ABSTRACT
The aim of this collection is to make a contribution to understanding the changing nature of teacher professionalism. We seek to do this both as an end in itself and to inform debates about enhancing teachers’ professional practice. Much has been written about the notion of professionalism and related notions such as ‘profession’, ‘professionalization’ and ‘professionality’, and the literature is full of all manner of overlapping distinctions and debates. We will not attempt an overview of this literature here – which would in any case take up the whole of this introduction. Nor, given the extraordinary level of contestation that surrounds the topic, will we attempt a simple ‘definition’ of the concept of professionalism. Nonetheless, we will offer a brief account of the broad domain we are exploring before going on to map the policy shifts that are currently shaping teachers’ work and the rationale and structure of the book.
