Misogyny in English Departments

“This book is a ground-breaking contribution to the English discipline, promising to change the very way in which English faculty members understand the work that we do. Casting bright light from the MeToo Movement directly upon academia—Robillard reveals the insidious ways in which some of the most supposedly ‘enlightened’ spaces, English Departments, often depend upon very disturbing misogynistic cultural practices. She couples meticulous, complex analyses and research with a voice that is simply stunning—always clear, always candid, and always calling the guilty to account. Robillard’s must-read book should be prominently displayed on all English Department’s faculty lounge coffee tables and discussed repeatedly at our faculty meetings. It should also serve as a crucial model for other academic disciplines that desperately need to do similar sorts of self-reflection.” Laura A. Gray-Rosendale, President’s Distinguished Teaching Fellow and Professor of English, Northern Arizona University; Author of College Girl: A Memoir; and Editor of Me Too, Feminist Theory, and Surviving Sexual Violence in the Academy
“Misogyny in English Departments meticulously and empathetically documents women's experiences with misogyny across ranks and positions in English Departments. Many of us will recognize our experiences with misogyny on these pages and in the voices of Robillard's interviewees. The interviewees have generously and courageously shared their stories and mapped the toll that misogyny has taken on their work lives, bodies, and psyches. In an age where universities and departments proclaim diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives, Robillard calls out misogyny as 'the law enforcement branch of patriarchy' and demonstrates how women are often policed, punished, overworked, undervalued, and dismissed in English Departments. This book makes an important contribution to critiques of gendered labor structures and feminist analyses of sexual harassment and sex discrimination. Robillard and the interviewees' analyses of misogynistic patterns and logics give us frameworks for calling out and fighting those patterns in our English Departments and Writing Programs.” Eileen E. Schell, Professor of Writing and Rhetoric and Faculty Affiliate in Women's and Gender Studies, Syracuse University