ABSTRACT

These extracts were precipitated by developments that were taking place in the UK in the 1990s in which changes in health policy (DH 1989a) and medical and nursing education (DHSS 1987; UKCC 1987; GMC

1993) had created vigorous debates about the future shape of the nursing role. They suggest very different versions of nursing and are assembled in rhetorically distinctive ways. Caines uses the language of management with its emphasis on quality, economy, efficiency, and competition. Gillespie employs a professional discourse that stresses the importance of holistic care and the value of combining physical tending with counselling, reassurance and health education. Both are oriented to a ‘common sense’ understanding of nursing work. Caines makes an appeal to the (self-evident) mundaneness of hands-on care, whereas Gillespie aims to counter ‘what everybody knows’ by making visible the indeterminacy and complexity of nursing practice.