Professional and personal responsibility in higher education : an inquiry from a standpoint of pragmatism and discourse theory

• In recent years, reports have drawn attention to an ongoing instrumentalization of academic actions, governed by economic power. In the light of these reports higher education in Sweden is analysed combining Deweyan pragmatism with the discourse theory of Laclau and Mouffe to construct a theoretical conception of professional and personal responsibility. At the beginning of the 1990s and the 21st Century it is possible to observe a discursive domain filled with variations in language use - the existence of a classical academic discourse, a discourse of Bildung, a discourse of democracy and a discourse of economic globalization - that causes both conflicts and oppenness regarding the meaning of higher education and professional responsibility. The closer we get to 2007, the more this variation in language use is reduced and the narrower the meaning we find, owing to the hegemonic tendencies of the discourse of economic globalization.

Subject headings

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Utbildningsvetenskap -- Pedagogik (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Educational Sciences -- Pedagogy (hsv//eng)

Keyword

higher education

responsibility

individuality

discourses

Education

Pedagogik

Pedagogik

Education

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

art (subject category)