Intersectionality: A Gifted Contribution to University Life and Leadership? Dr Fiona Kumari Campbell School of Education & Social Work University of Dundee f.k.campbell@dundee.ac.uk

Normal? I don’t know what it is to be ‘normal’ – I went to 12 schools and have moved around most of my life. I have always been an outsider looking in. Diversity extraordinaire (vomit): lesbian, disabled, mixed race, Buddhist & Jewish Difference or Sameness (equalities & integration argument)?? I am not the same of the so-called mainstream ‘majorities’, I have no real (aside from academic) understanding of how majorities experience life.

Intersectionality …as a way of understanding and analysing the complexity in the world, in people, and in human experiences… When it comes to social inequality, people’s lives and the organisation of social power in a given society are better understood as being shaped not by a single axis of social division, be it race or gender or class [ or age or disability], but by many axes that work together and influence each other. P. Collins and S. Bilge. 2016. Intersectionality, Cambridge: Polity Press, p. 2

Assumptions in intersectionality theories? Are there presupposed agreements about the forces of marginalisation within intersectionality theory(ies)? For instance many writers leave out ableism as an axis of subordination. My own understanding of ableism as having five prongs which are useful for thinking about intersectionality: differentiation ranking negation notification and prioritization of sentient life

Ableism … A system of dividing practices, ableism institutes the reification and classification of populations. Ableist systems involve the differentiation, ranking, negation, notification and prioritization of sentient life. Campbell, 2017, cited in Campbell, 2019. Precision Ableism: a studies in ableism approach to developing histories of disability and abledment, Rethinking History,23(2): 147.

Biopolitics – governing the population A good citizen is one that can be counted To be knowable, individuals have to be visible Hence the need for enumeration and classification - countability

Silos – Protected Characteristics Equality Act 2010 Discrimination framework contrasts with one based on theories of power, marginalities i.e. ableism Focus should be on institutionalised racism, ableism etc, systems that ‘entitle’ Protected Characteristics – mismatch between ‘lived experiences’ Protected Characteristics - Anti-intersectionality (compartmentalises peoples lives) Profoundly individualised and privatised (the communal is missing)

Square pegs, round holes … Does not grapple with Protected Characteristics and interactivity with contexts (place of intersectionality) Experiences of regular microaggressions …. Staff Networks – Which one? Which room? Inter-disclosures? Pressures of leadership pioneers: role models/performativity/ mental health

Poster girl or pest? Heavy lifting – whose responsibility? Accusations of a compromised perspective – yet ‘majorities’ have one Impact of ‘majority’ pervasiveness – white, able-bodied, heteronormative, christianisation

Costs of exclusion Ableism literally kills us (poor mental health, cardio-vascular issues) Adaption/maladaptation to ‘inclusion’? – still looks like assimilation to me Terms of inclusion – cultural collision? Emotions management Accumulated effects of marginality and hostilities

Be Authentic – Living a Good Life We are a product of our stories which frame us but don’t contain us Get support Awareness of influence ‘normative shadows’ and gaslighting Being ‘outsiders’ and ‘oddities’