(Re)Conceptualizing a New Ethic of Care Within Discourses of Early Childhood Education and Care Professionalism?

• In Event: Power to the Field!: Equity and Transformation in Early Childhood Workforce and Education
  In Paper Session: Power to the Field! Equity and Transformation in Early Childhood Workforce and Education

Abstract

A historical legacy of disharmony and unease between education and care continues to date in Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC). A distinction that intensified within neoliberal/elite discourses of professionalism resting on technocratic platforms. Here we conduct a critical scrutiny of care in ECEC reforms from the perspectives of early years practitioners in Ireland (n=101). How is care conceptualised in ECEC official texts, in practitioner perspectives and within new modes of evaluation? Results reveal real and symbolic dangers in uncertain relationships between education and care. We (re)conceptualise a new ethic of care in ECEC professionalism that goes beyond this dysfunctional split/dualism, one that advances an emancipatory practice and supports a broader view of a good life and public interest values.

Authors

• Dawn Murphy, Institute of Technology Carlow

• Geraldine Mooney Simmie, University of Limerick