Thread by @womaninacademia

There is one more thing I wanted to say before I go..
I haven't elaborated here on my field, uni, or my position (cos I wanted anonymity).
But there's something to be said about precarity before I go.

My specialism is small.
I reckon there's about 25-30 lecturer/prof posts in it worldwide.
Those jobs are the only permanent posts.
The other option is longterm precarity (@ThePrecariat)

My work is also interdisciplinary.
Which everyone loves at graduate research level and on a grant app, but is a disadvantage in the job search.
Jobs sit within disciplines & disciplines discipline (phrase via @ZoeSTodd)

I've been quite successful at the grant, researh fellow thing.
Ten years of work, all on grants I pulled in (despite the fact in the UK you can only apply to a handful of places if you aren't employed permamently by a uni - a joyous Catch-22).

There were gaps of course.
And always applying for the next thing, and never being able to follow the work right through cos you needed to shape things in order to get grants, rather than follow research.
And constant anxiety. Constant.

And there was no maternity package the second time with the second pregnancy because I only had 3 months left on my grant when I had ot take ML & the uni requires you work for 52 wks after ML to get the package.
And that was twins. So it nearly broke us financially again.

So, just once more for those at the back who misses it:
I only hung on so long, because of family support, because my partner had permanent work, because of my privilege.

That privilege enabled me to do all the extra free labour you do when you're precarious.
I taught entire courses, supervised grad students, PhDs, developed a MOOC, helped design a new UG course... for free.
But ultimately all that free labour changed nothing.

It became expected.
I think (I hope) colleagues assumed I had another income or was fully waged, if they thought about it at all.
I know when I quit, my HoD was angry partly cos she thought I was walking out on a project. She had no idea my contract ended 6wks before.

My leaving was ugly. When I stopped saying yes, people reacted badly.
My HoD got personal in her anger.
And I realised a few things.

Precarity - the long time researcher - is gendered too.
I was titled Senior Research Fellow, but always positioned as less, expected to say yes politely to unpaid labour, never to speak up as an equal or rock the boat.
I was expected to perform polite gratefulness

I was expected to perform the grateful grad student role - with all the smiling free labour - I tried to protect my grad students from.

My partner is fulltime in a diff discipline.
Some of my colleagues made it clear my work (& my need for a wage) must be less serious than his.
I was a wife indulged to some of them.

The short version (cos I've gone on longer than I intended) is that my gender, marital status, motherhood all played a significant role in my experience of precarity.
But it was also my other privileges (incl. of family & marital status) that enabled me to carry on for so long.

Shorter version:
I'm in fucking awe of those without my supporting set of privilege (white, cishet, middle-class etc) who survives - and thrive - in it.

*Apologies for all the typos. I just a bit bloody knackered right now.