Neoliberal academic speeds and the desire to slow down (in) academia as a feminist practice of resistance

Abstract

In this chapter we will articulate through interviews - in conversations with prior scientific studies in the fields of critical theory, political theory, decolonial studies, and feminist and queer theory - the embodied effects, discriminations, and tensions of the fast speed of the neoliberal university. We articulate how this academic logic produces a careless model of academic success and assumes a very specific kind of subject. It also results in teachers and students being overloaded, overworked and without the time/possibility to process the impact this speed has on their lives and health. We present some of these stories, explicitly centralising students' experiences; and we argue that this neoliberal rationality is in contrast with a feminist, careful and caring pedagogy. In short, in this chapter we present an in-depth analysis of the functioning and consequences of the speeds and time pressures in the specific context of the Dutch neoliberal university through the lived experiences and voices of students and teachers.