Early-career women in geography. Practical pathways to advancement in the neoliberal university

Abstract

This special issue is the result of our longstanding interest in the conditions and experiences that characterize early career women's scholarly standing in academia. In 2016, we co-authored on the trajectories of recent doctors in Geography in Sweden (Caretta and Webster 2016). We wondered whether the situation was similar elsewhere and wanted to explore more deeply questions of: What are the key obstacles facing women in geography institutions today? How have women learned to bypass or navigate these hindrances? How is resistance incorporated in daily work-place practices? And for those who have overcome or continue to resist and encounter these challenges, what were the main factors in their successes, and which strategies helped as they navigated their career paths? Finally, we wanted to explore what approaches are being used by early career women geographers today to avoid falling into the trap of the 'leaky pipe' for those wishing to remain in academia as their chosen career path?To delve deeper and unravel the diversity of experiences of women in academia we organized a session at the 2017 Nordic Geographer's Meeting in Stockholm, Sweden called 'Women in Geography: is there a disciplinary glass ceiling?' The response to the session was overwhelming with at least 40 academics present; the room was at capacity for both the paper session and the group discussion that followed. The level of interest and the vigour of feelings regarding people's experiencesranging from Sweden to New Zealand, to Argentina, Iran and the USAled us to believe that there is an urgent need to unveil and discuss these questions. Following the session, we issued a call for practice-oriented contributionsfrom both the human and physical sides of geographyto outline and critically discuss grassroots organizing, mentoring approaches, foreign female scholars' inclusion strategies, networking tactics and practical solutions implemented at the department level by female early-career geographers to foster their permanence and advancement in academia, we received numerous abstracts. Eventually, with the collaboration of the journal editors and peer review processes, we came to the five articles that comprise this special issue. In the following sections of this introduction, we cover the themes and contributions that this special issue makes to the discipline of geography and we discuss the range of pathways to women's career advancement presented by the authors. The neoliberal academic panoramaPublications focusing on the gendered ramifications of the neoliberal university are ever growing (e.g. Thwaites and Pressland 2016;Bosanquet 2017;Taylor and Lahad 2018). Research shows small disciplines such as geography tend to rely on homosocial practices; making the career progress of men relatively smoother than that of women (Crang 2003; Mott and Roberts 2014; Leslie et al.

“Wait for a permanent contract”: The temporal politics of (in)fertility as an early career researcher

“…Here we impose structures that effectively discriminate against families, carers, those with health issues, and migrants. This risks those already marginalised within this sector being held back from permanency (see also Webster and Caretta, 2019). Understanding the breadth of the instability generated by an expectation and/or requirement of mobility is key to understanding lived experiences of (in)fertility for ECRs, in part because:…”

“…Examples of the forms that such a broader understanding of the challenges of (in)fertility within ECR academia could include: institutionally refusing to accept short-term and/or hourly paid contracts; providing mentorship to ECRs (and including the time this takes within staff work load allocations); ensuring that parental leave is considered with ECRs on short-term contracts in mind; rethinking assumptions around institutional mobility when on hiring committees; creating spaces for ECR voices to be meaningfully heard (e.g. including them within departmental decision making); actively participating within Unions, and reflecting upon the implications of narratives of productivity during parental leave (Webster and Caretta, 2019). Funding bodies need to extend contracts to cover parental leave for postdoctoral researchers.…”

“…This “casualized and predominantly female teaching class in higher education follows longstanding patterns of devaluing socially reproductive work under capitalism” (Cardozo, 2017: 405). This intervention then, also reflects upon the impacts of uneven reproductive labour in the context of female academics’ career trajectories (hiring, promotion), and that creating space for (in)fertile subjectivities is enmeshed within a wider legacy of feminist politics within the neoliberal academy (Caretta and Faria, 2020; Rose, 1993; Webster and Caretta, 2019). To clarify, I do not prescribe to a singular meaning of neoliberalism; the term is used here to refer to the multiple implications of subjecting universities to the free market economy, the resultant model of fee-paying students as consumers, and the proliferation of metric-based markers of quality (Castree and Sparke, 2000).…”

“…I am also aware of my privilege as a British citizen and my current entitlement to free healthcare, contraception, abortion and parental leave. Berg et al (2014: 1; see also Maddrell et al, 2019;Webster and Caretta, 2019) comment on the intersectionality of such forms of privilege, noting that the neoliberal academy produces new forms of academic subjectivity that "interlock with forms of exclusion including patriarchy, classism, ableism, heterosexism, and racism." The employment experiences of ECR are welldocumented: short term contracts, hourly paid work, the expectation of institutional mobility, heavy teaching loads, poor pay and lack of career support (O'Dwyer, 2018; UCU, 2018), but the implications of this for (in)fertility have not been explored.…”

The ‘Mirrored Ceiling’: Young undergraduate student women’s expectations of gendered career opportunities and constraints

“…The 'glass' in the metaphor highlights that these barriers are often invisible (Carli & Eagly, 2016) as processes reproducing gender inequality are often ingrained into society and business practices (Hoobler et al, 2009). Nonetheless, people can see through the glass ceiling, giving the impression that they are able to reach the highest echelons of their career -a failure to succeed to the top is often therefore internalised as an individual failing rather than understood as underpinned by a broader set of constraints (Webster & Caretta, 2019). As Maddrell et al (2019) rather than being an involuable structure, the glass ceiling is underpinned by a set of socio-spatial processes including discrimination, everyday micro-discrimination and unequal caring responsibilities.…”