Chinese international doctoral students' perceptions of publishing: a time-space perspective

This study draws from the notion of chronotope to explore how time and space play out in the formation of Chinese international doctoral students' perceptions of publishing. It is contextualised in a New Zealand research-intensive university, using data generated from four participants through online qualitative surveys and one-on-one semi-structured interviews. The findings show that the students perceive doctoral publishing as simultaneously, sometimes contradictorily, a bonus, a necessity and disciplinary engagement in the time-space contexts of doctoral study, academic career and disciplinary community. This study also reveals a contextual and cultural formation of perceptions, which involves constant and dynamic interplay among various normative, cultural and ideological forces in international, national, institutional and personal spheres that are manifested in different material and/or discursive time-space contexts. It concludes that supervisors and students should open up to uncertainties that breed the possibilities for not only misunderstandings but also deep mutual understandings.