Kunskapssamhällets gästarbetare – Internationella studenter i interferenser mellan kön, sexualitet, nationalitet och klass i globaliserade utbildningslandskap

The aim of this article is to investigate interferences betweengender, class, sexuality, and ethnicity among international studentsby looking at migration patterns and living conditions of internationalmaster and PhD-students at three Swedish universities (LuleaUniversity of Technology (LTU), Linkoping University (LiU), TheRoyal Institute of Technology (KTH)). The experiences of thesestudents with regard to transnationalism, higher education andresearch is a point of departure for discussing global stratificationand transformation in the contemporary neoliberal knowledgeeconomy. The article interprets the transnational flows of highereducation in relation to a critical understanding of knowledgesociety and higher education by introducing the notion of eduscapes.This concept refers to the contemporary transnational flowof ideas and people with regard to higher education, and wherenodes of knowledge centres and peripheries shift over time but areconnected through modern communication technologies anddifferent epistemic, ethnic, and student communities. In thetransnational practices of higher education where students travelthe globe in search and dreams of knowledge, a better life andfuture career possibilities, routes and imaginaries to a large extentreproduce and follow geopolitical power patterns. In this respecteducation by going global is shrinking the world but also stratifies,creating new patterns of inequality and competition.