association Barbara Gittings Prize for Literature, and a LAMBDA Literary Award Finalist. He has taught creative writing at UCLA, Occidental College, and in the Masters of Professional Writing program at USC. His short fiction and articles have appeared in publications including Harvard Review, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, Southern California Review, Best Australian Stories, Australian Love Stories, and The Rattling Wall. He is Vice President of PEN Center USA.