(Re)Birthing the Academy: Unruly Daughters Striving for Feminist Futures

Abstract

In this chapter, the authors argue for the (re)birthing of the academy in ways that would support academic women in their responsibilities for the care of others. They explore how the two institutions of the university and motherhood have been constructed without reference to women/mothers. They then fast forward to the present where women and mothers are present within academe. This sets the scene for four vignettes of the kinds of university the authors, as feminist academics, dream of giving birth to: a university that is more human, more interconnected in time and space, more organic, more family-friendly. By bringing their children and grandchildren into their workspaces, normalising motherhood within academic life, and challenging dominant discriminatory practices, they begin to live this future university.