The Postdigital University

The nature of the university has been debated for centuries. In a postdigital age, the focus of the debate is on the politics of knowledge. Historically, the university has been classified in many different ways, yet Matthews’ recent classification into Mode 1 University: The Ivory Tower, Mode 2 University: The Factory, and Mode 3 University: The Network, offers a good starting point for postdigital analyses. These modes reflect structural relationships between the university, the market, and the society and reveal questions pertaining to power, including the university’s relationships to academic freedom, critical thinking, democracy, and knowledge production.