Reconceptualising transition to Higher Education with Deleuze and Guattari

This article draws on the philosophy of Deleuze and Guattari to reconceptualise transition to Higher Education. In doing so it contributes a new theoretical approach to understanding transition to Higher Education which largely remains under-theorised, uncritical and taken-for-granted. Drawing on data from two projects, the article activates Deleuze and Guattari’s concepts of assemblage, rhizome and becoming to contest the established view of transition as a linear pathway or series of ‘critical incidents’. The article illuminates how Deleuze and Guattari’s concepts are of value both in theorising the multiplicity and heterogeneity of transition and in refocusing attention on the lived specificities of students’ experiences within a complex web of institutional and affective practices. The article ends with a consideration of how Deleuze and Guattari recast understandings of transitions theory and practice.