Re/thinking practices of power:: The discursive framing of leadership in The Chronicle of Higher Education

Countless authors, both popular and scholarly, have studied the concept of leadership and have attempted to define it, quantify it, and ideally provide "a set of principles that are universal to leadership which can be then adapted to different situations" (J. A Burns, qtd. in Mangan, 2002, p. A 10). However, the scholarship of leadership rarely considers ways in which discourses-constellations of words and images circulating in broader society-operate to construct images of leaders and leadership. Not simply passive products of discourse, these images also contribute to shaping dominant discourses and, in turn, influence beliefs about leadership. They may even constrain the performance of leadership. Identifying dominant discourses that reflect and shape contemporary images of leadership in higher education can provide another lens for understanding leadership and how it functions in a given context. It may also contribute to helping leaders be more strategic about how they re/position themselves in dynamic and complex college and university environments.