Living Dissertation

"When crafting phenomenological research, we need to slow down in this way. It is not as though we will not have deadlines, or that the actual time and timelines will change. It is how we experience our patient crafting over this time." 

- Mark Vagle, Crafting Phenomenological Research (2018)


Timeline

 Keywords

There was always going to be a deadline for my dissertation; that's the way Graduate Schools and commencement operate. However, once Dr. Amy Stich introduced me to the concept of a "living dissertation," I was immediately relieved. If I could accept that my published dissertation was simply the first of many milestones in a longer scholarly career, my perfectionist tendencies could be eased. Instead of burning myself out while attempting to craft an all-encompassing dissertation, I could instead publish this dissertation as it was and build upon it over time. Though my initial dissertation will be published in May 2023, this website will serve as my virtual office or workspace. Drop by and say hello; interact with my bookshelves; inquire into the ways in which you, too, are engaging in social reproduction theory, post-intentional phenomenology, or higher education exploitation scholarship. 

Above: Higher Education Bookshelf

What is social reproduction?

Under the current system of late-stage capitalism, care work can be understood as “social reproduction” or the everyday tasks necessary to sustain life (i.e., feeding, sleeping, shopping, nurturing, mending, cleaning, chaperoning), disproportionately affects women (and especially women of color) (Hester, 2018). Gendered care work has been the subject of much critique; scholars such as Silvia Federici and her "Wages Against Housework" campaign recognized the ways in which capitalism conveniently dismisses care work as labor to be compensated. Such social reproduction activities relate to Arlie Hochschild's (1989) “the second shift,” where women leave one shift (at their site of their employment where they are compensated with waged labor) to their second shift (at home) where they provide private, uncompensated labor. Both neoliberal trends and the patriarchy facilitate two forms of simultaneous labor exploitation. 

Concerning neoliberal trends, while social services are dismantled and underfunded, uncompensated but necessary care work is forced to be provided by individuals in the private home (Calarco, 2020) by the nuclear family. More specifically, care work is provided primarily by women because of socialized gender norms under the patriarchy (Ferrant, 2014). The compounded effect of care work, or social reproduction, performed privately in the home results in gendered labor exploitation which disproportionately impacts women.

Problem Statement

Both higher education institutions (HEIs) and the home are sites of reproduction. Higher Education Institutions “(re)produce” critically thinking, democratically aware, skill-based laborers who upon their graduation and certification populate the workforce. Simultaneously, the home is where “activities that nurture future workers, regenerate the current workforce, and maintain those who cannot work—that is, the set of tasks that together maintain and reproduce life, both daily and generationally” occur (Hester, 2018, p. 345). Although women employed by HEIs receive some wages for one form of labor by their employers, they are uncompensated—and are thus exploited—by their second shift of reproductive labor at home. 

Even though “non-education” higher education staff constitute over half of academe’s employees (57%), this population is not proportionately represented in higher education studies compared to research concerning faculty (NCES, n.d.). Prior to COVID-19’s exacerbation of labor issues, scholars have called for more research across the spectrum of workers in higher education. Specifically, Sallee (2021) suggested that future studies investigate “how various populations—further delineated by demographic group and employee level—are impacted by ideal worker norms. Explicitly understanding how these norms operate will help dismantle them” (p. 305). First introduced by Joan Williams (2000), the ideal worker is the model employee willing to dedicate herself entirely to her job, absent of any personal distractions. She is completely devoted and loyal to her work and is therefore prone to exploitation. 

Similarly, Kezar et al. (2019) examined the many ways in which neoliberalism and academic capitalism since the 1970s have impacted higher education workers. The authors reported: 

In the Gig Academy, a growing proportion of faculty, postdocs, graduate students, and staff have quite similar poor working conditions: subsistence wages; lack of benefits, retirement funds, and vacation time; no influence over conditions of work or structures of advancement; and constant anxiety over the possibility of arbitrary termination. These 5 trends impact all institutional types, but they are often more drastic at public institutions and poorly resourced institutions such as community colleges. (2019, p. 36-7) 

The authors went on to suggest, “We hope that increased clarity around Gig Academy trends will inspire action among faculty and staff to combat these trends and collectively hold administrators accountable for decisions that undermine student learning and institutional missions” (Kezar et al., 2019, p. 145-6). The call for increased clarity can be answered with additional scholarship to enhance both workers’ and their employers’ understanding of neoliberalism’s impact on higher education labor exploitation. 

Research Questions

Broadly, the goal of this higher education labor study was to understand the experience of gendered labor exploitation in two separate but connected reproductive spaces to inform labor reform. As such, the following research questions guided this higher education labor study: 

1. What does it mean for women staff to experience labor exploitation in both their homes and their places of employment (higher education institutions)? 

2. To what extent and in what ways do women staff imagine institutional support services and policies could be adjusted to address social reproduction equity?

Above: Conceptual framework written on the back of a receipt.
Above: Google Jamboard logo
Above: Example of Jamboard usage through analysis.
Above: Redacted Productions & Provocations visual assembled throughout analysis.

Methodology

Though feminism and phenomenology are often perceived to be incompatible, I disagree. When thoughtfully organized, feminist theory and phenomenological methods work together to become something greater than their individual parts.

This study intended to inspire and ultimately empower individual workers and their managers by drawing attention to the potential ways in which staff members privately (and unnecessarily) struggle. Like Vagle's (2018) own rejection of phenomenology’s historic dualistic approach, the Post-Intentional Phenomenology (PIP) approach was both an appropriate methodology to pair with critical feminist theory. 

In what follows I briefly outline my methodology based on Vagle's (2018) non-linear approach to PIP.

1. I, first, identified a post-intentional phenomenon in context(s), around a social issue (i.e., gendered labor exploitation). The identification of this phenomenon was the result of not only my own experiences as a woman staff member working in higher education but also from my observations and conversations with other women staff members across a number of HEIs. A review of the literature revealed a timely gap.

2. & 3. I devised a clear yet flexible process for producing phenomenological material and made a post-reflexion plan. Ultimately, I produced phenomenological material from four sources: a series of semi-structured conversations with 11 participants, participant-generated daily schedules (via reflective activity), a collection of participant job descriptions, and my bridling journal. Practicing post-reflexivity involved journaling and crafting initial and post- post-reflexion statements.

4. As I explored the post-intentional phenomenon using Social Reproduction Theory (SRT), I engaged the phenomenological materials by 1) deconstructing the wholes of the materials via careful line-by-line readings, 2) “thinking with theory” (Jackson & Mazzei, 2012), and 3) analyzing my post-reflexions. Utilizing Google’s digital Jamboards, I organized phenomenological materials into, first, Participant Venn Diagrams and synthesized said diagrams into, second, Participant Profiles. In familiarizing myself with the phenomenological materials produced, I eventually identified both “productions” and “provocations” that could produce social change concerning the phenomenon of interest. 

5. Ultimately, this dissertation was presented as text that engages said productions and provocations of gendered labor exploitation within two separate but related sites: the home and R1 higher education institutions (HEI).

Findings.

Several productions and provocations of gendered labor exploitation were identified. For those unfamiliar, productions capture the ways in which intentionalities are made and constantly remade over time. Provocations are intensities or catalysts related to intentionalities. Intentionalities are “the inseparable connectedness between subjects (that is, human beings) and objects (that is, all other things, animate and inanimate, and ideas) in the world” (Vagle, 2018, p. 58). As I understand this lifeworld, all things, people, relationships, and ideas are in relation at all times; what's more, they're constantly in flux as intentionality is not constant nor complete.

The table below presents this study's findings.

Read more about each individual production and provocation identified in the published dissertation, accessible by clicking on the link in the above Resources list.

Future Research Opportunities. 

This is just the beginning. Findings from this study reveal a plethora of opportunities to continue this important and timely research. If you are interested in picking up the torch individually or are interested in collaborating, please do outreach by emailing me (link below).