This article presents research which was carried out in one federal university in Brazil. The focus was on: (1) the ways in which institutional strategies and policy initiatives of different types, relating to research and to teaching, were being developed in the wake of internationalization and national policy shifts; (2) the views of different academics regarding these ongoing policy processes, and the wider discourses about language and about knowledge-building underpinning their views. The research was carried out as part of a wider study, based in two universities. The wider study was entitled: The changing language and literacy landscapes of Brazilian universities. This article builds on recent lines of theory-building in the ethnography of language policy.