Epistemic Agency and Future Knowledge Transformation Among International Students

Existing research with international students explains why international students should be recognised as knowers, and how returnees may transform and circulate knowledge. Less is known about how students begin to view themselves as capable of evaluating the relevance of academic knowledge during studying abroad. Through a qualitative secondary analysis of narrative interviewing with four Chinese international students in the UK, this study explores how students exercise epistemic agency, evaluate and contextualise knowledge, and develop orientations towards its future transformation. This study finds that international students’ agency involves both participating in university knowledge practices and judging the relevance and limits of academic knowledge, contextualising it across professional and educational worlds, and anticipating its possible future transformation. This article offers a processual account of how international students begin to become legitimate knowers and potential knowledge transformers while studying abroad.