Tacit Knowledge and Silenced Knowledge: Fundamental Problems and Controversies

Abstract

During the 1980s the concept of “tacit knowledge” became the central theme in discussions about professional skills and expertise in Sweden. This chapter discusses the reason for its popularity and investigates the most important underlying issues and controversies. Essentially, there seem to be two different knowledge traditions: a “scientific” one with the emphasis on articulated theories and descriptions, and a “practical” knowledge tradition with the emphasis on training and apprenticeship. It is argued that the expression “tacit knowledge” is misleading if it is taken as referring to a particular type of knowledge because, on the one hand, all knowledge is in a way tacit, and on the other, verbal expression plays an important role in all kinds of professional knowledge and expertise. In various attempts to explain the nature of “practical” knowledge, three strands can be distinguished, related to the view of knowledge as inherent in, respectively, a human body, a social community, and human actions. It is also argued that the main problem in trying to develop an explanation of “practical” knowledge is the tension between knowledge as an essentially critical enterprise, emphasized in science, on the one hand, and confidence in action, which is the hallmark of practical skills on the other. Finally, some outlines for a future epistemology of practical knowledge are proposed, suggesting that knowledge is never ending but always “moving”, and that people do not “have” but rather “participate in” knowledge.