Professions at the margins

The contributions in this special issue of ephemera examine the relation between professions and the margins. While the professions have become well-established at the centre of public life over the last one hundred and fifty years, they also bear an intrinsic relation to the periphery - social, cultural and economic. The papers in this special issue explore the way that occupational groups try (and sometimes fail) to gain professional legitimacy in fields such as massage therapy and social work, how managerialism has eroded collegial organization in the teaching profession, and the types of subjectivity that are excluded from discourses of professionalism. Taken together, the contributions offer a series of critical perspectives on professions at the margins.