Gendered Entanglement in Academia

Why do we still need to talk about women in academia in 2025? This question was answered in January, when I attended a Women Space event at the University of Coventry called Accelerate Your Leadership Career: Challenges, Opportunities, Networks and Communities for Women in Academia, organised by Professor of Women and Gender and Founder of Women Space, Christina Hughes. The day consisted of learning about and discussing the numerous ways in which women experience challenges in academic spaces (particular when at the intersection of other marginalised identities relating to, for example, race, class, and ability), from family responsibilities and societal expectations to imposterism and institutional sexism. As well as, crucially, how we can work to untangle such knotty yarns.

Despite progress for women in academia, there is still a way to go. In 2024, only around 30% of professorships in the UK were held by women[i]. This number reduces significantly for women of colour: out of over 23,000 professors at British universities, only 61 identify as Black women[ii]. Women are also more likely to be on fixed-term rather than permanent contracts[iii], and working-class women are more likely to be in lower-paying academic jobs at less prestigious institutions[iv].

One portion of the day at Coventry was set aside for analysing our inner critic, and understanding how this differs from self-limiting beliefs. The former stems from internal limitations. Think of it as your inner gremlin (we were encouraged to give ours a name) who says things like, “I’m not intelligent enough”, rather than an inner cheerleader (or inner mentor, as Tara Mohr calls it[v]) telling you that “you’ve got this”. Self-limiting beliefs, on the other hand, stem from, for example, external stereotypes such as ‘men are better leaders’, which we may believe are validated by the fact that more men hold leadership positions, and they have been doing it longer, so it must be natural for ‘masculine’ qualities to be more beneficial in this arena.

As well as gender, intersections with race, class, and ability cannot be ignored. My parents come from traditional Northern working-class backgrounds and, although I grew up with economic capital they did not, going to university as a first-generation student was a shock due to a lack of social and cultural capital. What’s more, understanding this experience took years, as the ‘hidden curriculum’ of higher education was not made explicit and I didn’t have the theory to make sense of, or the language to explain, how I felt. Thankfully, I have since come across people who provide this language, such as Carolyn Steedman who wrote eloquently in 1986 about her experience straddling class lines in Landscape for a Good Woman: A Story of Two Women; the women being her working-class mother from Lancashire and herself as an academic in London. In the book, she vividly describes meeting a woman at a networking event and having the realisation that, 100 years ago, she’d have been cleaning the woman’s shoes. Likewise, Pat Mahony and Christine Zmroczek’s 1997 edited collection of essays – Class Matters: Working Class Women's Perspectives On Social Class – reflected on the intersection of gender and class within academia in a powerful way, highlighting common struggles and insecurities.

Back in Coventry, the flip chart paper we had been given called to be filled, and I began to draw out how I felt these issues were interconnected, as well as how these manifestations swim in the murky waters of modern society and all its ‘isms’. (Think sexism, racism, classism, ableism, homophobia, native speakerism, and so on.) To this diagram I added the self-sabotaging ‘excuses’ we make to protect us from failure – or is it from success? – such as not having enough knowledge, or not having enough time. Whilst women notoriously have to balance the ‘triple shift’ of paid work, domestic labour, and emotional labour for their loved ones[vi], it is a bitter pill to swallow that “I don’t have time to apply for that promotion/write that article/attend that conference” may also be (subconsciously) used as a way to avoid taking the leap of faith in ourselves in the first place. It might feel bad if we are not hired, or our article is badly received. And if we are hired, or do present at that conference, we might have to step out of our comfort zone to step into our power.

With that said, societal pressures to be endlessly ‘productive’ abound, and I feel strongly that rest is a personal, political, and spiritual issue. During my doctoral degree, I had a group chat with two other women which we named “the ‘no’ committee”, as we kept having to remind one another not to take on yet another project we didn’t have time for because we felt we ‘had’ to.[1] You can see our predicament.

Cristina pointed out that, as scholars, we like to categorise things neatly into boxes. This, however, negates the reality of life that is messy, non-linear, and entangled. Unpacking our beliefs and decision-making can be a challenging process. Add to internal challenges the debate around the neoliberalisation of higher education as learning becomes more marketised[vii]. This, combined with the fact that institutions are doling out redundancies as a Brexit-inspired loss of international students saw a loss of their revenue[viii], means that deciding whether to enter or stay in academia is a decision not to be taken lightly, regardless of gender.

Someone in my group joked that I had created a framework and that needed publishing. My immediate reaction was “it’s just some scribbles” then, after encouragement from others, I joked I “didn’t have time.” I caught myself (ironically or fittingly?) reflecting both feelings of imposterism and an ‘excuse’ I had just discussed. It is true that I am ‘busy’, but ‘not having time’ can also be reframed into: “I choose not to prioritise this.” Whilst this reframing can be utilised positively if you align these choices with your values, it may also be used to protect from rejection, as it’s easier or less painful not to try than to try and fail.

So what can we do with this complex entanglement? Moving forward, it is important to work on ourselves and our own beliefs and inner dialogue, whilst building networks of both formal and informal support. Engaging in critical dialogue with others, holding to account people in positions of power, and challenging institutional barriers that continue to see gender pay gaps and less women in leadership roles, particularly women from minoritised backgrounds is also vital. As proclaimed by second-wave feminists of the 1960s, the personal is political, and in academia it is no exception.

Ally Victoria Shepherd
Educator | Researcher | Writer | alisonvictoria.co.uk

[1] The Nap Ministry has excellent resources on rest as a decolonial and anti-capitalist act of resistance.

[i] Equality in higher education: staff statistical report 2024 | Advance HE

[ii] 100 Black Women Professors NOW | Equality, Diversity and Inclusion | University of Exeter

[iii] Academic staff study shows increase in short term contracts | Higher education | The Guardian

[iv] For Working-Class Academics — Crooked Timber

[v] Mohr, T. (2o15) Playing Big: For Women Who Want to Speak Up, Stand Out and Lead, Arrow.

[vi] Duncombe, J., & Marsden, D. (1995). ‘Workaholics’ and ‘Whingeing Women’: Theorising Intimacy and Emotion Work — The Last Frontier of Gender Inequality? The Sociological Review, 43(1), 150-169.

[vii] https://www.hepi.ac.uk/2023/12/07/neoliberal-or-not-english-higher-education-in-recent-years/

[viii] Thousands more university jobs at risk, union warns - BBC News