ABSTRACT
Higher education employment across the Hawai’i Islands – geographically isolated, utterly beautiful, mild weathered, with long standing communities, and a rising indigenous nation – is unquestionably shaped by place. This chapter is based on a grounded theory analysis of 50 in-depth interviews conducted in 2018 with University of Hawai’i Community College faculty from departments in the natural and social sciences, as well as in engineering and computer science. We argue that islandness, is an ‘intervening variable’ (Baldacchino, 2006, p. 9) that ‘contours’ institutions, culture, and the mundane, as it intersects with gender, ethnicity, race, and indigeneity among other social factors, to starkly shape the experiences of faculty members across Hawai’i. Faculty demonstrate a profound dedication and familiarity with students and attachment to place, at the same time, they are overloaded by work demands with wages that do not meet the high cost of living on highly touristed islands. Our chapter considers the particular conditions of STEM women faculty, by reviewing the academic literature on STEM careers and linking the field of island studies with an island feminism lens. We examine the pathways to employment, the gendered management of childcare work, and the insufficiency of island salaries as they apply to the Hawai’i Islands.
