Contributions from the Social Representations Approach to the Field of Education

The article examines the relations between the field of study of education and the field of study of social representations. Its aim is to show the relevance of the resources offered by the latter to analyse the processes regulating the different levels of the educational system. After having given evidence of the historical and logical links that exist between the two fields, it underlines the importance to preserve their specificities. The author isolates the guidelines that allow the encounter between the two fields, taking into account the French situation that she knows and whose analytic devises can be extrapolated to other national and cultural contexts. The purpose is to delineate the schemas that organize the educational system and express ideologies that define its functions in order to fulfil the financial, educational and democratic demands of society and their historical change. Social representations give evidence of an evolution in the functions given to education and school, and have some influence on the conceptions related to teachers and students agency. The important role they play in the relation between the actors of educational system is illustrated by different examples. This historical and documentary examination shows how the social representations approach is an instrument and a mediation corresponding perfectly to the multiple problems tacked in the field of study of education.