SRHE and Open University Press Imprint
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Reclaiming Universities from a Runaway World
by Melanie Walker and Jon Nixon
·How may we construct an alternative vision for higher education?
·What might such an alternative look like?
Within the knowledge economy, higher education has expanded and changed through policies and practices of audit, performativity and ‘market’ values. In the face of such shifts, Reclaiming Universities from a Runaway World contributes to a timely and important debate around the civic function and democratic values of universities.
The book is divided into three parts:
·‘Dark Times’ critiques the effects of contemporary higher education on professional life, research and curricula.
·‘Languages of Reconstruction’ explores alternative conceptualisations of what universities and higher learning are for, reaffirming difference, deliberative dialogue and the intrinsic goods of learning. The book argues that different languages enable different ways of thinking about university life.
·‘Pointing to Hope’ builds upon the foundations of the previous section to demonstrate how practices in pedagogy, new technologies, management, research and scholarship can be developed.
This book offers a compelling and workable new vision for higher education. It is unique in bringing together critique with alternative ways of thinking about and doing higher education, providing theoretical and empirical grounding and focusing on international issues. With its international authorship, it provides insight for anyone interested in debates about the directions of higher education, including students, researchers, higher education managers and policy makers.