Feminist Responses to the Neoliberalization of the University: From Surviving to Thriving

The contributors in this collection argue neoliberal discourses are prevalent in higher education and seek to undermine, commodify, and co-opt the radical, transformative work that many gender and women’s studies departments, programs, and centers are doing. The contributors discuss the ways in which they respond to these challenges in and out of the classrooms: from mentorship and activism to active allyship, experimental pedagogies, and applying feminist theory. The contributors propose a new wave of feminist consciousness raising, new tools for engaged teaching and activism, new visions of self-care models, slow research and scholarship, unionization, and new advice for leaving tenured or tenure-track positions that serves as doorways to new understandings of productivity and creativity.