ABSTRACT
In this chapter I intend to examine the lived character of role within multidisciplinary team practice. I intend to contrast the lived orderliness of role work with models of role and practice evident within some of the models of multidisciplinary practice outlined during the introduction to this book. A starting point in this endeavour will be a consideration of the concept of role in the social sciences. A consideration of the concept of role in the social sciences is central to contrasting the models of role evident in models of multidisciplinary practice with the character of first order observations of interaction in teams. This is because the concept and articulation of team roles evident within the multidisciplinary team literature is based on the traditional social scientific concepts of role that I intend to explore prior to analysis of examples of the social organisation and accomplishment of role in team based settings. I will then contrast these models with the notion of role as an interactional device and outline what this concept means through the analysis of talk in interaction within multidisciplinary social/care work team meetings, although some indirect discussion and explanation of this concept will be presented as a preface to analysis.
