Yu(Aimee)Shi

Tuesday 3rd November, 2020

This project examines the professional trajectories of doctoral students who move from China to the UK’s higher education. In contrast to much of the existing literature where attention is paid to how social actors mobilise various forms of capital to engage in transnational education migration, I focus here on what these trajectories do and how they help constitute specific global circuits of knowledge and labor. I aim to describe the process of socialisation into a particular field of expertise (e.g., academic labour) in relation to the larger regimes of citizenship (Ong, 2006). Adopting an ethnographic sociolinguistic perspective, I follow two PhD candidates at a prestigious university in London. By documenting their language use in a range of institutional settings, I hope to provide a nuanced account of the negotiation of meanings and contradictions in higher education through close exploration of their discursive/semiotic practices. Data analysis will focus on the enactment of a professional persona through the acquisition of a specific set of discursive registers, with language also being a meditational tool when they reflexively talk about their transnational experiences. Existing data suggests that these participants have fully invested in transnational higher education to perform professionally in relevant fields. This process is aligned with the formation of a self-enterprising subject, and it also enables global circuits of transnational academic labor. Data analysis also indicates the emerging forms of social hierarchisation as manifested in their negotiation of meanings and various contradictions while becoming a professional.

References 

Ong, A, (2006). Neoliberalism as exception: Mutations in Citizenship and Sovereignty. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

In this session, we hosted Ayse Gur Geden, a doctoral researcher from the Department of Culture, Communication and Media.

Please find her abstract below.

Language Training and the Making of Brokers: Sub-Saharan African Students in Turkey 

Internationalisation of higher education (IoHE) has shaped trends and strategies for higher education institutions in various corners of the world. Although well-established in universities in the Global North, the aims of these strategies and their accompanying rationales often differ from those of the higher education systems of developing and non-Anglophone countries in which IoHE is a relatively more recent phenomenon. This is the case of Turkey where such strategies are aimed to harness so-called “soft power”, a developmental political economy that encourages public and private universities to draw more students from developing and underdeveloped countries. It also operates an attractive funding scheme that targets students in the regions it recognizes as its hinterland based on historical ties dating back to the Ottoman Empire. Among these regions, the Sub-Saharan Africa holds enormous potential for business and trade. Great attention has been paid to various aspects and impacts of Turkey’s IoHE strategies and funding scheme for both parties involved, specifically focussing on economy and diplomatic relations. Yet, there is a pressing need to further investigate the ways in which these processes are enabled by the discursive production and enactment of changing forms of citizenship via Turkish and English (in English-medium instruction universities) language training programmes that aim to bridge between Turkey and students’ countries. By detailing the intersection of these processes, practices and formation of selves, this presentation draws on ethnographic fieldwork conducted at a public university in Turkey, with focus on policymakers, institutional stakeholders, students, lecturers and external stakeholders such as NGOs and student-led organisations.

In the seventh session of our CCM Seminar series,  we hosted Sudha Vepa who presented her PhD project titled  Language, Identity and the Empowerment of women through HE in Bangladesh –  a critical analysis of discourse. She also brought a piece of data for analysis.

Please find the session recording below.