Despite the diversity of entry points into academia, little research exists examining the experiences and impact of precarious employment at different life stages. Drawing on interviews with 19 academics employed casually or on fixed-term contracts in Australian universities, this paper illustrates how precarious employment is experienced at different life and career stages. Using Foucauldian understandings of power and discourse alongside a life-course sociological approach, we explore how parenthood, relationships and life decisions are shaped by precarious employment in the academy. Discourses around academic ‘pipelines’ and ‘early careers’ obscure the experiences of those entering academia as a second-career; and those in long-term precarious employment. These employment structures have deep personal, professional and financial impacts. By identifying the intersection between precarious employment and life stages, we argue that an understanding of the effects of precarious employment requires further, urgent attention to support the diverse needs of academics.

Wage theft claims against Australian universities have raised awareness of the substantial proportion of academics who are precariously employed and underpaid. The COVID-19 global pandemic has further highlighted the extent of precarity for many working in higher education. It is in this context that we situate this paper, reflecting on how time is experienced for academics in a period of growing uncertainty, and what this means for individuals who work on casual or fixed-term contracts. While previous research has examined how academics experience time, limited attention has been paid to the ways in which time is experienced by those in precarious employment. Drawing on interviews with 24 academics employed on casual or fixed-term contracts, this paper investigates differences between the experiences of time for those in the ‘precariat’ and those in ongoing employment. We describe social acceleration and uncertainty as inherent features of the neoliberal context of academia. This paper builds on Ylijioki and Mäntylä’s categories of academic time to illustrate how the paid work of precariously employed academics consists primarily of ‘scheduled time’. We argue, however, that academics in short-term or casual employment also engage in substantial unpaid work or ‘concealed time’ in order to compete for future employment. While acknowledging the struggles associated with the acceleration of work for all academics, this paper raises significant concerns about the overwork and risk of burnout for those in precarious employment.

Internationally, changes to university funding arrangements have put pressure on the workloads of tenured academic staff and increased the reliance on casual academics to backfill teaching and research positions. Limited research has focused on the effects of casualisation on research academics and the institutions in which they work. This paper draws on interviews with 26 contract researchers, who have worked in the US, UK, and Australia. Drawing on the construct of ‘Othering’, identified in our interviews we explore the work of academics employed casually or on contract. Using a Foucauldian lens to make visible and disrupt regimes of truth about academic work, we found that there are numerous ways in which institutional discourses and practices marginalise casual academics and conceal the challenges they face. We argue that the disruption of dominant discourses about academic work is one way of supporting academics whose employment is insecure.

Neoliberal reform of the university sector has resulted in increasing numbers of academics employed on casual or fixed-term contracts. While there is an emergent body of literature on issues of precarity in the academy, relatively little attention has been paid to the roles and responsibilities of those tenured academics who employ and manage non-tenured researchers. The work involved in hiring and managing a contract researcher is rarely acknowledged or supported, and managers receive little to no training. In this paper, we draw on Dorothy Smith’s feminist sociological approach to analyse interviews with 22 non-tenured researchers to examine how managerial relationships shape the employment experiences of those working precariously. We argue that tenured academics have ethical responsibilities to provide a working environment that is fair, supports the ongoing development and wellbeing of non-tenured staff, and challenges dominant discourses of precarious academics as ‘other’.