From a Foucauldian approach, neoliberal rationality in science can be understood as a form of governance of the self that produces mechanisms through which the subject is constructed and subordinated at the same time. In this study we examine subjectivation processes and gender in centres of research created under neoliberal scientific rationality. We analyse 19 semi‐structured interviews of men and women researchers conducted in three highly competitive centres of excellence — a context rarely addressed in the literature of academic subjectivities. Following a critical discourse analysis, we show how subjectivation processes of neoliberal rationality result in two main discursive mechanisms of subjection that prevent or hinder alternative subjectivities and collective resistance, especially for women, presenting a double turn that we call: a ‘turn on oneself’ and a ‘gendered turn on oneself’. We conclude that these centres are spaces which provide the conditions of possibility to develop a scientific entrepreneurial self, excluding ‘other’ scientific subjectivities and preventing possible resistances that could emerge from them.

Two antagonistic Spanish discourses on abortion were examinedfor the use of explanatory genres. The materiell consisted of Information published by a pro-abortion group (Commisio pel Drei a L'Avortament) and an antiabortion group (Pro-Vida). The two discourses made different use of different explanatory genres (causal attribution; reason-giving; backing claims and backing speech acts). The Pro-Vida texts usedproportionally more cause-giving and the Commisio texts more reason-giving. There were also more backings of definitional claims and of speech-acts in the ProVida discourse. We show how explanatory genres are used by the antiabortion group to construct abortion äs a philosophical and moral event, whereas the pro-abortion group construct it äs a matter of political action.