From peripheral participation to professionalism

Peripheral participation and professionalism are relevant issues to consider in order to become active members in a certain discourse community. According to Lave and Wenger (1991), new participants’ position in a discourse community “[is] not central but [is] on the margins of the activity”(as cited in Pintos & Crimi, 2010, p.14). Lave and Wenger (1991) also argue that as long as a member takes part in the development of knowledge, members hold a legitimate peripheral position. Thus, involvement in knowledge development as well as in academic issues would enable students and professionals to become legitimate members in a given discourse community.
As regards professionalism, Banfi (1997, cited in Pintos &Crimi, 2010) describes the necessary requirements to be considered a professional in a certain field. Professionals should “provide a social service, […] [professionals] should have had a long period of specialized training and be autonomous and involved in decision-making issues”(Banfi,1997,as cited in Pintos & Crimi, 2010, p.28). Moreover, Wallace (1991) adds that professionals should “perform (…) socially useful tasks in a demonstrably competent manner” (as cited in Pintos & Crimi, p.28).
From the concepts defined above, it should be said that peripheral participation and professionalism are indicative and necessary requirements for a membership in a discourse community. Those concepts are related and connected since they refer to the achievement of professional goals, professionals should aim at becoming legitimate participants through the development of new knowledge. In the case of teachers, they should seek to “play a central role in the development of research” (Banfi, 1997, as cited in Pintos & Crimi, p.29)
After this brief overview of the concepts of peripheral participation and professionalism provided in this paper, it should be stated that peripheral participation in a teaching discourse community means learning about the genres and conventions of academic writing. It can be concluded that becoming a professional means complying with the requirements of a professional reflective teacher who can work autonomously seeking for new developments in his / her specific filed.


References

Pintos, V., & Crimi, Y. (2010). Unit 1: Building up a community of teachers and prospective teachers. Retrieved August 2010, from
http://caece.campusuniversidad.com.ar/mod/resource/view.php?id=7214