Book Review

English for Academic Purposes in
Neoliberal Universities: A Critical
Grounded Theory

Hadley, Gregory. Switzerland: Springer International, 2014.
(184 Pages). ISBN 978-3-319-10448-5.
Reviewed by Gemma Campion
Nottingham Trent University
First and foremost, English for Academic Purposes in Neoliberal Universities
which is the result of over seven years of research and interviews with overninety participants at eighteen higher education institutions in Japan, the UK
and the USA, and seeks to critically highlight the processes and strategies usedby English for Academic Purposes (EAP) middle managers, so called BlendedEAP Professionals (BLEAPs), to negotiate and survive the neoliberal university.
However, in its unique exploration of the effects of neoliberalisation in the EAPcontext, its implications extend well beyond the professional lives of BLEAPs, tonot only teachers of EAP (TEAPs) and others who work in the field, but also
to all of those working within the increasingly commodified context of higher
educational institutions (HEIs).
The book is written by Gregory Hadley, who has lived and worked
predominantly in Japan for over twenty years, and who has published articleswidely on English language teaching (ELT), as well as on a range of researchinterests including historical literature and oral history. Although the emergenceof the neoliberal university has been the subject of increasing interest in theliterature over recent years, as Hadley points out, “scant attention has been given64

English for Academic Purposes, OnCUE Journal, 9(1), pages 64-68

to the effects of neoliberalism on tertiary level EAP” (p. 4) until now. Hadley’s
discussion of the data is interspersed with frequent, often quite lengthy extracts
from the interviews, which give the reader direct insights into the ways inwhich these BLEAPs attempt to understand, and survive in, the modern-day“corporate” university. BLEAPs are defined as “a new and highly disposable typeof HEI worker who is neither fully academic nor fully administrative in nature”(p. 8).
Beyond its focus on BLEAPs, the book also turns a light on the wider, morepervasive process of “professional disarticulation”. This process, which forms acore category of Hadley’s theory, is defined as the increasing sense of dislocationthat people feel from their professional identities as the result of organisational
dynamics which have blurred traditional boundaries and created instability.
Although it is framed in relation to BLEAPs in the context of this study, it has
resonance for TEAPs and all who are working within a culture where education
has been reduced to “replicable products [which require] constant surveillanceand control” (p. 40).
The book begins with a short first person narrative in which Hadley is sat
on a plane on a university business trip, where he began reflecting on changes
in higher education in Japan and wondering about what effect these changes
were having on those who work within the field. He paints a rather bleak pictureof the privatisation of university education and teachers’ mounting workloads
and dwindling autonomy, which he sets against the pampered back-drop of thepresidential plane and chauffeur driven cars of his business trip. From this initialscene-setting, the book’s organization follows standard research reporting,containing chapters on the study’s concepts, methodology, context and results.
Hadley’s research does not aim to be a contrastive study of neoliberalisationin different countries, and although his discussion largely generalises about
its effects, he does also highlight differences where they occur. As such, Japan
receives numerous specific mentions throughout the book, and although thediscussion is often brief, what emerges is a picture of Japan as being somewhat
a step behind other countries, in its journey towards neoliberalisation. Whentalking about ideology, for example, Hadley notes that Japan has started
65Campionto “mirror changes first seen in the United States” (p. 28) relating to theabandonment of cultural ideals in favour of vocational training. The book’srelevance for those in Japan is perhaps therefore less in its ability to reflect current
conditions and more in its ability to forewarn of changes to come. Whilst, forexample, the study reveals that the internal weighing and measuring of TEAPs isparticularly demanding in the UK context, in Japan, at least for now, it remains
something of a formality. One wonders, however, how long this will continue
to be the case, given the wide-scale privatisation of universities in Japan and theconcurrent establishment of a neoliberal model of governance.
The approach taken in the study is “critical grounded theory”, which
Hadley takes considerable time to explain, and which is worthwhile, given thatas a research methodology it has rarely been used in the field of TESOL andApplied Linguistics. Whilst Grounded Theory (GT) carries some of the typicalweaknesses of qualitative methodology, such as concerns about researcher bias, itclaims to be more systematic and generalisable in so far as the theorist is involvedin a long process of coding data before looking for commonalities. These are thenexamined further, with the ultimate goal being to “identify actions and socialprocesses which are transferrable across similar social environments” (p. 14).
The critical element that is included is necessary because of Hadley’s particularconcern for examining a social process which is deeply bound up with power,
stratification, economic domination, and exploitation.
Following an in-depth elucidation of the methodology, the following
chapter attempts to counter a criticism often leveled at grounded theorists(which is that they fail to adequately explain the concepts which inform theirtheories) by discussing issues which shape EAP in the Third Space of NeoliberalUniversities. In a similar vein, the following chapter provides a detailed
introduction to the concept of BLEAPs, before going on to discuss the strategies
that they use to survive, under the rather imaginatively named categories ofhunting and gathering, weighing and measuring, and moulding and shaping.
The final chapter provides some very brief reflections on the study and mentionof implications.
Whilst this book will undoubtedly be of most interest to so-called BLEAPs,
66

English for Academic Purposes, OnCUE Journal, 9(1), pages 64-68

being one of the first to look at the effects of neoliberalisation in the EAP context
means that this book makes a substantial and unique contribution to helping allof us who work in the field become more aware of the nature of the forces which
are currently shaping our professional lives and impacting upon our behaviours
and identities. TEAPs do however only receive explicit mention in passing,
and whilst there is little that is directly useful to this audience, there is muchto be gleaned from the way in which Hadley reveals the reality of professionallife within the EAP unit and the way in which the business model can shape
our working lives. The book is also notable for its choice of methodology;
GT has barely been used in TESOL research, but its use here may spark moreinterest across the field. Whilst GT represents a qualitative methodology,
it claims the advantage of a more systematised analysis of data, which aims to
make connections with situations beyond the confines of the present researchcontext. In this way, the findings also have potential and far-reaching relevance,
not only for departments across the higher education sector but also for otherinstitutions such as hospitals and care homes, which are currently undergoing asimilar process of change.
Perhaps due to the nature of the methodology employed, the results forthe most part present long and detailed schemes of strategies which BLEAPs
are found to use. In terms of hunting and gathering, for example, BLEAPs arefound to use a range of strategies which involve a number of activities fromsecuring resource flows, investment servicing, milking the cash cow, and resource
leeching. At times, the descriptive detail is lengthy, and as a (TEAP) reader I
did find myself wanting to skip over parts of these chapters in order to get to thesummaries, which give a more succinct account of BLEAP behaviour. However,there are interesting insights into the ways in which these strategies often
implicate, and impact upon teachers. The section on resource prospecting, forexample, reveals that Caucasian, native speaker TEAPs are often seen as highly
valuable in Japanese HEIs. The “younger, more energetic, …smiling foreign
instructor”, who often feature prominently in universities’ recruitment literature,
can act as an important tool in the hunting and gathering of domestic students.
Although the methodology used in this study is focused upon actions and67

Campionsocial processes, I felt that the discussion would have been greatly complemented(both in terms of providing a richer understanding, and in terms of simply being amore interesting read) by more information relating to identity, and insights into
how the subjects feel about their role and the vast changes which are sweeping
through their work environments. Chapter seven, concerning the implicationsof the study is also very brief, with little by way of concrete suggestions for action.
The important contribution of this study is not so much in its results perse, but rather in its overall ability to uncover the power of neoliberalisation andthe manner and extent to which it is shaping the behaviour of people who work
in EAP, the wider implications it has for students, and for the very nature ofeducation and how we conceive of it. Whilst the data is interesting and offers
insights into the ways in which BLEAPs are adapting their behaviour in orderto survive in their very precarious space between that of managers and teachers,
where the book really holds interest is in its wider discussion of organisational
and ideological change. The chapter on “EAP in the Third Space of NeoliberalUniversities” is particularly key; it provides much food for thought in its
discussion of the globalisation, massification, and even McDonaldisation ofhigher education, raising issues that are not yet, in EAP, receiving the (urgent)attention that they surely warrant. If nothing else, Hadley’s book should beread for its capacity to warn us of the danger of falling into a corporate-cultureinduced slumber, and hopefully prevent us from sleepwalking our way into
becoming little more than “pedagogic factory workers” (p. 155) in the academic
sweatshops of the future.

Author Bio

Gemma Campion was teaching in-sessional English for Academic Purposes at
Nottingham Trent University at the time of writing. Prior to that she worked on presessional programmes, as well as in ESOL and EFL. She is particularly interested
in teachers, and investigated the process of learning to teach EAP for her masters
dissertation in TESOL. gemmacampion@hotmail.com
Received: December 5, 2014
Accepted: January 6, 201568