Distinctive and unique in its approach, this book opens up art education to the broader field of social enquiry into practice, subjectivity and identity. It draws upon important developments in contemporary philosophy and the social sciences and applies this to the professional field of art in education. It opens new perspectives for teachers, teacher educators and student teachers.

Acknowledgements. About the Author. Introduction. Memory Seed. Theories of Learning. Learning Theory in Art Education. Representation and Signification. Identity and Difference. The Idea of Experience. Outline of the Book. Part One: Interpretation and Practice. 1. Semiotics and Hermeneutics. Introduction. Semiotics. Hermeneutics and the Problem of Interpretation. Hermeneutic Strategies. Post-Structural Hermeneutics. 2. Semiotics, Hermeneutics and Observational Drawings. 3. The Semiotics of Children's Drawing Practices. Language Games. Drawings From Australia. Children Drawing Objects. Mystery. Summary. 4. Experience and the Hermeneutics and Semiotics of Visuality. Perspective and Visual Representation. Visualities of Difference. Part Two: Identity and Practice. 5. Constructions of Identity. The Truman Show. Changing the Subject. Althusser. Foucault. Normalisation. Discourse. Discourses of Normalisation and Identification in Art Education. Power-Knowledge. Video Sequence. 6. Identity and Psychoanalysis. Lacan: The Imaginary, the Symbolic and the Real. 7. The Field of Art in Education. Recent Pedagogies for Art Education in England. The National Curriculum for Art in England. Bourdieu's Notions of Field and Habitus. Change in the Field. Chreods and Epigenetic Landscapes. Teacher and Learner Identities in the Field of Art Education. Part Three: Difference and Practice. 8. Forms of Life. Two Narratives. Practice and Change. Experience and Experiencing. Difference. Student's Work. 9. Experience and Practice: Theorising New Identifications. Consequences of the Critique of Experience for Art in Education. References. Subject Index. Name Index.