April 22, 2004
Children and the academy
There have been a series of posts lately on the singles/parents divide between academics and related issues. Don't have time now to do more than list them as I am getting my kid ready for his first dentist appointment in about an hour. (Sorry, gotta go; continue without me.)
A little while ago Netwoman noted the difficulties of being a woman with children on the job search in her post about "The Mommy Candidate" in The Chronicle of Higher Education.
Today, The Little Professor notes two other articles in The Chronicle: "Unmarried professors are outsiders in the Ozzie and Harriet world of academe" (huh?), and "Singing the Grad-School Baby Blues."
Laura at Apt. 11 D cites those same articles in a long and thoughtful post on the subject (with good links to the ongoing discussion in other blogs).
And, see this earlier post.
Update (5:16pm): Back from the dentist. The Jinker boy was a little prince. Chuck has an excellent post on the question of singles vs. marrieds in which he makes the crucial point that it is the competitive job market that is really at issue here, and is in effect turning us against ourselves. I heartily agree. There are some practically feudal aspects to the ways in which our profession is organized that affect all of us, no matter what our family status.
Update (23/4/04): the conversation continues at Apt. 11 D and Moment, Linger On.
Update (23/4/04): Brayden King adds his two cents, and concludes, "all workplaces need to do a better job of making room for the family." Samantha Blackmon is shut down when she takes issue with the idea of single people as "the last underrepresented minority on campus." And Liliputian Lilith reminds us of the impermanence of categories.
Scribbled at April 22, 2004 09:51 AM AST | Hmmm? (2) | TrackBack (3) | Link Cosmos | More? academe, gender/sexuality, parenthoodI don't take issue with "the idea of single people as an 'underrepresented minority on campus.'" so much as I take issue with the fact that the article called single people the LAST underrepresented minority on campus. The claim to minority status (and all of its implications) is a slippery slope and one would hope that one who writes an article for CHE which represents and informs those in the academy.
Scribbled by Samantha Blackmon at April 28, 2004 07:13 PM | PermalinkI'm sorry if I misrepresented your words; perhaps I was projecting my own annoyance at the idea of single people as any kind of minority. I have changed the entry to reflect your correction.
Scribbled by mj at April 28, 2004 08:05 PM | Permalinkhttp://webteam.unb.ca/cgi-bin/MT-2.21/mt-tb.cgi/488
Here's what others have to say about Children and the academy:
» The Single Guy from the chutry experiment
Thoughful posts all around about the recent Chronicle articles on the single/parents divide in the profession. The two most prominent articles, "Singular Mistreatment: Unmarried professors are outsiders in the Ozzie and Harriet world of academe" and "S......[read more]
Tracked: April 22, 2004 02:01 PM
» Parent/single wars from Brayden King
To have children or not to have children? A series of posts have emerged (see here, here, here and here) in the domestic-academic blogosphere (a highly specialized niche, I’d say) discussing, as Laura calls it, the “single/parent wars”......[read more]
Tracked: April 23, 2004 03:28 PM
» "The Last Underrepresented Minority" from the chutry experiment
Here's something I overlooked in my original entry on the Chronicle's articles on the "Single vs. Married wars" One of the interviewees Alice Bach, a profesor at Case Western University called singles "the last underrepresented minority." I remember fi......[read more]
Tracked: April 24, 2004 02:24 PM