Conference Agenda

This session will use an autoethnographic narrative to showcase how white women willfully colonize academic spaces such as classes, institutional resources, research and service opportunities in higher education. The idea of white women as Ms. Ann in the notorious Jim Crow era in the United States has not ended, but just shifted to identical roles in similar spaces. From the “White Woman’s Burden” to purposeful roles as a class traitor with a white fragility complex, this session will explore an embellished version of events witnessed in academia, where the never ending tide of neocolonization of higher education by white women unrelentingly dominates the role, identity, and place of women of color . Over the period of ten years, autoethnographic data such as conversations, events, emails, class periods, publications, and presentations have been collected and systematically evaluated to determine the roles of power between the white women and the women of color. Qualitative research methodology was used to analyze the data to create a narrative of thick description capturing the patterns of behavior of the army of Ms. Ann’s found within academic settings. The session will be presented as a combination of prose and storytelling and will include time for questions and feedback from the audience, as well as provide a community environment for solidarity and suggestions for coping, action and nonaction.

Social constructionist epistemological approaches call for a critical appraisal of academic knowledge and for a critical investigation of academic practices. However, often, beliefs circulating in academic discourse as academic knowledge remain unchallenged and are being considered as given truths. Social epistemology has argued that it is via community practices, like publication processes, that such beliefs acquire the status of true beliefs and calls for an investigation of such processes. In this presentation we use the case of a widespread belief about critical literacy origins as an example to illustrate how a social epistemological discourse analysis (SEDA), a kind of qualitative inquiry, can facilitate the challenging of academic knowledge and the disruption of certainties in academic discourse. SEDA is an approach we are currently developing, which brings together social epistemology and discourse analysis. For example, we suggest that the discourse analytic notion of intertextuality, that is the exploration of how texts relate to each other, can facilitate the examination of how academic knowledge gets constructed within the system of academic publications. Critical literacy (CL) is a very popular approach in fields like critical pedagogy, emphasizing the interconnectedness of power, ideologies and literacy practices. A wide-spread idea is that CL originates in Paulo Freire’s work. In this presentation, we challenge such an idea by reporting our intertextual analysis of published, conceptualizing texts about critical literacy, that is analysis of their interrelations. Our analysis suggests a fluid conceptualization and beginning of CL not necessarily associated with Freire. We conclude by advocating for subjecting widely entrenched academic beliefs and academic discourse to scrutiny as a prerequisite for a critically informed praxis.

In recent years, higher education institutions in the UK have widely espoused the language of disability inclusion. However, the fundamental logic of the university remains founded on elitist and exclusionary principles. In this paper, we mobilise the figure of the parasite (Serres, 2007) to explore the complex micro-politics of being a worker with investments in anti-ableism, situated within, against and beyond (Bell & Pahl, 2018; Lather, 1991) the contemporary neoliberal-ableist university (Goodley, 2018; 2024). In Serres’s account, the parasite takes up a somewhat ambivalent relationship with its host; sometimes benefitting from its power, sometimes syphoning resources out, and sometimes more directly disrupting and opposing hegemonic power from within. We will theorise different possible parasitical relations to the university, before drawing on our experiences of the two year, university-wide Wellcome Anti-Ableist Research Culture (WAARC) project, to illustrate how these may unfold in practice. Whilst both academic leadership and professional services work is often – albeit in different ways – assumed to involve complicity in neoliberal practices of academic governance and control, we surface examples of resistance which often involve bending, avoiding or disrupting ableist organisational logics. In this paper, semi-fictionalised creative writing allows us to explore the relational politics of anti-ableist working practices, without revealing sensitive details. Through critical reflection and analysis, we will highlight the tensions and creativity involved in attempted academic anti-ableism, whether they change these logics on a grand and enduring scale, or whether they are small and fleeting.

This autoethnographic study examines the complex negotiation of professional and personal identity through the lens of a U.S.-based academic navigating a transnational research collaboration, against the back drop of rising political uncertainty. Centered on the lived experience of a mother and scholar participating in an academic collaboration in Ireland, the work explores the emotional, ethical, and embodied labor of working and parenting during a time of rising political instability in the United States.

Drawing from personal vignettes and narrative reflections composed over a six-month period (January–July 2025), the research engages with themes of transnational belonging, fear, identity, and the moral tensions of professional mobility in turbulent times. The methodological approach used draws on autoethnographic traditions that center memory, relationality, and embodied experience as core sites of knowledge production. Vignettes were crafted from field notes, journal entries, memory and personal recordings, and analyzed thematically through iterative cycles of reflection, synthesis, and relational meaning-making. The analytic process foregrounds affective resonance, social context, and narrative clarity, inviting readers into an exploration of identity that is both deeply personal and socially situated.

Emerging from this work are interrelated themes of relationality, moral anxiety and identity rupture and reconstruction. Findings point to the embodied tensions between care labor and academic labor and presence and absence, in a globalized higher education environment. Experiences of parenting while abroad are placed in direct conversation with political realities at home, including safety concerns and growing authoritarianism. These tensions reveal both the emotional demands and ethical strain of cross-border work in politically volatile times.

By weaving personal narrative with scholarly inquiry, this autoethnography offers insight into how international collaboration, professional identity, and parenting intersect in complex, sometimes contradictory ways. It calls for a more human-centered and ethically attuned understanding of working, parenting, and living through political upheaval.

This autoethnographic article explores my journey as an adult educator navigating the often-stressful landscape of traditional positivistic scholarship within academia. Through a series of arts-based research (ABR) engagements, including poetic inquiry, I examine how these creative practices provided a cathartic space for personal and professional growth, challenging the dominant epistemic norms that often constrain academic identity. I delve into the emotional labor involved in reconciling my pedagogical philosophy with institutional pressures, revealing how ABR fostered a deeper understanding of my role as a researcher and teacher. Findings illuminate the transformative power of ABR in cultivating resilience, fostering critical reflexivity, and offering a more holistic approach to scholarly inquiry that prioritizes well-being and authentic expression. This work argues for the integration of ABR as a vital methodology for adult educators seeking to reclaim agency and cultivate sustainable scholarly practices beyond the confines of conventional academic expectations.