Introduction
The ways in which individuals
experience working conditions tend to vary depending on social factors such as
gender, race, and class, reflecting the socio-historical construction not only
of public and private spaces but also of how these spaces are legitimized for
some individuals over others (Antloga, Monteiro, Maia, Porto, & Maciel,
2020; Beauvoir, 1970; Beauvoir, 1967). Thus, the position of women in their
professional trajectories is shaped by the sexual division of labor (Kergoat,
2009), which prescribes a distribution of roles and socially constructed spaces
for each gender, grounded in established power relations (Bourdieu, 2010).
In seeking to correlate power
relations with everyday inequities, Bourdieu (2010) highlights gender as a
social construct that imposes performance expectations on both women and men,
shaping their characteristics, ideas, and activities. Beauvoir (1967) further
adds that these expectations, influenced by prevailing norms within a given
time and place, directly affect the idealization of female and male roles in
the labor sphere.
Within this framework, an androcentric
worldview emerges, reinforcing the belief that men are naturally suited to
occupy productive roles associated with intellect, leadership, and positions of
public authority. In contrast, women have traditionally been assigned to the
private realm, caregiving, and motherhood — in other words, the reproductive
sphere. Consequently, the social division of labor is founded on two
fundamental principles: separation and hierarchy (Kergoat, 2009).
The principle of separation refers to
the gender-based segregation of tasks. With respect to the principle of
hierarchy, it presupposes that certain types of labor are more valued than
others, specifically, work done by men is considered more prestigious than work
done by women (Kergoat, 2009).
Nevertheless, it is essential to note
that analyzing the division of labor cannot rely solely on the lens of gender
inequality; it must also be approached through an intersectional perspective.
Crenshaw (1991), a pioneer in the use of the term “intersectionality”,
emphasizes that women’s experiences are simultaneously shaped by gender, race,
and class.
For instance, a poor Black woman
seeking paid employment outside the home is often perceived and portrayed as
less capable, not merely because she is a woman, but also because she is
subjected to racism and the negative stereotypes attached to it, along with
class-based discrimination. These overlapping forms of discrimination
exacerbate women’s suffering and hinder their access to the job market and
various professional fields. From this intersectional perspective, white men
remain at the top of the social hierarchy, followed by Black men, white women,
and finally Black women, who occupy its lowest tier (Gonzalez & Hasenbalg,
2022; Gonzalez, 2020).
As previously stated, while the home
and the responsibility for maintaining its “harmony” were conceived as the
ideal life project for white women, Black women were relegated to subordinate
roles, ranging from labor under degrading conditions to prostitution.
Furthermore, Black women have been historically sexualized and excluded from
the ideal of the wife, a role reserved exclusively for white women.
Given this, even as late as the
mid-20th century, working outside the home posed a threat to white women’s
femininity and their socially assigned privileges tied to economic dependence
on their husbands. In this context, teaching was considered the paid occupation
most closely aligned with motherhood, making it the “ideal” profession: a woman
would leave home to care for other people’s children, as a nurturing
mother-figure (Rago, 2022).
According to Almeida, Almeida, and
Amorim (2022), this professional insertion was rooted in the belief that
teaching was a “natural” role for women, an extension of their supposed innate
ability to care. This notion gave rise to what scholars have termed the
“feminization of teaching” (Louro, 2022, p. 449).
Hence, the entry and later
predominance of women in teaching occurred largely due to male withdrawal from
the profession, as men migrated to other careers offering better working
conditions and status. Women, in turn, were left to “take what remained”, a
dynamic that suggests “You can keep this; we have better options”. As a result,
teaching children and adolescents became naturalized as women’s work and,
during the early 20th century, was the only socially and culturally accepted
path toward female professionalization.
However, when it comes to teaching in
higher education, Almeida and Soares (2012, p. 557) emphasize a paradox: “(...)
Since ancient times, men were the doctors, the scholars, the learned ones, the
free thinkers; and women barely managed to learn to read and write, submerged
in domestic and maternal dutie”. So how could women, especially poor women,
possibly lay claim to a space as complex and prestigious as higher education, a
space historically built by and for male intellectuals?
In contemporary times, even within a
post-feminist wave that encourages women to reach new academic heights, their
trajectories remain shaped by a male-oriented career model. Inequality stems
from the structure of the academic career itself, which demands full-time
dedication, constant competition, and excessive productivity in research,
conditions that systematically hinder women’s advancement in the field.
In Psychology, a study by Cunha (2021)
reveals that the daily lives of female psychology researchers are shaped not
only by domestic and academic demands but also by institutionalized sexism
within higher education institutions. Furthermore, through an intersectional
lens, Black women’s academic trajectories are also disrupted by racism. These
intersecting challenges contribute to vulnerability and both physical and
emotional suffering, sometimes leading to women abandoning their scientific
careers altogether.
Data from the Brazilian Higher
Education Census show that women constitute the majority of faculty in private
institutions, whereas men continue to dominate in public ones. In terms of
racial and ethnic composition, 55.8% of faculty identified as white, 15.9% as
mixed-race (pardo), 2.5% as Black, 1.0% as Asian, and 0.2% as Indigenous.
Notably, 24.6% of respondents did not declare their race (Brasil, 2022).
It follows that investigating gender
disparities in higher education teaching is essential, as these inequalities
directly impact women’s academic experiences. Additionally, the predominance of
white faculty members, alongside the underrepresentation of mixed-race and
Black individuals, reveals an academic structure shaped by whiteness. As
Ferreira, Teixeira, and Ferreira (2022) argue, governmental statistics
underscore the need for intersectional analysis to fully understand the
inequalities present in this context.
On a personal note, I approach this
topic as someone shaped by a lineage of educators. As the daughter and
granddaughter of schoolteachers, I grew up immersed in the educational
environment. After finishing school, I would accompany my mother to her classrooms,
blending in with other children and sitting in on faculty meetings. I witnessed
firsthand the daily struggles and precarious conditions faced by education
professionals. I observed mothers — unsung heroines — subjected to exploitative
systems that consumed their time and forced them to juggle both visible and
invisible labor.
As Ernaux (2023) suggests, writing
grounded in lived experience becomes a way of avenging our people. This study,
therefore, is constructed from the standpoint of a teacher’s daughter, a member
of the working class, an admirer of the teaching profession, and as a tribute
to my passion for education, despite its hardships.
In light of this context, based on the
question “What are the main tensions faced by female Psychology professors
working in private institutions in Itaperuna regarding academic permanence and
advancement?”, the objective of this research is to identify the tensions faced
by these women, considering their multiple responsibilities as teachers,
mothers, wives, and scientists.
Method
This study adopts a cross-sectional,
qualitative, and descriptive methodology, composed of a narrative literature
review and field research conducted with the target population. According to
Gil (2023), qualitative research, grounded in an interpretivist approach,
enables the analysis of the research problem from the perspectives of the
participants, allowing for a deeper understanding of social interaction
processes. Regarding the descriptive nature of the study, Richardson (2017)
emphasizes that this type of research aids in the characterization of specific
populations or phenomena.
Accordingly, the research unfolded in
three stages: a narrative literature review, data collection, and data
analysis. The literature review was conducted using the SciELO (Scientific
Electronic Library Online), PePSIC (Electronic Journals in Psychology), BVS
(Virtual Health Library), and BDTD (Brazilian Digital Library of Theses and
Dissertations) databases.
The inclusion criteria for selecting
materials were: (a) studies addressing the precarization of teaching work; (b)
research discussing the career trajectories of female professors in higher
education; and (c) studies analyzing gender inequality in graduate programs and
academia. The exclusion criteria were: (a) publications not focused on the
precarization of teaching work; (b) studies addressing women solely as
undergraduate students; and (c) research conducted in international contexts.
In the second stage of the literature
review, references cited in the previously selected materials were also
examined to identify additional relevant sources not found in the databases.
Furthermore, seminal works on gender and intersectionality were included, such
as those by Gonzalez and Hasenbalg (2022), Federici (2021), Gonzalez (2020),
Bourdieu (2010), Kergoat (2009), Beauvoir (1970), and Beauvoir (1967).
Data collection was carried out
through semi-structured interviews. According to Minayo (2009), this method is
effective in obtaining relevant information for research design, as it allows
participants to freely express their experiences and perceptions.
In compliance with ethical standards,
this study was submitted to and approved by the Research Ethics Committee of
Centro Universitário Redentor/Afya on September 2, 2024. The Certificate of
Ethical Approval is registered under number 69315423.3.0000.5648 on the
Plataforma Brasil system.
Following approval, professors were
invited to participate in the study via WhatsApp. Due to participants’
availability and geographical distance, all interviews were conducted through
video calls on the Google Meet platform.
Inclusion criteria for participation
were: (a) holding a bachelor’s degree in Psychology from an institution
recognized by the Ministry of Education (MEC); (b) being employed as a faculty
member at a higher education institution also recognized by the MEC and located
in Itaperuna (RJ); and (c) identifying as a cisgender woman. Exclusion criteria
included: (a) not having a degree in Psychology; (b) not teaching in a
Psychology program at a higher education institution in the aforementioned
municipality; and (c) not identifying as a cisgender woman.
The Informed Consent Form (ICF) was
sent alongside the invitation to ensure participants were aware of the study’s
objectives, as well as potential risks and benefits. In total, nine professors
were contacted, and eight agreed to participate. One professor did not respond
to the invitation after three attempts (two via WhatsApp and one via Instagram)
and was thus considered to have declined participation.
At the beginning of each scheduled
interview, the researcher reiterated the content of the ICF, clarified any
doubts, and requested participants to sign the form before proceeding. The
interviews were conducted between September 24 and October 15, 2024.
As stated in the ICF, interviews were
recorded using the researcher’s cell phone, which was essential for later
transcription. The average interview duration was one hour. After data
collection was completed, the interviews were transcribed using Microsoft Word.
It is important to note that the
transcriptions were non-naturalistic, focusing on the content of the interviews
(Nascimento & Steinbruch, 2019). Hence, grammatical corrections were made,
and filler words — such as “né” a colloquial Brazilian Portuguese expression
similar to “right?” or “you know?” often used at the end of sentences — were
omitted when they did not serve any discursive purpose.
For data analysis, Discursive Textual
Analysis was adopted, following the recommendations of Moraes and Galiazzi
(2020). This method lies between content analysis and discourse analysis,
enabling a hermeneutic interpretive process through three main stages:
unitarization, categorization, and development of analytical metatexts. The
unitarization and categorization processes were carried out using Microsoft
Excel spreadsheets. The overall data analysis process was summarized and
systematized in Box 1. The categories should be understood as emergent, arising
from a comprehensive and systematic examination of the research corpus (Moraes,
2003).
In order to humanize the narratives,
fictitious names were used instead of numbers to identify the teachers. The
choice of these names was not random: each one was inspired by a woman who
actively participated as a symbol of resistance throughout history, each in her
own way. This choice reflects our commitment to recognizing the specificities
and uniqueness of each individual's trajectory, as each one is more than just a
number or a mere representative of a category; they are women with their own
experiences and stories.
Below is a summary of the rationale
behind each selected name: a) Bertha Lutz: a leader in the Brazilian suffragist
movement, instrumental in securing women's right to vote; b) Carmen Lúcia: the
first Brazilian woman to preside over the Electoral Justice and a Supreme
Federal Court (STF) justice, known for her defense of human rights; c) Celina
Guimarães: a teacher and the first registered female voter in Brazil,
representing the achievement of women's suffrage; d) Maria da Penha: a symbol
in the fight against domestic violence, who inspired Brazil’s Law No. 11.340 of
2006, widely known as the Maria da Penha Law; e) Nísia Floresta: a pioneer in
advocating for women's education and rights in Brazil; f) Olga Benário: a
political activist and symbol of resistance against the Nazi dictatorship,
remembered for her strength in the face of oppression; g) Patrícia Galvão
(Pagu): a militant and writer, emblematic of resistance during the military
dictatorship in Brazil; h) Rachel de Queiroz: a writer and journalist, one of
the first women to be admitted to the Brazilian Academy of Letters.
Results
The study sample comprised eight female professors, aged between
25 and 50. Of these, seven self-identified as white and one as Asian. Six
participants were mothers, and six were in stable relationships. In terms of
educational background, four held a master’s degree, one was currently enrolled
in a master’s program, and the remaining three had completed postgraduate
specialization courses. It is worth noting that the participants were at
different stages in their academic careers, reflecting a diversity of
professional experiences, which is consistent with the findings of Silva and
Ribeiro (2014).
During the semi-structured interviews, participants were invited
to recount their academic and professional trajectories starting from their
undergraduate studies, including how they entered the teaching profession, what
motivated them to stay in it, and the tensions they encountered throughout
their journeys. It is important to emphasize that this study does not aim to
compare the participants’ narratives nor to produce generalizations.
Accordingly, based on the interview data and as outlined in Box 1
of the previous section, the following final categories were established:
“Between the visible, the invisible, and the ‘being’ in the margins”,
“Existence and resistance of women in a space built by and for men” and
“Circles of support”.
Discussion
Between
the visible, the invisible, and the “being” in the margins
The narratives of the female faculty members are marked by
movements encompassing visible work, invisible work, and the possibilities of
existence in the margins. The intertwining that constitutes this category
reveals that the daily life of the professors is not limited to activities
performed openly, such as teaching scheduled classes. It also includes the
responsibilities and tensions of invisible activities, such as out-of-class,
intellectual, and domestic work, which leave space for personal experiences
detached from the profession during “marginal” moments.
Regarding visible work, references to precarious labor conditions
were recurrent among the interviewees, reflecting unanimously in the necessity
of maintaining multiple employment contracts, accumulating extracurricular
tasks, and participating in unpaid events and projects. For professors Olga and
Celina,
(...) I
perceive there is little appreciation. (...) For example, for me, it should
count that I am there listening to that student, that the student has my
WhatsApp contact and talks to me during the week, that on Saturdays and Sundays
I am grading exams, thinking about work, thinking about a new didactic approach
to teaching. (...) Maybe if I were well paid for this, I wouldn’t have other
jobs. Or, for example, I could work fewer hours in other jobs or dedicate less
time to other things. (...) If the demand is high, the time is short, and the
salary is low, at times it can become very stressful (Recording of
Olga_10/02/2024_00:25:56).
There
are demands that always come up, that are not related to classroom teaching:
creating test questions, participating in projects, I don’t know where from.
(...) Unpaid work demands. So you have to participate in some event at
God-knows-what time, on a Saturday at noon, and you are not paid for it. You
get paid by the hour, but you won’t get paid for that (Recording of
Celina_10/11/2024_00:24:32).
Olga’s statement denounces the devaluation of the teaching
profession, which is not limited to Basic Education but extends to Higher
Education. Her denunciation aligns with the contributions of Gemelli and Closs
(2022), who state that precariousness has intensified due to the expansion of
vacancies in higher education and the growing demand for efficiency and
productivity aligned with market interests. Hourly-paid faculty, who often
accumulate contracts in multiple institutions — and in Psychology, including
freelance work — frequently receive insufficient remuneration for subsistence,
forcing them to increase their working hours.
Concerning the unpaid work mentioned by Celina, it should be
considered that, although not obligatory, it manifests passively. That is, if
one opts out or is absent, the person tends to be marginalized, which may cause
disadvantages later on.
Carmen, a woman with a consolidated career in the field, mother,
and wife, complements that the class sizes are around one hundred students, an
excessive number for a single classroom:
Today, classes
are very large. So, imagine, you have to... And also, in my work routine, you
have to stop, you have to read one hundred assignments, you have to give that
attention (Recording of Carmen_09/24/2024_00:16:24).
In this context, although the professors strive to maintain the
quality of their work, some aspects end up compromised, as additional effort is
required, resembling a production line in grading assignments and exams. This
is, at the very least, inhumane. Moreover, the professors find themselves in a
paradoxical situation: they need to increase their workload to improve
remuneration but must also manage huge classes, signaling the precariousness of
faculty work in private higher education institutions.
Regarding invisible work, Rosa and Vieira (2023) point out that,
under the capitalist mode of production, the appropriation of labor goes beyond
physical effort, extending also to intellectual labor, where the demand for
polyvalence and efficiency is equally intense. Silva and Ribeiro (2014) further
add that in the academic world, scientific production has become the main
currency of value, in other words, the more you have, the more you are worth.
The following excerpt illustrates how this pressure manifests for faculty
working in private institutions:
I feel very
pressured. (...) Thankfully, I have these productions because of my students,
who are wonderful. (…) I can keep my Lattes curriculum updated thanks to the
students’ production and the advisement I provide. So that alleviates some of
my burden, but they want more now. So, there’s a lot of demand. And sometimes
it’s not even paid demand. (...) I am already teaching, organizing myself,
improving. (...) It’s an internal demand from the environment (Recording of
Patrícia_09/27/2024_00:35:57).
Professor Patrícia’s contributions reaffirm how maintaining an
updated Lattes curriculum is relevant in the academic scenario. However, this
requirement is just one among many others: professors must prepare lessons,
create exams, grade activities, advise projects, and also produce scientific
work to enlarge their Lattes. Intellectual work, which is, to some extent,
creative work, becomes just another item to be ticked off.
Following advocacy, notably by the Parent In Science movement
(Staniscuaski et al., 2021) — dedicated to supporting parents in science —
since April 15, 2021, the National Council for Scientific and Technological
Development (CNPq) allows maternity leave to be included in the Lattes
curriculum, recognizing the effects of parenthood on scientific production
(Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico, 2021).
According to Portugueis (2023), intellectual work cannot be
compared to typical company work: a researcher does not simply sit in a chair
to write an article at 8 a.m., take a one-hour lunch break, then return and
finish the article (or book chapter, monograph, or similar) at 6 p.m.
Intellectual production requires productive leisure and inspiration for
writing, which may occur unexpectedly, without a timer or scheduled hours. It
is work that takes time, involving constant writing and rewriting, rethinking methods,
and reconsidering what is being done. Due to its particularities, it is often
done outside scheduled class hours, and when performed under pressure to
increase publications to feed indicators, it may result in a burden associated
with intellectual work (Portugueis, 2023).
Furthermore, invisible work also encompasses domestic work.
Patrícia offers an interesting analogy relating intellectual and domestic work:
Well, I think
the hardest part is having a double shift. This is not just for us researchers
who want to do a doctorate, for example, but having a double shift at any time
is complicated because no one understands research as... just as the housewife
is not valued, the researcher isn’t either. These are two completely different
ends, two totally different types of work, but they share this invisibility of
not being valued. So, everything that is not... I don’t know how to explain,
but it seems like it’s not work. When you do your schedule, you are home
studying, it seems like studying is nothing, just as housework is like nothing
too (Patrícia_09/27/2024_01:04:40).
Patrícia’s discourse demonstrates how, despite being distinct,
both types of work share invisibility and lack of recognition. Federici (2021)
contributes to this reflection by stating that when women are not paid hourly,
the time dedicated to work becomes irrelevant in society’s eyes. Consequently,
the mismatch between effort and appreciation portrays the tensions women face
in their academic and professional trajectories, showing that the burden of the
double shift goes beyond the physical aspect, also affecting the recognition of
their contributions.
Antloga et al. (2020) point out that the double work shift can
negatively impact women’s physical and mental health, besides reducing time
available for self-care, proper nutrition, sleep, and leisure activities.
Therefore, this additional load not only reinforces gender inequality but also
limits opportunities for growth and permanence in academic careers.
From the interviewees’ reports, it was observed that they take
advantage of the “margins”— intervals between work contracts and short moments
when they are not involved in extracurricular activities — to carry out
personal activities such as leisure and spending time with children and
partners. In the excerpt below, Carmen explains how this works in her life
today, expressing that between one job and another, she picks up her child from
school and that even in socially invisible work, the demands tend to fall more
heavily on women:
(...) Today, I
can be closer, take [my child] to school, pick up, have lunch together,
anyway..., but now I have no one else. It’s just me and my husband. So, I don’t
count on anyone’s help besides him. (...) You can’t unbalance, so to speak, the
attention you have to give to family, to the children, to their education.
That’s also a responsibility that I think is not as demanded of men. It’s much
more demanded. (...) It’s because the mother didn’t cut the child’s nails, the
mother didn’t see the clothes he was going to wear (Recording of
Carmen_09/24/2024_00:12:59).
Similarly, Maria points out the use of time in the margins when
talking about time with her son, as exemplified in the excerpt below:
(...)
We are doing the best we can today. Like, today, for example, there are no
classes, I will be with him. Soon we’ll go to a family party that we planned.
(...) It’s weekend, also during the week after ten p.m. It’s this rush, let’s
put it that way, but at the same time with a feeling that it’s flowing
(Recording of Maria_10/15/2024_00:47:14).
Reflecting on motherhood and its impacts on women’s careers,
especially those of faculty members, involves considering that it is a
condition that multiplies the demands related to reproductive labor and the
different forms of mothering, present in the singularities of each
mother-professor, elucidating unequal relations (Oliveira, 2023). For example,
a single mother, as in Maria’s case, has different experiences with overload.
Despite attempts to reconcile all responsibilities, the presence
of guilt is noticeable: guilt for the need to juggle multiple jobs to guarantee
income and quality of life and, at the same time, the absence of time to enjoy
personal activities, time with children and partners (when applicable). In the
interview with Nísia, she reports:
(...) We manage
somehow, but it costs a lot: it costs your marriage, your hours, your weekends,
your time with your daughter, it costs courses you can’t take because you’re
involved with other situations. And it’s a tough game because, at the same time
I need to specialize to keep myself in this market, in this niche, I don’t have
time for that. The scale is always tipping more negatively, at least in my view
(Nísia_09/26/2024_00:12:56).
According to Calmon et al. (2021), women tend to consider the
reconciliation between professional and personal life as a determining factor
for continuing their scientific trajectories. Moreover, motherhood and the
challenges of reconciling it with the professional path are frequently cited as
reasons that can lead to dropout or reconsideration of the academic career.
Exemplifying the reasons why she has not yet entered a doctoral program, the
faculty member Celina states:
For example,
the doctoral issue is not here. How am I going to go to Rio, two or three times
a week, be away? I have colleagues who manage it, I can’t because, at the same
time I want to be a mother, but I want to be a mother who I think can give a
deserved childhood (...) which is having the mother nearby. So, we stay in
contact. But we who study development, study theories, we are stuck, I feel in
a very complicated position to provide support and at the same time fulfill
myself as a woman, as a person (Recording of Celina_10/11/2024_00:05:53).
As a psychology professor, Celina understands child development
issues but, as a woman and mother, she finds herself in a “catch-22” This
further confirms the difficult balance between professional and personal life.
Additionally, the excerpt allows us to understand that, as a mother, she
worries about her daughter, willing to put her professional desires second to
dedicate herself to her child.
In this scenario, although women currently occupy a greater space
in the public sphere, they still dedicate more attention to family demands than
men (Souza & Carvalho, 2023), a situation that becomes clear in another
excerpt from Celina’s interview:
After I became
a mother, everything changed. And even though I denied it, oh, it’s a shared
role, everyone should raise children together... I have a great partner, it
will be divided equally, no. For me, it hasn’t been, (...) there are demands
that only we, well, only we can meet, and socially too. I don’t know if it’s my
issue, rushing things and taking on tasks, but this being a woman and a mother,
I realized, yes, I have been harmed” (Recording of Celina_10/11/2024_00:05:02).
It is clear that, even having a strong support network and a
husband who actively helps with childcare, there is an unequal burden, and
starting from a meritocratic viewpoint is unfeasible since the balance clearly
tips toward women. Gender inequalities in academia manifest when a faculty
member, mother, and researcher has less time to “expand” her Lattes due to
childcare responsibilities. According to analyses by Souza and Carvalho (2023),
these concerns are rarely part of men’s daily lives, who exhibit more immediate
and individualistic attitudes, principles that sustain the academic environment
and will be addressed in the next section.
Beauvoir (1967) adds that the burdens of marriage and motherhood
remain heavier for women than for men, making it clearly more difficult for a
woman to reconcile the role of worker and family life. Even today, attempts at
reconciliation may result in the hardship of female existence.
The tensions between reconciling visible work, invisible work, and
being in the margins are even more intensified by Itaperuna being an inland
municipality. Professors who wish to specialize in Psychology must seek
master’s and doctoral programs in major urban centers. The nearest cities
offering such specialization opportunities in the academic field are Santo
Antônio de Pádua, home to the Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF), and Campos
dos Goytacazes, which houses UFF Campos and the Universidade Estadual do Norte
Fluminense Darcy Ribeiro (UENF).
However, these institutions offer only interdisciplinary programs,
such as Education, Social Policies, and Cognition and Language, none of which
are specific to Psychology (Brazil, 2024). The need to travel makes this
situation even more burdensome, as professors would have to allocate time not
only for commuting and attending classes but also for dedicating themselves to
the specialization, often sacrificing the time margins they have for themselves
and their families.
Based on the narratives presented in this section, it is observed
that the sexual division of labor, widely present in various social spheres,
also perpetuates itself in the scientific field, reflecting gender inequalities
in Higher Education. The interviewed professors, all of whom hold multiple
employment ties, experience tensions in balancing their various
responsibilities, which affects both their scientific output and professional
advancement, such as their availability to pursue stricto sensu graduate
studies. In the case of faculty members who are also mothers, it is undeniable
that motherhood, combined with the lack of adequate public policies and the
traditional model of labor division, interferes significantly with their
academic trajectories (Reis & Antunes, 2023). In the narratives of Nísia
and Celina, it becomes evident that motherhood hinders academic progression,
requiring a restructuring of plans and prompting them to reconsider their
choices.
Existence
and resistance of women in a space built by men for men
As discussed in the introduction of this study, Brazil’s
socio‑historical construction has been marked by the segregation of spaces
defined through markers of gender, race, and class (Beauvoir, 1970; Davis,
2016; Louro, 2022). In this context, women’s participation in academia is
permeated by various tensions. The participants’ accounts indicate that their
conditions of existence in this space are closely linked to the impossibility
of failure, the relentless pursuit of superior performance as a means of validation,
and the constant confrontation with the devaluation of female knowledge.
Moreover, these accounts emphasize the burden imposed by motherhood and paid
work, the necessity of emotional self‑protection within academia, and
experiences of harassment, which point to the institutionalization of sexism.
At first glance, when asked about gender prejudice in the field of
psychology teaching, some participants stated that they did not perceive any
prejudice against them as women. The excerpts below illustrate their
narratives:
The psychology
environment does not provoke that. At least, that’s what I perceive. Whether as
students or professionals, practicing some activity… So, I believe that because
our profession and our science are so female‑dominated, prejudice is very… well,
I think it is very, very punctual (Recording of Rachel_09/25/2024_00:06:17).
No, I wasn’t
disadvantaged, not really. After all, I didn’t compete with many men. There
weren’t many men applying. Maybe that’s why I didn’t feel at a disadvantage.
(…) I didn’t have trouble getting a job because I am a woman. Nor did I have
difficulty entering a master’s program for being a woman (Recording of
Patrícia_09/27/2024_00:05:51).
Cunha (2021) highlights that although psychology is predominantly
female, it is essential to understand the specificities of women working in
this field. The predominance of women in psychology reflects not only a
preference but also the historical insertion of women into public care and
assistance professions — such as nursing, early childhood education, and
naturally, psychology (Louro, 2022).
Indeed, because it is a field characterized by a female majority,
a discourse of care, and attention to individual singularities, overt
discriminatory speech and behavior may be less present than in STEM fields,
which are more male‑dominated, where gender prejudice and discrimination are
often more visible (Cunha, 2021).
Nevertheless, tensions related to gender inequality manifest in
subtler ways, such as the impossibility of failure, the constant expectation of
excellence, and devaluation of female knowledge.
And we’re
heavily pressured — you’re pressured from every angle; you’re a mother, you
have to be the best mother, you’re a professional, you have to do much more to
be recognized, that’s very important. It’s a reality in which you can’t slip
(Recording of Carmen_09/24/2024_00:34:50).
Carmen’s incisive remark demonstrates how women are expected to be
infallible, performing almost as embodiments of Wonder Woman. Meanwhile, men
are often seen as perpetual learners, “boys”, and every time they make a
mistake, no matter how serious, they are granted allowances, the opportunity to
try again, to start over. After all, they are still learning, aren’t they?
Likewise, women must consistently perform at peak levels. It’s
almost a “prove you deserve to be here” scenario, “show that you know what
you’re doing; one success is not enough, it has to be every single day”. This
pressure is directly linked to the gender‑stratified nature of social spaces
and the legitimacy of women occupying them (Kergoat, 2009), which necessitates
a constant struggle for recognition and validation of female-specific
contributions.
Beyond overt expressions, inequality also appears in more implicit
ways. Olga exemplifies this in everyday teaching:
When a
professor is a man and enters the classroom, a certain authority is already
assumed. The notion that he masters this knowledge is taken for granted. But
when it’s us, women, there’s a sense of: well, prove what you know. Tell me
what you’re doing here. Let’s see if you really know what you’re talking about
(Recording of Olga_10/02/2024_00:11:17).
According to Silva (2023, p. 183), modern science constructs a
scenario in which “(...) the male body stood for intellectuality, while the
female body stood for motherhood.” Thus, society perceives knowledge as
legitimate when it comes from a man, whereas a woman, associated with domestic
care (Bourdieu, 2010), must constantly prove herself.
Furthermore, maternal overload and engagement in multiple roles
(work, education, and caregiving) recur. Literature indicates that, to avoid
disrupting their academic careers, some women opt not to have children. For
those who do, tensions include extended career timelines and exhaustion due to
role accumulation; female faculty with children take longer to advance
(Protetti & Souza, 2023; Silva & Ribeiro, 2014). In a male‑centric
career model, the choice often becomes mother or scientist (Silva &
Ribeiro, 2014), as Bertha illustrates:
It involves
research; we work like everyone else works — it’s very hard to reconcile with a
personal life, with family, with motherhood. Very hard, very hard. I… that’s
why I joked: I can’t do that badly with a boyfriend; imagine a woman with
children, a family, marriage, motherhood… The free time you have is used for
studying, for research; rarely for leisure. So it’s a life where you have to
really love doing this. It’s a life where you will give up a lot, and you have
to choose this, choose to be this (Recording of Bertha_09/25/2024_00:27:36).
Silva and Ribeiro (2014) argue that women who remain in academia
often harden themselves to persevere. Schiebinger (2001, p. 152) adds that
“(...) abandoning the trappings of ‘femininity’ is generally necessary for a
woman to be taken seriously as a scientist, and often important to avoid
unwanted attention to her sexuality”. Here, the trappings of femininity can be
any emotional trait that distances one from the emotional and necessitates
emotional fortitude as self‑protection. Recalling a former female professor,
Nísia says:
I saw women
overloaded and whose personal lives had collapsed. All my professors… all
divorced. […] She was dust, someone — she was a reference in her family, but
she carried much pain. That’s when it hit me: to be where she was, she had to
give up so much personally. And I thought: how cruel. Why can’t we have both?
And then, when I looked at her, I saw her as an inspiration, but I thought: I
can’t lose the other side? And today I live the same. I need to renounce the
other side, balance a thousand plates to handle one that’s still insufficient…
I want to be a university professor who knows what she’s doing and owns
herself. Who lives, who dreams, who plans, who accomplishes. But I didn’t want
to lose the other part. The part of dreaming, affection, romance… I often felt
them hardened. They were very hardened women and I didn’t want to lose that
(Recording of Nísia_09/26/2024_00:51:43).
As she expresses, the image of a professionally successful woman
is often associated with the renunciation of the “other side” of life — dreams,
emotions, leisure, and romance. Nísia’s observation echoes Celina’s earlier
dilemma: a “catch‑22” for women.
Pressured to be good professionals, good wives, and good mothers —
to ensure “nothing is lacking”, while shouldering all expectations — women
frequently find success at the expense of emotional wellbeing and balance in
other life areas, ultimately bearing the marks of frustration in confronting
the impossibility of a desired horizon.
This reflection prompts the question: why can’t one have both
sides? Until when, in order to be respected, will women have to conform to a
persona shaped by masculinities that valorize strength, rationality, and
objectivity as the only legitimate traits? The imposition of an identity that
suppresses women’s complexity, emotional vulnerability, sensitivity, and
pursuit of balance between professional and personal spheres calls into
question the structural foundations that perpetuate entrenched gender stereotypes.
Similarly, reports of academic harassment illustrate why some
women avoid positioning themselves, in certain contexts, within the limits of
the “feminine” stereotype. Though this experience occurred outside Psychology,
the victim recounts it during her attempt to enter a master’s program in
Engineering, a predominantly male field. Bertha’s account highlights women’s
vulnerability to objectification and devaluation in male‑dominated environments
like STEM. In her words:
I remember I
cried. All day I was very upset by it, devastated. I felt I had wasted six
months, believing I was showing my best, and in reality I was just another one
of the countless girls who went through something like this. Some gave in,
others didn’t. Knowing I was tested in that way, it’s…heartbreaking (Recording
of Bertha_09/25/2024_00:17:56).
Silva, Araújo, and Andrade (2024) emphasize that harassment is
intrinsically tied to power relations and is frequently perpetrated by men
against women. This behavior includes insinuations, threats, intimidation,
unwanted physical contact, blackmail, and sexual requests, none of which occur
with the woman’s consent. The consequences are profound, affecting
psychological well‑being (anxiety, insecurity, depression, anguish) and somatic
health (insomnia, eating disorders, tremors), as well as disrupting professional
and personal functioning, exemplified in Bertha’s trajectory.
Support circles
By naming this category “Support Circles” we aim to highlight that
despite the previously mentioned difficulties and tensions, the academic
journey becomes possible through networks of support and the outsourcing of
domestic work. It is important to emphasize that these networks comprise
friends, partners, family members, and colleagues.
Unanimously, the participants underscored at various points in
their interviews how crucial a solid support network has been for them. Below
are key excerpts that exemplify this:
In addition,
during meal times, she’s [the housekeeper] preparing everything. She prepares
food for everyone, cleans the house, and does the laundry. She does, let’s say,
most — or perhaps all — of the household chores that I would never be able to
handle (Recording of Maria_10/15/2024_00:13:28).
At the same
time, I didn’t want to abandon my career, my profession, and I received
incredible support from my husband regarding that… Because my first thought
when my daughter was born was that I would quit teaching, because it’s
something that holds you captive and demands many hours. The classroom is
wonderful and time flies, but what you need to do before and after class takes
a lot from you. And my first thought was: I’m going to quit teaching. He said,
“No, you’re not going to quit teaching. It’s your dream, and you just achieved
it”. (Recording of Nísia_09/26/2024_00:12:18).
Considering the numerous obstacles these women face in their
academic trajectories, emotional and affective relationships emerge as pivotal
for full development, functioning as support networks and motivators in
sustaining such demanding careers (Cunha, 2021). Souza and Carvalho (2023)
further assert that building routines aligned with efforts to manage overloads
typically relies on supportive networks that enable the reconciliation of
academic, domestic, and family demands.
When such a network is solid and understanding, it allows women to
balance academic pressures with domestic and familial responsibilities without
emotional and physical exhaustion becoming insurmountable. Conversely, when
that network is lacking or absent, many women are forced to choose between
professional aspirations and personal responsibilities — a situation
particularly pronounced among Black women and those with low income (Silva,
2023). The participants’ narratives make it clear that without adequate
support, their academic journeys would be even more arduous.
Where are black women?
A central question during data collection was: where are Black
women? Of the eight participants interviewed, seven self-identified as White
and one as Asian. This fact alone invites reflection on the structural forces
that exclude Black women from academia, particularly from teaching roles in
private higher education.
The absence or invisibility of Black women in this space is not
coincidental but rather the reflection of a long-standing historical and social
process. Gonzalez and Hasenbalg (2022) assert that Black people have
historically been relegated to subordinate positions, with restricted access to
roles of prestige and higher remuneration. Davis (2016, p. 25) further notes
that “(...) the enormous space that labor occupies today in Black women's lives
reproduces a pattern established during the earliest years of slavery.” Thus,
the sexual and racial division of labor materializes when Black women occupy
the “remnants” of the labor Market, precarious roles with low pay and little
recognition.
hooks (1995), addressing intellectual labor, argues that
scientific racism has historically contributed to the exclusion of Black women
from intellectual labor. In this context, scientific intellectuality was
construed as an almost exclusively male and White domain, associating knowledge
with the White male and deliberately excluding Black women from knowledge
production. As a result, higher education teaching, a field that confers
intellectual prestigie, remains structurally illegitimate for Black people, especially
black women.
Crisóstomo and Reigota (2010) add that for these women, the
struggle for belonging in academia involves continuously proving their
professional competence while also confronting racial prejudice and
discrimination, requiring double the effort to earn respect and professional
recognition.
Therefore, one might ask: Where are black women teaching
Psychology in private higher education in Itaperuna? The answer is clear: they
are not present. They were absent from this study’s corpus because their paths
are systematically blocked before these spaces are even reached.
Final considerations
We conclude that reconsidering the academic space, historically
shaped by a male-centric and exclusionary model, reveals that women must not
only navigate multiple roles and ties but frequently renounce their
individuality, which is expressed only in the margins of time. The paths
traversed by these women are far from linear; they are fraught with tensions
between imposed standards of excellence and lack of time due to labor
precarization, between career aspirations and the responsibilities of being both
a mother and a worker.
As Souza and Carvalho (2023) emphasize, the presence of these
women in academia is far more than a symbolic victorym, it is an act of
resistance. It stands against deeply entrenched structures that privilege
models of productivity and success disconnected from the diverse and complex
realities of women’s lives. Each fragment of narrative presented here bears
witness to the daily struggle, the burdens they carry, and their attempts to
“do it all” within a system that neglects human limitations and the plurality
of lived experiences.
In this sense, the construction of an equitable academic space
that values and understands women’s experiences must be more than an academic
aspiration: it is an ethical and political imperative. Notably, institutional
support or incentive policies were never mentioned. The institutions demand
top-tier professionals with high academic qualifications, but insist that these
women manage everything on their own.
We also highlight that the lack of nearby stricto sensu
postgraduate programs in Psychology in the municipality of Itaperuna poses a
significant barrier. After all, how can women already employed locally, with
young children, uproot themselves for specialization in urban centers — without
any assurance of academic success or economic sustainability upon completing
the program? Investing in such a career is akin to nurturing a plan from
scratch in a system that devalues both academic and domestic labor in Brazil.
Finally, we denounce the exclusion of Black women from academia
and call for affirmative actions and institutional policies aimed at promoting
equity. Their voices were absent from this study because Black women are simply
not represented in Psychology faculties within private higher education
institutions in Itaperuna. The question remains: for whom is an academic career
even a legitimate space?
Ultimately, these women’s narratives invite us to rethink the
meaning of academic work and professional life, urging us to foster a logic in
which reconciling personal and professional spheres is not a burden, but rather
an acknowledgment of the essential and humane dimensions in all our
trajectories.
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