A Critical Discourse Analysis of the Commercialization of Higher Education in Hong Kong: A Case Study of the Business School Undergraduate Admissions Prospectuses

Abstract

With the influence of promotion culture, the commercialization of higher education has become a trend. To further understand the impact of promotional culture on the discourse practice of universities in Hong Kong, this study uses Fairclough’s three-dimensional discourse analysis theory to conduct text analysis, discursive practice analysis, and social practice analysis of the business school undergraduate admissions prospectuses of the top 3 universities and two private universities in Hong Kong. The results show that all five universities use first-person and second-person pronouns to narrow the distance between the school and the readers. In addition, all five schools use a large number of evaluative adjectives and superlative forms to promote the quality of their education while presenting the school information, to make the higher education service more specific. The two private schools put more emphasis on the beautiful campus environment to increase their competitiveness. In terms of syntax, the prospectuses of these five schools form a generic intertext with advertising discourse. The combination of short sentences, phrases, pictures, and colors impresses readers deeply in a short time. In terms of social practice, the five schools promote their international education to cater to the tastes of the education market.