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Occupational Knowledge and Practice amongst UK University Research Administrators
Author(s) -
Hockey John,
AllenCollinson Jacquelyn
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
higher education quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.976
H-Index - 42
eISSN - 1468-2273
pISSN - 0951-5224
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-2273.2008.00409.x
Subject(s) - qualitative research , higher education , medical education , public relations , sociology , order (exchange) , work (physics) , administration (probate law) , task (project management) , pedagogy , engineering ethics , psychology , political science , management , medicine , social science , business , engineering , economics , law , mechanical engineering , finance
With the exception of lecturing staff, research on occupational groups and cultures within the UK higher education system is relatively sparse. This paper focuses upon one specialist group, to‐date under‐researched but which plays a central role in contemporary higher education administration: graduate research administrators. This occupational group is of particular interest as its members administer and manage an increasing complex and key area of university life, which in many cases appears to span the putative occupational divide between ‘academic’ and ‘administrative’ work. Based upon qualitative interviews with 27 research administrators, and using some of Bourdieu's conceptual devices, the paper analyses particular kinds of informal occupational knowledge and practice, necessary in order effectively to ‘do’ the complex task of research administration in the pressurized environment of contemporary British higher education.