Expansive Learning in Professional Contexts

A Materialist Perspective

This book discusses approaches to organizational learning from a materialist point of view. Inspired by research into Police Firearms training, features of expansive learning inform the development of perspectives on training which challenge traditional modes of research and delivery. The book critically reviews a range of approaches to expansive learning and organizational research, establishing the bases and limitations of an Expansive Learning Index whose aim is to support collaborative provision in the context of work-based research. Reflecting on this process, it stresses the strangeness and mobility of workplace learning and develops a philosophical pragmatics for professional development. Approaches to knowledge and enquiry which place language and subjectivity at the heart of development are challenged by a more pragmatic approach to expansive learning: its consequences for training, research, and professional development lead to a discussion of the need for immanent forms of professional ethics.