The self‐managed heart: teaching gender and doing emotional labour in a higher education institution

Abstract

It is considered good pedagogical practice for undergraduate social science students to reflexively use their real‐life experiences to illustrate concepts and theories, especially in relation to themes of social inequality and power. When teaching gender and sexuality, this can become problematic because of the emotional topics involved such as rape, domestic violence and pornography. Inevitably some female students will have experienced sexual assault or domestic violence, whilst male students may feel uncomfortable and somehow to ‘blame’ when discussing topics such as rape and pornography. This article draws upon my experience of teaching gender and sexuality, where female students and some male students have made painful and emotional disclosures. I highlight the ways in which the relationship between lecturer and student changes, how boundaries are challenged, and how the learning journey becomes an emotional journey where the desire to help students takes precedence over the pedagogical role. The work of Hochschild is used to argue that teaching gender involves ‘emotional labour’ that is self‐managed and invisible in institutional terms. Finally, I consider how lecturers might cope with emotional labour and maintain boundaries between the personal and the pedagogic within the new academic workplace.

Keywords:

• emotional labour
• gender
• stories
• boundaries
• pedagogical

Acknowledgements

My grateful thanks to Paul Watt for suggesting that I write this paper and for his helpful advice. I would also like to thank the two anonymous referees for their constructive comments.

Notes

1. Since 2000, TRAC has been the standard methodology used by the 165 higher education institutions in the UK for costing their main activities (Teaching, Research And other Core activity). Academics are required to complete an annual survey showing how they have spent their time for one allocated week according to the three activities above.