Objective: By analysing historical documents from the UNESCO archives, this study aims to trace the evolution of the concept of gender as an international construct in higher education at the transition of millennia. It is essential to understand the journey that concepts carry from mere theoretical constructs to policy tools that have great impact on underrepresented groups in higher education.

Method: The combination of academic theories on gender with archival research brings new insights with the potential of challenging our representations and improving the production of new policies for social change. The detection of conceptual interactions facilitated the analysis of conceptual trajectories in the UNESCO archives.

Results: There were three World Conferences on Higher Education. Organised by UNESCO, in 1998, 2009 and 2022, they represent important chronological milestones. It is possible to observe that between 1998 and 2022, the concept of gender acquired a more multidimensional nature and tighter interactions with the idea of empowerment. However, it has not achieved a univocal definition.

Conclusions: The present analysis found that the lack of a solid definition of gender did not stop its evolution. In the three World Conferences on Higher Education, gender emerges as an increasingly sophisticated theoretical construct with high practical potentialities. Through the application of archival research and critical approaches, researchers can apply potent theoretical and methodological tools that unify interdisciplinary frameworks. This approach touches the very idea of learning.