ABSTRACT

This paper critiques the emergence of micro-credentials in higher education. It argues that micro-credentials build on the discourse of employability skills and 21^st century skills within human capital theory, and that they increase the potential of human capital theory to ‘discipline’ the HE curriculum to align it more closely with putative labour market requirements. The paper is situated within the social realist school in the sociology of education, and it draws primarily on the sociology of Basil Bernstein to develop this critique, while also drawing on the Continental Didaktik tradition. It analyses the nature of the person envisaged in curriculum, the homo economicus of human capital theory. This self is a market self who uses micro-credentials to invest in this or that set of skills in anticipating labour market requirements. The paper uses a range of Bernstein’s concepts to analyse the links between what is to be taught, to whom is it taught, and how is it taught in micro-credentials. It focuses on the principle of recontextualization which comprises instructional and regulative discourses, to examine the ways in which notions of the person and human motivation are reshaping relations of classification and framing in HE curriculum.

摘要

本文对高等教育中微凭证的兴起提出了批评。它认为对的就业技能和21级的话语是微凭证构建^ST人力资本理论中世纪的技能，而且他们提高人力资本理论，以“纪律”的HE课程与假定的劳动力市场需求更紧密地结合起来的潜质。该论文位于教育社会学的社会现实主义学校之内，主要借鉴了罗勒·伯恩斯坦（Basil Bernstein）的社会学来发展这种批评，同时也借鉴了大陆迪达克提克（ Continental Didaktik）的传统。它分析了课程中所设想的人的本质，即经济人人力资本理论。这个自我是一个市场自我，它使用微凭证在预期劳动力市场需求的这套或那套技能上进行投资。这篇论文使用了伯恩斯坦的一系列概念来分析要教的东西，教给谁的人以及如何在微证书中教书之间的联系。它着重于包含教学和规范性话语的重新语境化原则，以研究人与人的观念如何在高中课程中重塑分类和框架的关系。