The Trials of being a Working Class Academic in Social Work: the Spoils and the Apple Cart – the politics of compliance and complaint by Caroline Bald
I have a thing for words.
I struggle with the word ‘academic’. I have called myself by every other name I can think of and nothing feels quite right; lecturer, educator, researcher, teacher, social worker – my twitter profile is littered with labels. Academic sounds ‘other’ and ‘above’ to my ears. It is not simply another sorry case of imposter syndrome, it is an issue of positioning that takes me back to the origins of social work (Jane Addams and minimising the space between them/us) and critical pedagogy (Paulo Freire and learning as emancipatory). So for me, with my fourth year in academia under my belt, I continue to harbour both a feeling of sitting in the Prefect’s Room and an ethical value base that wills me to never forget it.