Can I succeed as a working-class academic?

So the answer it yes. Congratulations. We could all have avoided an extended whinge of woe-is-me if this had been printed at the top of the article: "Since this article was submitted and edited, the author has received and accepted a fixed-term job offer from another institution." Turns out class is not a barrier to securing full time academic employment.

I am a female academic from a working class background, and although both these traits have disadvantaged me at times, I have nevertheless found a secure academic post early in my career (after one two-year fixed term post) and progressed to a professorship. Where I did have an advantage over the author of this article is that I managed to go to university from school -- and I wonder if that helped me to overcome 'imposter syndrome' earlier -- and perhaps also meant I did not have to deal with ageism (or racism) as well as sexism and class discrimination (though when I interviewed for a university bursary for Master's study aged 25 I was told that I was 'not getting any younger').

The bulk of the article isn't about any sort of mistreatment, but rather about financial challenges that most 'middle class' (*not* the same as 'wealthy') academics face, and the author's various inferiority complexes. Diddums...

Following the timeline of the writer's thread it would seem they are in their early Sixties. ( Started a masters and then PhD in early 5Os). Then they imply having subsequently been on a variety of contracts for around 10 years. Rightly or wrongly, its hardly surprising they struggle to establish an academic career at an age when many others have long been retired off (and not always voluntarily). Indeed sounds like they have done remarkably well for someone starting out in academe in later life. Or have I got the timeline wrong?

Life can be tough. Whining about it gets you nowhere, though. After working full-time all my life, I had a period of unemployment from 2009 to 2014, with only a couple of low paid part-time temporary contracts, nearly lost my home, yada yada... but now have slithered into academia, have embarked on a part-time PhD alongside a full-time job, and am respected by colleagues and students alike... at the grand old age of 59! (Oh, and I do have imposter syndrome...) But when things are going wrong for you it is all too easy to blame others, to emit shrill yells of "If they weren't ageist/racist/classist/sexist/whateverist I would have been the one appointed". It's more comfortable than looking long and hard at yourself and figuring out how to maximise your own chances, make yourself into the candidate they just have to appoint.

why has the THE combined these two articles. One talks about the genuine experience of working class academics. The other writes about "deficits in their social bridging and networking". We are NOT deficienct, we may lack the network opportunities of colleagues but that is not a personal attribute it is a product of social structure and claiming that universities exist to remedy or compensate this defincicny further stigmatises working class students by creating a false "normal" to which they should aspire.

There's something that makes my hackles rise the more I read the articles and comments here, and it pretty much explains a lot of the experience of the first contributor. Lots of the discussion of being "working-class" paints a picture of "otherness", and a sense that somehow it is to be worn like some kind of badge of shame. It's instructive that the second piece talks about Bourdieu's suggestion of "a deficiency of cultural and social bridging capital". So let's lay it out. I am from the working class. And worse (heaven forfend!) I'm northern, to boot. I've worked in HE for around 20 years now, in both academic and professional roles. I'm not proud of where I'm from, but I'm not ashamed of it either, it is simply part of who and what I am. I grew up in a stable environment and made something of the chances that came my way. Some of that is about me, some is just plain luck. And yes, in some places you have to fight against entrenched snobbery and a sense of privilege. But it it were not about those things, it would be about something else, because that's what some people are like: they like to play games and mark territory, usually because of some underlying deficiency on their part, not mine. To rathet pretentiously steal from Derrida, context is all. The social and cutural networks in the academy are highly contextual, and there are institutions and disciplines where the context is different. The fact is, if you are not form a particular milieu, there are some networks where you will simply not fit, and that fit is not always about class. But sometimes it is. But that is the case outside the academy too. But what rankles is that in some quarters we're beginning to see a fetishisation and ghettoisation of being "working-class", and the inevitable wringing of hands. Perhaps if some people stopped talking about social mobility as the one way process it has become (how many Old Etonians slum it on the checkout at Tesco, eh? Jarvis Cocker pretty much nailed that one backin in the 90s), and stopped looking at being working class as some kind of afflication that must be treated, then we wouldn't get into these tangles. BUt I don't see that happening anytime soon, I'm afraid.

The experiences highlighted in the article ring true for many academics from working-class backgrounds. Classism is real. The biggest shock for me as a working-class person starting out in academia was the culture of individualism - I was used to people helping each other out at work! The presence of working-class academics can be a threat to middle-class colleagues when we start to change the culture and encourage collectivism (of course, we need secure jobs to be able to do so, and those of us who do now have continuing positions have a responsibility to support those who do not). Solidarity with the author and my fellow working-class academics around the world.

Very self indulgent piece. And what does being working class have to do with the admittedly difficult nature of the academic job market?

I sympathise with the first contributor, and although I agree with others here that academia is a tough career choice and difficult to enter, she has suffered a triple whammy of class, gender and age bias. My experience of working as an academic for several years in the UK is that class affects everything. The contributor's working class background has affected her educational opportunities and job choices. Her gender has then likely played a role in the direction she has taken in ensuing years. By the time the contributor has been awarded her PhD, published academic papers etc, her age has become a factor when applying for full-time academic positions. I am currently a professor in Australia and have sat on many job selection panels. Ageism plays a strong role in ranking applicants although no-one would ever say so openly. The situation is exacerbated here by the absence of a mandatory retirement age here.

I am shocked by some of these comments - 'whining', 'whingeing', 'self indulgence' and even 'diddums' in response to someone speaking their truth about oppression. Do the people who wrote these comments really think that this is a decent and humane response? I am surprised THE has allowed the publication of these nasty comments given that this woman lost her voice for years due to the trauma of the situation. However, they do illustrate the point that she makes - the lack of understanding of classism and the cruelty among some academics. This woman is not asking for pity - she is asking for justice. She outlines the policy that needs to change and she explains why it should change by giving an insight into the problems that working-class people can face. She then wants to set up a network to help others (and herself) - she should be admired for her courage, determination and resilience, not bullied as these comments seem to do. I suspect she has touched a nerve - is this middle class fragility showing its ugly face?

This links in with another article the THE did not so long ago. "an academic career arguably remains as remote an aspiration as it has ever been for working-class academics. That is because even if, against all the odds, they excel at school and – perhaps via a widening participation initiative – find their way to a top university, they must still negotiate an alien, emphatically middle-class cultural setting, not to mention sustain themselves during the various periods of low or no income that early career academics typically have to endure." This article talks about the often invisible barriers that working class academics have to face. https://www.timeshighereducation.com/features/being-working-class-academy

I'd say call out the academic who "[called you] various names and denigrat[ed your] Romany Gypsy heritage" as the bigot he is - shameful. Now you've secured another post, circulate those e-mails he sent . . . .

To the article’s author — I am so sorry about what you went through. Shame on the above commentators who accuse you of whining — how morally reprehensible. The lack of empathy among those posters is thoroughly pathetic. The author is right that the academic job market is often not about merit or ability. It is a nepotistic system in which academics hire their friends and people they know. Yes, meritocratic hiring does happen sometimes — but in my department most of the people hired for lectureships have been friends of people on the panel, their PhD students or people they used to work with. I have seen it happen in nearly all cases of hiring for various jobs from lecturer to professor. Getting hired for a postdoc is even more nepotistic and my advice to people applying for post docs and finding a lot of rejection is also apply for permanent lectureships. With many academic jobs, in manh cases, the job ad is mere tick-boxing to satisfy laws about equal opportunities. In reality they often already know who they want to hire and the other candidates are just there to give the impression of a fair selection process. The nepotism is, I think, class or other demographics and also about more basic friendship networks. It is possible for new academics without influential networks to get hired in subjects where supply is low (such as a very niche field). Otherwise when there are 100+ applicants for jobs the unknown hardly have a chance. They will look at who you know through your co-authors, etc. I just want the article’s author to know it is not their fault that academic hiring is corrupt and unfair. Take no notice of the appalling commentators showing you no empathy.

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The anonymous academic (finally having a decent career offer), is right that being working class can be a hinderance to moving forward with one's education and career. However, she is hardly working class, I would have thought, owning a house of her own in a university city, and somehow managing to pay the mortgage and keep up the repairs. At some point, a person in academia leaves "working class" behind and becomes a member of the elite (or privileged if elite isn't the right description for all academics). Another matter of importance that I would like to mention here is age - the difficulties associated with even having a career when one starts off later in life. Putting family on the back burner, disregarding the criticism that comes from members of younger generations in particular, and having grown up and gone through marriage with a different set of values than either younger students or older students who have had a career are just a few of the challenges such students face. Here's one article, from CBC in Canada, that tells some of the success stories, which to me suggest that if the older student is good enough or wants it bad enough they will succeed. But as the story of anonymous suggests, about working class, being determined and having a relevant research topic one is passionate about doesn't always help: Aren't you too old for that? The late life plunge into a PhD https://www.cbc.ca/radio/thesundayedition/the-sunday-edition-october-14-2018-1.4858401/aren-t-you-too-old-for-that-the-late-life-plunge-into-a-phd-1.4858402

Sometimes we come across of whingers just because we have managed to stick around for so long that we accumulate long lists of injustices. I too have been on fixed-term contracts for over a decade, with periods of unemployment. I have watched people who have achieved less than me obtain posts quickly because they are friends or proteges of senior staff. I know that my social class is an issue, because it is regularly commented on by one senior member of staff in particular. It is very hard to sit in yearly staff evaluations knowing that I have achieved more than anyone else in my department in terms of research funding, publications and impact and listen to them make up reasons why I am not suitable for a permanent position. One bit of advice if this is happening to you - go to the Union.