Narratives of Academic Productivity: Compliance Versus Realization in the Process of Professional Self-Construction Among University Professors

• In Event: Achieving Professional Competence: Beyond Knowledge and Skill

Abstract

This study uses an interpretative approach to understand the ways in which faculty’s understanding about academic productivity shape their professional identity and practice. Through narrative analysis, we examine interview transcripts from twenty faculty members (Assistant, Associate and Full professors) from social and natural sciences departments in a research intensive and a comprehensive university in southern California. Findings suggest that faculty members develop two types of narratives: fragmented and comprehensive definitions of productivity. These narratives provide a framework of interpretation that guides faculty’s organization and integration of their academic functions (research, teaching, and service). Both career stage and learning at work were mediators of the ways in which faculty made sense of productivity and their actions to construct themselves as professionals.

Authors

• Virginia Montero-Hernandez, Universidad Autonoma del Estado de Morelos

• John S. Levin, University of California - Riverside

• Omar Garcia, Universidad Autonoma del Estado de Morelos