The Impending Fall of Academia

The upcoming academic term will be unusual, to say the least. The global pandemic led to emergency shutdowns in March, and it is likely that many colleges and universities will continue teaching partially or wholly online. And protests against anti-Black racism in the United States and elsewhere have led to institutional statements about taking an antiracist stand - which may or may not translate into real change. In this episode, we discuss some of the changes and how we are thinking about them in our work. How did we adapt our teaching for remote learning, and what do we think fall will look like? What changes can we make to our teaching and service to be more antiracist? How can we stay focused and motivated when we're acting as individuals against systemic problems? Plus, we answer a letter about working in the lab of your more senior and prominent partner. Simine chides her co-hosts over ignoring Southern Hemisphere seasons (and the one who writes episode titles promises to try harder, right after he gets this one pun out of his system). And Sanjay talks about coping with grief under social distancing.

The Black Goat is hosted by Sanjay Srivastava, Alexa Tullett, and Simine Vazire. Find us on the web at www.theblackgoatpodcast.com, on Twitter at @blackgoatpod, on Facebook at facebook.com/blackgoatpod/, and on instagram at @blackgoatpod. You can email us at letters@theblackgoatpodcast.com. You can subscribe to us on iTunes or Stitcher.

Our theme music is Peak Beak by Doctor Turtle, available on freemusicarchive.org under a Creative Commons noncommercial attribution license. Our logo was created by Jude Weaver.

This is episode 80. It was recorded on July 8, 2020.