Abstract:

The British REF with its Impact Agenda has changed the way in which academics think, talk and write about their research. Impact, alongside research and teaching has become yet another area in which a scholar must excel to succeed in academia.

The case study method of impact evaluation, first introduced with REF 2014 and used again in REF 2021, was also adapted in national evaluation exercises carried out in Norway (2017) and Poland (2021).

It is curious that implementing similar frameworks of research impact evaluation rendered very different effects in the three countries, particularly in terms of academic discourse.

In my talk I compare the features of the impact case studies submitted by scholars in the three countries linking them to broader qualities of the evaluation systems and academic cultures in which they were produced. In my analysis I draw mainly on linguistic pragmatics (genre analysis) and foucauldian governmentality theory.

Bio: Marta Natalia Wróblewska is Assistant Professor in the English Studies Department at SWPS University of Social Sciences and Humanities in Warsaw, Poland. She holds a PhD in Applied Linguistics from Warwick University (2019). In recent years she has conducted studies on research impact evaluation in the UK, Norway and Poland. As well as working at one of the Polish funding agencies – National Centre for Research and Development she has advised several Polish universities in the run-up to the national evaluation. She is interested in the mutual relationship between discourse and policy-making. Her recent publication is Wróblewska, M.N. Research impact evaluation and academic discourse. Humanit Soc Sci Commun 8,58 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-021-00727-8