Abstract
Introduction
During a monthly Editorial Board meeting of Affilia, several members described current and former leadership roles within their respective academic institutions and professional organizations. While some board members discussed their formal roles as leaders, several noted that they led in ways that did not have an official role or title. Serving as deans, associate deans, directors, mentors, and chairs, Editorial Board members followed the historical precedent set by Affilia's forebearers of nurturing, anchoring, centering, and encouraging feminist leadership in social work academia. The discussion during this meeting made it apparent that critical feminists in social academia are a formidable force. Engaging in day-to-day decision-making, problem-solving, strategizing, advocating, and visioning, critical feminists in social work academia continue to persevere and progress. They bring a wealth of philosophical and epistemological knowledge to academic administration. Critical feminist scholars challenge oppression, discrimination, entitlement, and privilege within educational structures. They are dedicated to activism within their institutional contexts while consciously balancing the roles and expectations that the academic system demands of us.
The authors of this editorial have diverse racial, ethnic, and other socially marginalized identities and lived experiences within academia. We have held or currently hold formal and informal leadership positions in various academic settings across the United States, Canada, and internationally. We bring our cultures and ancestral histories to bear in our work, and it is filled with love for our people and our past. Our understanding of critical feminism has grown from our peoples' lived experiences with injustice and our thriving despite those centuries of oppression.
We have decades of diverse experiences, but what brings us together is that we currently serve on the Affilia editorial board. We acknowledge that feminist leadership in academia is often focused on the representation of women in leadership; however, in this editorial, we emphasize the practice of critical feminist leadership. We highlight the experiences, tensions, challenges, joys, rewards, joys, connections, and lessons learned by editorial board members as we navigate leadership roles within social work academia.
Our conceptualization of critical feminism is based on the principles for research and praxis documented in the Affilia editorial by Goodkind et al. (2021). The conceptual, epistemological, and political principles of critical feminism highlighted by Goodkind and colleagues resonate with us as we go about our day-to-day administrative duties. Additionally, the fundamental writing of Lazzari et al. (2009) on the application of feminist principles to leadership in the social work profession has strongly influenced this editorial. As critical feminists, we underscore the importance of holistic understanding, intersectionality, praxis, complexity, context, inclusion, relationality, trust, authenticity, and connection. We challenge assumptions around any singularity of thought among or between us as scholars and colleagues. We focus our energies on advocating for diversity, inclusion, antiracism, and anticolonialism within academic settings and, in so doing, wrestle with power dynamics. We center conversations on social justice, equity, and belonging. We strive to build strong, generative, positive, and welcoming cultures. And we honor and acknowledge the rewards of working in the community with our critical feminist colleagues.
Critical Feminist Praxis in Social Work Academia
Feminism has evolved from being an exclusionary sisterhood of white women to a framework that stretches and develops our understanding of how multi-gendered bodies are marginalized along various axes of social identity, including race, religion, class, sexuality, disability, and nationality. Critical feminism embodies various strands and takes a structural approach to understanding how marginalization works, scrutinizing states, nations, and borders. Yet, feminism remains a loaded term in social work academia. Accordingly, feminist research, feminist pedagogy, feminist mentorship, and feminist leadership praxis are still misunderstood and sometimes disregarded, as if they are not entirely legitimate in our profession or in scholarly work.
Critical feminist leadership in academia not only focuses on the praxis of building agency, relationship, community, and resistance to exclusionary social norms but also supports scholarship from and about groups who are minoritized by structural exclusion. Such scholarship is deeply important even if it does not always appeal to public funding sources or private donors, forces whose approval is often required for tenure and promotion in the neoliberal environment of academia. We want to let feminist scholars know that we see them, we support them, and we value them.
Further, because gender oppression intersects with racial, class, and other oppressions, feminist leadership does not view gender as a single variable but as a factor implicated in larger structural inequities. Critical feminist praxis involves breaking hierarchy, taking an equity-focused view on resource allocation, and developing participatory methods of decision-making, not merely “for women” but for all who are systematically minoritized by structural oppression. As minoritized people experience a unique set of disadvantages within academia, it is particularly important to inculcate feminist leadership that can identify and produce equity-focused solutions.
The Call to Duty
From being “volun-told” to step in as leaders to actively seeking leadership opportunities, our decision-making around accepting leadership positions has followed a number of paths. Oftentimes we have found ourselves providing labor that gets marked as “service obligations” while male academics are seen as presumptive leaders for the same roles. The emotional and intellectual labor that our leadership demands creates insurmountable time commitments and burdens that other colleagues are not called to do with the same frequency. However, feminist leaders deftly navigate academic spaces with a keen awareness of how they have not been built for us or for others like us. During this critical time of social unrest and political turmoil, who better to lead in academia? Critical feminist leaders have been and will continue to be torchbearers who value and practice equity, inclusion, and community—priorities that every academic institution must grapple with.
We discussed our experiences of having difficult conversations and of stepping up in challenging situations. We have found ourselves doing the messy work of engagement that our male counterparts have not had to do and often do not value. As critical feminists, we do not need to lead in the ways we have seen others lead. We do not need to use power in the way it has been used against us. We can make accountability as important as authority. Our leadership is relational and involves building communities; therefore, we hold our connections to others at the heart and soul of who we are and what we do as scholar-leaders. When feminists are called to duty, we redefine leadership. We pave the path forward for others—faculty, staff, students, and community members—who dream of an academic home where they are acknowledged and valued.
Learning and Unlearning
As we discussed the myriad challenges of practicing critical feminism in academic leadership, we acknowledged the learning and unlearning that are part of this journey. At its core, feminist leadership involves acquiring an understanding of institutional policies and procedures while simultaneously challenging and unlearning implicit and explicit biases. As feminist leaders, we engage in continuous self-reflection, critically examining our biases and acknowledging areas where we may unknowingly perpetuate stereotypes. Learning includes the deconstruction of cisheteropatriarchal frameworks and the recognition of praxis: the continuous process of action and reflection. Unlearning involves shedding preconceived notions and biases, rejecting singularity, and allowing space for alternative perspectives and voices. As a group, we see this journey as ongoing, and it requires a strong commitment to staying informed, listening to diverse experiences, and adapting leadership practices that align with our evolving goals.
Through this learning and unlearning process, we shape our own growth and create more inclusive and equitable environments for those around us. As we commit to lifelong unlearning and learning together with our colleagues and students, we underscore the importance of having space to make mistakes. We resist the impulse to “cancel'’ others, focusing instead on the hard work of holding competing understandings simultaneously, thinking in complex ways about people and situations. We hold ourselves to account with grace and humility if we harm others through our actions. And we also are patient and reflective about ourselves, being cautious not to blame or “cancel” ourselves for mistakes or harms that we have caused.
Mentoring and Building a Sense of Community
Mentoring and community building emerged from our collective discussions as essential tasks in the day-to-day lives of critical feminist leaders. Creating a positive work culture, supporting colleagues, and fostering a sense of belonging are core elements of feminist leadership. Some of the ways that we, the authors of this editorial, described our roles included: providing a safe space for conversations and check-ins, listening and learning, leaning in on critical topics, and supporting and mentoring colleagues. It's important to note that none of us named these activities as part of our listed job duties; rather, these activities are intrinsic to critical feminist praxis.
We have shared with each other how, in extremely challenging social and political climates, amidst intense personal and professional pressures, we lead with a spirit of camaraderie, collaboration, and dialogue. In addition to mentoring our colleagues, we support one another. We have shared our experiences of feeling isolated and often being the lone voice as feminist leaders in academic settings. This discussion has echoed the work of Alvarez and Lazzari (2016), who underscored the importance of mentoring for professional development and success, particularly for women in social work academia. Alvarez and Lazzari discussed how academic leadership can be isolating, especially for individuals from marginalized backgrounds. In such situations, it is imperative for feminists to form a collective as we navigate complex and patriarchal professional settings.
Being Leaders in the Current Political Climate
Many of us live and work in socially and politically conservative environments where our values of antiracism and antioppression are under attack. Many of us face broad efforts to erode higher education and dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives. We contend that our work is needed now more than ever to support our students, staff, and faculty, especially those whose social locations occupy the margins. Rather than despair, we choose hope and possibility in our vision for the future. We consciously take a growth approach that looks to turn the mud into a lotus—that is, we strive to turn bad experiences and suffering into personal, collective, and institutional growth. If we adopt this general approach, we will always be seeking opportunities to make something positive out of the negative. As critical feminist leaders, we forge alliances and collaborate with other feminist leaders to strengthen collective voices. We work toward building feminist solidarity and a sense of community that helps us in recognizing the emotional toll of these challenging times. We seek support from peers and communities—and give support in return—to sustain our collective resilience and well-being.
Self-care
Self-care emerged as an ongoing and vital strategy that enabled us to maintain a positive, fresh, strong, and healthy approach to living and working. Individual and collective self-care strategies, such as reflecting, journaling, meditating, sharing space, bonding over shared interests, and checking in on one another, help us to cultivate respite, rest, and rejuvenation. However, obstacles arise when we try to prioritize “self” while managing “others.”
As leaders, we have found ourselves engulfed in multiple professional and personal roles and responsibilities. Several of us recognized that self-care included our ability to say “no” when we must, to rest when we have to without burdensome feelings of guilt. Indeed, we experience guilt because the neoliberal university has primed us to feel that we are not doing enough and because we have received the message that, as minoritized bodies, we need to do much, much more than our white male counterparts to be seen as their equals. And that is why we invariably push ourselves to drink from an empty cup, even though as social workers we know that is impossible. As critical feminists and feminist leaders, we discussed our need to build a communal cup from which we can all draw strength and compassion, to work together to dissolve otherness. We must see the self not as autonomous and independent but as connected, co-dependent, and impermanent. Indeed, co-dependency is not a red flag but our reality, one that we must acknowledge and become comfortable with.
Self-care is about using silence, not just words, as needed to honor our own mental health. Audre Lorde (1997) identified the trouble with not only experiencing oppression but also having to do the labor of educating others about that oppression, often against intense resistance. We must permit ourselves to say no, to use silence as resistance as Sara Ahmed (2010) has taught us, and to let go of the associated burden that comes with guilt.
We found the process of imagining and writing this editorial to be a cathartic relief, one that has contributed to our self-care. We discovered great value in our discussions and learned from one another, from fostering community, empathy, and support. But most importantly, we have recognized and acknowledged our roles and positionalities within academic contexts. As critical feminist leaders in social work academic institutions, we are cognizant of the power—perceived or actual—that we have. We have deliberated on the privilege we possess in being able to convey our thoughts to a broad audience. With this editorial, we humbly recognize all those who preceded us, as well as our peers and colleagues who actively serve, lead, and make a difference. We see you.