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This performance autoethnography may or may not be interpreted as a continuation of a conversation regarding the experiences of those with devalued statuses in academic settings. The authors rely on “strange accounting” to consider their experiences in the academy from various standpoints: before and after promotion, before and after leaving academia. While reflecting on our past experiences, we introduce the concept of “everyday precariousness” as a way of explaining the normalization of instability, insecurity, and negative affect that is part of everyday life for those with devalued statuses in academic settings and beyond. Everyday precariousness is an embodied experience for those in vulnerable positions. Normalized exposure to risks, such as discrimination, harassment, bullying, or structural instability, produces an undercurrent of threat that permeates academic culture. Our stories of everyday precariousness span race, ethnicity, class, academic roles, and gender boundaries (among many others). Analyzing these experiences furthers previous work on the uses of strange accounting as well as the dynamics of status silencing. In the final analysis, unresisted and unabated, everyday precariousness and status silencing can lead to institutional failure and resonance disasters.

This autoethnography takes up the matter of toxic masculinity in university settings. We introduce the term “status silencing” as a way to make visible the normalization of toxic masculinity in everyday talk and interaction in university settings among and around colleagues. Status silencing is the process in which the status of a dominant individual becomes a context which renders the story of an individual with a subordinated status untellable or untold. Using strange accounting, we explore active and passive types of status silencing to show how talk and interactions involving toxic masculinity are both internalized and externalized expressions of power and dominance. We argue that while most scholars view toxic masculinity as blatant acts of violence (mass shootings, rape and sexual assault, etc.), it is also a normalized occurrence for feminized others and that toxic masculinity in academic settings is part of an ongoing institutional norm of silence.

This chapter provides the historical and intellectual context of studying inequality and domination using the symbolic interactionist perspective. Lonnie Athens' radical interactionism was identified as a useful framework to research the omnipresent and insidious inequality found in everyday life. Chapters presented in this volume represent a follow up of Volume 41 of Studies in Symbolic Interaction, edited by Athens, where he laid the ground work for the research of domination and subordination. Chapters in this volume demonstrate the advancements made in studying inequality in symbolic interactionist research.

This study examines and describes the experiences and perceptions of women and men associate professors from various academic disciplines as they chart and navigate their academic career trajectories.

Using a case study approach, we interviewed 11 purposively selected mid-career faculty members and five department heads.

Through the Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT), we identified issues of clarity, climate, self-efficacy, and gender disparity as major concerns for mid-career faculty.

This research is limited to a research-intensive university in the southeastern United States. The small study population and unique context limit the generalizability of the study.

Findings of the study provide a lens for university and college administrators, human resources professionals, and other institutional leaders to view professional development programs for mid-career faculty members at their own institutions. The findings also suggest a need for improvements to current family-friendly policies to reduce gender bias and retain women faculty members.

This paper offers practical recommendations to higher education administrators and human resources professionals on how to positively cultivate a better work climate and culture for mid-career faculty members. It also offers suggestions on how to be sensitive to and improve gender equity among mid-career faculty in higher education.