Loaded dice: games playing and the gendered barriers of the academy

ABSTRACT

This paper explores the perceptions and experiences of women academics in the UK, participating in a small-scale qualitative study exploring career progression and encountered institutional obstacles. The accounts are considered in terms of both disadvantageous institutional strategies and interpersonal ones governing day-to-day working relationships. The findings contribute to a growing body of international research on gender constructions in the academy, where both inhibiting and exclusionary barriers are examined in focus group discussions (FGDs) in terms of gendered constructions that are perceived to impact upon the career opportunities of women academics. Analysis of data encouraged the employment of a ludic construction in this critical exploration of games playing and ‘gamesmanship’ (a masculinised term); these being themes raised in the FGDs as representing blocks and challenges to women’s academic careers.

KEYWORDS:

• Women academics
• careers
• gender
• ludic
• barriers

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Professor Sara Ashencaen Crabtree is Professor of Social & Cultural Diversity in the Department of Social Sciences & Social Work, Faculty of Health & Social Sciences at Bournemouth University, UK.

Professor Chris Shiel is Professor in the Department of Life and Environmental Science, Faculty of Science & Technology within the same institution.

ORCID

Sara Ashencaen Crabtree http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8479-7066

Additional information

Funding

We would like to acknowledge Bournemouth University for awarding the authors the research funding that enabled this study to be undertaken.