Features

The critics of private-sector higher education can muster plenty of hostility - even hatred - towards its providers but precious few reasoned arguments, according to Peter Crisp

Ireland’s government expects consolidation to play a big role in creating a financially sustainable higher education system. As the sector pores over a new strategy document that will inform ministers, Matthew Reisz considers the shape of things to come

Ireland’s government expects consolidation to play a big role in creating a financially sustainable higher education system. As the sector pores over a new strategy document that will inform ministers, Matthew Reisz considers the shape of things to come

Whether spurred by lofty research ambition or the prosaic hope that one can live more cheaply than two, universities’ urge to merge can bring cultural as well as organisational challenges, as recent unions show. David Matthews reports

Whether spurred by lofty research ambition or the prosaic hope that one can live more cheaply than two, universities’ urge to merge can bring cultural as well as organisational challenges, as recent unions show. David Matthews reports

Scholarship has long been international but the current vision of a ‘worldwide’ academy of rootless student-consumers and national economic competition is as contradictory as it is immoral, argues Thomas Docherty

With radical changes causing discontent across Europe, Susan Bassnett wonders if UK scholars are justified in feeling so aggrieved about their lot

Toby Miller did not take a straight path into academia - far from it, having been, among other things, a DJ, a ditch digger, a speech-writer, a bureaucrat, a security guard and a merchant banker. He reflects on how his atypical trajectory shaped his views of the insular scholarly world

Austerity has brought tragedy to Greece and the UK. Martin McQuillan reflects on the narrative and ideology of ‘fiscal discipline’ and what it means for both nations and their academies

Ronald Barnett offers an imaginative approach to the idea of the university: ‘feasible utopias’ that open up possibilities for renewal beyond the dominant ideas of the market and the pessimistic reactions they elicit

Well, we didn’t see that coming but Patrick McGhee did: the v-c consults the oracle and offers his forecast for the year ahead

To many in the West, Central Asia is a bewildering array of indistinguishable nations. But if you take the time to get to know them, argues David Mould, the ‘stans’ are fascinating individuals

Live tweeting at conferences is on the rise as audience members share with online followers, but some think it improper, impolite and plain rude. Chris Parr navigates the new-media rules

Tom Palaima muses on truth’s troubled relationship to the tales we tell about the heart of war

Rejecting dire warnings that increasing competition in higher education will end in disaster, Paul Ramsden argues that the opposite could be true, but only if the sector is allowed to take charge of its own destiny

All eyes are on Brazil’s academy and its rising research output, generous funding and willingness to team up internationally in a bid to become a major player. Elizabeth Gibney reports from São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro

Moocs are already big - in reach and in hype - and are predicted to explode. Zoë Corbyn checks in to learn if they are more than just a novelty and to find out what it’s like to teach a class of 38,000

Spring is dawning in the Gulf and the UK academy’s links with the region’s repressive, anachronistic autocracies look increasingly questionable, says Christopher Davidson

Learning outcomes are frequently dismissed as a nuisance to be dutifully completed and swiftly put aside, but Frank Furedi believes their prescriptive nature and underlying utilitarian ethos make them an altogether more corrosive influence on higher education

In the first of a new series on academics who conduct research in extreme circumstances, Gillian Fowler recalls the six years she spent working as a forensic anthropologist exhuming mass graves in Guatemala

To mark the 10th anniversary of the film-maker Karel Reisz’s death, his son, Times Higher Education staff writer Matthew Reisz, examines academics’ appraisals of his father’s work, and reflects on how it feels to view your parent through scholars’ eyes

Read all about it: Fred Inglis on the horn-blowing and the hoopla, the cant and the can-do spirit of the glossy world of official university magazines

They may (almost) all be white men in suits but that doesn’t mean that all vice-chancellors are the same, says Jack Grove. So which tribe does your v-c belong to?

Weary of cronyism, many in Italy welcomed a metrics-based research evaluation - until they saw the catalogue of approved publications, ‘crazy lists’ that ignored many journals in favour of provincial newspapers, religious circulars and yachting magazines. Massimo Mazzotti writes

Next week, scholars will launch the Council for the Defence of British Universities. Historian Keith Thomas and astrophysicist Martin Rees, eminent founding members of the independent body, explain why they believe the academy requires protection from the state and the market

Genius and madness may be two sides of the same coin and both states exhibit ‘out-of-the-box’ thinking. Such unusual thought patterns are key to creativity but can also lead reason astray. Glenn Wilson takes a look at the psychology of minds at the margins

A childhood spent near the coast sparked Frances Ashcroft’s lifelong passion for biology. It also meant she caught the sailing bug early on, and she has been captivated - and frequently capsized - ever since

The REF is coming and many institutions are looking to poach premier league researchers to boost their scores (and income) before it is too late. Elizabeth Gibney takes a look at the recruitment ‘feeding frenzy’

Joanna Sugden reports from New Delhi on the challenges facing Western institutions seeking to gain a foothold in India

Filled with treasures from around the globe and across the ages, England’s university museums are as varied as their funding, but those of Oxford and Cambridge still take the lion’s share of Hefce cash. Matthew Reisz on the changing roles of these repositories of knowledge

The UK sector’s growing involvement in offshore education includes everything from branch campuses and institutional partnerships to validation and franchising. David Matthews weighs the different models’ risks, rewards and rationales

As the first undergraduates subject to England’s new higher fees regime acclimatise to campus life, Chris Parr talks to freshers across the capital about their reasons for going to university, how they are financing their studies and how they feel about tuition costs of up to £9,000 a year

The tide of instrumentalism threatens to engulf the UK’s higher education sector, but could a new wave of liberal arts programmes signal a return to the ancient ideal of learning for its own sake? Nigel Tubbs hopes so

The Ivy League’s autonomy has allowed its members to conquer the world. The UK must loosen the reins on its universities and establish an equivalent, Terence Kealey argues

Full results of the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2012-13 with all the data, interactive tables and analysis.

There was never a golden age in which academic values such as universalism and disinterestedness were not at risk, argues Bruce Macfarlane. But in an age of sponsorism and insecurity, all scholars must hold fast to the precepts that make our intellectual endeavours worthwhile

As the traditional academic publishing model comes under pressure from legitimate criticism, austerity and alternative forms, firms are springing up to exploit the uncertainty. Iain Stevenson investigates

A handful of universities have produced more than their share of vice-chancellors. Jack Grove looks at how these centres have nurtured talented leaders

A young Nick Hillman chose Manchester less for the university’s eminent historians than for the city’s glorious music scene - and despite the latter’s loathing for his Conservative heroine

Is the new student loans system an affordable, progressive system of graduate contributions - or a dodgy move to get debt off the books that could bring grave fiscal consequences? John Morgan sifts through the rhetoric, rates and RABs

Simeon Underwood argues that the data requirements imposed on universities have got out of hand - and there's no let-up in sight

No stranger to broadcasting himself, Christopher Bigsby considers the rise of the public intellectual - halfway up a mountain, on a motorbike, quoting Aeschylus, coming to a telly near you

Policymakers focusing on science's utility have consigned the humanities to a supporting role, but scholars in each of the 'two cultures' understand that they share a love of discovery and capacity for wonder, says Martin Willis

Caught between posturing government ministries and kicked about like the proverbial political football, London Metropolitan University may have reached the point where it is no longer match fit, argues Martin McQuillan

Dare to write clearly and engagingly whatever the audience, Helen Sword urges junior and senior scholars alike in a myth-busting guide to good academic prose. You have nothing to lose but your enunciatory modality

Despite being the father of modern computing, Alan Turing’s greatest impact on contemporary science may stem from his insights into altogether more complex hardware, argues Ray Dolan: the human brain

Fees needn't mean the end of scholarly values, argues Felipe Fernández-Armesto. For his US students, putting a price on learning just makes it more desirable

Chile’s education minister says reform is coming at last to its costly, largely privatised academy - but at a ‘slower pace’. Will it satisfy those who joined widespread protests calling for affordable study? Elizabeth Gibney reports

With cycling enjoying huge popularity after the successes of Bradley Wiggins and other Olympians, Thomas Docherty explores how the pain, endurance and concentration demanded by the sport’s premier event, the Tour de France, find parallels in academic life

A renowned immunologist whose life was turned upside down when it emerged that one of his postdoctoral researchers had falsified experimental results tells Paul Jump that the sector needs a culture change if it is to fulfil its duty to expose research misconduct

When ERC grant winner Hilde De Weerdt found administrators to be more interested in her funding than in her project, she moved institution. She suggests that those similarly treated seek a more accommodating home

‘Agnotology’, the art of spreading doubt (as pioneered by Big Tobacco), distorts the scepticism of research to obscure the truth. Areas of academic life have been tainted by the practice, but some scholars are fighting back by showing the public how to spot such sleight of hand, reports Matthew Reisz

Martha Biondi on the black student protests of the 1960s and 1970s that transformed US campus life and led to the birth of African American studies

Tim Birkhead has been studying a single guillemot population for 40 years. Here he explains how such commitment provides insights that the three-year studies favoured by the research councils cannot hope to match

For six years the government has targeted the decline in UK health research. But a law putting GPs in charge of allocating local resources has left many clinicians fearing that those advances could be derailed. Elizabeth Gibney reports

Mascots, especially animals, play a big role in the multibillion-dollar business of US university marketing. Is it all just fun, asks David Mould, or have we gone too far in allowing corporatised Bobcats, Panthers, Eagles and Owls the run of campus?

Matthew Reisz speaks to scholars with learned bloodlines about the inspirations, insights and rebellions that come with growing up in the very midst of the academy

Can useful parallels be drawn between apiculture and running a university? Ruth Farwell does both and isn’t sure, but one thing’s for certain: in both pursuits, losing your cool can sting

As the social science model of history has been overtaken by events, biography has grown as a serious discipline. This is welcome, says Jonathan Steinberg: after all, people make history (but not in the circumstances of their choosing)

As UK universities welcome the world's elite athletes ahead of the London Games, hopes are high for a golden legacy of swifter innovation, higher-quality facilities and a stronger profile. Jack Grove reports