Despite existing work on the situated and sometimes alienating nature of academic writing practices, the implications of the specifically spatial nature of these practices continue to pose questions for teaching and learning in higher education. This paper addresses these questions through a study of the views and experiences of students and teachers of academic writing in postgraduate teacher education (n = 33). Specifically, it introduces a concept, xenolexia, which complements that of alienation by recognizing the dynamic nature of academic writing, texts and practices without reifying them. Discussing the fundamentally spatial nature of this dynamism, the concept of xenolexia is used to analyse perceptions of academic writing practices as 'foreign'. The features of this 'foreignness' are examined from the point of view of both teaching and learning, and lessons about identity and dynamism in academic writing are drawn for writing pedagogies in postgraduate teacher education contexts.