ABSTRACT
In this chapter, I identify, examine, and discuss how the paradoxical nature of the notions of the West and Asia has been used purposefully and interchangeably by both Western and Asian education providers to optimise their internationalisation and/or their education as a business agendas. ‘The West’ is moving towards Asia, Asia is approaching ‘the West’, yet both parties tactically and subconsciously keep distant from each other. These processes take place strategically to maximise the best of ‘English’, ‘the West’, and ‘Asia’ while minimising the negative connotations of these value-laden notions. The power of the West-Asia dichotomy in both broadening the gap between Western and Asian education and simultaneously bringing the two together is another core issue that I take up in this chapter. At the same time, I also show that transnational space in Asia remains the transit point, a layover, a feeder for the more desirable destination – that of ‘the West’.
