Prelims

Half Title Page

The Intersections of a Working-Class Academic Identity

Series Page

PRAISE FOR THE INTERSECTIONS OF A WORKING-CLASS ACADEMIC IDENTITY

A hugely important book, which deserves to be read not only by academics, whatever their class, but also all universities, who desperately need to update their policies to encompass central issues of class. Based on research with working-class academics at a wide range of university types, the book is erudite and offers a very significant contribution to the field. Everyone should read the research participants’ own proposals for university change – what a wonderful change to present policies and practices they would make! Bring them on!

Professor Valerie Walkerdine, Cardiff University

This rich and thought-provoking book provides a powerful rejoinder to deficit models of social mobility and underlines the profound wealth of knowledge and experience that working-class academics bring to the academy.

Professor Sam Friedman, London School of Economics

Title Page

The Intersections of a Working-Class Academic Identity: A Class Apart

BY

TERESA CREW

Bangor University, UK

United Kingdom – North America – Japan – India – Malaysia – China

Copyright Page

Emerald Publishing Limited

Emerald Publishing, Floor 5, Northspring, 21-23 Wellington Street, Leeds LS1 4DL.

First edition 2024

Copyright © Teresa Crew 2024.

Published by Emerald Publishing Limited.

This work is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this work (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this licence may be seen at http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode

An electronic version of this book is freely available, thanks to the support of libraries working with Knowledge Unlatched. KU is a collaborative initiative designed to make high quality books Open Access for the public good. More information about the initiative and links to the Open Access version can be found at www.knowledgeunlatched.org

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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978-1-83753-121-9 (Print)

ISBN: 978-1-83753-118-9 (Online)

ISBN: 978-1-83753-120-2 (Epub)

Corrigendum:

It has come to the attention of the publisher that the chapter: Crew, T. (2024), “The Complex Question of Definition”, The Intersections of a Working-Class Academic Identity: A Class Apart, Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 9-32. https://doi.org/10.1108/978-1-83753-118-920241004, mistakenly incorrectly interpreted the disability status data presented in Table 1. Within the second paragraph on page 28, the sentence regarding the disability status of working-class academics reflected the error in interpretation. The sentence should read as follows:

“The reported disability rates among WCAs varied widely, ranging from 5.6% to 19.0%. While this range is substantial, it's important to note that the small sample size of WCAs in the statistics limits our ability to determine whether these differences are statistically significant or representative of the broader WCA population.”

The author sincerely apologises for any inconvenience caused.

Dedication

To my Daughters, Jade and Zoe, my pride and joy, and part of the next generation of working-class women in academia. Love Always xx

To Nick, Thank You for everything, even more so recently. Love Always. xx

Contents

List of Figures and Tables

Acknowledgements

First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to the team at Emerald who have been so supportive and helped this book become a reality.

I would also like to extend my sincere thanks to my peer reviewers for their supportive comments. Their insights have been invaluable to me.

Thank you to Professor Valerie Walkerdine, Professor Diane Reay, and Professor Valerie Hey for their inspirational scholarship.

Thank you to Professor Sam Freidman and Dr Daniel Laurison for documenting the ‘Class Ceiling’, illuminating an area so long ignored in academia.

Thank you to Professor Tara Yosso for her wonderful work who has managed to provide an alternative lens in which to view marginalised groups.

Thank you to my colleagues at Bangor University, and people I have met along the way at various working-class academic events. Your support recently has not gone unnoticed!

Thank you as always to my students, past and present, who inspire and teach me some new every day.

Finally, this book would not have been possible without my research respondents. I’ve met wonderful people along the way who have reminded me just how much we offer to academia.