Sep 04 2018

The University as Anxiety Machine

Category: Contract Faculty,Research — Bob Hanke @ 9:37 am

The neurotic academic: anxiety, casualisation, and governance in the neoliberalising university

by Vik Loveday (2018)

Journal of Cultural Economy, 11(2), pp. 154-166.

ABSTRACT

Based on empirical research conducted with academic staff working on
fixed-term contracts, the article explores the subjective experience of
anxiety in the UK’s ‘neoliberalising’ higher education (HE) sector. As HE
undergoes a process of marketisation, and the teaching and research
activities of academics are increasingly measured and scrutinised, the
contemporary academy appears to be suffused with anxiety. Coupled
with pressures facing all staff, 34% of academic employees are currently
working on a fixed-term contract and so must contend with the multiple
forms of uncertainty associated with their so-called ‘casualised’ positions.
While anxiety is often perceived as an individualised affliction for which
employees are encouraged to take personal responsibility, the article
argues that it should be conceptualised in two ways: firstly, as a symptom
of wider processes at work in the neoliberalising sector; and secondly, as
a ‘tactic’ of what Isin [(2004). The neurotic citizen. Citizenship Studies, 8 (3),
217–235] refers to as ‘neuroliberal’ governance. The article concludes by
proposing that the figure of the ‘neurotic academic’ is emblematic of the
contradictions facing the contemporary academy.

To read the article, click Loveday 2018.

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May 14 2017

Contingent No More: An Academic Manifesto

Category: Contract Faculty,Essays — Bob Hanke @ 5:42 pm

Contingent No More: An academic manifesto

by Maximillian Alvarez

(excerpted from The Baffler, May 3, 2017)

A SPECTER IS HAUNTING ACADEMIA—the specter of something that has yet to definitively claim a name for itself, but is rising nonetheless. So many of us have been buried underground, so many breathing through small breaks in the soil that covers our pristine university campuses where guided tours are given and frisbees are thrown, where deep-pocketed donors stroll nostalgically and future debtors gaze longingly. Looking up, we may, each of us, feel like the forgotten seeds moldering beneath these hallowed grounds—but we are, all of us, the tectonic plate holding them together. When we move, the world above will feel it.

Academia is in the midst of an acute, unsustainable crisis. For those working in the higher-education industry, and increasingly for those outside of it, it has become impossible to ignore.

To read the rest of this manifesto, click here.

 

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Dec 27 2015

2016 OCUFA Conference Addresses Academic Precarity

Category: Conferences,Contract Faculty — Bob Hanke @ 9:10 pm

Confronting precarious academic work

February 11-12, 2016

The conference examined the realities and impact of precarious academic work on our universities and consider solutions now and for the future.

Key themes include:

  • Current realities of precarious academic work and the impact on faculty, students, and higher education
  • Learning from the experience of precarious labour in other jurisdictions
  • Responding to the challenges of precarious academic work: current directions and future needs
  • Re-imagining academic work for the future

The 1 1/2 day conference was held at the Intercontinental Hotel, Toronto.

You can access the conference agenda, slides and audio here.

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Nov 07 2015

The Cost of Casualized Labour

Category: Academic Freedom,Contract Faculty,News — Bob Hanke @ 11:39 pm

Casualization of Academic Labour has its Costs

(excerpted from the CAUT Bulletin, October 2015)

In the ongoing massification of post-secondary education, university and college administrators are increasingly turning to temporary or contract academic staff to teach and work in their institutions’ lecture halls, labs and libraries.

“More than 30 per cent of academic staff in Canadian post-secondary institutions are faced with short-term, insecure employment and struggle to find decent work,” notes Sylvain Schetagne, CAUT’s director of research and political action.

Living with uncertainty about when and what you might teach next creates financial, intellectual and emotional strain. Most contract academic staff live on four-month contracts and worry about finding a job for the next semester.

“The inability to plan is a major issue and a great cause of stress in the lives of contract academics,” said James Gerlach, who has taught on contract at Wilfrid Laurier University since 2006 and also serves as chair of CAUT’s contract academic staff committee. “You can teach six courses one year and two courses the next year. You can live on six courses, but not two.”

According to a 2015 United Way report, precarious workers face significant barriers to building stable and secure lives. Precarious workers face greater challenges finding childcare and addressing health and safety concerns in the workplace. They face more gender and racial discrimination and spend less time with their families and in their communities.

Unpaid work is also a widespread reality of the insecure academic job landscape. Office hours, advisement and recommendation letters, for example, are rarely spelled out in contracts, but these tasks can be part of job expectations, says Gerlach.

“Contract academic staff are paid for a fraction of the work they need to do,” he said.

To read the complete story, click here.

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Jul 05 2015

CUPE 3908 Call for Presenters: Academic Precarity Symposium

Category: Conferences — Bob Hanke @ 11:54 am

Challenging Academic Precarity

October 2-4, 2015 Artspace, Peterborough ON

Academia has long been heralded as the ivory tower to which we all should aspire and those that are admitted are thought to be well compensated. With the prevailing winds of neoliberalism blowing at the doors, the corporatization of the university has witnessed the reduction of tenured faculty positions. At the same time, increasing resources have been assigned to professional administration. The result is that more and more full-time academics are paid part-time wages and forced to endure precarity when alternatives abound.

This interdisciplinary symposium seeks to situate and understand how these trends emerged and continue to develop. The first two days will feature a keynote address, roundtables and panel discussions. The final day will be an exploration of avenues for future intervention and activism.

We seek proposals for the following possible subject matter:

* Political economy of ‘just in time’ academic labour
* Forms of resistance and protest
* Engaging tenured & tenure-track faculty
* Student academic workers’ plight
* Mobilization strategies
* Challenging precarity with art
* Movement to zero tuition

We welcome diverse proposals and formats including, but not limited to, full panel proposals, multimedia presentations, artistic interventions, and, of course, more conventional academic papers.Please send all abstracts and/or presentation proposals in either .rtf, .docx, or .pdf formats to office@cupe3908.org by August 25th, 2015. Please limit your proposal to no more than 250 words. Notifications will be sent out by September 1, 2015. Please send all other inquiries to: James Onusko at vp1@cupe3908.org

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