Area of study as a discursive field: some notes on method and an inquiry into the challenge of moral education

Abstract

This is a paper on the nature of modern academic disciplines and an inquiry into the origin of their boundaries in the discourse of modernity and their contemporary inadequacy in the face of the challenges of the present and also those of the future. The paper argues that there is a need now to move from disciplinary boundaries to areas of study, while conceptualizing areas of studies as discursive fields, and not as bounded systems. The paper discusses at great length the methodological issues involved in the study of discursive field, particularly in its description and explanation. The present inquiry contextualizes these issues with specific reference to the question of moral education in modern societies.