The Gig Academy

"This book fills a huge void in the professional literature by reminding readers that labor practices in the academy are changing—and for the worse. Its accessible and clear style, coupled with its capacity to synthesize trends, will appeal to diverse academic audiences as well as lay readers. The analyses and recommendations invite readers to evaluate their own work environments, engage in dialogue about necessary change, and act to address injustice."—Peter M. Magolda, author of The Lives of Campus Custodians: Insights into Corporatization and Civic Disengagement in the Academy

"The Gig Academy offers an essential new angle on the now well-established trend of contingent employment in higher education, broadening the discussion of contingent and adjunct faculty to include the other contingents: staff, researchers, post-docs, and graduate students. As administrators centralize control and diminish the valuing of faculty, staff, and graduate students, they enact an ethos of individualism, undermining the very enterprise of higher education, which is built on notions of community. In doing so, administrators also contribute to the broadening erosion of public trust and support for higher education. The Gig Academy importantly suggests that this misalignment between espoused and enacted values has enormous implications for students, especially given increasing evidence of their need for continuity and mentorship. In fact, it would appear that it is just a matter of time before the effects of the gig economy will be primarily absorbed by students. This examination offers a strong warning about the implications of the neoliberal embrace of gig economic strategies in higher education. Fortunately, The Gig Academy also offers practical recommendations for how employees across all spectrums of academic labor might move forward collectively to demand change."—Sue Doe, Director, Center for the Study of Academic Labor, Colorado State University

"The Gig Academy is a wonderful précis on the dire state of the modern American university."—Daniel Bessner, The Nation