Deal-making and rule-breaking: behind the facade of equity in academia

Title
Deal-making and rule-breaking: behind the facade of equity in academia
Publication Date
2005
Author(s)
Kjeldal, S
Rindfleish, JM
Sheridan, AJ
( author )
OrcID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9342-4931
Email: asherida@une.edu.au
UNE Id une-id:asherida
Type of document
Journal Article
Language
en
Entity Type
Publication
Publisher
Routledge
Place of publication
Oxford, United Kingdom
DOI
10.1080/09540250500145130
UNE publication id
une:104
Abstract
A glass ceiling for women still exists in academia after two decades of equal employment opportunity (EEO) legislation in Australia. There are complex factors that when combined make gender inequity in the higher education sector highly resistant to change. Using personal histories as a reflexive device, the paper makes explicit the embedded male patterns of behaviour in academia that operate beneath the facade of policies and rules put into place to counter inequity. In particular, the paper focuses on the cognitive dissonance individuals experience due to the disparity between formal organizational policies promoting equity, such as workload allocations, and perceptions of the unequal opportunities for women and men. Using social identity theory and the leader member exchange (LMX) framework, the daily experiences of three academic women are interpreted, the impediments to equality identified, and suggestions made for more fundamental change to gendered organizational structures within academia. The analysis of such behaviours shows that the traditional emphasis of EEO legislation on formal policies and procedures to bring about genderequity in academia needs to be accompanied by cultural change programs that make explicit and challenge behaviours that reproduce and reinforce male hegemony in academia.
Link
Citation
Gender and Education, 17(4), p. 431-447
ISSN
0954-0253
Start page
431
End page
447

Files:

NameSizeformatDescriptionLink