This article is written with the recognition that, as higher education studies evolve as a multidisciplinary area of inquiry, there is a need to reflect on the theoretical and practical concerns emerging from conducting higher education research. This is especially the case for early-career researchers who enter this relatively new field of study.…

In recent years, the field of geography in higher education has increasingly embraced the integration of visual and audio-visual methods as it enables enhanced understanding, multimodal learning, and geospatial literacy. Therefore, there is ample opportunity to incorporate new techniques from various disciplines to improve modern education for…

This article is a response to the methodological problems I experienced during fieldwork. It follows that the article is an experiment of creating alternative possibilities for thinking about ethnocentrism as a phenomenon in transformation in a contemporary, innovative, higher educational setting. Throughout the article, I argue for the…

Size is the big unspoken problem in UK higher education. Small providers are stifled. Large universities enjoy oligopolistic advantage at the cost of agility. This damages institutional diversity and dynamism: the sector's ability to absorb new concepts, to grow and renew itself. For the first time, this report provides a full picture of small and…

Higher education, or more strictly higher education studies, is sometimes referred to as a discipline, though it is more often referred to as a field, sector or area for study. But what is a discipline and does higher education studies, at its current state of development, qualify as one? This article re-considers these matters and comes to some…

Humanizing Higher Education was the 2022 conference theme for the Association for the Study of Higher Education. This presidential address takes a forward look back on higher education within a global context and in the aftermath of a global health pandemic, making an argument for the need to humanize higher education. The address offers a…

In the United States, the academic discipline of higher education has emerged as a site in which transgender scholars have begun to engage. Transgender scholars have begun to disrupt the normative logics of epistemological trans oppression, forcing those in higher education to contend with us, our work, and the possibilities therein. And yet, the…

Higher Education as a Field of Study is multi-disciplinary in its origin. Given the relative youth of the field, as it was only founded less than 130 years ago, it does not yet have standalone theories or philosophies as the scholarship in the field frequently borrows from its epistemological, methodological, and philosophical ideas from more…

As a white assistant professor of mostly white graduate students who will become higher education leaders, I work to dismantle whiteness in my curriculum, assignments and pedagogy. I make meaning of my own white identity through my commitment to reflexivity as a constant activity. Equally salient are my identities as a queer, able-bodied,…

The curriculum is a critical element in the transformation of higher education, and as a result, I argue for the inclusion of what I refer to as an African epistemic in higher education curricula in South Africa. In so doing, attention is directed at the decolonisation of the curriculum in higher education in South Africa, which aims to give…

In recent years there have been calls both for building the knowledge base of academic development (AD) and for systematic induction of newcomers to the field if AD is to advance as a professional and an academic field. Despite the importance and complexity of AD, induction of novice academic developers remains mostly informal and predominantly…

This paper calls into question the idea that we can simply think about higher education as a research field and explores different meanings of the term field. It asks whether there are related fields: research into higher education, academic development and disciplinary teaching research, rather than one. The approach of the paper is conceptual,…

The central proposition of this article is that Manitoba's faith-based higher education institutions have become more accepted by, and more closely integrated into, the mainstream post-secondary system in the province. Drawing on theoretical work explaining change in higher education systems, the article examines legislative and policy actions by…

This paper proposes the importance of qualitative research synthesis to the field of higher education. It examines seven key texts that undertake synthesis in this field and compares essential features and elements across studies. The authors indicate strengths of the approaches and highlight ways forward for using qualitative research synthesis…

The accountability movement in higher education is gaining momentum in the United States and around the world. In recent years, there has been a growing pressure on higher education institutions to demonstrate their value through various accountability measures with a strong focus upon the assessment of student progress and success. In the U.S.…