ABSTRACT

This chapter discusses the context of the growth of consumerism in higher education (HE) in the UK and considers how the produces evidence of neoliberal discourse in 'student-facing' texts that circulate in the HE environment. The concept of normalisation in discourse and ideology was one associated with Fairclough whose prescient discussion of the discourse of consumerism in universities appeared in 1995. M. Molesworth et al offer several analyses of the subtle ways in which a focus on consumerism, ‘managing’ student demand and ‘student satisfaction’ disturbs the educational process and the opportunities afforded by a university education in a more unfettered setting. Far from being a construct of government policy and strategy, the student as consumer role coincides with a university managerial project to undermine the agency of the student body by ensuring that decision making is exercised within sharply demarcated limits.