Educational Philosophy and Theory

Incorporating ACCESS

ISSN: 0013-1857 (Print) 1469-5812 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rept20

The smiling philosopher: Emotional labor, gender,

and harassment in conference spaces

Liz Jackson

To cite this article: Liz Jackson (2017): The smiling philosopher: Emotional labor,
gender, and harassment in conference spaces, Educational Philosophy and Theory, DOI:
10.1080/00131857.2017.1343112

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Published online: 21 Jun 2017.

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Educational Philosophy and Theory, 2017
https://doi.org/10.1080/00131857.2017.1343112

The smiling philosopher: Emotional labor, gender, and

harassment in conference spaces
Liz Jackson
Faculty of Education, Division of Policy, Administration and Social Sciences Education, University of Hong Kong,
Hong Kong, Hong Kong

ABSTRACT KEYWORDS
Conference environments enable diverse roles for academics. However, Gender; sexual harassment;
conferences are hardly entered into by participants as equals. Academics philosophy of education;
enter into and experience professional environments differently according affect
to culture, gender, race, ethnicity, class, and more. This paper considers
from a philosophical perspective entering and initiating culturally into
academic conferences as a woman. It discusses theories of gender and
emotional labor and emotional management, focusing on Arlie Hochschild’s
foundational work, and affect in gendered social relations, considering Sara
Ahmed’s theorization of the feminist killjoy and the affect alien. It applies
these lenses to explore problematic experiences of women initiates at
conferences. The paper proceeds with a theoretical discussion of gender,
emotional labor, and affect. Then the paper discusses women academics’
experiences generally and at conferences, including educational research
conferences, with reference to relevant higher education research as well as
anecdotal evidence, relating these experiences to the theories. It thus aims to
tie together theoretical insights, higher education scholarship, and ordinary
real-life experiences of gendered social relations in conference activities.

As we spoke, an eminent professor at my current institution … walked behind me and ran his palm across my
shoulder blades and down my arm to my elbow. He kept walking … I convinced myself that there was nothing to
it … Surely he didn’t intend to be inappropriate. (Buddug, 2014, More sexism in medieval studies)

[M]­anaging feeling was taken as the problem. The causes of anger were not acknowledged … The only question
to be seriously discussed was ‘How do you rid yourself of anger?’… If this fails, fall back on the thought ‘I can
escape.’(Arlie Russell Hochschild, 1983/2003, p. 113, The managed heart)
Conference environments enable diverse roles for academics. The most obvious role is professional.
Academics gain recognition for and feedback on their research formally, through submitting writing to
present at a conference, being on a conference program, and participating in sessions. More informally
one networks with peers and colleagues. Through inter-personal communication those in academia gain
unofficial information and insights about such things as emerging trends of higher education employ-
ment and promotion, new research fields and methods, and the like. For many frequent conference
goers, camaraderie, friendship, and a sense of community is also sought. Philosophers of education,
for instance, relate to each other regarding how they experience their academic identities across insti-
tutions. They discover similar challenges in demonstrating the value of the field to others at their work,
for example, or teaching students who are not interested in Plato, Thomas Aquinas, or John Dewey.

CONTACT  Liz Jackson  lizjackson@hku.hk

© 2017 Philosophy of Education Society of Australasia
2    L. JACKSON

Academics also develop friendships with fellow conference goers over years. In this way, conferences
represent a blurred professional and personal space for many regular attendees. Attendees do not
necessarily see themselves through a binary logic of personal and professional selves in these activities
and relationships. Instead they may seek a sense of vocation where the professional is personal, giving
work a broader meaning than making money or ‘just networking’.
At the same time, academic conferences are hardly entered into by participants as equals. First there
is a learning curve. A good advisor will try to help her students learn the ropes of attending confer-
ences for the first time. The ‘ropes’ may include issues varying from the personal to the professional,
such as how to choose and frame presentation topics, which events to attend, and maybe even how
to behave toward others (for example, how to demonstrate academic preparedness without being
aggressive with senior scholars). Second, there are, as in all spaces, informal and often invisible rules
of behavior and relating, which trace other identity politics. That academics enter into and experience
various professional environments differently according to culture, gender, race, ethnicity and class, has
been analyzed from sociological perspectives (e.g. Aiston, 2011; Gutierrez y Muhs, Niemann, Gonzales,
& Harris, 2012; Rodgers & Cudjoe, 2013). Historically academia has been white and male. Thus, many
academic societies have been observed engaging in soul searching in recent years regarding the acces-
sibility and openness of conferences to minorities, women, schoolteachers, etc., pondering the value
and legitimacy of traditions and norms associated with what some may still see as old boy networks
(e.g. Armstrong, 2015; Stewart, 2015).
This paper considers from a philosophical perspective entering and initiating culturally into academic
conferences as a woman. By ‘initiating culturally’, I mean that there are rules of participation that are
more or less clear-cut to conference goers, about peer review, submission procedures, etc.; and then
there are pathways to meaningful interpersonal engagement within the community of scholars. These
latter pathways are not clearly defined, and can involve what I discuss here as emotional management
on the part of young and/or ‘junior’ academic women, within unequal power relations. This paper thus,
articulates a gap between the obvious rules and the hidden curriculum of attending a conference as
a woman, particularly a young woman or junior ‘initiate’ woman (typically, a higher degree student or
early career researcher).1
Primarily, the paper discusses theories of gender and emotional labor and emotional management,
focusing on Hochschild’s foundational work (1983), and affect in gendered social relations, consider-
ing Sara Ahmed’s theorization of the feminist killjoy and the affect alien (2010). It applies these lenses
to explore possible, perhaps common, but problematic experiences of some women initiates into
academic conferences. It thus, aims to tie together theoretical insights, higher education scholarship,
and ordinary real-life experiences of gendered social relations in conference activities. The first section
proceeds with a theoretical discussion of gender, emotional labor, and affect. Then the paper discusses
women academics’ experiences generally and at conferences, with reference to relevant higher edu-
cation research as well as anecdotal evidence, relating these experiences to the theories. It concludes
with some recommendations.
Emotional Labor and Affect Aliens
The company lays claim not simply to her physical motions … but to her emotional actions and the way they
show in the ease of a smile. The workers I talked to often spoke of their smiles as being on them but not of them.
(Hochschild, 1983/2003, p. 127, The managed heart)

It could happen during a conversation with a neighbor, a family member or a professor … ‘Why do you look sad?’
or ‘What’s wrong?’ Even when I least expect it … like a haunting ghost I can’t shake. Well, guess what, everybody?
Nothing’s wrong just because I’m not smiling all the time. (Rebecca Grushkin, 2017, ‘I’ll smile when I want to: Resting
bitch face is sexist’)
In The managed heart, Arlie Hochschild analyses the work of flight attendants as gendered emo-
tional labor. Flight attendants, traditionally women, are expected to perform happy, cheerful affect in
relation to customers who often feel entitled to work out and express negative emotions toward them,
such as irritation over delays, thirst, or hunger. In this field, women attendants walk a fine line in being
authoritative without creating emotional discomfort in customers, particularly men. Men and women
 EDUCATIONAL PHILOSOPHY AND THEORY   3

customers treat them less authoritatively than they do men flight attendants. The work is emotional
labor, as it requires they accept negative feelings and attitudes thrown toward them and deflect them
with expressions of calm and serenity, if not happiness.
This emotional labor often has a toll on flight attendants: In fact, the recruitment process is preferen-
tial toward those who can withstand others’ negative emotions with sincere-looking smiles, Hochschild
found. Even those with apparently sincere smiles can suffer estrangement from their smiles and their
sense of self, while on the job. They can experience feeling lost about what is good for them to feel
according to others, versus what they think they really feel. Hochschild writes (1983/2003, p. 133):
At some point the fusion of ‘real’ and ‘acted’ self will be tested by a crucial event … Often the test comes when
a company speed-up makes personal service impossible to deliver because the individual’s personal itself is too
thinly parceled … As a matter of self-protection, [public and private selves] are forced to divide. The worker won-
ders whether her smile and the emotional labor that keeps it sincere are really hers. Do they really express a part
of her? Or are they deliberately worked up and delivered on behalf of the company? Where inside her is the part
that acts ‘on behalf of the company’?
As Hochschild notes, the sexy girlfriend and supportive mother are two prominent postures available
to woman flight attendants for maintaining control of passengers while also enhancing passengers’
emotional well-being or affect. In the first posture, Hochschild notes that some women use sex appeal
to their advantage, while serving customers. This script of service is reinforced by stereotypes of flight
attendants as sex symbols. Such stereotypes can be found in historical advertisements for airlines that
focus on how the flight attendant ‘might even make a good wife’ (Hochschild, 1983/2003, p. 182). The
airline Aeroflot’s advertisements today show well-groomed, shapely women flight attendants in fitted
skirts smiling with closed mouths and sideways glances, being trailed by male pilots, the men’s toothy
smiles direct to the camera. Hochschild’s research found that women flight attendants who took on the
tactics of ‘sexy girlfriend’ did so to gain acquiescence from men customers, who might be offended by
them seeming distracted, too busy, or self-important. It is one way, and for some it seems the best way,
they can gain the authority they require in their occupation through interpersonal relations.
The ‘supportive mother’ flight attendant is caring, nurturing, and sympathetic above all. She appears
selfless and completely compassionate regardless of how poorly customers may treat her, typically
due to no fault of her own (if there are flight delays, for example). Flight attendants are trained to be
customer-centered. Meanwhile, customers are encouraged to see flight attendants as the embodiment
of the corporations that advertise themselves as oriented toward the best customer service, as in the
statement ‘the customer comes first’. Customers expect flight attendants to care about them as individu-
als, not to treat them like one of hundreds of liabilities in the sky. The sexy girlfriend and the supportive
mother both downplay their expertise and competency in relations with customers in comparison with
their caring roles, to meet (men) customers’ expectations of them as mothers or girlfriends in the sky.
Hochschild’s work on emotional labor helped shape Ahmed’s more recent theorization of the femi-
nist killjoy and the affect alien. Ahmed’s conceptualization of the feminist killjoy highlights heightened
expectations women face more broadly within interpersonal relationships and in communities to put
on a happy face, for the benefit of the larger group (2010). The contemporary popularity of the phrase
‘resting bitch face’ reflects expectations on women in the public sphere to perform happiness and ‘just
smile’, as many women are encouraged to do by (typically men) strangers, acquaintances, and loved
ones, on the street, at home, and at work. Women may be taught when they are young that all their
families want is their happiness (Ahmed, 2010). Her potential unhappiness is framed as a problem for
everyone. Women who are not apparently satisfied with the status quo are, historically and today,
often labeled as deviants. Ahmed compares the trope of the happy housewife with the happy peasant
or happy slave. Those with less power are expected to show acceptance of the status quo so as not to
threaten a status quo that does not serve them. Ahmed also notes how, when challenging the status
quo, women (and others with less power in a community) are commonly dismissed due to their affect,
for being too angry or emotional, while those in power are unlikely to encounter such ‘tone policing’.
Ahmed describes the unhappy housewife or feminist killjoy as an affect alien (2010). The alien expe-
riences feelings that go against the desires or expectations of others, or what she thinks they desire or
4    L. JACKSON

expect of her based on her past experiences. At the same time, she cares about how those around her
feel in the situation—she has been educated in various ways to care. Therefore, she is alienated from
her own affect, not sure which feelings to recognize and which to ignore, caught in conflicting concerns
with self and other. Like Hochschild’s woman flight attendant, she trains her posture and body, her face,
eyes, breathing, and mouth, to put others at ease, because this seems easier than asking for changes
in relationships and in situations with others around her, who, she has learned from past experience,
are likely to challenge her to just look within herself for change. She searches for roles to play besides
sexy girlfriend/happy housewife, supportive mother, and feminist killjoy, but does not see a pathway
forward where she can feel comfortable in the world as it is.
Ahmed also discusses sexual harassment in institutions through this feminist lens, having observed
sexual harassment in her higher education workplace. In line with her work on the affect alien, Ahmed
notes that the situation wherein some men sexually touch or sexually or dismissively speak to some
women is often not seen as a problem for everyone, because to recognize it would be to label normal
acts of some or a few men as deviant. It would amount to identifying something bad about the status
quo—killing joy (Ahmed, 2015). So, it may hardly seem like a good strategy to a woman victim, who
is typically in a position of less power or less rank than the man in question. Ahmed elaborates such a
woman’s predicament (2015):
You might feel you cannot afford to become alienated from those around you; you might lose access not only to
material resources (references, scholarships, courses to teach), but you might lose friends; connections that matter.
You risk losing warmth … It is happening all around you; and yet people seem to be getting on with it; you can
end up doubting yourself; estranged from yourself. Maybe then you try not to have a problem. But you are left
with a sickening feeling …
Yet some may think that sexual harassment is far from common, especially in western higher educa-
tion. However, it may be more common than it seems, owing to complex expectations women face to
manage emotions within power relations. The next section explores experiences of women academics
more substantively.
The Academic Alien, the Conference Killjoy
There are people who go to these conferences with the expectation that this is serious business, where you go to
present your research … And then there are people who are there to party and drink … Sometimes these are even
the same people.… You think you’re going to a professional conference and instead you get hit on by six guys in
the lobby of a hotel. (Eva Galperin, in Cox, 2016, ‘Female hackers still face harassment at conferences’)

‘[O]­h he’s a bit of a womanizer’; ‘oh yeh I was warned about him’; ‘oh yeh that was the booze talking’; there might
even be a smiling, a joking, there might even be a certain kind of affection … let it go, let him off. A culture is built
around this affection which is to say: harassers are enabled by being forgiven, as if their vice is our virtue. (Ahmed,
2015, Sexual harassment, emphasis added)
In The managed heart, Hochschild suggests that gendered expectations for emotional labor are
required in many service and relational occupations beyond working as a flight attendant. While she
does not focus on higher education, women professors also face expectations to be more emotion-
ally comforting than men, in being student-centered as instructors. In student teaching evaluations,
women instructors are more likely to be rated with the use of the words ‘nice’ and ‘caring’ while, men are
described in terms of being ‘intelligent’ or ‘expert’ (Schmidt, 2017; also Boring, Ottoboni, & Stark, 2016;
Macnell, Driscoll, & Hunt, 2014). One study gathered anonymous student teaching reviews of the same
instructor, who gave all the same comments and all the same kinds of interactions within an online
class, who was called ‘Paul’ in one class and ‘Paula’ in the other. ‘Paul’ was rated higher, even in apparently
objective questions, such as, whether the teacher returned assignments in good time (Kamenetz, 2016).
These findings indicate that in many cases women academics are expected by students to be more
emotionally available, present, and involved in their relationships with students, in contrast with men.
Elsewhere in higher education workspaces, women academics are more likely to be recog-
nized by supervisors for achievements that are service-oriented, such as administrative work and
teaching, rather than research, in environments where research is clearly more prized; and often
women are expected to do equal research to men while taking on more service and teaching
 EDUCATIONAL PHILOSOPHY AND THEORY   5

(Aiston, 2011; Misra, Lundquist, Holmes, & Agiomavritis, 2011). Women of color and women
from lower socio-economic family backgrounds can face even more challenging demands, to be
competent and open with colleagues but not ‘culturally different’ than colleagues with
­mainstream academic backgrounds (Gutierrez y Muhs et al., 2012; see Rodgers & Cudjoe, 2013;
­Selman-Killingbeck, 2006). In sum, women are not treated the same as men in higher education,
by students or colleagues. They are expected to take on more caring, interpersonal roles, and to
succeed in them by being nice, supportive, and not too bossy, points underscored by the popularity
of texts like Lean in: Women, work and the will to lead (Sandberg, 2013), with corporate and higher
education editions, that encourage women to internalize alternative ways of relating to others at
work as a woman, rather than facing larger social and institutional norms (Jackson, 2017).
Academic conferences must not be regarded as utopian spaces in relation to these findings. Just as
few students or men academics would say that they have different expectations for women and men
in terms of emotional relationships in higher education, in conference spaces, too, men and women are
encountered and treated in different ways. Hochschild’s insights regarding diverse ways women can
be seen to experience their work and cope with gendered expectations are applicable to this context.
The ‘sexy girlfriend’ role in this case is far less likely to be intentionally cultivated by women, but can be
seen as a model men conference-goers reflect or construct when it comes to bodily touching in con-
ference spaces. Women report across fields some very negative experiences at academic conferences,
such as of having their bottoms grabbed and being described as ‘too good looking for my own good’
(Cox, 2016; Rogers Ackermann, 2016); of being stalked by men academics (Shen, 2015); of being told
they should give papers in their underwear if they want people at their sessions (Baker, 2015); and so
on. Less dramatically but still noteworthy, women conference-goers report commonly getting asked if
they are someone’s girlfriend or wife, instead of being recognized as a peer and scholar, upon arriving
at conference events (Cox, 2016).
I personally am also aware of some women who do not regard some educational research confer-
ences as safe spaces for them, particularly the less formal parts of the conferences, where many believe
valuable networking takes place. As highlighted in the opening quotation, I have discussed with other
women shared experiences of being touched in unnecessary and unexpected ways by men, in greeting
or in the course of conversation, with men’s hands caressing, grabbing, and lingering at hips, arms,
backs, hands, and shoulders. A man may regard their contact as an innocent gesture, but a woman
may experience such gestures repeatedly, from different men, upon arriving at an event; and she may
therefore, face challenges in regarding each as innocent, well-meaning, and discrete and independent
of the others. I have also heard of women giving keynote lectures at educational philosophy conferences
and afterward being approached by men with comments on their (good) looks rather than their ideas.
Returning to Hochschild’s sexy girlfriend and supportive mother, one can articulate these postures—
and perhaps three others—in the context of an academic conference: sunny daughter, little sister, and
‘ungirly’ woman. The ‘sunny daughter’ can be expected to appreciate and learn systematically from
senior men academics at informal events like meals or receptions. She may be given unsolicited advice
or long anecdotes that will extend until the time when she creates an assertive interruption to leave the
conversation. As some women professors experience in working with students, the sunny daughter (and
the supportive mother) may be expected to appreciate such listening periods affectively, and may be
held by the talking man as rude, ungrateful, or even unprofessional if she appears bored, impatient, or
busy. Women doctoral students are particularly susceptible to finding themselves inadvertently in this
role. They may find themselves, like Hochschild’s women flight attendants, alienated from their smile,
after a day of waiting for their opportunity to share their research and views with other substantively,
after various senior men share theirs, with clear delight and entitlement, with her.
The ‘little sister’, like the sunny daughter, may experience being treated in a more familiar and pedan-
tic way than men counterparts, but in this case by men at her rank or lower. When a woman scholar is not
asked if she is a girlfriend or spouse at a conference, she may be often asked instead if she is a student,
by men her age and men doctoral students (Cox, 2016), revealing a lack of positioning for young and
junior women academics among men counterparts beyond sexy girlfriend or sunny daughter/little sister
6    L. JACKSON

(or if she is older, she may be presumed a conference organizer, read thusly as a supportive mother).
When I was a tenure-track assistant professor, several men doctoral students, at my institution and from
academic societies, gave me advice on who/what I should be reading, or how to navigate tenure track
and my career. No men colleagues I have asked report similar experiences. Woman professors face male
advisees who refer to their (male) colleagues as ‘real professors’, while women doctoral students can
receive hypercritical feedback on their work from men doctoral students, as if they are her advisor (DKL,
2014; Frustrated Graduate Student, 2016). The sunny daughter and little sister may both also experience
tone policing, where people critique their tone of voice and the extent to which they seem emotional
when discussing research formally. They may be counseled on how they should read and speak at length
before and after giving presentations at conferences. In contrast, men counterparts’ imperfect speaking
talents—and in particular their passion or lack thereof—are rarely seen as noteworthy.
‘Ungirly’ women include many who are not regarded as heteronormative and/or heterosexual, but
rather as LGBTQ+, asexual, or androgynous. Such women may be subject to various forms of teasing,
bullying, and harassment as they are seen as threatening to a conservative status quo. The website
Academic sexism stories include a horror story from a woman who, as an unmarried but partnered
woman, was harassed by colleagues and students who collaboratively produced a website mocking her
as a lesbian and a witch (Pocahontas, 2014). A non-binary person presumed as a woman was mocked,
bullied, and punished by her supervisor formally, after she reported his sexual harassment (kk, 2016).
Less dramatically, I know of women colleagues in my field (philosophy of education), LGBTQ + as well
as heteronormative and/or heterosexual women, discussing expectations to be ‘one of the guys’. For
example, they may be expected to participate in or at least enjoy offensive, sexist, and/or sexual com-
ments made about women colleagues in their presence. These women may be startled and disturbed,
by men’s sexual objectification of their colleagues, as well as by the notion that they would enjoy or
identify with the men engaging in this objectification.
How frequently, commonly, and intensely such things occur is impossible to know. Clearly, some
women experience these challenges more than others. However, that some women see these expe-
riences as stymying to their sense of self and professional development in diverse fields should be a
cause for attention regardless of numbers. Furthermore, women may not frequently or openly discuss
these experiences even if they are commonplace for them, because of early/initial experiences where
such sharing—particularly about experiences that border on sexual harassment—is met primarily with
objections and/or skepticism. These may include: (a) a version of ‘not all men’—that there is a spectrum
of ‘good guys’ and ‘bad guys’, and her complaints risk defaming ‘good guys’, and (b) ‘not all women’—
that it has not happened to her so it must not be generalizable or particularly helpful as a comment
on the space, but rather must have something to do with the perception or behavior of the woman
complaining. I once mentioned to a man feeling uncomfortable in a philosophy of education conference
space, to which he replied that once or twice a woman flirted with him in the workplace when he did
not desire her to do so (thereby equating the experiences). I have also encountered demands, upon
mentioning how touchy-feely some men can be, to identify the ‘bad guy’, which bolsters the ‘not all
men’ view, by casting the behavior as deviant and universally deplored, rather than (as some women,
including myself, assert experiencing it as) fairly normal.
In many cases, such negative experiences go unrecorded and unexplored, as victims are often women
with the least power in the community: new women, who do not know many people or the ropes,
who are not sure what the norms are and how they should behave. These women likely learn to avoid
socializing. They may internalize negative feelings rather than speak up, as feelings are commonly
regarded in society as personal rather than social, and as such women may not want to create conflicts
with men who seem to expect them to enjoy the experiences. Such a woman, who is trying to tolerate
grabs or sustained touching because she knows men hope she enjoys or tolerates it, such a woman
experiences the split affect of the affect alien. Because sexual harassment is something that bad people
do, she might try to tell herself that she is the problem. She just needs to avoid the drinking crowd, or
change something about her appearance, her posture, her voice, or herself.
 EDUCATIONAL PHILOSOPHY AND THEORY   7

Thus, issues of generalizability are complicated by the fact that some women internalize messages
about taking personal responsibility for their experiences, including the behaviors of others, such as
a high-ranking man unexpectedly touching her in an intimate way at a conference. They may find
discussing the topic scary or traumatic, aware that it is contentious to complain about a community as
a newcomer, and feeling they are not well protected or supported in this context. Or they may expect
from past experience that their comments will fall on deaf ears. So how can we identify and recognize
these negative experiences, if the women most vulnerable to them may simply disappear, internalize
the issue, or otherwise try to quietly grit their teeth? I leave this question unanswered—but would
suggest that some symptoms may include after-parties at conferences being overrepresented by men,
and the formation of informal women-only cliques.

Conclusion
We need to recognise sexual harassment as … a means through which the academy itself becomes available only
to some. Sexual harassment is an access issue; it is a social justice issue. (Ahmed, 2015, Sexual harassment)

While all forms of harassment are unwelcomed by the recipient, some forms are not recognized as harassment by the
perpetrator. Harassment can be unintended and not malicious. Moreover, when one person has formal or informal
power over the other, it may be difficult to ascertain what is unwanted. An individual might tolerate unwanted
behavior if there are power imbalances between the individuals involved, but tolerance is not consent. It is every
member’s responsibility to be vigilant about how their behavior affects the experiences of others. (Philosophy of
Education Society member bulletin, 2017, ‘Safe environment/Anti-harassment policy’)2
This paper has attempted to intersect three lines of thought. The first is scholarship on women’s
emotional labor and affect alienation, which has been explored as distinct from that of men in personal
and professional spaces. The second is research on women’s experiences in higher education, includ-
ing but not limited to academic conferences, reflecting on expectations based on gender in relations
with colleagues and students. The third: women’s experiences in educational research conferences. To
be certain, many women reflect on their experiences in educational research; but this analysis is not
commonly elevated above the level of sharing anecdotes. I have not attempted a systematic study
here. However, women’s experiences in one particular field (such as educational research) do not exist
in a vacuum from the rest of the world. In this world, women are expected to smile and care more, with
customers and colleagues, than men. Women carry these experiences when they attend conferences
and hope to become a part of scholarly societies, such as in philosophy of education. Then they meet
fellow conference goers; a few or some may treat them in ways that feel harmful based on their new-
comer and/or gender status. They may or may not also meet people who are open about recognizing
challenges women face in academia, like everyday sexual harassment.
This paper suggests in this context reframing women initiates’ experiences not as their personal
problems, or unique to them as individuals. An equitable and just environment is one where exclusion
is taken seriously. Conference communities dedicated to equity and justice should share and recognize
the challenges and concerns minority and initiate members face. A sexual harassment policy, as the
Philosophy of Education Society (PES) has implemented (above), is a step in the right direction (see also
Baker, 2015). Yet as the PES policy illustrates, the way a society is experienced has to do with the work of
its membership, which should include providing society initiates care and dignity, and the protection
needed to be tolerably or reasonably comfortable in their skin, upon arrival, and during the receptions.
In relation, Ahmed argues for institutional change through spreading consciousness, which implies in
addition to policy statements the developing and nurturing of spaces for consciousness raising. We can
also find such spaces in educational research conferences. They include formalized women’s and gender
studies groups, and many other diverse forms of people banding together to acknowledge, recognize,
and interrogate the possibility and extent of sexist and/or other harassing practices. The purpose is not
fundamentally to accuse or critique but to recognize and question. When people do not give spaces for
such practices, this does not mean the challenges do not exist; but it risks a lack of attention.
8    L. JACKSON

Because affect circulates in communities through interpersonal relations, safe spaces are those
where people feel looked out for by others, known or unknown to them, who interrupt cases where
they appear or may be uncomfortable, such as when women initiates are in a corner with flirtatious or
domineering men. One can enhance safety by asking whether a junior colleague is being treated well
by someone who has been known to be sexist or harassing in the past. Raising consciousness along-
side others can deter women initiates from leaving conference events for their safety and sense of self,
thinking that is their only option. To be open can be as simple as responding to women’s perceptions of
their experiences with concern rather than shock or skepticism. Incoming women to a field should not
rethread old ropes worn thin. Community commitment to more equitable access to scholarly, personal,
and professional development in the field can be enhanced as we facilitate academic spaces where all
members aim to learn from each other.

Notes
1. 
It is worth recognizing that women’s experiences are shaped by other identity markers that are not explored in this
paper, such as culture, race, ethnicity, religion, ability, and family background (hooks, 1990; Suleri, 1992). Gender
should also be understood as fluid rather than binary ‘man/woman’ (Butler, 1990). Furthermore, women are not
unique in facing challenges related to power and social difference, in conferences and elsewhere. As identity is
intersectional, many different people face challenges related to their desires for authentic forms of recognition. In
this context, this paper aspires to generate awareness of challenges some women face in a way that can encourage
broader consideration of how affect and interpersonal and community norms undergirded by power relations
can shape conference experiences of members of other groups. It aims to articulate the experiences as not inside
women, but as a concern for communities whose members aim toward justice and inclusion.
2. 
This paper was inspired by experiences and communications with colleagues in philosophy of education and
beyond, as well as by formal and informal inquiries into other fields. It is not meant as a charge against any person
or academic society.

Acknowledgments
The author wishes to thank friendly early informal reviewers as well as the formal reviewers of this paper.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor
Liz Jackson is an assistant professor of Education in the Division of Policy, Administration and Social Sciences Education
at the University of Hong Kong. She is the author of Muslims and Islam in US Education: Reconsidering Multiculturalism
(London: Routledge, 2014). She has published in Journal of Moral Education, Philosophical Studies in Education, and Asia-
Pacific Education Researcher. Her research interests are moral and civic education, moral feelings in education, and cross-cul-
tural and global studies in education.

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