Roads Not Travelled, Roads Ahead: How the Theory of Practice Architectures Is Travelling

Abstract

This chapter asks how the theory of practice architectures is travelling, in terms of the way it has been used, primarily in this volume. The chapter (1) clarifies some key terms in the theory including (a) the relationship between practices and practice architectures, (b) the ideas of ‘enabling’ and ‘constraining’, and (c) the relationship between the theory of practice architectures and the theory of ecologies of practices. The chapter also addresses (2) the ubiquity of contestation and variation in the formation, conduct, reproduction, and transformation of practices and practice architectures to dispel the perception of ‘seamless’ harmony between practices and the practice architectures that sustain them. It examines (3) the question of agency and how it is evident in the formation and conduct of practices. Finally, the chapter addresses (4) the centrality to the theory of the notion of intersubjective spaces. The chapter concludes with some remarks encouraging critical use of the theory.