Michelle Owen’s research while affiliated with University of Winnipeg and other places

Academics have historically been members of socially dominant groups—white, cisgender, heterosexual men, from middle- to upper-classes, who identify as able-bodied and able-minded. Members of other groups are often disadvantaged. In two larger studies, semi-structured interviews were conducted with professionals from marginalized groups. Here we explore the narratives of 16 participants who explicitly discussed their experiences in faculty positions within the health and social service professions. The expected academic roles of teacher, researcher, and colleague/administrator did not neatly fit for participants, clashing with the expectations they faced by virtue of their marginalized identities. Within the health and social service professions, the norms and expectations of the academy required marginalized faculty to make sacrifices of their time and sense of self to meet job demands. The effects of these role conflicts are pervasive, affecting many areas of academic work and beyond.

As health and social service professions increasingly emphasize commitments to equity, advocacy and social justice, non-traditional entrants to the professions increasingly bring much-needed diversity of social backgrounds and locations. Long the domain of elite social classes, the professions are not always welcoming cultures for those from lower social class backgrounds. This paper draws on notions of material, social and cultural capital, along with habitus, to examine the experiences of professionals with lower-class backgrounds, in educational programs and in their professions. The critical interpretive qualitative study draws on interviews with 27 professionals across Canada in medicine, nursing, social work and occupational therapy. While participants were clearly set apart from their colleagues by class origins, which posed distinct struggles, they also brought valuable assets to their work: enhanced connection and rapport with clients/patients, approachability, structural analysis and advocacy, plus nuanced re-envisioning of professional ethics to minimize power dichotomies. Rather than helping lower-class entrants adapt to the professions, it may be more beneficial to alter normative professional cultures to better suit these practitioners.