Paul Trowler: Academic Tribes and Territories

This talk describes and reflects upon the Academic Tribes and Territories thesis as it has developed over 25 years and set out in two separate editions and a third book. The talk evaluates each of these books, setting out the developing thesis and in so doing describing a shift away from epistemological essentialism towards a more nuanced understanding of academic disciplines and their power. This is an understanding influenced by social practice theory and one which sees individual disciplines as constructed as well as enacted, with that construction influenced by contextual factors in academic departments, universities and more broadly.

Paul Trowler is Professor of Higher Education, Lancaster University and Research Director of here@lancaster (the higher education research and evaluation centre). He also engages in research, evaluation and development work with universities and higher education funding and policy bodies across the world, most recently in South Africa, Sweden, Chile, Italy, Norway, Australia and Ireland.

Paul has published 20 books, 21 articles and 20 chapters as well as numerous research reports. Most relevant to this keynote are:

Trowler, P., Saunders, M. and Bamber, R. (Eds) (2012). Tribes and Territories in Higher Education: Practices in the 21st Century. London: Routledge.

Becher, T. and Trowler, P. (2001) Academic Tribes and Territories: intellectual enquiry and the cultures of disciplines (2nd edition). Buckingham: Open University Press/SRHE.

Trowler, P. (2013) Depicting and Researching Disciplines: Strong and moderate essentialist approaches. Studies in Higher Education. T&F Online First: www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03075079.2013.801431

Paul’s full CV is available online at: www.lancaster.ac.uk/staff/trowler/cv.htm