Abstract

Studies that have explored the need for a greater sense of community and more liberatory praxis all find relationship critical to the success of an emancipatory agenda. This study takes a critical look at the epistemological content of relationship based on the belief that the development of relationship could be more easily operationalized with such an understanding. ;Building upon Putnam's notion of social capital and Freire's emancipatory dialogue, the existence of and need for Relational Knowledge is grounded. Then Representational Knowledge and Reflective Knowledge are delineated, as is the epistemological void that remains. The void is Relational Knowledge---the knowledge between two people, knowledge in relationship. A theory that defines Relational Knowledge and the process by which it is developed and maintained is put forward, and the issue of validation for this form of knowledge is considered. Finally, the theory of Relational Knowledge is applied to community building and liberatory praxis. The connection between the personal trust of Relational Knowledge and the social trust of social capital as well as the ramifications of the theory for social change practitioners are considered. ;A hermeneutic process was used to move between epistemological theories, theories of relationship and intimacy, theories of knowledge and relationship from other cultures, and insights gained from dialogue sessions on people's experience of Relational Knowledge. These dialogue sessions allowed for collective inquiry and collaborative theory building. ;The study found Relational Knowledge to have primacy among the forms of knowledge but to be integrally connected with the other forms, making up the totality of what a person knows, It also confirmed that the validity criteria applied to Representational Knowledge are not appropriate for Relational Knowledge. Instead, trust was found to be the indicator of whether one has Relational Knowledge with another. Further, it was found that in dismissing Relational Knowledge as real knowledge, we also dismiss the value of community, compassion, and the reliability of the relations in our life. With it goes the personal power to affect change based upon a belief in the credibility of our own knowledge and understanding