R
Research in Higher Education,
Cultural Perspectives
William G. Tierney and Michael Lanford
University of Southern California, Los Angeles,
CA, USA
Synonyms
Cultural frames; Cultural understandings; Cul-
tural viewpoints
Definition
Research into the norms, values, and ideologies
that are created, shaped, and sustained within an
institution or other higher education-related
organization.
Cultural perspectives have informed educa-
tional research for decades, even if the theoretical
frameworks used to explore a variety of educa-
tional phenomena have not always been explicitly
cultural in nature. Educational historians such as
Roger Geiger (2015) have observed that cultural
objectives have long played a central role in deter-
mining the “curricula, institutional mission, and
student life” (p. 540) of colleges and universities.
Moreover, the burgeoning interest in higher edu-
cation institutions as cultural entities has mirrored
the broader exploration of organizational culture
in business and management schools during the
# Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2018
J.C. Shin, P. Teixeira (eds.), Encyclopedia of International Higher Education Systems and Institutions,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9553-1_165-1
1980s (Smircich 1983; Trice and Beyer 1984).
Over the past few decades, however, researchers
have exhibited an increased interest in under-
standing the intersection of culture and higher
education, particularly as universities have
become global entities and individuals from a
broad range of backgrounds enroll and work in
institutions throughout the world.
This chapter introduces the topic of cultural
perspectives in higher education by first pre-
senting a working definition for cultural perspec-
tives in higher education, with a special focus on
the writings of anthropologist Clifford Geertz.
Afterwards, the intellectual history of contempo-
rary cultural research is reviewed through a syn-
opsis of major works on culture and higher
education. Finally, the utility of cultural perspec-
tives for higher education in today’s age of glob-
alization is considered.
Defining Culture
The study of culture has its origins in the disci-
pline of anthropology, where researchers gener-
ally studied “exotic” groups that were presumed
to share several features, habits, and customs in
common. Hence, Geertz (1973) has maintained
that the traditional study of culture was focused
on pinpointing “a historically transmitted pattern
of meanings embodied in symbols, a system of
inherited conceptions expressed in symbolic
forms by means of which [people] communicate,
2 Research in Higher Education, Cultural Perspectives
perpetuate, and develop their knowledge about
and attitudes about life” (p. 89). The interest in
explaining culture through meanings, symbols,
and communicated forms of knowledge has trans-
lated well to higher education studies. Becher and
Trowler (2001) have formulated a similar defini-
tion for culture in higher education, stating that it
constitutes “sets of taken-for-granted values, atti-
tudes, and ways of behaving, which are articulated
through and reinforced by recurrent practices
among a group of people in a given context”
(p. 23).
Perhaps owing to its development in the disci-
pline of anthropology, cultural studies in higher
education have generally been conducted using
qualitative methods, although quantitative and
mixed methods also have been viable options for
the exploration of culture. Nevertheless, qualita-
tive studies have reigned supreme in the study of
culture. At least three implications follow from
this development. First, whereas much quantita-
tive research endeavors to establish a distinction
between the researcher and the object of study,
qualitative researchers wishing to understand the
culture of higher education may deliberately
explore their relationship with “participants” as
part of their ongoing study. Second, disagreement
among participants concerning a given phenome-
non is not viewed as a data problem nor are unique
perspectives seen as “outliers.” Instead, many of
the most interesting – and important – data may be
known only to a few “insiders” privy to special-
ized cultural information. Third, the nature of
inquiry is temporally different. A quantitative
study may try to capture the effects of an assess-
ment, or other educational initiative, during a spe-
cific period of time. Many researchers studying
culture in higher education spend several months,
or even years, engaged in observations, inter-
views, and other “field” activities. Participants’
understandings of the topic under study may
change during that time, and the researcher may
accordingly use “thick description” to illustrate
how cultural perspectives and understandings
undergo transformation (Geertz 1973).
Culture is also a concept subject to changing
meanings depending on the academic disciplinary
tradition that understands the term, the subject
(s) under study, and the time period in which the
term is understood and utilized. Hence, despite the
definition provided here, it is essential to note that
“culture” has been conceptualized in multiple
ways. As observed by Välimaa (2008), culture
may refer to “universities as the carriers of intel-
lectual, academic, and national traditions” (p. 9),
the different cultural perspectives one is likely to
encounter in different institutions and higher edu-
cation systems or the nexus of theoretical and
methodological approaches to studying higher
education in a humanist fashion.
Research on Culture and Higher
Education
Institutional Cultures
Much of the earliest scholarly interest in culture
and higher education dates to the 1960s and early
1970s. During that time, Clark (1963) and Becker
(1963) focused on faculty and student cultures,
respectively, while Reisman and Jenscks (1962)
of Harvard University were among the first to
consider the institution as the unit of analysis,
contending that a higher education institution con-
stituted its own “subculture, which its own idio-
syncratic customs and concerns” (p. 104). This
notion of the institution as a unique cultural
body was later reflected by Clark’s landmark
1970 study, The Distinctive College: Reed, Anti-
och, and Swarthmore. As theorized by Clark,
individuals affiliated with these three American
liberal arts colleges foster and perpetuate an
“organizational saga” that is rooted in a recog-
nized series of unique historical events. This
saga not only gives members of the college a
sense of unified purpose, but it drives sentiment
and reinforces individuals’ bonds with their insti-
tution. Clark’s reliance on historical data to inform
his institutional analysis, in service of theory
development, echoes sociologist C. Wright
Mills’ (1959) call for researchers to develop a
“quality of mind” that would enable a simulta-
neous understanding of “history and biography
and the relations between the two within society”
(p. 6). As argued by Mills, “neither the life of an
individual nor the history of a society can be
Research in Higher Education, Cultural Perspectives
understood without understanding both” (p. 3).
Similarly, Clark (1971) subsequently contended
that one might better understand the “structures of
governance and how they work” (p. 499) within
an institution by interrogating collective individ-
ual sentiment.
Clark’s study of institutional culture was
extended in the 1980s by Tierney (1988), who
developed a widely cited organizational frame-
work derived from anthropology. This framework
focused on six concepts – environment, mission,
socialization, information, strategy, and
leadership – that were intended to be flexible
enough for both administrators and researchers
interested in understanding the cultures of their
institutions. Other researchers, such as Cameron
and Ettington (1988), developed “competing
values” frameworks to depict the trade-offs and
values that individuals in universities consider
when assessing institutional goals. While this
framework allows for a certain degree of general-
izability about the culture of an institution and is
suitable for quantitative methods, it also loses
some of the nuance and complexity of more
descriptive approaches.
In recent years, the study of cultural perspec-
tives in higher education institutions has
expanded to include a broad array of approaches.
For instance, a burgeoning literature on educa-
tional reform processes has embraced the notions
of “cultural change” and “cultural clash.” Often,
colleges and universities are portrayed as bureau-
cratic institutions reluctant to embrace new tech-
nologies and/or much-needed organizational
changes. A cultural analysis, however, may reveal
that what is perceived as institutional paralysis
might be the product of organizational values,
such as shared governance, or unique expertise
that casts a critical eye on innovations that are
untested and might place an institution’s hard-
earned prestige in a given area in considerable
peril (Tierney and Lanford 2016). Insider ethnog-
raphies of universities, such as Tuchman’s (2009)
Wannabe U, have critiqued the perceived imposi-
tion of corporate values within higher education
institutions and explored the impact of adminis-
trative decisions on students and faculty. Other
scholars who have explored power and politics
3
within an institution may not explicitly use a
cultural framework, yet they have similarly
approached their topics with a fragmentation per-
spective in order to better understand competing
interests and ideas (e.g., Bolman and Deal 2008).
The fragmentation perspective is rooted in Cohen
and March’s (1974) memorable description of
universities as “organized anarchy,” where the
diverse landscape of higher education institutions
resists the wholesale adoption of new cultural
values from outside sources.
Student and Faculty Cultures
Research has also centered on student and faculty
cultures within institutions. Even though Pierre
Bourdieu (1973) and Paulo Freire (1985) were
not focused specifically on higher education,
their critiques of educational content and peda-
gogy as being representative of a dominant culture
focused on social reproduction have been
extremely influential on contemporary critical lit-
erature concerning student learning.
A continuously evolving line of inquiry concerns
how university students navigate coursework,
develop friendships, become involved in college
groups, and engage in extracurricular activities.
To better understand and portray students’ univer-
sity experiences, scholars have undertaken eth-
nographies of student life by enrolling as
students (Moffatt 1989; Nathan 2006).
Researchers have also conducted hundreds of
interviews with students in order to better under-
stand a topic of consequence, such as Blum’s
(2009) study of plagiarism at a major research
university. Through such immersive research,
educators and policymakers can better discern
the distinct challenges faced by students as they
endeavor to meet their instructors’ expectations
and progress through coursework.
To this end, scholarly work on traditionally
marginalized cultures, such as Black students in
the United States, has also emerged as a vital
research area. Shaun Harper (2009), for example,
has employed a critical race framework to dem-
onstrate how assumptions and stereotypes by
White educators are deleterious to Black student
outcomes in American colleges and universities.
Similarly, quantitative and qualitative research
4 Research in Higher Education, Cultural Perspectives
that critically examines the challenges faced by
female students, queer students, and students from
religious minority groups has informed institu-
tional and state policy (Bowman and Smedley
2013; Hurtado et al. 2008; Renn 2007; Rhoads
1994), although much work remains to be done.
An amplified understanding of traditionally mar-
ginalized cultures within academe is needed as
institutions examine how to improve graduation
rates and encourage more diversity among student
and faculty populations.
Faculty cultures have been explored in multi-
ple ways. For instance, the profession itself is one
culture. Professors, regardless of discipline or
locale, have a different vocation from that of a
plumber or a politician (Tierney and Rhoads
1994). Faculties are also socialized in their disci-
pline and learn how to carry out their work among
disciplinary colleagues. As Snow (1959)
famously noted, the culture of the humanities,
for example, differs from that of the natural sci-
ences. Becher, in the 1980s, extended the study of
academic disciplines with his classic text, Aca-
demic Tribes and Territories. By splitting disci-
plinary knowledge into four categories – hard
applied, hard pure, soft applied, and soft pure –
Becher (1989) demonstrated how academic disci-
plines could be theorized as communities with
distinct epistemological values and social expec-
tations, a conceptualization that continues to
inspire revisions and critiques to this day (Tight
2015). The distinctive campuses, missions, and
histories of universities naturally differ as well,
affecting professors’ socialization and integration
into institutions as graduate students and as junior
professors (Austin 1990).
Higher Education Culture and the Nation-
State
In addition to the institutional, student, and faculty
cultures already discussed, researchers have
explored the cultural dynamics of higher educa-
tion within a single nation-state so that complex
economic, political, and technological phenom-
ena might be better understood (Postiglione
1999). On a nation-state level, at least two com-
pelling questions exist with regard to the analysis
of culture and higher education. The first question
pertains to the value of the interpretation: does a
nation’s particular interpretation of the culture of
higher education augers well for the citizenry? In
future years, these interpretations have critical
import for defining fundamental issues central to
the higher education enterprise, such as academic
work, academic freedom, and the nature of schol-
arly inquiry.
The second question is comparative: how do
nations differ with regard to the interpretation and
implementation of data and trends? This line of
research usually employs a cultural framework to
contextualize data about a specific higher educa-
tion topic, such as faculty research expectations,
institutional assessment, or student outcomes.
Sophisticated heuristics that attempt to account
for multiple levels of local, national, and global
actors have also been developed (Marginson and
Rhoades 2002). Thoughtful analyses by higher
education scholars like Simon Marginson (2011)
triangulate economic, historical, and public
policy-related data to shed considerable light on
the values and actions of universities in a specific
region (e.g., the Asia-Pacific) and highlight trends
(e.g., a “Confucian” model) that might otherwise
be underappreciated.
Epilogue: Cultural Perspectives in an
Age of Globalization
As detailed in this article, institutional, faculty,
and student cultures – as well as the intersection
of cultural perspectives and the nation-state –
have each been the subject of important campus-
based ethnographies, quantitative analyses, and
other scholarly investigations. An understanding
of cultural perspectives may be even more essen-
tial in future years due to globalization’s influence
on higher education. As national boundaries
become increasingly permeable, the legitimacy
of the nation-state is increasingly dependent
upon cultural constructs, such as ideology, as
much as geographical features or projections of
military influence. For this reason, every instru-
mental action – whether it involves the projection
of mass media, a technology transfer, or trade
policy – can be viewed as a product of culture,
Research in Higher Education, Cultural Perspectives
even if its stated purpose is to drive transnational
economic development.
One of the benefits of a cultural perspective is
that it enables researchers to explore the potential
for human agency. Even though a once-
particularized practice, such as yoga, might
become known and practiced throughout the
world, individual societies interpret and utilize
such practices in different, unforeseeable ways.
As individuals experience the assorted products
of globalization, they are not simply passive con-
duits who faithfully replicate originals. Instead,
they actively engage with the novel ideas and
commodities presented by globalization,
reinterpreting them in ways that make sense for
their selves and their communities. A cultural per-
spective can reveal how individuals interpret and
attenuate certain aspects of higher education in
this age of globalization. Through the exemplary
scholarship that has already been published, a
foundation has been established on which we
can continue the study of culture in higher educa-
tion, thereby expanding our understanding of one
of the most crucial institutions for human progress
and development in the twenty-first century.
Cross-References
▶ Academic Profession
▶ Cultural Capital, Social Class, and Higher
Education
▶ Diversity and Higher Education
▶ Types of Higher Education Systems
References
Austin, Ann E. 1990. Faculty cultures, faculty values. New
Directions for Institutional Research 68: 61–74.
Becher, Tony. 1989. Academic tribes and territories: Intel-
lectual enquiry and the cultures of disciplines. Milton
Keynes: Open University Press.
Becker, Howard S. 1963. Student culture. In The study of
campus cultures, ed. Terry F. Lunsford, 11–26. Boul-
der: Western Interstate Commission for Higher
Education.
Becher, Tony, and Paul R. Trowler. 2001. Academic tribes
and territories: Intellectual enquiry and the culture of
5
disciplines. Buckingham: Society for Research into
Higher Education and Open University Press.
Blum, Susan. 2009. My word! Plagiarism and college
culture. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Bolman, Lee, and Terrence E. Deal. 2008. Reframing
organizations: Artistry, choice, and leadership.
4th ed. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Bourdieu, P. 1973. Cultural reproduction and social repro-
duction. In Knowledge, education, and cultural
change: Papers in the sociology of
education, ed. R. Brown, 71–112. London: Tavistock.
Bowman, Nicholas A., and Cynthia T. Smedley. 2013. The
forgotten minority: Examining religious affiliation and
university satisfaction. Higher Education 65 (6):
745–760.
Cameron, Kim S., and Deborah R. Ettington. 1988. The
conceptual foundations of organizational culture. In
Higher education: Handbook of theory and
research, ed. John C. Smart, vol. 4, 356–396.
New York: Agathon Press.
Clark, Burton R. 1963. Faculty cultures. In The study of
campus cultures, ed. Terry F. Lunsford, 39–54. Boul-
der: Western Interstate Commission for Higher
Education.
Clark, Burton R. 1970. The distinctive college: Antioch,
reed, and swarthmore. Chicago: Adline.
Clark, Burton R. 1971. Belief and loyalty in college orga-
nization. Journal of Higher Education 42 (6): 499–520.
Cohen, Michael D., and James G. March. 1974. Leader-
ship and ambiguity: The American college president.
Boston: Harvard Business School Press.
Freire, Paulo. 1985. The politics of education: Culture,
power, and liberation, trans. D. Macedo. Westport,
CT: Bergin and Garvey.
Geertz, Clifford. 1973. The interpretation of cultures:
Selected essays. New York: Basic Books.
Geiger, Roger L. 2015. The history of American higher
education: Learning and culture from the founding to
world war II. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Harper, Shaun. 2009. Niggers no more: A critical race
counter narrative on black male student achievement
at predominantly white colleges and universities. Inter-
national Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education
22 (6): 697–712.
Hurtado, Sylvia, et al. 2008. Diversifying science: Under-
represented student experiences in structured research
programs. Research in Higher Education 50 (2):
189–214.
Marginson, Simon. 2011. Higher education in East Asia
and Singapore. Higher Education 61 (5): 587–611.
Marginson, Simon, and Gary Rhoades. 2002. Beyond
national states, markets, and systems of higher educa-
tion: A glonacal agency heuristic. Higher Education
43 (3): 281–309.
Mills, C. Wright. 1959. The sociological imagination.
New York: Oxford University Press.
Moffatt, Michael. 1989. Coming of age in New Jersey:
College and American culture. New Brunswick:
Rutgers University Press.
6 Research in Higher Education, Cultural Perspectives
Nathan, Rebekah. 2006. My freshman year: What a pro-
fessor learned by becoming a student. Ithaca: Cornell
University Press.
Postiglione, Gerard A. 1999. China’s national minority
education: Culture, schooling, and development.
New York: Falmer Press.
Reisman, David, and Christopher Jenscks. 1962. The via-
bility of the American college. In The American col-
lege: A psychological and social interpretation of
higher education, ed. Nevitt Sanford, 74–192.
New York: John Wiley.
Renn, Kristen A. 2007. LGBT student leaders and queer
activists. Journal of College Student Development
48 (3): 311–330.
Rhoads, Robert A. 1994. Coming out in college: The
struggle for a queer identity. Westport: Bergin and
Garvey.
Smircich, Linda. 1983. Concepts of culture and organiza-
tional analysis. Administrative Science Quarterly
28 (3): 339–358.
Snow, Charles P. 1959. The two cultures and the scientific
revolution. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Tierney, William G. 1988. Organizational culture in higher
education: Defining the essentials. Journal of Higher
Education 59 (1): 2–11.
Tierney, William G., and Michael Lanford. 2016. Concep-
tualizing innovation in higher education. In Higher
education: Handbook of theory and
research, ed. Michael B. Paulsen, vol. 31, 1–40. Dor-
drecht: Springer.
Tierney, William G., and Robert A. Rhoads. 1994. Faculty
socialization as a cultural process: A mirror of institu-
tional commitment. Washington, DC: George
Washington University, School of Education and
Human Development.
Tight, Malcolm. 2015. Theory development and applica-
tion in higher education research: Tribes and territories.
Higher Education Policy 28 (3): 277–293.
Trice, Harrison M., and Janice M. Beyer. 1984. Studying
organizational cultures through rites and ceremonials.
Academy of Management Review 9 (4): 653–669.
Tuchman, Gaye. 2009. Wannabe U: Inside the corporate
university. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Välimaa, Jussi. 2008. Cultural studies in higher education
research. In Cultural perspectives on higher
education, ed. Jussi Välimaa and Oili-Helena Ylijoki,
9–25. Dordrecht: Springer.