12 Rules for (Academic) Life : A Stroppy Feminist’s Guide through Teaching, Learning, Politics, and Jordan Peterson

Introduction Do you have skin in this game?.- Rule 1 Always ask why.- Rule 2 Be an intellectual and make your decisions about the mode.- Rule 3 Laugh like a Medusa and maintain the confidence of a mediocre white man.- Rule 4 Empowered groups have to be confident in their power to give some away.- Rule 5 Intellectual generosity is the foundation of scholarly life.- Rule 6 Simply because you work in a university does not mean you are an expert in higher education.- Rule 7 Freedom to read is more important than freedom of speech.- Rule 8 Be a leader rather than complain about leadership.- Rule 9 Teaching matters. Learning matters more.- Rule 10 Women are humans, citizens and fully formed people.- Rule 11 Respect the vulnerable, the sick, the dying and the dead.- Rule 12 Be the change you want to see.- Conclusion Our future is in the post.

These are strange times.  Climate crises. Health crises. Collapsing systems. Influencers.  And yes - Jordan Peterson. We are currently living in a (Post) Peterson Paradigm. This book – 12 Rules for (Academic) Life - explores what has happened to teaching, learning and politics through this odd and chaotic intervention. Deploying feminism, this lens and theory offers a glass-sharpened view of this moment in international higher education. It is organized through twelve mantras for higher education in this interregnum, and offers new, radical, edgy and passionate methodologies, epistemologies and ontologies for a University sector searching for a purpose. This is a feminist book which targets a feminist audience, both inside and outside higher education. It presents a clear focus on how this Peterson moment can be managed and challenged, when in future such academics deploy social media in this way. This book is also a partof higher education studies, exploring the role of the public / critical / dissenting / organic intellectual in debates about the political economy, identity/politics and leadership. A question of our time – through a climate emergency, a pandemic and polarized politics – is why Professor Jordan Peterson gained profile and notoriety. The Jordan Peterson moment commenced in September 2016 with his YouTube video, “Professor against political correctness,” and concluded with his debate with Slavoj Zizek on April 19, 2019. From this moment, his credibility was dented, if not destroyed. Jordan Peterson infused scholarly debates with Punch and Judy extremism and misunderstandings. Instead, this book offers research rather than certainty, interpretation rather than dogma, evidence rather than opinion, and theory rather than ‘moral truth.’ The goal is to recalibrate this (Post) Peterson Paradigm, to take stock of how this moment occurred, and how to create a revision of higher education.