Institutional Elitism:

Critical Discourse Analysis of Private Educational Institutions

Abstract

The fact that graduates from western or foreign countries, or at least those with qualifications from these countries, are highly prized is probably a marketization ploy in order to enhance the international atmosphere and reputation of the host institution. In a country like Bangladesh, very few get the opportunity to study beyond the shores of their home country, and most of the fortunate few are usually from the upper middle class. By somewhat surreptitiously opening the doors of employment to the very privileged few, the advertisers are not only being elitist and discriminatory but also contribute to the (re)production of the ideology that anything foreign is better than local. To separate this reality from the rhetoric in Bangladesh’s private education discourse, this paper analyzes a sample of web-based recruitment advertisements of the country’s private institutions and attempts to illustrate how institutional elitism is practiced in the country.