Nursing Praxis: Knowledge and Action / Edition 1

by Sally E. Thorne, Virginia Hayes

Overview

With the evolution of nursing knowledge and theory, relationships between ideas and actions often become blurred and difficult to articulate. In this ground-breaking volume, the contributors present some of the ways in which nursing scholars are confronting this problem by reflecting upon the nature of nursing knowledge and the application of theory in practice. The book is divided into three sections that address: the nature of knowledge in clinical practice; the application of theoretical knowledge; and the creation of new forms and avenues of inquiry.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780761900115
Publisher:	SAGE Publications
Publication date:	12/11/1996
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	335
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.75(d)

About the Author

Sally Thorne, RN, Ph D, FAAN, FCAHS, is a Professor and former Director of the School of Nursing at the University of British Columbia, where she currently also holds the position of Associate Dean of Applied Science. She has a longstanding research program in the field of patient experience and relational practice in chronic illness and cancer care in addition to a body of scholarly work in the philosophy of science, the nature of evidence, and applied qualitative methodology. She is author of four books, including a popular qualitative research text on Interpretive Description. She has an extensive record of peer reviewed journal publications and has presented her work internationally as invited scholar, keynote lecturer and distinguished professor. She is Editor-in-Chief of the scholarly journal Nursing Inquiry and Associate Editor for Qualitative Health Research. She has served terms as Board Director for numerous organizations, including the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, Canadian Partnership Against Cancer, Canadian Association of Nurses in Oncology, the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research, and the Association of Registered Nurses of British Columbia, and is a Fellow of both the American Academy of Nursing and the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences.

Table of Contents

Praxis in the Context of Nursing's Developing Inquiry - S E Thorne
PART ONE: KNOWLEDGE IN THE CLINICAL ENCOUNTER
The Nature of the Knowledge Used in Nursing Practice - J L Johnson and P A Ratner
Knowing the Patient? - J Liaschenko
Discovering Knowledge in a Practice Setting - F Ndidi and U Griffin
Searching for Family Nursing Practice Knowledge - V E Hayes
Knowing and Forgetting - M Sandelowski
The Challenge of Technology for a Reflexive Practice Science of Nursing
PART TWO: APPLIED THEORETICAL KNOWLEDGE
Enlightenment in Nursing - D Trainor
Implications of the Caring-Competence Dichotomy - S Halldorsdottir
Thinking Nursing - M Jones
Multiple Paradigms for Nursing - S Miller
Postmodern Feminisms
Counsciousness Raising as a Feminist Nursing Action - D J Henderson
Promise and Practice, Present and Future
The Revolution Never Ends - C Varcoe
Challenges of Praxis for Nursing Education
PART THREE: EMANCIPATORY INQUIRY
Foundation Thought in the Development of Knowledge for Social Change - L E Maxwell
Nursing Inquiry for the Common Good - R Starzomski and P Rodney
Health Knowledge and the Praxis of Otherness - E L S Angerami and F A Correia
The Case in the Developing World
Action Research as Authentic Methodology for the Study of Nursing - S Rasmussen
A Feminist Poststructuralist Orientation to Nursing Praxis - J Mc Cormick and J Roussy

Editorial Reviews

Reviewer: Barbara Stevens Barnum, RN, PhD, FAAN (Columbia University School of Nursing)
Description: This is a serious work on the nature of praxis in nursing, that is, on the connection between knowledge and action. It seeks to describe what can be learned from a reflective practice of nursing.
Purpose: The purpose of the book is to upgrade the dialogue among nurses with a serious interest in the relationships among nursing theory, practice, and research.
Audience: The audience for this book should be all nurses, but it will probably only appeal to nursing faculty and advanced practice nurses.
Features: Each contributed chapter is a scholarly work on different aspects of praxis, such as what it means to know the patient, what technology means for reflective practice, care versus competency ideologies, and the use of action research. If the book has a bias, it is that parts of it come from a postmodern feminist perspective, held, however, in intelligent check. Also, it tends to favor critical social theory over classic experimental design for research. Hence, it will not surprise the reader to find topics dealing with the developing word, development of knowledge for social change, and inquiry for the common good. Never, however, does the book lose its scholarly restraint.
Assessment: The book is extremely well done, not only in its citations, but in the thought given to each paper by the respective authors. The contributors all have status within the profession and the ability to deliver thoughtfully on their assigned topics. This book is not for the casual reader, but for the scholarly nurse it will be provocative and an interesting read. Nursing scholars too often forget that ultimately, our knowledge comes from, and returns to inform, practices. This book is a wonderful corrective on that point.

Doody's Review Service

3 Stars from Doody

This is a serious work on the nature of praxis in nursing, that is, on the connection between knowledge and action. It seeks to describe what can be learned from a reflective practice of nursing. The purpose of the book is to upgrade the dialogue among nurses with a serious interest in the relationships among nursing theory, practice, and research. The audience for this book should be all nurses, but it will probably only appeal to nursing faculty and advanced practice nurses. Each contributed chapter is a scholarly work on different aspects of praxis, such as what it means to know the patient, what technology means for reflective practice, care versus competency ideologies, and the use of action research. If the book has a bias, it is that parts of it come from a postmodern feminist perspective, held, however, in intelligent check. Also, it tends to favor critical social theory over classic experimental design for research. Hence, it will not surprise the reader to find topics dealing with the developing word, development of knowledge for social change, and inquiry for the common good. Never, however, does the book lose its scholarly restraint. The book is extremely well done, not only in its citations, but in the thought given to each paper by the respective authors. The contributors all have status within the profession and the ability to deliver thoughtfully on their assigned topics. This book is not for the casual reader, but for the scholarly nurse it will be provocative and an interesting read. Nursing scholars too often forget that ultimately, our knowledge comes from, and returns to inform, practices. This book is a wonderful corrective on that point.

Barbara Stevens Barnum