Motherhood and Academia - (In)compatibility, the Pandemic and Us | Input and discussion with Dr Sarah Czerney and Dr Lena Eckert
![[Translate to English:] Dr. Lena Eckert und Dr. Sarah Czerney (Fotos: privat)](/fileadmin/_processed_/3/9/csm_Lena_Eckert_Sarah_Czerney_500x500_e539e7c51b.jpg "[Translate to English:] Dr. Lena Eckert und Dr. Sarah Czerney (Fotos: privat)")
Time: 31.05.2023, 11 a.m. - 12.30 p.m.
Location: UB, Steubenstr. 6, Audimax
In German. No registration required.
The Corona pandemic clearly shows what was already visible before: We are far away from gender equality. This is true for society as well as for science. Even before the pandemic, motherhood and science in particular were too often incompatible, as Sarah Czerney, Lena Eckert and Silke Martin demonstrated in 2020 with their anthology "Mutterschaft und Wissenschaft. The (In)Compatibility of Motherhood and Scientific Activity". The pandemic has exacerbated the structural incompatibility, as the impact of COVID-19 is primarily borne on the shoulders of mothers*. Some have to take time off, take unpaid leave or even lose their jobs to care of their children during school and daycare closures.
The Corona Gap is also noticeable in academia: While there is an above-average amount of publications since the beginning of the pandemic, publications by mothers*_scholars have declined sharply. This also applies to the acquisition of third-party funding, the development of new research projects, and attendance at conferences.
In response to the worsening of the situation during the pandemic, the editors published a second book in 2022: "Mutterschaft und Wissenschaft in der Pandemie. (In)Reconciliation between Children, Care and Crisis" (Barbara Budrich). Here, a wide variety of experiences of mothers* and people involved in motherhood in academia during the pandemic are collected and a manifesto is presented in which demands are formulated for the German academic sector.
They have also founded the network Motherhood and Academia, in which more than 500 people are currently already gathering and getting involved in order to make the incompatibility of motherhood and scholarship visible and to collect proposals for solutions.
In the event, Dr. Sarah Czerney and Dr. Lena Eckert will give an insight into the books with reading samples in order to explore the field of tension between motherhood and academia in a subsequent discussion. Based on this, participants will have the opportunity to network with other affected people or supporters and to empower each other.
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About the contributors:
Sarah Czerney, Dr. phil., currently works as a research assistant in the gender equality project FEM POWER at the Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology in Magdeburg. She studied European Media Culture and completed her doctorate at Goethe University Frankfurt/M. in 2018. In addition to practical gender equality work, her focus is on feminist theory and critique of science, motherhood and academia, and equal parenting and feminist motherhood. She has two sons and lives with her family in Magdeburg.
Lena Eckert, Dr. phil. is a gender scientist as well as a writing and education researcher. She lives with her family in Berlin and works as an academic assistant at the Centre for Teaching and Learning at the European University Viadrina in Frankfurt Oder. Her research focuses on the critique of power and domination relations in higher education and society. She is particularly interested in the structuring of society and perception through gender and other categories of difference and seeks emancipative strategies in the academic enterprise. She publishes internationally on interdisciplinary, media and educational topics of critical gender studies and always tries to bring activism, art, and science together. www.lenaeckert.org
They founded the Motherhood and Science Network https://www.mutterschaft-wissenschaft.de/ to provide a forum for all those who identify as mothers and work in academia to exchange ideas, network, support and inform each other. The network serves to make us strong and visible to each other. We do not want to let the anti-life, unhealthy and competitive structures of the current academic community get us down! The problems that arise with the issues of motherhood and academia do not only affect mothers. They concern everyone, because care work is the basis of society and of every human living and working together. That is why we are also a network for partners and allies. We are a forum for those who consider a structural change in academia necessary.