Cultural Perspectives on Higher Education

Cultural Perspectives on Higher Education takes a critical look at what cultural perspective means, and how it works in higher education institutions. What is actually happening in the internal life of the higher education institutions, and how can we study the topic from a cultural perspective?

The chapters selected for this book consist of studies in which culture has been either the object, or the structuring principle of the study, or in which cultural studies have been used as intellectual devices in the analysis. We are not only interested in gaining a better understanding of the cultural aspects of higher education, but also in analyzing the potential of cultural perspectives as intellectual devices.

The main aim of the book is to provide the readers with a good understanding of the variety of possible cultural perspectives to higher education, and to show how they can be used in both qualitative and quantitative research.

The editors of the book invite you to read the chapters of the book not only because they open fresh perspectives to higher education as a social phenomenon, but also because they tell interesting stories about the small worlds of academia where we live and work.

Zusammenfassung

This book analyses higher education from cultural perspectives and also to reflect on the uses of intellectual devices developed in the cultural studies of higher education over the last decades.

The first part of the book presents fresh perspectives to integrate cultural studies in higher education with wider societal processes. Professor William G. Tierney speaks about trust and culture in higher education, whereas Professor Imanol Ordorika opens a political perspective to higher education institutions.

The second part of the book studies the internal life of higher education. Relying on a variety of cultural perspectives, the chapters explore the actual day-to-day practices taking place in higher education, ranging from student socialisation, student consumerism, tensions in combining academic and market-oriented targets in knowledge production to the formation of academic identities in different disciplinary and organisational cultures.

The focus in the third part of the book is to use cultural perspectives developed in previous studies on disciplinary and organisational cultures as a framework to understand a variety of processes and reforms taking place at the institutional level of high education. The chapters in this part of the book analyse the Bologna Process, the evolution of scientific fields in American universities, organisational cultures in Chinese post-merger universities, and doctoral education and cooperation with industry.

Inhalt

Culture, Society and Higher Education.- to the Book and Its Contents.- Cultural Studies in Higher Education Research.- Trust and Organizational Culture in Higher Education.- Building or Eroding Intellectual Capital? Student Consumerism as a Cultural Force in the Context of Knowledge Economy.- Academic Practices and Identities.- The Moral Order of Business Studying.- A Clash of Academic Cultures: The Case of Dr. X.- Academic Work and Academic Identities: A Comparison between Four Disciplines.- Culture in Interaction: Academic Identities in Laboratory Work.- Caught in the Science Trap? A Case Study of the Relationship between Nurses and "Their" Science.- Determining the Norms of Science: From Epistemological Criteria to Local Struggle on Organizational Rules?.- Higher Education Institutions and Reforms in Cultural Frameworks.- Doctoral Education and Doctoral Theses - Changing Assessment Practices.- Challenging Traditional Research Training Culture: Industry-oriented Doctoral Programs in Australian Cooperative Research Centres.- The Evolution of American Scientific Fields: Disciplinary Differences Versus Institutional Isomorphism.- Quantitative Assessment of Organisational Cultures in Post-merger Universities.- The Bologna Process in Academic Basic Units: Finnish Universities and Competitive Horizons.- How Does the Bologna Process Challenge the National Traditions of Higher Education Institutions?.- Future Challenges.