Crafting the Conditions for Professional Membership: Women of Color Navigating Inclusion into Academia

ABSTRACT Previous scholarship has documented women of color’s experiences in professions such as law and medicine, but less research has explored how women of color experience the process of becoming members of professions. Using academia as a case I draw from interviews with thirty women at a single research-intensive university to demonstrate that women of color have different orientations to professional membership as compared to white women. These differences are made evident by women of color’s extra work to justify and make sense of inclusion in the profession, their beliefs about research, and their participation strategies. I argue women of color differentiate themselves from their white peers by crafting a moralized version of the profession.