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