CROSSROADS IN CULTURAL STUDIES
Fourth International Conference
June 29 - July 2, 2002, Tampere, Finland
"Playing the Game" in the Context
of Globalisation: The New Political Economy of Higher Education
Organisers: Wes Shumar
Brayboy, Bryan McKinley (University of
Utah, USA) PLAYING THE GAME AND WINNING?: INDIGENOUS TRIBAL NATION'S STUDENTS'
AND COMMUNITY USE OF IVY LEAGUE UNIVERSITIES TOWARD EMPOWERMENT AND LIBERATION
Drawing from a seven-year longitudinal ethnographic study, this paper examines
the "games people play" and how the 'underdogs'-in this case, tribal
nations-make sense of the rules in universities and the skills and credentials
gained there. The paper is based on the following two questions: 1). How are
Indigenous tribal nations utilizing the skills and credentials gained at Ivy
League universities toward visions of empowerment, liberation, and
self-determination? 2). What are the individual and community costs and benefits
of playing a game where others make up the rules? Building on Bourdieu's (1986)
concept of the "embodied state" of cultural capital-by which he means
educational credentials-I will examine the ways that American Indian individuals
and their tribal governments use skills and credentials earned at Ivy League
universities for self-determination and empowerment. The use of these
credentials toward empowerment for Indigenous tribal nations is particularly
interesting in light of their quasi-sovereign status as nations. Many of these
nations are moving from industrial models of operation and employment to ones
driven by information and knowledge-based economic endeavors. The fight for the
legal use and control of their natural resources relies directly on the skills
and credentials earned in institutions of higher education (Bourdieu's embodied
state) in realizing their larger social, political, and economic goals of
self-determination and tribal autonomy. Additionally, these tribal nations push
the boundaries of what it means to be "global" because of their
governmental status and the manner in which they position themselves regarding
other nations. With the passage of NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement),
Indigenous tribal nations are creating ways to compete in a global economy that
values capitalist production and consumption. The individuals and tribal nations
discussed in this paper will ultimately speak to and about strategies, costs,
and benefits for being politically and economically competitive in global
markets. Ultimately, this paper lays out some of the consequences of individuals
and tribal nations "playing a game" where the stakes are for the
survival of their nation, culture, and economic well being.
Brandt, Carol (University of New Mexico,
USA) SCIENTIFIC DISCOURSE AND AMERICAN INDIAN STUDENTS IN HIGHER EDUCATION:
PLAYING THE GAME IN MOLECULAR RESEARCH
In the past ten years, the pace of research in molecular biology has accelerated
to an amazing speed. Faculty and students now participate in a global
conversation, sharing data with colleagues on an international scale. For
students in higher education, the stakes of learning the 'game rules' (Lyotard,
1984) of scientific discourse are higher than ever. Universities are now key
players in the global politics and the power of genomic research, competing with
corporations for control and access to molecular data. In this ethnographic case
study research, American Indian students share their experiences in grasping the
game rules of communication in a molecular biology laboratory. This qualitative
research explores how six students gain the discursive resources and cultural
capital needed to participate in molecular biology. Following Bourdieu (1988),
these insights provide a way to bring more "self-reflexivity" and
awareness of the power relationships that pervade molecular research.
Luthar, Breda (University of Ljubljana,
Slovenia) and Sadl, Zdenka (University of Ljubljana, Slovenia) POWER IN THE
ACADEMIC INSTITUTION: WOMEN AS A PROBLEM
This paper is an attempt to explore "the hidden transcripts" of power
and marginalization in the academic milieu in the so called
"transitional" academic institution.The paper is based on ethnographic
research and interviews with academics, between 35 and 45, in the mid of their
academic careers, but in a dominated position within an organizational context
which is traditionally the locus of a senior male domination. We are
particularly interested into the linguistic, bodily, and communicative regimes
of the front-stage regions of the academic institution (departmental and
committees meetings, the institutional ritual events...) where symbolically the
dominate and dominated positions are constructed and the range of legitimate
identities available to academics are offered. Further, we would like to explore
how the interviewees experience, reflect, subvert or support the rhetorical and
interactional construction of their dominated position and radical changes in
the notion of rationality that should govern the academic institution
(competition, the introduction of measurement techniques to scrutinize the
individuals' achievement, internationalization, globalization, the
transformation of a public intellectual into a teacher-worker), which at least
in Eastern Europe, developed in the nineties.
Shumar, Wesley (Drexel University, USA)
FLEXIBLE WORKERS: THE STRATEGIES OF TEMPORARY FACULTY IN THE NEW UNIVERSITY
In the last two decades higher education in the United States has gone through a
dramatic restructuring. Pressured by the influences of globalization and
neoliberal economic policies, universities have moved to a model that Slaughter
and Leslie (1997) call "academic capitalism." The entrepreneurial
university focuses on instrumental concerns such as, large profit areas of
research like biotechnology and the creation of inexpensive means to deliver a
broad based education to name two of the many changes. These changes occur due
to pressure from the Federal Government, granting agencies, large corporate
interests and the business culture of academic administration. In this climate
more and more university administrations are seeking to "creatively"
use their non-tenure track faculty. This paper looks at the strategies of the
faculty who make up the flexible workforce as they attempt to cope with the
dynamic and changing landscape of teaching in an institution of higher
education. This workforce is both increasingly important to many university
strategies as well as a workforce that is now a permanent part of the university
community and no longer thought of as an unusual moment in history. The paper
will argue that this workforce is singled out for disciplinary action designed
to send messages to department heads and tenure track faculty. As such,
negotiating the day to day for this group of faculty becomes increasingly
perilous.
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