Page 103 - Through the gate of the neoliberal academy • Herschberg

someone who stops work on a Thursday, with an experiment that lasts three days; she’s going to start work normally on the Monday, and then after Wednesday, she’s not going to be able to do anything else, even if she’s paid until Thursday evening! (CH, STEM, M)
This respondent also refers to the “competitive” context in which (early-career) researchers operate. Furthermore, he argues that part time work “just doesn’t fit in with the way work is organised” and thus connects full time availability with the nature of academic work. He also states that a four-day workweek, an 80% appointment, will in practice lead to “at least 50%” productivity reduction and then further elaborates on his conviction that experiments cannot be done when working part time. We learn from this that excellence and part time work are decoupled, as full time availability is the norm.
Our results corroborate earlier studies on the evaluation of academics who are also parents (Cech & Blair-Loy, 2014; Herschberg, Vinkenburg, Bleijenbergh, & Van Engen, 2014). Our study shows that most committee members across the countries problematize parenthood for mothers but not for fathers. They reproduce the cultural expectation of women as main caregivers. Even though “the lived experiences of both men and women in academia may no longer match the ideal academic norm of having no care obligations” (Herschberg et al., 2014, p. 205) our findings show that still women researchers are predominantly expected to have care responsibilities. Research participants do not take into account that young men may face the same obstacles whilst being fathers, or that not every woman is or will be a mother. Two decades ago Bagilhole (1993) already stated that “the academic profession as it stands does not appear to accept married women with children” (p. 272). This study shows that bias against women with children still holds, but that women without children suffer from this bias too. The image of women as mothers who are involved in caring for their children is problematic as committee members imply that this creates a lack of commitment to the profession (cf. Grummell, Devine, & Lynch, 2009). This adds to the precariousness of women early-career researchers as it evokes expectations that women are less suitable for assistant professor positions.
International mobility. A third specific gender practice we identified in the data is the gendered construction of the criterion of international mobility. Before explaining the gender practice inherent in the criterion of international mobility we will first briefly illustrate how the criterion is defined and how it is applied in selection procedures.
THE PERIL OF POTENTIAL 101
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