Abstract
In a recent department faculty meeting, an endowed White male professor commented that the majority of students were “cordwood.” As an adjunct professor, I found that his comments bothered me. Is it possible he considered adjuncts—the majority of faculty who teach our nation’s undergraduate students (Kezar, 2012)—as expendable objects too? The New Oxford American Dictionary defines “cordwood” as wood that has been cut into uniform lengths, used especially for fires.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Clawson, D., & Page, M. (2011). The future of higher education. New York, NY: Routledge. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.4324/9780203834183
Coalition on the Academic Workforce (CAW). (2012). A portrait of part-time faculty members. Retrieved June 4, 2014, from http://www.academicworkforce.org/CAW_portrait_2012.pdf
Cordwood. (n.d.). The new Oxford American dictionary. Cupertino, CA: Apple, Inc.
Curtis, J. W., & Thornton, S. (2013). The annual report on the economic status of the profession 2012–13. American association of university professors. Retrieved June 4, 2014, from http://www.aaup.org/file/2012-13Economic-Status-Report.pdf
Duggan, L. (2003). The twilight of equality? Neoliberalism, cultural politics, and the attack on democracy. Boston, MA: Beacon Press.
Freire, P. (1970/2000). Pedagogy of the oppressed (30th anniversary ed., M. B. Ramos, Trans.). New York, NY: Continuum. (Original work published 1970)
Freire, P., & Macedo, D. (1999). Ideology matters. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
Giroux, H. A. (2005). The terror of neoliberalism: Rethinking the significance of cultural politics. College Literature, 32(1), 1–19. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.1353/lit.2005.0006
Giroux, H. A. (2010). Bare pedagogy and the scourge of neoliberalism: Rethinking higher education as a democratic public sphere. The Educational Forum, 74(3), 184–196. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00131725.2010.483897
Giroux, H. A. (2014). Neoliberalism’s war on higher education. Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books.
Hayes, C., & Hartlep, N. D. (Eds.). (2013). Unhooking from whiteness: The key to dismantling racism in the United States. Rotterdam, The Netherlands: Sense Publishers. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-94-6209-377-5
Hecht, I., Higgerson, M., Gmelch, W., & Tucker, A. (1999). Roles and responsibilities of department chairs. The department chair as academic leader. Phoenix, AZ: ACE Oryx. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/2649267
Hensley, B. O. (2013). The absent adjunct. The Adjunct Project. Retrieved June 14, 2014, from http://www.adjunctproject.com/the-absent-adjunct/
Hensley, B. O. (2014). How far from income equity are faculty in four-year, non-doctoral universities? Journal of Academic Administration in Higher Education, 10(1), 13–18.
Hoeller, K. (2014). (Ed.). Equality for contingent faculty: Overcoming the two-tier system. Nashville, TN: Vanderbilt University Press.
hooks, b. (2003). Teaching community: A pedagogy of hope. New York, NY: Routledge.
Keeling, R. P., & Hersh, R. H. (2012). We’re losing our minds: Rethinking American higher education. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.
Kezar, A. (Ed.). (2012). Embracing non-tenure track faculty: Changing campuses for the new faculty majority. New York, NY: Routledge.
Reich, R. B. (1992). The work of nations: Preparing ourselves for 21st-century capitalism. New York, NY: Vintage Books.
U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce Democratic Staff. (2014, January). The just-in-time professor: A staff report summarizing eForum responses on the working conditions of contingent faculty in higher education. Washington, DC: House Committee on Education and the Workforce. Retrieved June 14, 2014, from http://democrats.edworkforce.house.gov/sites/democrats.edworkforce.house.gov/files/documents/1.24.14-AdjunctEforumReport.pdf
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2015 Sense Publishers
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Hensley, B.O. (2015). We are not “Cordwood”. In: Hartlep, N.D., Hensley, B.O. (eds) Critical Storytelling in Uncritical Times. Constructing Knowledge: Curriculum Studies in Action. SensePublishers, Rotterdam. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-6300-256-1_9
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-6300-256-1_9
Publisher Name: SensePublishers, Rotterdam
Online ISBN: 978-94-6300-256-1
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawEducation (R0)