Sans enfants dans le milieu universitaire

classe sociale et maternité au sein du corps professoral

Auteurs-es

Mots-clés :

travail universitaire, membres du corps professoral sans enfants, membres du corps professoral qui sont les premiers de leur famille à fréquenter l’université, membres du corps professoral issus de la classe ouvrière, discrimination fondée sur le genre dans le milieu universitaire, discrimination fondée sur la classe sociale dans le milieu universitaire

Résumé

En s’appuyant sur un sondage mené auprès de professeur·e·s de littérature anglaise dans l’ensemble du Canada et de données de Statistique Canada, le premier tiers de cet article examine l’intersection du genre et du niveau de scolarité des parents en lien avec la probabilité que les membres du corps professoral aient des enfants. Bien que, chez les hommes, le fait d’avoir des enfants ne soit pas associé au niveau de scolarité des parents, les femmes dont les parents détenaient des diplômes d’études supérieures étaient plus susceptibles d’avoir des enfants que les femmes dont les parents avaient un niveau de scolarité inférieur. La majeure partie de l’article examine certaines des répercussions de ces disparités. Les femmes ne se heurtent pas toutes aux mêmes difficultés pour concilier une carrière universitaire et l’éducation des enfants : les privilèges liés à la classe sociale peuvent compenser certains désavantages liés au genre. Compte tenu de leur plus grande probabilité de ne pas avoir d’enfants, de leur genre et de leur milieu socioéconomique, les femmes membres du corps professoral dont les parents ont un niveau de scolarité inférieur peuvent se retrouver avec une charge de travail plus lourde que celle de leurs collègues. Alors que le gouvernement et les universités ne fournissent pas suffisamment de services de garde, les administrateur·trice·s universitaires transfèrent régulièrement la responsabilité de l’adaptation des horaires des parents aux femmes sans enfants et aux membres du corps professoral LGBTQ+. Comme les hommes (hétérosexuels) consacrent généralement plus de leur temps de travail à la recherche que leurs collègues féminines en raison de présomptions genrées du travail de service et de l’accompagnement des étudiant·e·s, ainsi que des contraintes de temps auxquelles font face les mères membres du corps professoral, une part disproportionnée de ce travail et de cet accompagnement est assumée par les femmes sans enfants et leurs collègues LGBTQ+, ce qui nuit à leur capacité de publier.  

Biographie de l'auteur-e

  • Lynn Arner, Brock University

    Lynn Arner is an Associate Professor of English at Brock University. Trained in feminist theory and in Women’s and Gender Studies, her current research focuses on first-generation university students, especially women, who become English faculty at universities in Canada and the US. Lynn has published a series of articles on class and gender in the professoriate and is currently writing a book on class, gender, race, and sexuality in the professoriate in the discipline of English in Canada and the US. Her earlier scholarship centered on class and gender in late medieval England. She wrote Chaucer, Gower, and the Vernacular Rising: Poetry and the Problem of the Populace After 1381, guest-edited a special issue of Exemplaria, and published articles on medieval English literature. 

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Publié

2026-08-05

Numéro

Vol. 47 No. 2 (2026): Open Issue

Rubrique

Recherche originale

Licence

© Lynn Arner 2026

Licence Creative Commons

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