An ethnographic investigation of the discourse processes of school science

Abstract

In this article we drew from studies in the sociology of scientific knowledge (SSK) to create a new perspective for understanding school science. In doing so, we brought together ethnography and discourse analysis to study science-in-the-making in a physics classroom. We sought to document the social practices that constituted students' experimental data trials. To understand these interactions, we investigated the local conceptual ecologies created in the moment by student laboratory groups and the views of science made available across multiple classroom-based activities. Throughout the study we asked what counts as science in this science classroom. In doing so, we traced how science was portrayed and interactionally acknowledged across the shifting sociocultural contexts that constitute this high school physics class studied. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.