Introduction
This study will explore the diverse experiences of the authors who are two women doctoral students, one international Korean student, and one white student from the Southeastern United States who is also a mother, both pursuing their degrees in Adult Education and working as graduate assistants. In this paper, we put our own stories to work, in dialogue with each other and in dialogue with theories of feminist positionalities, subjectivities, and spaces in order to explore our experiences of safe and unsafe spaces encountered during our time as doctoral students of Adult Education.
In our narratives we found that ‘safe spaces’ are complicated and shift depending on positionality, subjectivities, and physical space itself. Finally, we discussed how different teaching and learning spaces might influence our own teaching/learning and how we might create new spaces for inclusion and diversity as students of Adult Education who are interested in enacting feminist pedagogies and socially just ways of knowing and being. We argue that, while ‘safe spaces’ may be impossible to achieve in any sort of pure form, studying the experiences of safe and unsafe spaces for women doctoral students of varying positionalities and backgrounds can help inform the creation of less harmful and more inclusive spaces for teaching and learning with women and other marginalized adult learners.
Literature review
This paper builds from feminist literature in the field of Adult Education that is interested in creating more inclusive learning environments through the use of multicultural feminist approaches to pedagogy (Tisdell, 1995) and exploring the educational potential of work through feminist perspectives (Hart, 1992). Tisdell (1995) has argued that in order for adult educators to meet the needs of diverse learners, they must consider the politics of
knowledge creation and the power dynamics at the intersections of gender, race, class, and sexuality. Tisdell (1995) argued for combining multicultural and feminist approaches to pedagogy in order to achieve more inclusive environments where adults can learn, and also pointed out the importance of considering how the learning environment is nested within a particular societal context.
Mechthild Hart (1992) argued that the concept of work is never simply about economic realities, but also draws upon cultural assumptions about work and production in powerful ways that signify attitudes toward the nature of existence and being. Hart (1992) also argued that illuminating hidden and marginalized experiences of work has profound
educative potential. We seek to further value experience-based knowledge by highlighting our own unique experiences with space as women doctoral students and graduate
assistants—a location between learning, teaching, and work itself. Through our narrative research, we intend to highlight our own experiences in order to expand upon this existing body of knowledge about how adults learn, teach, and work, and how spaces come to be recognized as safe or unsafe in the process of learning.
Theoretical framework
Collins’ (2000) described power as a complex force that can be wielded to oppress certain groups, as well as an intangible phenomenon that flows through our society resulting in people experiencing inequalities in four domains: the structural, disciplinary, hegemonic, and interpersonal domains. The structural domain refers to institutional, economic,
governmental, and legal realms of life, which could also include educational structures like a University. The disciplinary domain refers to the ideas and practices that sustain certain power relationships while the hegemonic domain refers to the images, symbols, and ideologies that shape our perceptions and consciousness. Finally, the interpersonal domain refers to the power interactions between individuals and groups. Exploring these four domains of power helps to illuminate how oppression and power is constructed and maintained along various identities and social locations that individuals hold at one time (Collins, 2000).
In Elizabeth Tisdell’s (1998, 2001) work on poststructural feminist pedagogy she argued that our identities are always shifting, following the movement of our worlds, experiences, and social locations. Tisdell (2001) argued that when we examine our positionalities in the world, or how we are affected and affect others based on the social locations of gender, race, class, and sexual orientation, that this shapes our identities as teachers and learners and our ways of knowing and being. To act in a socially-just or feminist way in one
moment does not mean that one cannot wield power in an oppressive way at another moment. This is particularly powerful if we consider Collins’ (2000) concepts of power as it operates on multiple levels and domains in our society, particularly in education where all of these domains are at play. An additional element to consider is Soja’s (1989) argument that just as social practices shape space, space also produces social practices in dynamic ways. Following this line of thought, it is productive to consider the ways that physical spaces where adults teach, learn, and work impact possible courses of action. Methods and data analysis
In this paper, we use the qualitative methodological approach of narrative inquiry, or
narrative research (Clandinin & Caine, 2008), to explore our experiences. Narrative inquiry is an appropriate methodology for uncovering and understanding participants' and
researchers' experiences by inquiring into their own stories and life experiences (Clandinin & Caine, 2008). In this paper, we position ourselves as both researchers and participants, and use our own stories as a way to understand our experiences.
Narrative inquiry also encourages researchers to attend to issues of space, temporality, and social practices (Clandinin & Caine, 2008). This is compatible with our intention to highlight how space exists, produces, or is produced in particular ways that impact teaching, learning, and working. In order to facilitate the creation of our narratives we asked of ourselves, and each other, two questions, 1) have you experienced any ‘safe spaces’ while working, learning, and teaching in graduate school, and 2) have you experienced any ‘unsafe spaces’ while working, learning, and teaching in graduate school? In the following section, we will share our stories.
Stories of our experiences of safe/unsafe spaces
While attempting to answer the questions of whether we had ever experienced a ‘safe space’ or an ‘unsafe space’ in our experiences teaching, learning, and working as
graduate students of differing positionalities, we found that the answers were not so simply stated. The first story describes Brigette’s experience of searching for a safe space to continue breastfeeding her young infant while starting a new job as a Graduate Assistant at her University in order to pursue her doctoral degree full time. The second story
describes Chaewon’s experience of being ‘intersectional’ at an American University in the South as an international woman graduate student from South Korea.
Searching for a safe space as a mother, student, and worker
During my second semester of graduate school I was hired to work as a Graduate
Assistant for one of the offices of our University’s administrative organizations. At the time, I had a seven-month old infant and was breastfeeding, so in my interview I mentioned that I would need a space to breastfeed every four hours or so, or a place to pump milk. I remember feeling terrified bringing this up during the interview, and I felt sure that this would diminish my chances of getting the position. However, the two women that
interviewed me appeared receptive to my request that would allow me to take breaks as necessary during the work day to breastfeed or pump milk in a private space during the workday, and I was hired for the position.
Looming heavily over me at this time was the financial pressure of needing to keep my Graduate Assistantship in order to afford my school tuition, move from attending school part-time to full-time, and provide for my family’s financial needs. At this time, we had no family who could assist us in caring for our son, and we could not afford alternate
childcare. My husband reduced his work hours to part-time so that he could care for our son on the days when I would be working and bring him to my office so I could continue breastfeeding.
At first when I asked my supervisor about finding a place to breastfeed my son during days when I worked eight-hour long shifts, she told me that she would have to ‘check with
someone in the main office’ to reserve a room for me, but that she would need to know one week in advance. I asked her to reserve the room for me the following week, and I agreed to use the shared staff break room downstairs in the meantime. The next week I brought up the issue again, and my supervisor acted as if it was the first time we had ever had the conversation. After this discussion, she never followed up, and never reserved a room for me. Fearing that my persistence would have consequences for my job, I did not press her on it further. Determined to make the best of the situation, I started using the shared employee breakroom to breastfeed my son.
My husband would usually arrive just before anyone would use the shared breakroom for lunch, so the space was mostly private. I carefully positioned myself in the corner of the room, parallel to the door, and my husband would sit in between myself and the door so that if anyone entered I would have time to make sure that I was not ‘exposed’ as I fed my son. Additionally, there was a key pad on the door that required anyone who entered to press a certain code, so prior to anyone entering I was also warned by the sound of the code being typed in and the automatic unlocking of the door. This usually provided me with a few extra moments to prepare a transition from private to public space.
Because the office was mainly women, there were only a few men that ever came into the breakroom while I was breastfeeding. Most of the men usually avoided acknowledging our existence and seemed very awkward and eager to get their food and leave. Some women also acted this way, most notably the primary administrator within the organization, while other women would make a point to say hello and ask about the baby. One woman in particular always made me feel welcome and shared that she was still breastfeeding her 2 ½ year-old child, and how she thought that it was great that my husband could bring my son to my work so I could continue breastfeeding. When she was in the breakroom, I did feel that the space was transformed into a safe space for me to care for my son and to be a working student.
Despite these positive moments during my breakroom breastfeeding strategy, I never felt completely comfortable or safe all the time. Because it was a public space, I could never be sure of who was coming or going, what their attitudes toward breastfeeding might be, and whether it would have consequences for my job and consequently my ability to pursue higher education. Somewhere in a combination of fear, sleep deprivation, and the general exhaustion that comes with being a new parent, I could not find the strength to confront my supervisor and ask that she provide a private space for me.
An alpha girl between two worlds: Chaewon’s story
I was born in the early 1980s, the time when the speed of economic development in Korea was at its peak. At that time, our grandparents’ generation still clung to the ideology that men were superior to women, and women should stay at home and take care of their families. Also, it was a common belief that women must assist their husbands to guarantee the husbands’ social success. An even more complex problem is that our parents’
generation grew up during that time when that ideology was prevalent—and although they were starting to imagine the possibility of changing gendered notions, there was no real consciousness-raising about those kinds of biases. Therefore, when I was young, several stereotypes of gender were still maintained by the adults around me.
However, economic development demanded a more skilled labor force, and the utilization of women was the most effective way to deal with the labor shortage. Therefore, equal educational opportunities for daughters and sons were encouraged. Parents began to feel proud of their smart daughters, and these young girls did not need to hide their talents or yield opportunities to their male siblings any more. This tendency was continued up to the time when I went to university and the term ‘Alpha Girl’ was coined. Along with our
parents, we did not hesitate to think of ourselves as Alpha Girls, and at that time, I thought girls could do anything and everything that we wanted to do and enjoy equal respect as boys.
Unfortunately, after graduating from University, the real situation was very different from what I expected. Above all, entrance into the labor market for women was much harder and less possible than it was for men, and it began to get even harder for the ‘Alpha Girls’ to have opportunities for jobs. I think this situation was our first experience with despair. Our parents and teachers told us that we could do anything and everything, but we experienced a different reality.
Although struggling in the labor market and society as an adult woman, I found someone who encouraged me to seek higher education when I worked as a researcher in a Korean national research institution. I think I got my best learning experience from my boss at this institute. My boss was a female senior research fellow, and a working mother with two teenagers. She was a very supportive person, and I was able to enjoy diverse research and learning experiences working with her.
I decided to come to the United States to pursue my doctoral degree in an Adult Education program in 2013. Moving to another country meant a lot of things for me: living without family, adjusting to a different culture, studying in a second language, and being part of a minority group. The racial diversity in the United States is one of the most interesting experiences for me as an Asian woman graduate student. In Korea, I was concerned about the gender differences and sexual discriminations in schools and workplaces. However, my most interesting experiences with discrimination in the U.S. were related to racial differences.
building relationships with native students in the classroom while working as a teaching assistant. I am most concerned with developing credibility and reliability as a professional teaching assistant, not only with the students but also with the professor I am working with. I am frequently asked about my future plans after graduation from the people surrounding me, and I usually say that I want to stay in the United States if there is an opportunity. However, when discussing the issue of marriage and future career plans, there are some people tell me to meet and marry American man. This assumes that all Asian women want to attain U.S. citizenship. While getting a job is much easier if Asian women have U.S. citizenship, in my case, I want to keep my own nationality even if I can work in the United States after graduation. I am not sure if people would ask the same question to
international women students who have French or British nationalities. I also wonder whether the same “advice” would be offered Asian men in higher education.
I have also met some people who want to correct my accent, and I usually accept their behavior as an expression of kindness. However, some people correct the accent of Asian female professors in the classroom, which makes it difficult for them to be seen as a
legitimate knowledge holder in the classroom and have the authority to create safer places for learning. I have experienced a dilemma of safe and unsafe space: while school and the classroom are sometimes safe spaces for me as an Asian woman graduate student, those places can also be an unsafe spaces for Asian woman professors.
Discussion
Brigette's story of searching for a safe space to breastfeed her child while working as a graduate assistant and transitioning to becoming a full-time Ph.D. student helps illuminate the complexity and fleeting existences of 'safe space' that surface in our daily lives.
Chaewon’s story also illuminates how she simultaneously felt that her University was a ‘safe space’ for her as a student in some situations, but also potentially unsafe if she were to take on more authority such as through her position as a teaching assistant, and her desire to continue working in the United States with her positionality as an Asian woman professor. In both stories, Brigette and Chaewon noted how space, and individuals within those spaces, impacted how they learned, taught, and worked in their positions as
graduate student workers of varying positionalities.
While there were moments when Brigette described feeling like the public break room was a 'safe space,' those moments were fleeting, and dependent upon who was present in that particular space at any given time. For instance, she felt that the safe was 'safe' for her to breastfeed her son when other women engaged with her and acknowledged her presence, but that the space could become less safe when others entered the room and said
nothing. Similarly, while Chaewon described feeling that the University classroom could be a ‘safe space’ for her as a student in Korea and the United States, as a teaching assistant and future Asian woman professor in the United States, she could recognize how the classroom could be transformed into an unsafe space for the teacher, or that might impact the teacher’s authority to make the classroom safe for other marginalized students. Within the realm of the breakroom in Brigette’s story and the classrooms of Chaewon’s story, aspects of Collins' (2000) explanations of structural, disciplinary, hegemonic, and interpersonal realms of power were all at play surrounding the acceptability of breastfeeding and of ‘having an accent’ at work and as a student.