Deleuzian Approaches to Researching Student Experience in Higher Education

Abstract

This chapter explores researching student experience in higher education from a Deleuzian perspective. It explores the key principles of a Deleuzian approach and introduces the concepts of becoming, assemblage and affect in relation to student experience in higher education. It shows how such concepts have been applied in two examples of research on student experience – the first reconceptualising the experience of ‘transition’ to university and the second exploring how student feedback might be gathered and engaged with differently in order to deepen teachers' pedagogic reflections. The chapter shows how Deleuzian approaches avoid finding commonalities in student experience and instead place an emphasis on affective connections that in turn prompt us to engage in new ways with student experience.