Ontopower, Preemption, and the Impacts of Impact in Higher Education

• In Event: Marriott Roundtable Session 30
  In Roundtable Session: Power, Politics, and Reparative Writing

Abstract

In what ways does the concept of impact create university realities? This paper explores the creation of university environments through a concept tied to both cultures of assessment (Fuller, Skidmore, Bustamante, & Holzweiss, 2016) and a logic of preemption (Massumi, 2015). Preemption is the power formation of the emerging dispositif of our time, ontopower (Massumi, 2015; cf. Foucault, 1979/2008). This paper explores the operation of ontopower and preemption both theoretically and within one university’s revision of a high-impact practice (HIP; Kuh, 2008) to double-down on the concept of impact. What ways of being are made possible for students, faculty, staff, and institutions within an impactful HIP? Furthermore, what do these findings tell us about the emerging formation of preemption?

Authors

• Laura Elizabeth Smithers, Old Dominion University

• Lanah Stafford, Old Dominion University