ABSTRACT
Confusion is not eliminated by definition, or bypassed with negatives. What the vocational is has no stable meaning, and it cannot be established by simply listing the things it is not. The elements of social processes exist only in relationships, and the discussion here can focus on the vocational only by adventuring into the relationships in which it is held. From Aristotle to modern technological policy-making the ‘liberal’ and the ‘vocational’ have been in tension-though through most of that history it is the voices of the liberal that have been most heard. One of the purposes of this book is to hear and to interpret the sounds of institutions, courses of study, and teachers now commonly perceived as vocational-to listen to other voices.
