Abstract

Universities are highly interested to introduce emerging researchers into new strategies of publishing. Coaching emerging researchers counts as a strategic investment not only into emerging scholars, but also into the universities’ reputation and budget. In this context emerging researchers face diverse, even contradicting, tasks, challenges, obligations and commitments, especially when they are working in an intercultural and multilingual academic milieu. Significant problems result, when this cultural and linguistic diversity at the same time is governed by standardised means and criteria, which do not consider such academic milieus. The Free University of Bozen-Bolzano, South Tyrol, Italy, and the field of educational research serve as our experiential background to reflect on the multifaceted paradoxes, challenges and conflicts arising from these problems. Against this background we look at different concepts and criteria of research quality and reflect on coaching strategies for emerging researchers and on the ambivalences embedded in and resulting from such strategies. As a result we find significant disadvantages for German speaking scholars. We therefore suggest to teach and to coach students and researchers to use clever, hybrid strategies of research production, to disenchant the ‘scientific’ ideals, to learn to walk on the edge between the market, on which you have to sell yourself, and the scholarly and public responsibility, from which you draw your professional ethics and identity.