We want to be the kind of academy we want to see: inclusive, empowered, engaged and kind. We promote this through our joint project: The whisper collective.
The first episode is the first in the Whisperfest series: a 'fire side chat' with all the members of the Whisper Collective:
Inger Mewburn from Thesis Whisperer
Narelle Lemon from the Wellbeing Whisperer and Explore and Create Co
Jonathan O'Donnell and Tseen Khoo from The Research Whisperer
This session was recorded on Wednesday the 25th of November, 2020. It was the evening of day three of Whisperfest - a four day, online event featuring lots of people we knew, sharing what they were passionate about with our audience. Hundreds of people turned up for the sessions. I think it’s fair to say by this session we were all a little tired after so much zoom!
We took the theme of ‘the circle of niceness’ and expanded on what it means for us and how we enact it (or not) in our everyday academic lives. We cover a lot of ground in this discussion, from love to bullying, from academic writing to neoliberal university politics. Loosely this conversation is about the power of networks and networking, but not - you know - in an icky way (as Tseen would say).
Note: Jonathan drops the F-bomb about half way through and Inger lets rip with a bit of salty talk, so we gave this one an Expicit rating. If you are listening with kids in the car, take that under advisement!
A note on Audio: this session was recorded via Zoom. While most of it is good, there is a bit of a crackle on Inger's end. The connection to Canberra was not great that day it seems!
Links to content mentioned in this episode:
Academic assholes and the circle of niceness
Narelle's circle of niceness explanation and mind map
Academic Arrogance
How not to be an academic asshole during Covid (Inger's post on toxic positivity)