Birch, K.

Bond, S.

Catungal, J.P.

Harris, T.

Hoogeveen, D.

Laliberte, N.

Rosol, M.

English

International Migration, Integration and Social Cohesion online publications

UvA-DARE is a service provided by the library of the University of Amsterdam (https://dare.uva.nl)UvA-DARE (Digital Academic Repository)'Tim-adical' action: a reply to Culum CanallyBirch, K.; Bond, S.; Catungal, J.P.; Harris, T.; Hoogeveen, D.; Laliberte, N.; Rosol, M.Publication date2012Document VersionFinal published versionLink to publicationCitation for published version (APA):Birch, K. (Author), Bond, S. (Author), Catungal, J. P. (Author), Harris, T. (Author), Hoogeveen,D. (Author), Laliberte, N. (Author), & Rosol, M. (Author). (2012). 'Tim-adical' action: a reply toCulum Canally. Web publication or website, AntipodeFoundation.org.http://radicalantipode.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/sigj2-reply-to-culum-canally.pdfGeneral rightsIt is not permitted to download or to forward/distribute the text or part of it without the consent of the author(s)and/or copyright holder(s), other than for strictly personal, individual use, unless the work is under an opencontent license (like Creative Commons).Disclaimer/Complaints regulationsIf you believe that digital publication of certain material infringes any of your rights or (privacy) interests, pleaselet the Library know, stating your reasons. In case of a legitimate complaint, the Library will make the materialinaccessible and/or remove it from the website. Please Ask the Library: https://uba.uva.nl/en/contact, or a letterto: Library of the University of Amsterdam, Secretariat, Singel 425, 1012 WP Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Youwill be contacted as soon as possible.Download date:10 Mar 2023'Tim-adical' Action: A Reply to Culum CanallyThe SIGJ2 Writing Collective¹We appreciate Culum Canally making the effort to engage with the ideas we presented in our recent Antipode intervention, 'What can we do? The challenge of being new academics in neoliberal universities'.At the start we want to emphasize that we pretty much agree with everything Culum writes in his response, especially his comment about teaching or student engagement – we hold our hands up on this one, we dropped the ball and did not discuss student solidarity movements in our call to challenge neoliberal ascendency in the academy. Perhaps one reason for this is because we were (and still are) a pretty diverse group of people, from early-ish PhD students through temporary and contractual researchers, post-docs and teaching staff to more privileged, secure and tenure-track  lecturers  and assistant  professors.  So,  some of  us  at  the  time  of  writing  did  not  have teaching  positions  and  in  fact  were  still  students  ourselves  involved  in  the  very  student movements referenced. Nevertheless, we agree with the importance of working with students and student movements. Those of us who are teaching seek to engage students politically, to raise consciousness and solidarity in reclaiming university spaces at all levels.Where we disagree with Culum is when he suggests that we should not feel insecure about our careers. These straightened times have meant that many of us (and many others beside) are very much concerned with our precarious and insecure positions in the academy (and elsewhere). It is not just a feeling nor is it “a vain effort to preserve our careers”, as Culum implies. Several of us and many others now have unpleasant experiences with departmental closures, hiring freezes, shrinking  job  opportunities,  increased  hiring-committee  expectations,  ‘restructuring’  to  mask 1dismissing faculty who do not meet ‘appropriate’ performance criteria, and so on. This concern with our careers, which could be characterized as careerism like Culum suggests, may not be radical  and  may  indeed  be  a  sign  of  timidity,  but  our  piece  was  as  much  about  offering deliberately  modest  proposals  to  illustrate  the simple  actions  we can  all  take  to  change our universities without sacrificing ourselves into the bargain.Moreover, since many of us were not (and still aren't) in tenure-stream jobs our material and immediate situations have very real implications for our ability to afford next month’s rent, to be able to feed ourselves and our children, and indeed to have a means to support ourselves as we wait to see if we will have a source of income each semester. These concerns are not simple careerism, but speak to the incredibly uneven effects of the neoliberal academy as it materially affects many who seek entry into it, especially those of us who are precariously positioned in a hierarchical system that masks inequality as merit. Culum, therefore, makes an unfair assessment that rests on an assumption that the Collective which contributed to and wrote the original piece were and are all nicely positioned academic subjects with tenure-stream jobs. Quite the contrary. With this in mind, it is deeply unfortunate that even the modest and timid actions we presented are often not taken, by radicals or ‘tim-adicals’ alike. In other words, we agree it is not a time to  “pussyfoot around”, but how we encourage even our proposed modest actions is as important as storming the walls of the neoliberal university.With all that in mind, we think that Culum's response is perhaps written at cross-purposes to our own intervention and thus can be read as more complementary rather than an outright rejection of our suggestions. Why do we think this? To start with, Culum says he does not disagree “with their [our] intentions” and that he is not “picking on the group over semantics”. But we think this is precisely what he has done when it comes to main criticisms he lays at our door. We don't  disagree  with  what  Culum identifies  as  important  issues,  critical  for  us  all  as  academics  to address,  young and old alike (for example,  solidarity).  However,  we think he has turned his critical eye on us for the wrong reasons, and here's why...Although Culum claims not to disagree with our intentions or want to nitpick over semantics, his response is largely concerned with identifying universities as structurally neoliberal, corporate 2and/or  right-wing.  These  different  terms,  which  Culum  largely  uses  interchangeably,  are important to consider. We don't disagree that universities are being neoliberalized. And by this we take  him to mean that  markets  and market  forces  like  competition  are being inserted  in university life – sometimes surreptitiously, sometimes brutally, but usually in simple, everyday ways. What Culum argues is that we need to “strike at the roots of neoliberalism in the academy” and “positively alter the structure of the institution”. This is a clear example of where we are talking at cross-purposes (an all too common occurrence on the Left it seems) in that we consider – analytically – neoliberalism to always be in a process of becoming.This  means  we  need  to  change  the  process and  not  simply  change  structures  or  strike  at particular institutional forms. In our case, we think we can change the process by highlighting how academics come to embody neoliberal values like competition and how we might overcome these values before we embody them ourselves or fight them if we do already embody them. Hence why we argue that we need to rethink our own practices and not simply focus on the (neoliberal)  structures  of  the  university.  Doing  the  latter  would  do  nothing  to  change  the increasing competition we not only face but also embody as we seek to publish, to find grants, to apply for jobs, to secure tenure, etc. We have to acknowledge that we are competing on all these fronts with each other and against each other, that some of us will come out as 'winners' in this  process precisely because some of us will 'lose'.We can’t deny that we operate within neoliberal constraints on a daily basis. For the most part,  we have sought  academic  careers  precisely because  we are passionate about  learning,  about encouraging others (students and colleagues) to learn, to be political, to create opportunities to make  change  and  envision  alternative  futures.  To  admonish  us  that  “students  shouldn’t  be ignored,  infantilised,  or  treated  as  an  encumbrance”  is  perhaps  overstating  the  point  and suggestive of an over-wrought reaction to our argument. While we recognise the opportunities academia offers, perhaps more so than many other professions, the university environment has changed significantly over the last 30 years. There is little question that the ‘academic’ is shaped and  disciplined  by neoliberal  forms  of  governmentality  –  and  this  begins  with  creating  the vulnerable early career academic subject. Our call was in part to recognise this precarity, and yet 3find ways to subvert it, to empower ourselves and to resist embodying that which we find deeply problematic.Culum  commends  us  on  our  intent  and  our  passive  resistance  to  the  “tyranny  of ‘standardisation’”  –  our  second  point.  Yet  he  ultimately  condemns  us  for  recognising  the material effects of “how the neoliberal discourse limits […] acceptable actions” and “tempers the actions and thoughts of aspiring radical academics”. It comes back to the question of what is acceptable  action  –  not  acceptable  to  the  variously  neoliberal  institutions  in  which  we  find ourselves in everyday struggle, but acceptable to us as emerging academic subjects shaped by and disciplined by these structures, but who nevertheless seek to contest and subvert them. Are we fearful? Perhaps, but our intervention is not motivated by fear; it’s motivated by a material recognition of the increasingly constrained spaces in which new academics work and the need for solidarity and action, however small. If we were too shy we would not be seeking to contest the shaping effects of neoliberalization at all. The tone of Culum’s critique does not do much to demonstrate  the  kind  of  solidarity  we  seek and  perhaps  falls  back  into  debates  on  what  is ‘radical’ which have been thrashed out amongst leftist geographers for some time. We do not want to perpetuate this debate here, but would argue that what is considered radical shifts its terms  of  reference;  that  there  are  many  ways  to  be  radical.  Whether  radical  or  not,  the suggestions  we  made  are  efforts  to  subvert  neoliberalism's  hold  on  us  as  new  researchers, teachers,  and fully  engaged,  politicised  scholars.  They are  meant  to  encourage  others  to  do likewise  in  solidarity  and  while  cognisant  of  the  variety  of  precarious  situations  we  find ourselves in.Endnote¹ The following people contributed directly to the writing of this reply (listed alphabetically) : Kean Birch (corresponding author:  kean@yorku.ca),  Sophie Bond,  Jean Paul  Catungal,  Tina Harris,  Dawn  Hoogeveen,  Nicole  Laliberte,  and  Marit  Rosol.  The  response  builds  on  an intervention written with further contributions from the following people (listed alphabetically again):  Melinda Alexander,  Jason Beery,  Nathan Clough, Sean Gillon,  Vanessa Lamb,  Kyja Noack-Lundberg, Nina Martin, Andre Pusey, and Omar Salamanca.45

'Tim-adical' action: a reply to Culum Canally

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'Tim-adical' action: a reply to Culum Canally

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