| Chapter 2: | Background |
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Chapter 2
Background
2.1. Theoretical Foundation—Backround of the Sociology of Knowledge
The nature of the research questions broadly falls within the domains of the sociology of education, the sociology of scientific knowledge, and the sociology of knowledge. The literature available on the sociology of education is largely focused on pretertiary education. The contexts dealt with in this body of literature mostly relate to compulsory education rather than to higher education. Further, much of the research focuses on concerns related to equality, identity, and gender issues, which are not within the domain of this study. Parts of the literature of the sociology of education are relevant to the sociology of knowledge (e.g., Michael Young’s Knowledge and Control—New Directions for the Sociology of Education, 1971), and literature such as the sociology of curriculum has traces of the sociology of knowledge, which can be found in Apple’s (1990) Ideology and Curriculum and Bernstein’s (1975, 1990) multivolume work, Class, Codes and Control; however, these studies of the sociology of education mainly focus on the sociology concerning the relationships between educational knowledge and society.