What Makes It Real? Swapping Fake University Policy Agendas for Genuine Human Narratives

Fake news' is frequently (and understandably) portrayed as negative and a threat to democracy. Though controversial, this paper argues that the concept of 'fake news' is also useful, in helping to pinpoint certain 'falsehoods' transmitted through Higher Education (HE) policies in recent decades. Noticing these is important when HE is increasingly under scrutiny from the media, as well as from government and regulatory bodies. Firstly, through Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), I identify a problem where artificial linguistic labels created for elements of academic practice are attributed with human labour, within strategies written to meet the perceived demands of this terminology. Secondly, I point to auto-ethnographic theory to support the writing of genuine academic narratives, as an alternative approach towards policy.