The knowledgeable parenting style: stance takings and subject positions in media encounters

Abstract

In today’s media-saturated societies it can be assumed that encounters with therapists and other experts may have implications for adult learning. Taking the point of departure in the idea of public pedagogy, and by using a close-up analysis of interview talk, the pedagogical agency the media may have on parenting is investigated. Drawing upon the discursive notions of styles, stance takings and subject positions, a pattern of regularities emerges called ‘the knowledgeable parenting style’. The knowledgeable parent is fashioned through various, yet typical ways of assuming stances and negotiating positions in media encounters, by displaying recognition, discrimination and insight. The study illustrates how the media’s claim on a pedagogical role is acknowledged, however, what is provided to be valuable competence is not just accepted. While the interviewed adults mainly exclude themselves from that site of public intervention, the knowledge provided and instructions given are depicted as having the potential of facilitating learning for ‘other parents’. Apparently, the ways in which people rhetorically approach and systematically establish stances also reveal subject positions associated with learning. A dynamic space is created where the displayed norms for adequate behaviour, and invitations to act upon that knowledge, are subject to constant tension.