I would like to center this week's reading discussion based on the 2 posted articles "Resistance Is Not Futile" by Genevieve Erin O'Brien and "Academic symbiosis" by Wei Ming Dariotis. The first article mainly discusses the many difficulties O'Brien faces while working as an adjunct lecturer in academia as well as the evolution of his movement to support women of color in Academia. O'Brien was constantly faced with financial problems due to the low salaries provided to the adjunct lecturers by his university, and he usually has to work very long hours to ensure that he completes all his assignments on time. In another sense, O'Brien is the university is treating him like an intellectual slave. In the same article, O'Brien also talks about his desire to receive a tenure track position, but the road to tenure track seems almost impossible to him since the university administer today can typically hire three adjuncts for the price of one tenure-track faculty members, so the bar to tenure track seems almost unreachable for most adjunct lecturers like him. All of these unforeseen incidents eventually led him to create a powerful movement to support women of color in academia. While the first paper mainly discusses O'Brien's difficulties, the second paper takes a general leap back and chooses to focus on the competitivity and the hierarchical nature of academia and suggested a new system called academia symbiosis that helps alleviate and attenuates some of these negative aspects of academia. The author of this paper sees that individual success is favored heavily in the current academic system due to its competitive nature and faculties often use their power to bully and jeopardize other people in academia because they are in fear of losing their status. Therefore, she hopes that academia symbiosis will bring a change to the current deprived academia and by embracing companionship we can bring changes to this system and makes everyone in academia feels welcomed and valued disregard of their status and believes.
Photo:
Image citation:
“Hardship and financial difficulties.” Guides & cases, Banking Ombudsman Scheme, https://bankomb.org.nz/guides-and-cases/quick-guides/lending/hardship-and-financial-difficulty/.
No comments:
Post a Comment