Reimagining Care

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For Slow Scholarship

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Ethical Consumption?
There's an App for That

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Ethical Consumption?
There's an App for That

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CareMongering Supports Communities During the Pandemic

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CareMongering Supports Communities During the Pandemic

Introduction

Co-led by Dr. Roberta Hawkins, Associate Professor in Geography, and Dr. Amy Kipp, PhD graduate of the Social Practice and Transformational Change program, Reimagining Care considers how care is and could be practiced in a range of community, academic, and digital spaces. We examine care through practices that are often overlooked or undervalued, such as cultivating friendships with colleagues, sharing resources with neighbours, and organizing online spaces of care. Together, we imagine alternative, more caring futures and the transformational potential of care.

Current and Future Projects:

Feminist Ethics of Care in Academia

How might a feminist ethic of care be practiced in academia and why is such an approach needed? We identify and highlight unequal power dynamics and neoliberal influences in academic institutions and describe people’s embodied experiences of these power dynamics. We also offer possibilities for restructuring and reimagining what academia could look like centred around a feminist ethics of care.

As part of the LWWRC’s “Reimagining Livelihoods Forum” held August 2023 in Guelph, Ontario, we held a collective conversation during “Imagining a Caring University: A Creative Workshop,” organized by Roberta Hawkins, Amy Kipp, and Leah Levac. Through the Zine Creating a More Caring University, we share some stories of uncaring universities, already existing moments of care in universities, learnings from those moments of care, and strategies for creating more caring academic futures.

View Zine in Canva (PDF)

View accessible Zine in Canva (PDF)

View plain-text version of the Zine (PDF)

Related References

Hawkins, R., & Kern, L. (2024). Higher Expectations: How to survive in academia, make it better for others and transform the university. Toronto: Between the Lines Books.

Hering, Janet G. & Patricia A. Maurice (2024). "A Guide to Surviving and Transforming Academia for the Benefit of All." Epistimi.

Manzi, M., Ojeda, D., Hawkins, R. (2024). Creating “wiggle room”: Spaces of care and possibility within the neoliberal academy. Geoform, 149.

Community, Care, and Social Change

In the last few years, talk about care—and the need for more care—has been everywhere. We explore the multiple and intersecting crises of care and highlight social changes needed to create more caring communities. We are interested in understanding the ways in which care is being practiced at a local level, the processes involved in strengthening social infrastructures of care, and individuals’ everyday experiences of these processes.

This work includes Art in a Just Recovery, a community-based research in partnership with Art Not Shame, the Guelph Neighbourhood Support Coalition, and Social Artist Melanie Schambach, exploring community care and collective artmaking. There is currently an exhibit at the Guelph Civic Museum that includes this work, on now until April 30, 2025.

Related References

Kipp, A., & Hawkins, R. (2022). From the nice work to the hard work: “Troubling” community-based CareMongering during the COVID-19 pandemic. Gender, Work & Organization, 29(4), 1293-1313.

Care in Digital Worlds

In an increasingly digital world, care is being practiced in new ways. For example, there are apps for consumers who care about where their products come from, emojis that allow Facebook users to show that they care about friends’ posts, and digital spaces where communities of care can be organized and facilitated. We examine how care is being practiced virtually and consider the opportunities and tensions associated with online caring.