Embracing the Useless and Refusing the Vertical: A Feminist Response to Adjunct Hell

This paper considers the state of contingent laborers, Ph.D. holders, lovers of robust scholarship, and hopeful academics who toil away in the neoliberal university in the search for the academic good life. The author argues that the academic good life is a fantasy and agrees that the fantasy is cruel, i.e. not attainable or livable, but does suggest the practices of teaching and conducting research, the practices that make up a scholarly life, are sustainable activities of a good life that can and should inform how we "use" the university. After drawing on Alasdair MacIntyre and Chris Higgins to picture the academic good life, Deane turns to theories of refusal articulated by Sandy Grande and Bonnie Honig to suggest refusal practices for reimagining lives that are academic and good.