Abstract
Sociologist Christine Williams reflects on how she, as a feminist professor, advises her students to get power.
Part of the job of being a professor is offering career advice to undergraduates. For years I have used Max Weber’s “Science as a Vocation” as my guide. Find your passion. Only you can decide what career will be meaningful to you. Blah blah blah. I no longer say that. My message to my students is now clear and unambiguous: I don’t care what you do, as long as you have power. Go work for Wal-mart, the CIA, Exxon-Mobil, whatever. It doesn’t matter. The only thing that matters is that you end up calling the shots.
I had this epiphany at a recent showing of “Misrepresentation” on my campus, a film about pervasive sexism in the media. The audience of 300+ stayed behind to discuss the film and brainstorm about possible solutions. As an invited discussant, I found myself becoming increasingly agitated as one student after another stood up and passionately spoke of the need to “educate” others about sexism, especially children. I ended up haranguing them: Why would you want to teach children about this? Children have no power! They can’t change anything. And it’s useless to try and change the opinions of people who do have power. They are the ones promoting these sexist images! Only YOU can change society! So let’s cut out the middleman and get down to business. How are YOU going to get power so YOU can change these dastardly media images NOW?
I don’t care what you do, as long as you have power.
Let me back up. The people who come to me for career advice are not a cross-section of the population. They’ve taken my courses in gender, sexuality, or labor and labor movements. Most are women, with a few feminist men sprinkled in. I’ve taught them about discrimination and inequality, and now they want to do something about it.
These are the people who need to be in charge.
If I encourage them to follow their “vocation,” a lot of these folks will end up supporting, educating, and helping other people. They tell me that they want to help the less fortunate, teach girls, and empower women. Their gender socialization is reflected in these choices, and the labor force is structured to provide opportunities in these roles, as teachers and social workers and nurses. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t discourage them from pursuing these noble professions. But if they ask for my advice, I tell them they must aspire to become superintendent of schools or head of the hospital. Otherwise, nothing will ever change.
Looking back over my 30-year career studying gender and organizations, it’s a surprise to me that this basic insight was so long in coming. Chalk it up to my own gender socialization and to too much Weber (or not enough Foucault). Now I can’t shut up about it. I’m currently studying women scientists in the oil and gas industry. I interviewed a senior woman geophysicist at a major multinational corporation who is the “executive assistant” to a man who is her intellectual equal, and prior to his latest promotion, her organizational equal. I asked her: Why didn’t he become your assistant? This time I’ll quote her directly: “His personality type is very much to be a leader. On the other hand, my personality type is more to be a supporter. I spent years supporting VPs and got asked by VP after VP after VP to either come and do special projects, or to be their assistant. Because I’m so good at supporting them, they can take it easy while I’m there. And I really like to be somebody who supports a person that I believe in.” Reader, please forgive my indiscretion, but I just had to intervene. This woman is an environmentalist and a feminist. I told her that she should be the CEO of the oil and gas company. Unfortunately, she wasn’t interested in my advice. She didn’t want that cutthroat political job, she told me; she would rather “help people.” Clearly, this gendered discourse provides a ready-made survival strategy in her male-dominated world—a world that is intent on forever casting her in the role of the assistant, never the leader.
Unlike oil and gas industry executives, my sociology students are interested in my advice. As a mentor to young women and feminist men, I think it’s my responsibility to tell them to get power. Quit helping people—and start changing the world.