Staying with the trouble of collegiality, professionalism and care: Fertilities in academia

Abstract

Collegiality and professionalism are touted as crucial in academic career success and security, and as required for participation in academic spaces. Conversely, care, essential to well-being and social reproduction, is rarely portrayed as necessary or even appropriate in academic space. This auto-ethnographic article uncovers discursive constructions of professionalism, collegiality, and care. I frame them as practices academics are unevenly required to perform—whether explicitly demanded or as a necessity for well-being—through the lens of my experience of fertilities as a graduate student. Rather than a single biological event, I frame fertilities as experienced as “an anticipatory weight shouldered throughout the life course” (Introduction, Themed Issue). Within academia, fertilities are constructed as threatening to academic success, particularly as they impose the burden of care work that may detract from academic work, impede professionalism, and leave less time for collegiality. This piece contributes to the intersection of three phases of fertilities experienced during graduate school: early pregnancy, miscarriage diagnosis, and the process of becoming un-pregnant. I highlight my experience of fertilities because they are common yet hushed by stigma—a silence co-constitutive with the under-theorizing of fertilities and leading to the absence of care, exacerbated by university policies and norms. Through this engagement, the article aims to change the parameters of the speakable within departments so we can seek and receive the care we need. Without discarding the positive potential of collegiality or professionalism, I advocate for mentorship, slow scholarship, and intersectional acts of care, arguing that ‘care’ should be neither stigmatized nor mandated. Instead, the definition must be collaborative, evolving, and intersectional. As bell hooks writes, “imagine how much easier it would be for us to learn to love [or care] if we began with a shared definition.”

Mid‐career faculty peer mentoring: Rationale and program design

“…For non-traditional faculty, a paternalistic mentoring relationship can mean learning to "mask" their embodied differences and needs (Buzzanell et al, 2015), as well as their embodied responses to micro-aggressions. The mentee learns the value that professionalism places on silence and the status quo (Kaufman, 2021). Gendered and racialized differences then become sites where the small injuries of ongoing microaggressions accumulate (Nadal et al, 2017(Nadal et al, , 2014.…”

‘Maybe one way forward’: Forging collective collegiality in the neoliberal academy

“…They make time for me to bounce ideas off when I am feeling on my own. (Phase 2) Our account of collective collegiality 'alludes to an affective relation' (Kaufman, 2021(Kaufman, : 1743 and connotes the idea of caring-about, as opposed to the 'hierarchical power relation of giver and receiver' inherent within the concept of caring-for. It aligns more closely with Bess's (1992) conceptualisation of behavioural collegiality which reflects 'prosocial and trusting values that exceed typical workplace norms' (Alleman and Haviland, 2017: 530).…”

Infertility and Pregnancy Loss in Doctoral Education: Understanding Students’ Experiences

“…Some many need more information about instructional supports (Springer et al, 2009) or guidance on how to provide effective, empowering support (Wladkowski & Mirick, 2019b). Mentors can create a space where both the professional and personal are welcome, and then explicitly welcome the sharing of personal information like reproductive challenges, providing guidance and advice, and advocating on the student's behalf (Hazen, 2006;Kaufman, 2021;Kent et al, 2020;Wladkowski & Mirick, 2019a). The mentoring relationship can be a space in which these challenges and losses are visible, acknowledging the impact and meaning of these experiences.…”