Gender and the politics of knowledge in the Academy

What counts as knowledge? Who are valid, legitimate ‘knowers’? In this chapter we revisit work that we have conducted collaboratively over the last decade, focusing and elaborating on a single theme that has threaded through much of our work: the dynamics of gendered knowledges in higher education. We draw on a range of intersectional perspectives in discussing the dynamics of gender and the politics of knowledge in higher education institutions, drawing on work we conducted on the gendered, classed and racialised assumptions underlying notions of a perceived ‘feminisation’ of the higher education sector. We then move on to discuss more recent studies we have conducted to explore the continuing effects on knowledge production (and the teaching and learning of knowledge) of audit accountability measures such as the UK’s Research Excellence Framework, and the casualisation of teaching in the sector. Finally, we conclude with a discussion of the growing challenge to the ‘elite’ academy from the radical/far right and how this is involving new (and some very old) gendered conceptualisations of what knowledge is seen as valued, acceptable and appropriate in the contemporary academy.