Where is nursing in academic nursing? disciplinary discourses, identities and clinical practice: a critical perspective from Ireland

Aim. To elicit the languages of legitimation of senior nursing academics and national leaders and to investigate the extent to which distinctive disciplinary identities and discourses are embedded in them. Background. Over six years after Irish nursing education became established in the higher education sector, an investigation into the disciplinary maturity of the field is overdue. Design. A constructivist–structuralist research design was used; data were elicited by means of naturalistic professional conversations and subjected to critical discourse analytic methods to interrogate their structuring and structured character. The focus here is on the latter. Methods. The languages of legitimation of Irish nursing’s key disciplinary custodians were elicited and subjected to a critical discourse analysis informed by a theoretical framework that helps to explicate the bases of claims to academic legitimacy embedded in these languages. Results. Clinical practice figures as a problematic component of Irish nursing’s academic identity and disciplinary discourse. Yet a focus on clinical practice is seen as central to the autonomy, integrity and distinctiveness of nursing as an academic discipline as well as to the legitimacy and credibility of those who claim to profess it. The overall consensus on the state of academic nursing in Ireland is that of a field characterised by low autonomy, high density, weak specialisation and disciplinary immaturity. Conclusions. The analysis highlights the need for academic nursing to reconfigure its relationships with clinical nursing, increase its intellectual autonomy, enhance its internal coherence, strengthen the epistemic power of its knowledge base and critically evaluate the ways the past should inform current and future practices and identities. Relevance to clinical practice. The production and dissemination of knowledge for nursing policy and practice provides the foundation for nursing education. If clinical practice is not central to the educational and research activities of nurse academics, the relevance of academic nursing to its professional base and its status and future trajectory as a distinct presence in academia, will continue to be questioned.