Sexisms and Un/welcome Diversity in Australian Universities

Abstract

This paper offers an analysis of data from the second phase of a project entitled Understanding and Addressing Everyday Sexisms in Australian Universities, which involved interviewing key stakeholders with an understanding of and/or experiences of ‘Everyday Sexisms’ within the academy. The paper demonstrates how women understand themselves as inherently unwelcome within higher education in Australia, and illustrates how this manifests through experiences, complaints procedures and seemingly banal everyday gendered and racilaised interactions. The authors show how complaints procedures often operate to further harass women who have experienced sexist harassment at work. The paper concludes by considering how the shared experiences of minoritised people within universities can pave the way for new ways of understanding diversity and working together to co-create a more equitable Higher Education.