Learning and identity construction in the professional world of the surgeon

Classic ethnographic and archive-based accounts of surgical life, describing identity constructions of surgeons and the development of an individualized surgical gaze, have been eclipsed by recent, radical developments in surgical education responding to new, collaborative forms of work. New accounts of the construction of multiple, fractured and distributed identities are needed, that draw on sophisticated models of authentic learning in work settings. This chapter considers the value of the ‘big three’ social learning theories – communities of practice, activity theory and actor-network theory – in exploring how the identities of the surgeon and surgical educator of the future may be constructed. Beyond such learning theories, a range of textual practices, where surgeons as professionals, interprofessionals and educators reflexively account for the quality of their practices through speaking and writing, are adding further complexity to the surgeon’s construction of identity in what has been described as an unpredictable, or ‘runaway’, world of work.