Not Getting Over It: The Impact of Sara Ahmed’s Work within Critical University Studies

Like a Pig in Mud: Rejecting the Manicured Boundaries of the Patriarchy

“…Like the pathways we propose here, we were lost and a mess. This project was messy in that the participants were seen as leaders within their respective institutions, yet this project was approached through a lens of critical university studies (Khoo et al, 2020), a framework that is oriented toward problematizing the changes in educational structures as influenced by neoliberal and/or free-market fundamentalism (Giroux, 2005; Moorish, 2018). As such Weiser and DeMartino were, and are, critical of the way that some institutions handled the crisis, particularly now that we are post-crisis and institutions are attempting a return to normal.…”

Researching and Writing Differently

“…This enabling environment challenges masculine ideas of failure and collaboration that are premised on calculations and instrumentalization, as well as metrics of input and output, and it is instead based on feminist ethics of care whereby 'central focus […] is on the compelling moral salience of attending to and meeting the needs of the particular others for whom we take responsibility' ( Held, 2006 , 10). A community of belonging premised on feminist approaches provides opportunities to look askance and athwart (across, in an oblique direction) in relation to our fi elds, our communities and profession (see Khoo et al, 2020 ). As writing diff erently is still an alternative to the mainstream way of researching and writing in the fi eld of management and organization studies, it is important to identify and join the community of scholars whose work we admire and are inspired by.…”

“…It also allowed me to see examples of writing diff erently and researching diff erently, and gave me the confi dence to attend other larger conferences. These shared events can also provide opportunities for 'defi ning moments' ( Henderson, 2020 ;Khoo et al, 2020 ) that transform an individual microinteraction or singular experience into a wider application to one's career or critical engagement with academia -for instance, I was able to recognize and become more consciously aware of the academic I did not want to turn into (the one asking questions about their own work in someone else's presentation, or hogging the mic; the one mansplaining on research; the one excluding doctoral students or using them as a power-magnifying clique; the one paraphrasing and recycling the same work for 20 years; the one talking only to 'the right people' such as high fl iers, infl uential professors and editors). Inhabiting these collective academic spaces can be intimidating -walking into a room full of people who are diff erent from you ( Ahmed, 2012 in relation to whiteness); not seeing yourself represented in any of the keynote speakers or organizers; presenting in front of a large auditorium of invisible faces, or conversely in a small space that feels too intimate and encroaching on one's personal body.…”

Academic Emotions

“…Microaggressions, the small indignities that question your place within the academy, can result in significant frustration and anger, and contribute to poor mental health and well-being, especially when they mirror larger social injustices experienced beyond the academy (Khoo et al, 2021). In this way, belonging within the university can be refused to some individuals and groups, so that even when they manage to develop a comfortable academic personaan authentic institutional selfthey are nonetheless routinely reminded of their outsider status by others.…”

“…Notably, in many accounts of the suffering body in the university, the institution that is produced is that of its community of academics and other staff, and they are held responsible for its failures (Khoo et al, 2021;Matthew, 2016). Racism, sexism, homophobia and other discriminatory or harmful practices are depicted as products of everyday encounters between humans in the academy.…”