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"Marketization" of Higher Education Discourse in UK and Czech Republic: A Comparative Study

Publication at Faculty of Arts |
2021

Abstract

The presentation uses a CDA approach to assess different degrees of the "marketization of higher education discourse" (Fairclough 2010), defined as colonization of discourse by the discourse of business and marketing (ibid: 108). This phenomenon may be observed in the discourse of British universities as a result of changes in the funding, as the institutions have been under more pressure from the government to act as if they were businesses, offering their service (education) to the customers (students).

My presentation compares the vocabulary of two strategic plans (University of Sheffield and Charles University), i.e. texts whose aim is to introduce the future plans and objectives of the university. Using 'ideological key words' analysis (Holborow (2013) and Stubbs (2010)) and frequency key word analysis in Sketch Engine, complemented by a 3- and 4-gram analysis, it is shown that the text of British provenance reflects the changes in funding of universities in Britain to a degree not attested in the Czech environment.

The frequency of ideological keywords (Holborow 2013) is markedly higher in the British text. Higher frequency of lexical items associated with the language of business and marketing has also been attested in the British text.