Gender, Race, and Precarity

Theorizing the Parallels Between Early Childhood Educators and Sessional Faculty in Ontario

Authors

  • Zuhra Abawi University of Toronto
  • Rachel Berman Ryerson University
  • Alana Powell Ryerson University

Keywords:

feminist political economy, precarious labour, anti-intellectualism, racialization, neoliberalism, education

Abstract

This paper critically examines the parallels of devaluation encountered by early childhood educators and sessional faculty members in Ontario as reflective praxis. The three authors’ experiences are diverse and include a tenured professor and two sessional faculty members, both of whom have worked in the field of Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC). The narratives of the authors inform the concerning trend of precarity and devaluation embedded within two polarizing spectrums of the Ontario educational landscape: Post-Secondary Education (PSE) and ECEC. Although these aforementioned areas of education rarely intersect, the authors centre them on the frontline of the neoliberal assault on education transpiring in Ontario today. The three authors self-identify as female settlers; two have doctoral degrees; one has an MA and is an early childhood educator (ECE). One author self-identifies as a racialized and white-coded cis-gendered woman, and two self-identify as white, cis-gendered women. All of the authors have worked in Ontario’s post-secondary landscape, one as sessional faculty member and then a tenured professor, and two as sessional faculty members. The paper will problematize the neoliberal assault on higher education and ECEC through a Feminist Political Economy (FPE) conceptual framework in order to draw on the multifaceted ways feminized discourses devalue the work of ECEs and perpetuate the overrepresentation of women, particularly racialized women in precarious faculty positions.

Metrics

Metrics Loading ...

Author Biographies

Zuhra Abawi, University of Toronto

Zuhra Abawi is a Senior Lecturer at Niagara University’s College of Education, Ontario Educational Studies. She completed her Doctor of Education in Social Justice Education at OISE/University of Toronto. Zuhra also holds a Master of Education, Bachelor of Education, and Bachelor of Arts in Political Science. Additionally, she has a Diploma in Early Childhood Education and is both an Ontario Certified Teacher and Registered Early Childhood Educator. Her research interests include Critical Race Theory, teacher education, reconceptualist approaches to Early Childhood Education, and educational policy. Zuhra has also worked as an elementary teacher for five years in the Peel District School Board.

Rachel Berman, Ryerson University

Rachel Berman is Graduate Program Director and Associate Professor at Ryerson’s School of Early Childhood Studies. Prior to joining the School of Early Childhood Studies, Rachel taught feminist research methods at both York University and McMaster University. Rachel has a PhD in Family Studies from the University of Guelph and an MA in Human Development and Family Relations from the University of Connecticut. Her research interests include mothering, parenting, family engagement and perspectives of youth and childhood, race and childhood, and critical qualitative inquiry. Rachel is also a member of the Reconceptualizing Early Childhood Education Association, Association for Research on Mothering, the Canadian Sociology Association, and the Women's and Gender Studies et Recherches Féministes, and an adjunct member to the graduate program in Gender, Feminist & Women's Studies, York University.

Alana Powell , Ryerson University

Alana Powell is Policy and Special Projects Officer at the Association of Early Childhood Educators of Ontario. Alana completed her MA in Early Childhood Studies from Ryerson University and is a Registered Early Childhood Educator. Prior to her role at the Association of Early Childhood Educators of Ontario, she was a contract lecturer at George Brown College’s School of Early Childhood. Her research engages in critical exploration of care discourses in early childhood and she has played an active role in the Ontario child care advocacy movement for several years.

Downloads

Published

2019-11-14

Issue

Vol. 40 No. 1 (2019): Open-themed

Section

Original Research

License

Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:

1. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication, with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.

2. Authors are aware that articles published in Atlantis are indexed and made available through various scholarly and professional search tools, including but not limited to Erudit.

3. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.

4. Authors are permitted and encouraged to preprint their work, that is, post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process. This can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work. Read more on preprints here.