BIPOC Women Faculty in Community Colleges and the Expectations of Emotional Labor

Abstract

Women faculty in higher education, and particularly BIPOC women faculty in community colleges, often bear the weight of emotional labor, or the expectation of managing both their feelings as well as their students’ emotional needs. Because emotional labor goes unrecognized, this places a strain on faculty who balance teaching, research, and advising in addition to emotional labor. The purpose of this paper is to explore the emotional labor performed by BIPOC women faculty in community colleges and ways institutions can value and support this work.