ABSTRACT

In this gallery contributors took the opportunity to reflect on how different kinds of precarity have made their careers different. Through five contributions (two full portraits and three miniatures), it touches upon a wide array of themes, including: economic precarity in the academic labour market (its embeddedness and its effects), motherhood and the penalty it inflicts on academic workers, the marginalised voice of mothers in the University, depression, long-term illnesses, toxic workplaces, and writing from the margins of academia. Together, they do not exhaust the different forms of precarity one may experience, but they give us a rich insight into the lived experience of five authors. For some, it is about coming to terms with their struggles and warn others, for others, it is about imagining how things could be different, and inviting and acting towards transformation.