Søren S E Bengtsen
Biographic Data
| ID | 77504 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Søren S E Bengtsen |
| GIVEN NAMES | Søren S E |
| FAMILY NAME | Bengtsen |
| SIGNATURE | BENGTSEN S S E |
| AFFILIATIONS | Aarhus University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-4349-4958 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 17 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 8 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 16 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2016 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
Fostering researcher independence: What are the educational and professional development consequences in the doctoral context?
Rectors and university-societal engagement: Representing the ‘reality’ of ‘their’ university
Globally, the past 10–15 years has seen universities experiencing increasing governmental reforms, including expectations for greater societal engagement. This places demands on the most senior university leaders to address and be seen to address these expectations. How do they situate themselves and negotiate their demanding role both inwardly and outwardly? We addressed this question in a case study of four rektors in four (of the eight) univer…
How do deans of humanities understand and enact societal engagement within their broader experiences of leading? A Danish case study
Globally, universities have experienced growing policy demands and societal expectations, including being engaged societal actors – with senior university leaders expected to strategically address these requirements. To understand the specificity of leadership around this issue, we focused on one disciplinary cluster, the humanities, often seen as particularly challenged regarding such engagement. We asked: How do Deans of Faculties of Humanities…
Who is ‘society’ in the societal impact debate? – A critical discussion of policies of closure
Discussions about the role of universities have long been framed in terms of questions of what is good for the public, as well as how and whether higher education serves that good. Today, the language of ‘societal impact’ has become an accepted way for policymakers to frame the matter, but just who is included in the underlying definition of society that this formulation presupposes? In this paper, we consider how ‘society’ has been constructed i…
The psychological turn in higher education and the new taxonomy of attitudes and emotions: Denmark as a case study
This article explores the increased concern with students’ well-being in higher education as a mode of governance that goes hand in hand with new mechanisms of exclusion. Focussing on a new student survey in Denmark that measures students’ well-being, we show how the well-being agenda is entangled with a new ‘taxonomy of attitudes and emotions’ that align with neoliberal ideals about the self-efficient and self-governing individual. Implied is a …
Doctoral students’ experiences of being affiliated with an interdisciplinary graduate school in aging and health
The aim is to describe the development of a novel interdisciplinary graduate school, using the Swedish National Graduate School for Competitive Science on Ageing and Health (SWEAH) as a case example. We explore doctoral students’ perceptions of being part of SWEAH and provide implications for practice. Written self-reports reflecting 78 students’ experiences and perceptions were analyzed using thematic analysis. The findings reveal that affiliati…
Valuing humanities: Rethinking the humanities-impact landscape in Denmark
Globally, the issue of research impact has grown as governments articulate policies around research as a contributor to economic and societal development, often through an econometric justification. This has triggered much discussion amongst humanities scholars in public formally-reasoned peer-reviewed texts that are rarely empirically-based. This Denmark-based empirical study used an individual biographical and historical structural framework to…
Becoming impactful: Humanities doctoral researchers navigating a lively zone of entanglement
This article explores societal impact of humanities doctoral research. Through an empirical inquiry based in Denmark, we analyse how current doctoral researchers conceptualize societal impact and how they articulate potential contributions to society. For theoretical framing, we employ a double-winged perspective combining concepts from the work of Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard with others from French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, namely co…
Part 5: Higher Education Futures
In this section, five authors reflect on Sue Wright's academic trajectory, her work in creating disciplinary and interdisciplinary networks and her engagement – as both an activist and scholar – in institutional change-making. They also reflect on her research on university reform, neoliberalisation and higher education futures
World humanities - Towards an ontology of policy
The border-crossing nature of science is well recognised, and has long been a focus of policy-makers with an interest in governing this space. The international aspect of the humanities is less clearly understood, and the extent to which it has been a focus of policy is similarly not well conceptualised. UNESCO’s efforts in this area provide a useful corpus of texts through which international humanities policy can be explored. Drawing on Theodor…
A novel perspective on doctoral supervision: Interaction of time, academic work, institutional policies, and lifecourse
While supervision is often characterised as a relatively private relationship, we would argue it is strongly influenced by departmental, institutional, national and global factors. It is also intertwined with other academic work and life experiences – with time playing an important role, not just as regards lifecourse but also changing institutional policies and practices. Using this embedded dynamic perspective in a longitudinal institutional ca…
The University Becoming: Perspectives from Philosophy and Social Theory
The University of We: Value-Sensitive Design for an Ethical University
In this article, the authors propose the ethical university may be manifested as the University of We: a university of character and care. We define the ethical university as a “value-sensitive design” that encapsulates and promotes certain virtues, values, habits of mind and practices while prohibiting and suppressing others. By combining value-sensitive design, with Aristotelian phronēsis, care ethics and the ethical demand of K.E. Løgstrup, we…
Re-imagining active learning: Delving into darkness
Ample attention is being paid in the higher education literature to promoting active learning among students. However, critical examination of educational purposes and ends is largely lacking in this literature on active learning. In expanding this debate, we consider it important to ask: About what substantive matters are students to be active? To what end is this activity directed, especially beyond gaining skills and competences within a unit …
Knowledge and the University: Re-claiming Life
For hundreds of years, knowledge has been central in understanding the university. Over recent decades, however, it is the economic value of knowledge that has come to the fore. Now, in a post-truth world, knowledge is also treated with suspicion and has become a vehicle for ideologies. Knowledge and the University combats all these ways of thinking. Its central claim is that knowledge is of value because of its connection with life. Knowledge is…
The alien university
Higher education in the period after postmodernism is haunted by darkness. Not a dystopian or apocalyptic darkness, but the darkness of the unknown (Bengtsen & Barnett, 2017a). Despite its projects of deconstruction and democracy, postmodernist agendas within higher education have been very much preoccupied with the present and its socio-political agendas and projections. In contrast, the darkness of higher education haunts us with a lust for and…
Confronting the Dark Side of Higher Education: Confronting the Dark Side of Higher Education
In this paper we philosophically explore the notion of darkness within higher education teaching and learning. Within the present-day discourse of how to make visible and to explicate teaching and learning strategies through alignment procedures and evidence-based intellectual leadership, we argue that dark spots and blind angles grow too. As we struggle to make visible and to evaluate, assess, manage and organise higher education, the darkness o…
World humanities - Towards an ontology of policy
The border-crossing nature of science is well recognised, and has long been a focus of policy-makers with an interest in governing this space. The international aspect of the humanities is less clearly understood, and the extent to which it has been a focus of policy is similarly not well conceptualised. UNESCO’s efforts in this area provide a useful corpus of texts through which international humanities policy can be explored. Drawing on Theodor…
Re-imagining active learning: Delving into darkness
Ample attention is being paid in the higher education literature to promoting active learning among students. However, critical examination of educational purposes and ends is largely lacking in this literature on active learning. In expanding this debate, we consider it important to ask: About what substantive matters are students to be active? To what end is this activity directed, especially beyond gaining skills and competences within a unit …
Confronting the Dark Side of Higher Education: Confronting the Dark Side of Higher Education
In this paper we philosophically explore the notion of darkness within higher education teaching and learning. Within the present-day discourse of how to make visible and to explicate teaching and learning strategies through alignment procedures and evidence-based intellectual leadership, we argue that dark spots and blind angles grow too. As we struggle to make visible and to evaluate, assess, manage and organise higher education, the darkness o…
Knowledge and the University: Re-claiming Life
For hundreds of years, knowledge has been central in understanding the university. Over recent decades, however, it is the economic value of knowledge that has come to the fore. Now, in a post-truth world, knowledge is also treated with suspicion and has become a vehicle for ideologies. Knowledge and the University combats all these ways of thinking. Its central claim is that knowledge is of value because of its connection with life. Knowledge is…
Confronting the Dark Side of Higher Education: Confronting the Dark Side of Higher Education
In this paper we philosophically explore the notion of darkness within higher education teaching and learning. Within the present-day discourse of how to make visible and to explicate teaching and learning strategies through alignment procedures and evidence-based intellectual leadership, we argue that dark spots and blind angles grow too. As we struggle to make visible and to evaluate, assess, manage and organise higher education, the darkness o…
The alien university
Higher education in the period after postmodernism is haunted by darkness. Not a dystopian or apocalyptic darkness, but the darkness of the unknown (Bengtsen & Barnett, 2017a). Despite its projects of deconstruction and democracy, postmodernist agendas within higher education have been very much preoccupied with the present and its socio-political agendas and projections. In contrast, the darkness of higher education haunts us with a lust for and…
Re-imagining active learning: Delving into darkness
Ample attention is being paid in the higher education literature to promoting active learning among students. However, critical examination of educational purposes and ends is largely lacking in this literature on active learning. In expanding this debate, we consider it important to ask: About what substantive matters are students to be active? To what end is this activity directed, especially beyond gaining skills and competences within a unit …
Knowledge and the University: Re-claiming Life
For hundreds of years, knowledge has been central in understanding the university. Over recent decades, however, it is the economic value of knowledge that has come to the fore. Now, in a post-truth world, knowledge is also treated with suspicion and has become a vehicle for ideologies. Knowledge and the University combats all these ways of thinking. Its central claim is that knowledge is of value because of its connection with life. Knowledge is…
The University of We: Value-Sensitive Design for an Ethical University
In this article, the authors propose the ethical university may be manifested as the University of We: a university of character and care. We define the ethical university as a “value-sensitive design” that encapsulates and promotes certain virtues, values, habits of mind and practices while prohibiting and suppressing others. By combining value-sensitive design, with Aristotelian phronēsis, care ethics and the ethical demand of K.E. Løgstrup, we…
The University Becoming: Perspectives from Philosophy and Social Theory
A novel perspective on doctoral supervision: Interaction of time, academic work, institutional policies, and lifecourse
While supervision is often characterised as a relatively private relationship, we would argue it is strongly influenced by departmental, institutional, national and global factors. It is also intertwined with other academic work and life experiences – with time playing an important role, not just as regards lifecourse but also changing institutional policies and practices. Using this embedded dynamic perspective in a longitudinal institutional ca…
Part 5: Higher Education Futures
In this section, five authors reflect on Sue Wright's academic trajectory, her work in creating disciplinary and interdisciplinary networks and her engagement – as both an activist and scholar – in institutional change-making. They also reflect on her research on university reform, neoliberalisation and higher education futures
World humanities - Towards an ontology of policy
The border-crossing nature of science is well recognised, and has long been a focus of policy-makers with an interest in governing this space. The international aspect of the humanities is less clearly understood, and the extent to which it has been a focus of policy is similarly not well conceptualised. UNESCO’s efforts in this area provide a useful corpus of texts through which international humanities policy can be explored. Drawing on Theodor…
The psychological turn in higher education and the new taxonomy of attitudes and emotions: Denmark as a case study
This article explores the increased concern with students’ well-being in higher education as a mode of governance that goes hand in hand with new mechanisms of exclusion. Focussing on a new student survey in Denmark that measures students’ well-being, we show how the well-being agenda is entangled with a new ‘taxonomy of attitudes and emotions’ that align with neoliberal ideals about the self-efficient and self-governing individual. Implied is a …
Doctoral students’ experiences of being affiliated with an interdisciplinary graduate school in aging and health
The aim is to describe the development of a novel interdisciplinary graduate school, using the Swedish National Graduate School for Competitive Science on Ageing and Health (SWEAH) as a case example. We explore doctoral students’ perceptions of being part of SWEAH and provide implications for practice. Written self-reports reflecting 78 students’ experiences and perceptions were analyzed using thematic analysis. The findings reveal that affiliati…
Valuing humanities: Rethinking the humanities-impact landscape in Denmark
Globally, the issue of research impact has grown as governments articulate policies around research as a contributor to economic and societal development, often through an econometric justification. This has triggered much discussion amongst humanities scholars in public formally-reasoned peer-reviewed texts that are rarely empirically-based. This Denmark-based empirical study used an individual biographical and historical structural framework to…
Becoming impactful: Humanities doctoral researchers navigating a lively zone of entanglement
This article explores societal impact of humanities doctoral research. Through an empirical inquiry based in Denmark, we analyse how current doctoral researchers conceptualize societal impact and how they articulate potential contributions to society. For theoretical framing, we employ a double-winged perspective combining concepts from the work of Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard with others from French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, namely co…
Rectors and university-societal engagement: Representing the ‘reality’ of ‘their’ university
Globally, the past 10–15 years has seen universities experiencing increasing governmental reforms, including expectations for greater societal engagement. This places demands on the most senior university leaders to address and be seen to address these expectations. How do they situate themselves and negotiate their demanding role both inwardly and outwardly? We addressed this question in a case study of four rektors in four (of the eight) univer…
How do deans of humanities understand and enact societal engagement within their broader experiences of leading? A Danish case study
Globally, universities have experienced growing policy demands and societal expectations, including being engaged societal actors – with senior university leaders expected to strategically address these requirements. To understand the specificity of leadership around this issue, we focused on one disciplinary cluster, the humanities, often seen as particularly challenged regarding such engagement. We asked: How do Deans of Faculties of Humanities…
Who is ‘society’ in the societal impact debate? – A critical discussion of policies of closure
Discussions about the role of universities have long been framed in terms of questions of what is good for the public, as well as how and whether higher education serves that good. Today, the language of ‘societal impact’ has become an accepted way for policymakers to frame the matter, but just who is included in the underlying definition of society that this formulation presupposes? In this paper, we consider how ‘society’ has been constructed i…
Fostering researcher independence: What are the educational and professional development consequences in the doctoral context?
Sociology (14 works) · Political science (9 works) · Higher education (6 works) · Pedagogy (6 works) · Social science (6 works) · Philosophy (5 works) · Psychology (5 works) · Law (4 works) · Philosophy (4 works) · Digital humanities (3 works)