Abstract
The previous chapter discussed luck, the scant research that has been undertaken about how women attribute success to luck, and the ways in which WPs talked about luck as part of their career progression and success. The focus of this chapter is critical events and women’s career profiles. Many women academics do not follow the traditional academic career pathway and progress from graduate study through the academic ranks (e.g., Bell S: Women in science in Australia: maximising productivity, diversity and innovation. Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies, Canberra. Retrieved from http://scienceandtechnologyaustralia.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/2009report_wise.pdf, 2009; Bennett C: Brussels Econ Rev 54(2/3):149–176, 2012). However, there is scant literature on nontraditional pathways that academic women might take. Hence, the purpose of this chapter is to explore the various life courses of women in the professoriate using a critical moment approach (e.g., European Commission: Meta-analysis of gender and science research: synthesis report. Directorate-General for Research and Innovation, Brussels. Retrieved from https://ec.europa.eu/research/swafs/pdf/pub_gender_equality/meta-analysis-of-gender-and-science-research-synthesis-report.pdf, 2016). Clark’s (Hum Relat 53(6):747–770, 2000) work/family border theory (W/F BT) is employed to provide insight into how these critical moments impact women’s career progression. She argues that women’s lives shape and are shaped by their work and family situations and the interactions between these. Of particular importance are the cultural norms of the work and family domains and their compatibility; the physical, temporal, and psychological borders between work and home domains; the ease of crossing the work-home borders on a regular basis; and the support of those who hold significant roles in the work or family domains.
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Notes
- 1.
The first letter of a participant identifier indicates whether the data source was the survey (S), focus group interview (I), individual phone interview (P), or individual email interview (E). The second letter indicates if the academic was female (F) or male (M). The code that follows was assigned to each participant in the surveys (N = 520), focus group interviews (n = 21), and individual phone and email interviews (n = 8).
- 2.
Head of Department
- 3.
Australian Research Council (ARC) grant
- 4.
Office for Learning and Teaching Grant (OLT) grant
- 5.
This Follower also assumed the role of a Professional alternating between academia and her profession.
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Diezmann, C., Grieshaber, S. (2019). Critical Events and Academic Women’s Career Profiles. In: Women Professors. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-3685-0_9
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