Geographies of Selection: Academic Appointments in the British Academic World, 1850–1939

Abstract

The middle decades of the nineteenth century were a period that witnessed the establishment and expansion of universities throughout the British Empire. While in 1880 the number of universities in England, Scotland, and Ireland was just 11, by that date there were already 26 degree-granting institutions located in the British colonies (Pietsch, 2013, pp. 202-209). Most of these were located in the "settler colonies" of British North America, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa, where they had been founded by self-confident colonial elites, who-although they looked to Britain-saw these institutions as symbols of the maturity of colonial societies and independent and autochthonous members within a wider British community. These "settler" universities therefore differed to those established in other parts of the "dependent" empire-in India and South East Asia and later in Africawhere educational institutions were established by British officials and were more explicitly associated with the imposition of foreign rule, language, and culture.In their early years these settler universities offered a classical and liberal (and often religious) education that was designed to cultivate both the morals and the minds of the young men who would lead the economically successful colonial societies of the mid-nineteenth century. But by the 1870s these educational institutions were coming under increasing pressure to demonstrate their relevance to the socially diverse and rapidly expanding communities in which they were located, and their connection to the new forms of scientific and technical knowledge that was changing life for so many people. They responded to these demands in two ways. First, they expanded their local educational franchise, opening their curricula to include science, law, medicine, and engineering, and admitting women; and second, they This chapter was first published in T. Pietsch, Empire of scholars: Universities, networks and the British academic

Knowledge Environments at Universities: Some Theoretical and Methodological Considerations

“…One begins by analyzing the recruitment of professors (Pietsch, 2017;Weick, 1995) and continues by asking what human, financial, and infrastructural resources are available and what paradigms and research cultures are dominant. It is also necessary to inquire how hostile the assessment is toward scientific project proposals and research results at certain universities (or entire states) and to what extent standardized assessment tools have curtailed the originality and creativity of academics.…”

“…The career and mobility of a scholar represents a first important hint at his or her scientific reputation (for details see Pietsch, 2017;Weick, 1995). If two or more faculties have confirmed that the scientific achievements, personal competence, and other merits of a scholar warrant that person's appointment as professor, then the uncertainty about that persons scientific potential is much lower than if the confirmation were only issued by the same faculty where the candidate had studied and graduated.…”

Geographies of the University: An Introduction

“…This asymmetry is largely the result of long-term historical path dependencies linked to shifts in economic growth that either preceded or coincided with changing academic mobilities and knowledge centers (Taylor, Hoyler, & Evans, 2008). Uneven global power relations were also reinforced through academic travels, collaborations, and appointment practices in the context of European imperialism (Ellis, 2017;Jöns, 2017;Pietsch, 2017). With these historical experiences in mind, Jöns (2015, pp.…”