1. The Idea of Quality in Higher Education: Bernstein and ideology Ourania Filippakou, Andrea Abbas, Paul Ashwin and Monica McLean SRHE Annual Conference 10 Dec 2009 Funded by:

2. Contextual considerations The institutionalisation of ‘quality’ Ending of binary divide in HE Diversity and massification of HE Increased marketisation Neoliberalism and ‘choice’

3. Some questions motivating the study To what extent do ideas of quality engage with issues of inequality in higher education? To what extent do quality assurance procedures configure (the current conditions of) higher education?

4. Two theoretical ideas Quality as a reified concept Variation-as-inequality in and through knowledge and learning and pedagogic rights (Bernstein 2000)

5. Variation as inequality? Stratification of recontextualising contexts Stratification of knowledge Stratification of pedagogic identities

6. Conclusion: theorising the idea of quality and inequality in higher education Can exploring variation in knowledge, explain differentiation in access to pedagogic rights?