Oralidad

Foucault (1977) drew attention to the nexus between power, knowledge and claims to truth, by arguing that:

… power and knowledge directly imply one another; that there is no power relation without the correlative constitution of a field of knowledge, nor any knowledge that does not presuppose and constitute at the same time power relations … the subject

110 who knows, the objects to be known and the modalities of knowledge must be regarded as so many effects of these fundamental implications of power-knowledge and their historical transformations. (pp. 95-96)

As power produces knowledge it can be properly understood only in relation to its connection with fields of knowledge and the discursive practices which disseminate and maintain them (Foucault, 1977). It is inseparable from particular fields of

knowledge and claims to truth, and from the discursive and material practices which intersect with and maintain power/knowledge relations (Schirato, Danaher, & Webb, 2012).Knowledges, discursive practices, and material relations of power vary according to changing historic, cultural and material circumstances. Despite this

contingency and fluidity, and the co-existence of contradictory and resistant discourses, power and knowledge remain in constant and dependent connection to each other (Jackson & Mazzei, 2012).

Given the power/knowledge nexus it cannot be assumed that knowledge is neutral or that truth and knowledge claims are not associated with power, and this, furthermore, problematises claims to universal or absolute truths, and identifies truth claims as claims to power (Richardson, 1991). Power/knowledge relations determine what knowledge is accepted as truth and whose knowledge is legitimated. Practices of power/knowledge are partial and situated (Jackson & Mazzei, 2012). Foucault’s analysis foregrounds the association of power with discursive practices and

professional fields of knowledge which make claims to truth and objectivity (Pease, 2002). Many fields of knowledge develop discourses proclaiming the objectivity, professionalism, and expertise of their knowledge bases. Foucault (1977) considered that bodies of knowledge, including the social sciences and emancipatory discourses, constitute particular forms of power and knowledge and operate as regimes of truth

111 (Healy, 2000; Pease, 2002). Healy (2000) and Pease (2002) argue that without

critique, discourses of empowerment can construct the status of ‘knower’ as powerful within a dichotomy which views the ‘client’ as powerless. Healy (2000) contends that recognising the forms of power and knowledge which are available to clients is a way to mitigate against constructing these relations within a powerful/powerless dichotomy. Taking into account the power/knowledge nexus, a lack of reflexivity towards any discourse considered emancipatory can constitute a “regime of truth” (Gore, 2003, p.340), which can operate to oppress those who are inside or outside of the particular social reality the discourse refers to.

Ife (2016) claims that expert knowledge is typically of a more universal and broadly generalisable nature than local and contextual knowledge. However, any claims to universality do not remove the political nature of this knowledge because power underlies the reasons for its universal or broad acceptance. Countering these

knowledges with other forms and sources of knowledge, or resisting these knowledges, challenges the truth claims of universal knowledge. The basic premise from which community development operates is that local people and local knowledge are the best source of information about the concerns of local people (Ife, 2016; Ledwith, 2011; Sandercock, 1998). In this view expert knowledge is valued as long as it is used reflexively and critically and does not devalue the knowledges of local people. Just as power/knowledge relations determine what knowledge is accepted as truth and who speaks with knowledge, they equally determine what knowledges are ignored or subjugated. Foucault(1980) describes “subjugated knowledges” (p.82) as knowledges that lack power, as they are considered naïve and lacking scientific verification.Ife (2016)argues that local knowledges are devalued within mainstream discourses in comparison with the professional and universal knowledge held by experts, because they are local and contextualised. Other examples of subjugated knowledges are

112 women’s and indigenous knowledges, knowledges of minority and marginalised

groups, the knowledge of elders, and any knowledges which pertain to relatively powerless groups in society (Ife, 2016; The Personal Narratives Group, 1989).

Second wave feminism challenged the sexism of male discourses and knowledge which privileged men and subordinated women (Gunew, 1990). Women’s knowledge and ways of knowing were not recognised or valued. They were on the wrong side of the binary which valued men over women, and scientific and rationalist practices over intersubjective, contextualised and relational ways of knowing (Belenky et al., 1997). Belenky et al (1997)challenged the hegemony of male-dominated knowledges and ways of knowing, describing the multiple ways in which women gain knowledge, and emphasising the importance of subjective and contextualised knowledge gained from lived experience. They claimed that:

Usually, we are supposed to learn it the way men see it. Men move quickly to impose their own conceptual schemes on the experience of women … These schemes do not help women make sense of their experience; they extinguish the experience. Women must find their own words to make meaning of their

experiences, and this will take time. (p.203)

This work recognised that women’s lived experience and the ways they chose to make meaning of their experiences are legitimate sources of knowledge.Freire (1970) sought to redress the domination of oppressed people by recognising that knowledge comes from lived experience, that those who are oppressed, although they may not recognise it, “‘know things’ they have learned in their relations with the world and with other women and men”(p.37). The idea of lived experience producing knowledge that transforms subjects resonates with Foucault’s notion of le savoir des gens (Foucault,

113 1980, p.82), a concept describing knowledge about the self that is constructed through lived experience and in relation to others (Jackson & Mazzei, 2012). We know what we know through direct embodied experience of the power/knowledge relations in which we are embedded. Knowledge does not pre-exist these relations, or reflect an objective reality existing outside of ourselves. Jackson and Mazzei (2012) describe savoir as “active and [it] captures a subject’s process of modification and transformation. Savoir

is a practice of knowledge which not only defines, but also changes the way a subject participates in the world” (p.60). Foucault understood power as productive, of

“knowledge, subjectivity, and resistance” (p.61). Jackson and Mazzei propose that people use knowledge constructed within particular relations and practices to understand themselves, their relations to others, and to transform themselves.