We are pleased to announce our forthcoming edited volume on How to Cultivate Academic Heterotopias: A Feminist Approach for a Collective Transformation in the series of How to Guides published by Edward Elgar.
We are currently awaiting responses from contributing authors who received the call for chapters.
What if academia could be a space of care, collaboration, equity, inclusion, and collective empowerment?
How to Cultivate Academic Heterotopias explores the transformative potential of a feminist lens to redesign academia. This groundbreaking volume delves into the historical challenges faced by non-traditional academics in higher education while offering actionable solutions to create more inclusive academic cultures. From reimagining leadership and policies to redefining success in teaching, research, external engagement, and service, this book provides a visionary feminist blueprint for a Positive Academia Collective Transformation (PACT). Topics include the heterotopic landscape of academia, transcending leadership boundaries, teaching & learning, research, external engagement and professional service, reimagining academic cultures and envisioning the academy of tomorrow. With practical tools and reflective questions, this book empowers readers – whether students, educators, researchers, or administrators – to reimagine academia as a thriving, inclusive, and positive environment for all.
Published in Edward Elgar’s widely read How-to-Guides series, our volume challenges traditional epistemological production by focusing on value co-creation, ethical writing, imagination, sensibility, sensitivity, and inclusive referencing. This book reaches beyond the collection of prescriptive ideas when inviting everyone to contribute actively to constructing a radically different academic future. A future that dismantles neoliberal scholarship in favour of collective, collaborative and societally meaningful intellectual practices.
This volume is being co-created by a team of academics who share a commitment to transforming academia into a more inclusive, caring and equitable ecosystem.
- [Lead Editor] Dr Christa Sathish
- [1st Co-Editor] Prof Anne-Wil Harzing
- [2nd Co-Editor] Prof Ina Aust-Gronarz
As editors, we do not see ourselves as gatekeepers but as pro-active co-creators. We are deeply involved in the process, not merely act as chapter assemblers but fostering an intellectual heterotopia where everyone’s ideas can flourish.
We reject the dominant notion of devaluing edited volumes as static outputs and instead cultivate a performative and relational approach to editorial work. This means that the process of interacting with authors, writing, referencing and structuring knowledge is as crucial as the final product. At the heart of our work is a working-out-loud culture, where we openly engage with ideas, challenges, and reflections as the book develops. We believe our active interaction and dialogue with authors and the audience creates a dynamic evolving conversation, which fosters continuous engagement, communication and a collective, reflexive sense-making with our stakeholders (e.g. authors, readers, academic community).
Our editorial philosophy is built on the following foundational elements:
Value co-creation: We are moving beyond solitary authorship in recognizing that knowledge is socially constructed, fostered through dialogue, interdisciplinary, and diverse identities. Authors are encouraged to engage with each other’s work, fostering an interconnected discourse rather than working in isolation.
Sensitivity & Sensibility: Writing with an ethics-of-care, challenging neoliberal structures and acknowledging the historicity of ideas. Contributions should prioritise accessibility, interdisciplinary engagement and contemporary situated knowledge.
Imagination: We are encouraging authors to experiment with content, integrate non-traditional sources and envision new academic futures that transcend rigid patriarchal confines.
Reflexivity: Understanding writing as an ethical, situated practice that requires authors and editors to critically reflect on their positionality, privileges, and the power dynamic embedded in citation practices.
Inclusive Referencing: Challenging neoliberal metric-driven approaches to knowledge construction by embracing decolonising, feminist and care-oriented citation practices that amplify underrepresented voices.
If you believe academia can be reimagined as a space of care and inclusion – one in which transformation and opportunities for alternatives are possible – we invite you to follow and engage with our journey through to September 2026 and the expected publication in early 2027.
How do you imagine a more inclusive academia? Please share your thoughts with us!
