Abstract
Whilst the presence of international students from so-called ‘developing’ or ‘newly industrialised’ countries has become a ubiquitous phenomenon in European higher education, few scholars have explored the underlying postcolonial trajectories that facilitate student migration to many European countries today. In this article, we seek to narrow this gap by critically engaging with the postcolonial heritage of European higher education and the ways in which it informs much student migration in today’s era of neoliberal globalisation. We propose a three-fold approach to reading this postcolonial heritage of higher education which comprises its historical, epistemic, and experiential (or ‘lived’) dimensions. Whilst such an approach requires a close examination of existing postcolonial theory in higher education studies, we also draw on qualitative research with student migrants in Portugal and the UK to show how the postcolonial heritage of European higher education is negotiated in everyday contexts and may become constitutive of students’ identity formations.
Highlights
Over the past two decades, student migration to Europe (i.e. EU) for the purpose of pursuing higher education (HE) has increased significantly and become an important political, social, Higher Education (2020) 80:373–389 cultural, and economic agenda (Consterdine and Everton 2012)
relatives that are here. (Rita), who attended a Portuguese school in São Tomé before moving to Portugal, illustrates how a colonial educational heritage may help create a strong sense of familiarity with the host country, leading students to feel comfortable in the new environment, and to avoid some of the difficulties when transitioning to university, I did my secondary level at a Portuguese school
As a form of cultural heritage, it conjures up forms of collective memory which are based on shared history, language, symbols, and learned knowledges, but which are subject to ongoing, and highly charged, cultural, and political contestation
Summary
Over the past two decades, student migration to Europe (i.e. EU) for the purpose of pursuing higher education (HE) has increased significantly and become an important political, social, Higher Education (2020) 80:373–389 cultural, and economic agenda (Consterdine and Everton 2012). The neoliberal logic of international HE is reflected in the competitive recruitment of the ‘best and brightest’ (and perhaps most affluent) overseas students to European/western universities, and surfaces in the prevailing discrimination of lower-income domestic social groups which generally, but not exclusively, emanate from minority communities with migration and/or colonial background.
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