Understanding Educational Experience. “Clinica della Formazione” as a Hybrid and Inclusive Research Approach

Research in educational and learning studies can not only be theoretical, analytical and descriptive. It has also to be connected with real social and educational experiences, in order to lead the subjects involved in these processes (especially professionals, such as educators, teachers, social workers, etc.) to reflect upon their daily practices and to understand, deconstruct, orient, plan, evaluate, criticize, and theorize them. This implies the need to carry out qualitative inquiry as activism, so as to make the research transformative, situated, positioned, context-sensitive, experience-near and embodied. It is no surprise, therefore, that in the last few decades many types of empirical research have emerged – for instance, participatory action research – with the aim not only to study, but also to change the social and material contexts of education, together with the subjects who experience these contexts every day. Starting from these introductory reflections, the paper intends to present the “Clinica della Formazione”, a particular theoretical-methodological approach to action research, which is still hardly known in the international debate. This approach was developed in the Nineties by the Italian pedagogist and philosopher of education Riccardo Massa, and is currently adopted by quite a few Italian scholars of education. Although the “Clinica della Formazione” grounds on specific and original theoretical categories, some of its epistemological premises and research and training strategies can interact successfully with current reflective perspectives, such as Transformative Learning and Critical Reflection, and with new materialisms and sociomaterial approaches, such as Actor-Network Theory and Activity Theory. In this sense, the most distinctive aspect of the “Clinica della Formazione” is hybridity, that is, the capability to synthetize theorizations and operative strategies belonging to research traditions that are often considered irreconcilable. This very characteristic makes it an inspiring and innovative perspective, able to contribute significantly to the contemporary debate in educational and learning studies. After briefly reconstructing the genesis and evolution of the “Clinica della Formazione”, the paper will outline the main theoretical and methodological characteristics of this approach, also showing some possible uses in both research and training of practitioners, and highlighting the points of contact with reflective and materialist perspectives.