The foundation of professional identities in life experiences

The authors have studied biographies and life histories in two different ways, aiming at the same objective: To understand how professional identity building is founded in personal life experience in its societal context. Our approaches have been developed in widely different cultural and theoretical contexts, and our paper will explore this background by contrasting similar research interests. One approach has focused on autobiographies of teachers/educators in their social and historical context, methodologically aware of the temporal and narrative nature of memory, looking for the way in which narrators have developed their personal and professional identity in this context. The other one has interpreted accounts of professional experience and learning, with a focus on the psycho-societal aspects of collective professional discourses (in-depth hermeneutics). Our paper will present the main features of each approach, and discuss their relevance for professional education and learning.  A potentially common denominator in the interpretations in the form of key concepts (comprensión escénica, scenic understanding respectively) will be considered theoretically.