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This is the author’s version of a work that was submitted/accepted for pub- lication in the following source: Dwyer, Angela E., Lewis, Bridget, McDonald, Fiona,& Burns, Marcelle J. (2012) It’s always a pleasure : exploring productivity and pleasure in a writing group for early career academics. Studies in Continuing Education, 34(2), pp. 129-144. This file was downloaded from: c Copyright 2012 Taylor & Francis This is a preprint of an article submitted for consideration in the Studies in Continuing Education c 2012 [copyright Taylor & Francis]; Studies in Continuing Education is available online at: www.tandfonline.com Notice: Changes introduced as a result of publishing processes such as copy-editing and formatting may not be reflected in this document. For a definitive version of this work, please refer to the published source: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0158037X.2011.580734

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This is the author’s version of a work that was submitted/accepted for pub-lication in the following source:

Dwyer, Angela E., Lewis, Bridget, McDonald, Fiona, & Burns, MarcelleJ. (2012) It’s always a pleasure : exploring productivity and pleasure in awriting group for early career academics. Studies in Continuing Education,34(2), pp. 129-144.

This file was downloaded from: http://eprints.qut.edu.au/52911/

c© Copyright 2012 Taylor & Francis

This is a preprint of an article submitted for consideration in the Studiesin Continuing Education c© 2012 [copyright Taylor & Francis]; Studies inContinuing Education is available online at: www.tandfonline.com

Notice: Changes introduced as a result of publishing processes such ascopy-editing and formatting may not be reflected in this document. For adefinitive version of this work, please refer to the published source:

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0158037X.2011.580734

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It’s always a pleasure: Exploring productivity and pleasure in a writing group for early career academics Angela Dwyer a; Bridget Lewis b; Fiona McDonald b; and Marcelle Burnsb a School of Justice, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia b School of Law, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia

Correspondence: Angela Dwyer, Lecturer, School of Justice, Faculty of Law, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, GPO Box 2434, 4001, Australia; email: [email protected] Word count: 8055 words

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It’s always a pleasure: Exploring productivity and pleasure in a writing group for early career academics

The professional development needs of early career academics (ECAs) are increasingly subject to scrutiny. The literature notes writing groups can be successful in increasing research outputs and improving research track records – a core concern for ECAs. However, the pressure on ECAs to publish takes the pleasure out of writing for many. We argue writing groups, created by and for ECAs, can provide an environment for ECAs to (re)produce pleasure in writing and participation in the processes of academic review and debate. In addition, our experience of a writing group was that it provided a platform of social and emotional support contributing to our personal well-being and professional development.

Keywords: writing groups; early career academics; pleasure; productivity; professional development

Introduction

I think the enthusiasm has been lost quite frankly. It is like we are being bogged down with so many expectations. A lot of the joy has gone…There is so much involved and you are becoming more a packhorse… (Alice, cited in Watkins 2007, 315).

This quote highlights how, for Alice, the expectations of her work as an academic

have reduced the role to a product or process rather than a pleasure. There is a

growing literature on the challenges facing early career academics (ECAs) to find the

space to write and research when transitioning to an academic role (Sikes 2006; Olsen

1993). The new contexts within which universities operate (Sikes 2006), contexts we

suggest are informed by discourses of research productivity, now place a greater

emphasis on ECAs publishing their research. We contend discourses of research

productivity are dominating new university contexts in ways that sideline the pleasure

of academic writing, rendering writing for many thinkable only in terms of

productivity (although we acknowledge pressures associated with productivity may be

enabling for some ECAs). In this paper, we present an account of a writing group for

ECAs that in its own way works against the contemporary imperative of writing as a

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product of academia rather than a pleasure. While our writing group produced

academic resilience, especially in respect of the provision of social supports, we argue

primarily that writing groups can provide a discursive space for ECAs to (re)produce

writing, academic review, and debate as pleasurable. This is more than simply finding

an intrinsic, internal motivation to write. We note below how ECAs can re-learn how

to do pleasure in writing as a discursive process while collectively working intimately

with text, and shaping ideas and argument. Writing groups can be a space in which

discourses of pleasure inform discourses of how best to do academic writing in new

university contexts.

There is general agreement that an academic writing group in a university

setting consists of a number of academics coming together for regular meetings to

review and feedback on group participants’ written work. We define ECAs as those

who are in the first five years of full-time employment as an academic. Traditionally,

ECAs commonly hold a doctoral qualification on appointment. However, in some

professional disciplines, a doctoral qualification is not always a prerequisite for an

academic appointment. The first five years as an academic are important (Dever et al.

2006) because ECAs typically transition from dependent to independent researcher, as

well as from student/professional to academic and these years are pivotal to long-term

academic success (Laudel and Glaser 2008).

This paper firstly explores how discourses of productivity dominate literature

about writing groups for ECAs in new discursive university contexts and tensions this

can produce for ECAs. We follow this with how we conceptualise our writing group

as differently productive of pleasure for our members. We then describe our writing

group and how it aligns with productivity discourses, in terms of increasing writing

outputs, as well as personal discourses, in terms of social and emotional supports. Our

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discussion then turns to the importance of pleasure, analysing how writing groups

may facilitate a (re)constitution of ECA identities in line with doing pleasure in

writing. We conclude writing groups play a vital role in enabling ECAs to

(re)producing pleasure in writing, a discursive position often marginalised in new

university research contexts so focused on productivity.

Early Career Academics and new international university contexts

Beginning an academic career can be taxing and emotionally difficult because of the

multi-faceted functions expected of academics. ECAs must come to terms with

sometimes conflicting demands of teaching, research and service and balancing these

with their personal lives. Many ECAs report feelings of isolation and a lack of

support from their colleagues (Adams and Rytmeister 2000). Early career participants

in a Monash University study noted ‘floating along’ and ‘not getting the guidance,

peer support and professional development advice required’ (Dever et al. 2006, 34).

ECAs also reported feeling subsumed by heavy teaching and administrative loads

making it difficult for them to advance their research programs (Reay 2000).

The new university discursive context described by Sikes (2006) presents

increasing challenges for ECAs facing a range of externally generated tensions and

opportunities from new institutional and sector politics. Government policies use a

variety of performance indicators to judge quality in both research and teaching to

determine funding (Harley, Muller-Camne and Collin 2001). For example, the

current regulatory framework for Australian universities focuses on performance-

based funding (Jongbloed and Vossensteyn 2001), i.e. funding is determined on

research productivity in terms of the quantity and latterly the quality of research

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outputs. Similar regulatory frameworks are in place in the United Kingdom (Elton

2000) and New Zealand (Middleton 2008).

This new university context produces a range of effects, some positive and

some not. Positive effects can include the implementation of quality indicators for

teaching and research which have resulted in teaching and, particularly, research

being given greater institutional emphasis and priority (Adams and Rytmeister 2000).

Negative effects can include pressures to achieve performance indicators which result

in university administration shifting towards less secure employment processes,

particularly more short term contracts (Wood 1990). Universities are also moving

away from a collegiate model to a corporatised model of control (Harley, Muller-

Camne and Collin 2001). Accordingly, achievement of externally and internally

mandated targets is a dominant concern of university administrators who impose key

performance indicators on middle managers with appropriate incentives for those who

achieve them (Jongbloed and Vossensteyn 2001).

These imperatives are then passed on to academics who are increasingly held

accountable for achieving teaching, research and service indicators. These

expectations create a highly competitive and individualistic context in which success

is measured by lists of outcomes (Grant and Knowles 2000). Research productivity is

assessed as a key indicator of staff members’ performance (Hemmings, Smith and

Rushbrook 2004). Being “research active” is now vitally important, with academics

expected to consistently apply for external grants and produce publications from

projects.

This context places further pressure on ECAs, many of whom struggle to

obtain a tenured position, to establish a research track record, or to establish the basis

for promotion. ECAs who are not publishing may be denied opportunities for career

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advancement: ‘recruitment, promotion, and tenure appear to be decided primarily

based on the number of articles published in a fairly select group of peer-reviewed

journals, based on their relative impact, selectivity, and relevance’ (DeRond and

Miller 2005, 322).

While there is a clear need to provide ECAs with appropriate support, some

institutionally run, professional development programs may be delivered in ways that

suggest ECAs require remediation (Grant and Knowles 2000) to be ‘real’ academics,

or that they are somehow ‘flawed’ or ‘deficient’ in not being more accomplished

writers. Thus they may be situated as ‘inadequate’ or ‘lacking’ in line with discursive

expectations of research productivity. This may have the effect, unintentionally or

intentionally, of reinforcing tensions emerging in ECAs’ working lives as to how to

meet institutionally defined ends. We argue that within these new university contexts,

centralised professional development programs can act as elaborate disciplinary

mechanisms (Foucault 1977) that reconstitute writing as academically necessary

rather than a pleasure in and of itself.

Research productivity and writing groups?

Given the new discursive academic context and the “great push” (Galligan et al. 2003)

to publish, writing groups are often positioned in literature as a focused strategy for

increasing academic research productivity and publication output (Page-Adams et al.

1995; Morss and Murray 2001). Increasing publication outputs is clearly an assumed

“need” (Galligan et al. 2003) rather than a negotiable outcome, with writing groups

purposely convened ‘to create a momentum in the participants’ writing’ (McGrail,

Rickard and Jones 2006, 30).

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“Hard outcomes” (i.e. number of publications) are foregrounded as a key

academic product in writing groups (Cuthbert and Spark 2008). This focus is

evidenced in McGrail, Rickard and Jones (2006, 25) who reviewed seventeen

interventions seeking to increase academic publication rates and concluded all

interventions increased outputs ‘at least twofold’ and other writing-related academic

activity was increased (for example, abstract submission and grant writing). Hard

outcomes are so much the focus that one academic who did not improve publication

outputs through a writing group was highlighted in the literature as neglecting to see

‘the need to change her writing practices’ (Morss and Murray 2001, 47). Like or hate

moves towards writing productivity, it appears to now be an expected part of proper

academic identity.

Writing groups are also positioned as a tool to instil writing skills and

workshop the art of writing (Kamler and Thomson 2006; Grant 2006) in new

university contexts focused on research productivity. McGrail, Rickard and Jones

(2006) highlighted the effectiveness of writing groups in teaching writing skills. As

the quality of publications improved, so did knowledge about writing skills and

publication mechanics. Boice positions this as facilitating scholarly writing, rather

than an intrinsic good in itself (1987, 17). His empirical study of four writing

development programs found those which incorporated field-work support

mechanisms led to greater productivity and satisfaction with writing, than those

focussing on writing skills alone (1987, 9). Some writing groups are set up with an

‘expert’ facilitator with ‘publishing acumen’ (Galligan et al. 2003, 35) driving

participant progress towards ensuring writerly skills are imparted (Lee and Boud

2003). This form of writing group can reinforce a hierarchical structure between the

expert writing “knower” and the “unknowing” writing apprentice.

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Within this discursive focus on productivity, lesser mention is made of

intangible, psychosocial benefits like improved writing confidence, encouragement,

support, motivation, and reflective practice as a writer (McGrail, Rickard and Jones

2006). Lee and Boud (2003, 196) note how writing groups foster desire ‘as a

potentially positive force in work life – that which will drive an academic to build and

sustain activity’. Galligan and others (2003, 30) foreground the importance of

building ‘confidence in writing and publication; know-how, not just knowledge, of

the writing process; and a language for talking about writing’.

Support is foregrounded in terms of developing ‘a sense of collegiality’

(Cuthbert and Spark 2008, 86; Grant 2006) so an isolating writing experience ‘enters

into a network of peer relations’ (Lee and Boud 2003, 190) and academics move

beyond experiencing writing as an isolating task (Cuthbert and Spark 2008). Even

when writing groups are celebrated as overcoming writing isolation, they are rarely

discussed as breaking down the isolation of academic work more generally. In fact,

Grant and Knowles is one of few articles to mention forming ‘warm bonds, finding

kinship, support and fun in sharing the struggle to write’ (2000, 12).

We argue new university contexts focus on writing as productivity,

marginalising broader social and emotional discourses, particularly discourses of

pleasure. Social and emotional supports become required outputs and/or strategies for

achieving key performance indicators (KPIs), an idea dovetailing with discourses of

productivity in the form of writing outputs. This context seems to exclude other

discursive ways of thinking about writing groups as productive, particularly in terms

of pleasure as we conceptualise below.

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Thinking through pleasure in writing

Departing from contemporary understandings of teaching and learning, pleasure is not

about motivation (Watkins 2008) or a spontaneous psychologically intrinsic force or

extraneous persuasion to partake in the act of writing. It is not an inner fire that spurs

us towards the act of writing, nor is it a visceral threat to proper academic social

order. We think differently about pleasure in terms of poststructural understandings

(Foucault 1977) of what it means to enact discourses of pleasure. In this paper,

pleasure is a discourse, a discursive body of knowledge detailing what it means to

do/enact pleasure in particular ways (McWilliam 2004). Understandings of academic

writing may also be informed by discourses of pleasure. When pleasure is

conceptualised as discourse, pleasure is rethought as a body of knowledge which

inscribes (Foucault, 1984) and reshapes academic writing discourses, and thus

academic writing practices.

The body features as a key element in conceptualising pleasure as discourse, as

discourses are enacted on, with, and through bodies. Drawing on Foucauldian (1977)

understandings of the body as a social and cultural product, we suggest academic

bodies are marked and inscribed by discourses. In this conceptual framework,

academic writing constitutes a discursive body of knowledge seeking to inscribe and

reinscribe academic bodies. The work of Jones and Jenkins (2000) highlights how

this might happen in their exploration of how discourses of handwriting acted as

civilising practices in colonial New Zealand in the nineteenth century. Instructing the

art of handwriting to the “natives” in this context moved beyond simply instilling

writerly skills. Handwriting practices served to discipline Maori student bodies in

ways that discursively marked them as civilised: ‘the neatness and care of its

execution, its grace and elegance, were markers of higher things’ (Jones and Jenkins

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2000, 40). In similar fashion, new university contexts (Sikes 2006) may discursively

reconstitute the bodies of writing academics as necessary for meeting research

productivity targets. Centralised professional development programs may therefore

instil academic writing skills in ways devoid of discourses of pleasure, as research

outputs are the focus of development activities.

We suggest our writing group enabled us to discursively reconstitute our

writing practice in line with discourses of pleasure. In line with Foucault’s (1977, 11)

thinking, our writing group enabled us to collectively enact discourses of pleasure as a

bodily discipline: ‘a whole new system of truth, [a] corpus of knowledge, techniques,

“scientific” discourses’ that make academic writing bodies objects of ‘a system of

constraints and privations, obligations and prohibitions’. We therefore concur with

McWilliam (1997, 219) by suggesting academic writers are ‘textual and material

“bodies of knowledge”, we pose and gesture what it means to be’, in this case,

competent academic writers taking pleasure in doing writing.

By inscribing our academic bodies according to a discursive discipline of

pleasure, we become knowingly subject to (and knowing subjects of) this discursive

knowledge of what it means to do pleasure in writing using our bodies, words, and

actions. In this process, ‘a new cultural landscape forms...a new set of meanings are

inscribed in the “civilising” act of writing’ (Jones and Jenkins 2000, 36). In being a

part of this, we perform, for ourselves and others, the pleasure of the discipline

(McWilliam, 1997) of doing writing. This contrasts with how academic writing can

often be discursively situated in terms of research productivity in new university

contexts in ways that reconstitute writing as academically necessary rather than a

pleasure in and of itself.

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Our writing group

Our writing group was established in November 2008, primarily as a peer support

mechanism to facilitate our development as ECAs rather than because individuals or

the group had any perceived deficits in respect of research outputs that needed

remediation. It is ongoing, and meets fortnightly like those discussed by Lee and

Boud (2003) and Galligan and others (2003). We have five regular participants in the

group, with most participants attending every meeting. This means each of us submits

writing in some form every ten weeks. We meet for no more than two hours and the

first part of our meetings focus on sharing our successes, failures, and frustrations as

ECAs (and not only those associated with writing) since our last meeting, and then

feeding back on writing provided by the participant. We are flexible so if workloads

inhibit one of us from producing writing according to our meeting arrangements, we

rearrange the times, dates, or even swap between people contributing writing so

pressures are eased and we continue to write.

It is comprised of four ECAs with differing levels of academic qualifications1

(one beginning Masters research, one beginning doctoral research, one recently

completed doctorate, and one completed doctorate in 2006) from a metropolitan

Australian university. We also have one member who is newly doctored and is

employed outside academe. All participants conduct research in various areas within

law, justice, and criminology.

We actively encourage the submission to the group of any writing in varied

stages of completion (higher degree research proposals, grant applications,, research

reports) and planned writing (notes about papers/research ideas), in addition to

publication “outputs”. Some of our most productive sessions have brainstormed

strategies about how and where to publish doctoral chapters as articles or collectively

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developing ideas for an article in progress. This provides a reiterative cycle of review

of writing, where a participant can submit writing, receive feedback, revise writing

according to the feedback, and resubmit again.

We are peer-based and self-determining. Rather than engaging an authoritative

writerly expert, for example, we generate knowledge about writerliness collectively

through reading and feeding back on participants’ work as mutual learners. From the

beginning the group has been collegial, motivated by collective professionalism, a

sense of reciprocity and mutual respect.

From productivity to pleasure: new benefits of writing groups for ECAs

In new university contexts, our writing group aligns with discourses of productivity

because we produce more writing, and we instruct/enact (McWilliam 2004) writerly

skills. In addition, our writing group aligns with discourses of the personal as ECAs,

encompassing social and emotional supports. But it is how our writing group aligned

with discourses of pleasure that we consider the most significant effect of this group.

We articulate below how we (re)constituted ourselves as academics doing pleasure in

writing in an academic context increasingly focused on productivity.

Productivity in our writing group

All group members acknowledge increases in productivity in relation to the quality

and quantity of our writing outputs and this is consistent with discourses of

productivity foregrounded in the literature discussed above. Our peer-review process

improves the quality of each individual piece of writing (often with the result of

increasing its chances of acceptance for publication) and enhances members’ writing

techniques.

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By discussing the writing process and sharing experiences of publishing, we

each enact a bodily discipline (Foucault 1977) of what it means to be confident

writers, including developing skills to locate and target appropriate journals and a

familiarity with the process of submission and review (Cuthbert and Spark 2008;

Page-Adams et al. 1995). Boice identifies how ‘social skills in writing’ can also

contribute to greater productivity and satisfaction with writing (1987, 18). By sharing

writing collectively, giving and receiving feedback, and learning to cope with

editorial comments, our writing becomes a ‘social and public act’, with positive

interaction diffusing the impact of less favourable reviews (Boice 1987, 18).

Like Maori students performing writing as a civilising process (Jones and

Jenkins 2000), we perform proper writerliness by discussing strategies, brainstorming

ideas or sharing writing and grant applications for proofreading and comment before

submission. The more experienced (yet not more senior) group members encourage

those starting out, and confirming productive (thrill of being accepted for publication)

and constraining (stress and anxiety of applying for, writing and submitting higher

degree research) effects of writing as an ECA. One member noted:

The writing group has given me that incentive to keep moving forward, take the knockbacks, and pick myself up and throw myself back in.

The personal in our writing group

“Soft outcomes” (Morss and Murray 2001) or social, emotional, and psychological

support flowing from writing group participation are what we consider to be aligning

with personal discourses frequently sidelined in the literature (Cuthbert, Spark and

Burke 2009; Maher et al. 2008; Wall and Shanker 2008; Boice 1987). Discursive

ideas about the personal in writing groups focus on social and emotional dimensions,

with some noting this as ‘the principal legacy of our involvement’ (Maher et al (2008,

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273). Other significant psychosocial benefits include ‘motivation, confidence,

satisfaction’ (Galligan et al. 2003, 38) and ‘support, motivation and encouragement’

(McGrail, Rickard and Jones 2006, 30). Our writing group is informed by personal

discourses in how we assisted each other in navigating the demanding, complex and

varied role of an ECA, and overcoming isolation and stress, managing the pressure to

publish, and creating a discursive space for us to do writing as research practice. One

of our members noted:

Our writing group gives us the space to be writers, reviewers and critical friends. As an early career academic it is easy to get sidelined by the demands of teaching and administration, but having a space to dedicate to our writing helps me to keep sight of the big picture - and I am here. Taking the time out to invest in ourselves makes us feel that our ideas and work is valued and worthwhile.

Academics are often so busy they may overlook the importance of providing a

discursive space in which to think and do writing as valuable. In line with discourses

of the personal, our writing group enabled us to perform as confident writerly

academic bodies of knowledge (McWilliam 1997) affirmed collectively by writing

group members.

Isolation is commonly situated as a constraining effect of academic writing

(Dever et al. 2006; Cuthbert and Spark 2008; Galligan et al. 2003). In their seminal

study, Dever and others (2006, 34) identified the negative impact isolation can have

for academics: ‘In general, isolation meant that individual staff often were not getting

the guidance, peer support and professional development advice required to assist

them in their research output...[S]uch isolation can be damaging to a researcher’s

career’. This conception of isolation is inextricably linked to Western concepts of

knowledge that recognise and value the individual efforts of the “author” or “creator”

of a work. Individual effort is therefore equated with achieving tangible research

outcomes. Such individualistic conceptions of knowledge may contribute to the

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isolated nature of academic work, and producing further constraints for ECAs who

may lack the confidence to approach more senior academics to pursue collaborative

work (Dever et al. 2006).

Members of our writing group experience varying levels of isolation due to

factors such as their area of specialisation, availability of collaborators and/or relevant

support groups, and the demands of fulfilling a large academic workload, together

with personal and family responsibilities. Our experience was that while university-

based professional development workshops may inspire ECAs by showcasing high-

achieving researchers, they can exacerbate anxieties stemming from lack of

confidence and/or inexperience. As a peer-negotiated space, our writing group created

an informal means of breaking down isolation and providing a forum for talking

through specific challenges in our research projects. In this sense we have become

what Boice calls field workers, who require no particular expertise, yet play a critical

role in facilitating scholarly writing by providing support (and reminders), but in our

case it is reminding each other of the value of our work (1987, 17). Collectively we

embody personal discourses as writing academics by performing (McWilliam 1997)

empathy and encouragement for each other to keep pursuing research goals. Our peer-

based, self-determining group draws on personal discourses to enable candid

discussion about the trials and tribulations of becoming an ECA engaging in research.

Another element of personal discourses included ‘networking’ with ‘good

people’ as an important component of successful research careers (Dever et al. 2006,

12-13). Wall and Shankar (2008, 557) suggest bonding is important to developing

‘meaningful exchanges’ in writing group contexts. They identified how shared

experience of stress and learning about the human dimensions of other participants

contributed to strong interpersonal relationships within the group. Winefield and

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others (2003) note how stressful academic work can be in Australia, reporting 43% of

academics experience higher levels of psychological stress compared to 12% of the

general population. The need to surround ourselves with “good people” was a key

catalyst for our group’s crystallisation through friendships formed in university

professional development programs for ECAs. We were looking for a different

discursive space than those offered by university-based programs, one inscribed

(Foucault 1984) in terms of the personal rather than productivity.

Writing group literature on the personal suggests quality mentor and role

model relationships are generated when such relationships develop ‘informally’, are

‘genuine’ and when a ‘natural affinity’ exists between the people, leading to ‘long

term relationships that form a significant part of a researcher’s working life’ (Dever et

al. 2006, 14). Studies typically identified a ‘nurturing rather than demanding or

threatening’ environment as key to successful writing groups (Galligan et al. 2003,

38). These discursive elements inform our group as we share interests and a desire to

be supported as ECAs engaged in writing beyond the life of fixed-term institutional

professional development programs. The peer status of group members assisted our

development as an effective network of like-minded academics sharing values and a

passion for research writing. The multi-disciplinary, collaborative (Kochan and

Mullen 2003) character of our writing group can also be less competitive, and better

focused on the clarity of writing rather than bogged down in intra-disciplinary debates

(Cuthbert, Spark and Burke 2009).

Discourses of the personal also heavily shaped our writing group in terms of

healthy work/life balance, something often highlighted as a challenge for academics

(Dever et al. 2006). As a group, we know about needing to maintain a healthy

work/life balance and therefore established a format enabling a “de-briefing” space to

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discuss tensions inherent in balancing an academic career and having “a life” outside

the institution. This de-briefing takes priority in our group meetings and gives us an

opportunity to talk about the things happening in our lives, particularly those

impacting on our ability to “find” time for our research. The personal dimensions of

our lives – relationships and family - are open for discussion before we get down to

talking about our research and writing. Whilst for some this type of discussion may

appear to be self-indulgent, we create new cultural meanings of writing (Jones and

Jenkins 2000) acknowledging how personal discourses can impact so thoroughly on

our academic writing practices, as well as fortifying social and emotional support

required for becoming an academic. Our group embraces a holistic philosophy

acknowledging how our academic roles intersect with our extra-academic roles, as

‘mothers, aunties, and daughters’, as one member of our group puts it, and the

enabling and constraining effects they can present for academic careers.

The personal not only included our personal lives outside work. We also

produced a discursive space in which to raise other professional challenges we

confronted in relation to coping with academic roles. These included positive and

negative effects of institutional administration, student relations, time management,

teaching, academic promotion, methodology, theory, pedagogy, and publishing.

Our discussions during writing group meetings contribute to the discursive

(re)inscription (Foucault 1984) of our academic identities, as researchers (Lee and

Boud 2003) and writers (Grant 2006), legitimising our position as rightfully belonging

to academia. Enabling new academics to shape their unique academic identities feeds

into career planning, as ECAs develop a sense of who they are, where they fit in, and

where they would like their academic career to take them. As one of our members

noted:

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Coming straight from professional work to academia it is hard for me to 'measure' the value of my academic work. A day at court meant I saw X amount of clients or closed X number of files. Academic work is far less tangible and whilst success may be measured in terms of research outputs, as an early career academic you need something to keep you going while you are battling away to get the runs on the board.

Participation in the writing group enables benchmarks for an academic identity to be

demarcated for this member and support to be provided during the processes of

making the transition from professional to academic. This was not just an issue for

this member; academic identities were often the focus of our ‘debrief’. This has also

been a useful space for career planning. Together we collectively shape our academic,

writerly identities as ECAs, and we continue to do so in a collectively supportive

space.

Our writing group is informed increasingly by discourses of the personal – to

learn what it means to be confident, resilient academic writers and how to work

through negative elements of academic life such as academic isolation. However, we

suggest our writing group transgressed personal discourses and moved towards what

we term discourses of pleasure.

(Re)constituting pleasure in writing

We discussed above how discourses of productivity tend to dominate new university

contexts for ECAs, a focus we assert is marginalising discourses of the personal and,

most importantly, reconstituting academic writing practices as unpleasant or at least

un-pleasurable for many. We contend our writing group produces a discursive space

in which we can re-produce academic writing processes in terms of discourses of

pleasure. Pleasure is not about an explosion of intensely happy feelings resultant

from a rush of blood to the head. Pleasure in our writing group is reconceptualised as

discursive knowledges about what it means to do pleasure in academic writing, and

we subsequently re-inscribed and re-trained our academic writing identities

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collectively to feel like doing writing (McWilliam 2000). We suggest finding pleasure

in writing is under pressure in the new university context with its focus on writing as

serious work that McWilliam (2000, 165) suggests is ‘productive…in the academy’.

There is an impetus, then, to create discursive spaces to enable the (re)inscription of

academic writing practices as pleasurable.

While pleasure in writing is noted in writing group literature (Galligan et al.

2003), the understanding of pleasure documented in these writing group experiences

differs from ours. Boud and Lee (1999, para. 57) provide probably the most extended

consideration of these issues noting a key principle of their writing group as

‘investment, satisfaction and pleasure’. Pleasure is conceptualised in this instance as

academic motivation and goal fulfilment. They focus on a ‘demystification process’

(para. 57) where participants gain pleasure through revealing ‘secret’ (para. 58)

publication knowledges, fulfilling writing and publication goals, and engaging in

writing group processes. Pleasure is about an academic obtaining deep satisfaction

and a sense of fulfilment through goal-oriented writing and publication, elements

which appear to be reminiscent of the productivity benefits we examined above. For

Boice, increased productivity correlates with an increased satisfaction with writing by

adopting ‘good’ writing habits (1987, 12). Writing retreat participants (Grant 2006,

488) have experienced increased pleasure in writing following their return, where

such pleasure is linked to impacts like including ‘learning new rituals, habits, skills or

strategies for tackling the writing task’. Clearly there is pleasure to be had in writing

practices in these forms, and we experience similar pleasure in writing as part of our

writing group. However, pleasure for us is differently conceptualised and in some

ways differently placed.

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Boud and Lee (1999) articulate pleasure in terms McWilliam (1996) has

highlighted in her critical discussion about pleasurable teaching. McWilliam notes

how critical reflection on pedagogical practices can often disembody teachers from

the pedagogical pleasure of teaching as an embodied event. McWilliam (1996, 312)

suggests reflective practice can be ‘elevated over – and indeed, antithetical to – the

immediacy of pedagogical pleasure’ experienced by a teacher in the classroom. In a

similar way, pleasure in writing group literature is associated with drawing pleasure

from productivity, of mastering complex writing skills rather than the pleasure of

writing for writing’s sake. McWilliam (1996, 313) argues teachers are disembodied

from pleasurable teaching ‘rendering them functionaries without self-interest, without

desire’. There is a similar potential to become functional academic writers in a new

academic context so focused on publication productivity.

Our writing group experience works within but also against these functional

imperatives as for us, the desire to write is not just about being motivated to write. As

one of our group noted:

I am motivated to write because I need to achieve my KPIs to achieve promotion, but environmental pressures often mean that writing for me becomes functional and instrumental. I must do it, but the pleasure in the performance of writing isn’t always there. The writing group provides a regular reminder that writing is a pleasure.

Just as a teacher mobilises pleasure in learning (McWilliam 1996), this quote

illustrates how as a writing group we collectively mobilise and enact (McWilliam

2004) discourses of pleasure in ways that inform our writing practices - we learn what

it means ‘to feel like doing them’ (McWilliam 2000, 165) when so often academic

environments undermine pleasure.

Pleasure also emerges in our writing group through working against

functionary writing – that is, writing as a product rather than a process to be enjoyed.

We do this by working through what Rorty (1989) calls irony, the opposite of which

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is common sense. According to Rorty (1989), working through irony means we refuse

final vocabularies and common senses. We take pleasure not only in coming together

and sharing ‘delight in the flirtatiousness of intellectual debate’ (Kirby 1994, 19) but

also in keeping ideas ‘in play, constantly moving, jumping about, making trouble’

(McWilliam 2000, 174). As one member of our group notes:

I love that when I submit writing and we come together to talk about it, my writing can be pulled in new directions. We play with ideas and even plan entire papers in the group space. There is no greater thrill than an ‘Aha!’ moment that comes from something discussed in the group and I can connect it to my own writing. Coming from a difficult PhD supervision where positive feedback was rare, I panic about the nitty gritty of finalising a draft, having perfect sentences, forming a perfect argument, and actually letting it go and submitting is always the hardest part for me. Getting positive feedback from the group is always a pleasure and bringing away new ideas that push me back to the bigger picture in the writing makes it even better.

As this quote indicates, we take pleasure in the writing process and academic critique,

talking back at common sense like writing as only a product for publication, turning

ideas on their heads, and ‘refusing to settle finally on the account, the formula, the set

of principles for good moral, political, economic, or pedagogical order’ (McWilliam

2000, 174) – or in this case, good academic order. Our writing group represents a

space in which we write, talk, think ironically ‘to underline and undermine those

ways of speaking and thinking and being that have come to characterize’ (McWilliam

2000, 176) what it means to be an academic in contemporary Western culture.

Performing academic writing in terms of discourses of pleasure provides the impetus

to write and moves us to continue writing.

Pleasure also inscribes our writing group through reciprocity. Giving our time

to review and comment on each other’s works requires an investment of our personal

resources which are already in high demand. For our group, reciprocity resonates with

our discursive approach, as ‘the practice of making an appropriate return for a benefit

or harm received from another’ (Blackburn 2008). This concept influences how the

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group operates, with members gaining from (informal) peer review and feedback

(together with emotional support noted above). Group members have commented on

the importance of this for their experience:

Sometimes when multiple deadlines are looming it is tempting to 'decline' the invite to the writing group, as time is precious and other tasks seem to take priority. However I have never walked away from writing group thinking 'that was a total waste of time' - the effort and time we put into supporting each other is repaid tenfold.

Reciprocity is central to how the group functions as a pleasurable academic activity,

acting as an incentive and investment we make in supporting the work of other group

members. Enacting reciprocity performs the pleasure of the discipline (McWilliam

1997) of academic writing.

Discourses of pleasure also inscribe our writing group practices through

synergy, meaning ‘the interaction or cooperation of two or more...produce a combined

effect greater than the sum of their separate effect’ (Soanes and Stevenson 2008).

Synergy makes writing a collective pleasure because our diverse backgrounds and

academic/research experience offer broader perspectives on written work extending

beyond disciplinary specialisation. The breadth of our experience assists our co-

writers to step outside their work and consider a broader social, cultural and political

context. Drawing on multiple contextual discourses enriches members’ writing by

helping us to develop stronger critical faculties, make our writing accessible to a

wider readership, and keep our writing ideas in play. More importantly, pleasure

constitutes our writing practices in ways aligning with how doctoral students

experience pleasure in the work of McAlpine and Amundsen (2009) – from

contributing to communal practice. As noted by one group member:

There is a real buzz which comes from working through a problem together and arriving at a solution and the diversity in our group means that the end result is often something that the author might never have thought of alone. The members of our group are not there just to proofread and provide comments - we take a real interest in the academic challenge of each piece of writing, and the pleasure that each person takes from this process is both

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intellectually nourishing and infectious. I always come away from group meetings with a renewed enthusiasm for my work.

The collective experience re-engages us with pleasure in our work and in the work of

others; it reinvigorates us as academics and as researchers. Pleasure in our writing

group comes from the collective experience of enacting pleasure as a bodily discipline

(Foucault 1977) through nascent drafts, shaping lines of thought and argument, and

expanding conclusions through multiple perspectives in terms of possibilities rather

than closures.

Conclusion

We have examined how our writing group practices can align with dominant

discourses of academic writing productivity, and with marginalised discourses of the

personal in line with existing literature about writing groups. Importantly, we have

demonstrated how our writing group moved beyond this to discursively (re)inscribe

(Foucault 1984) academic writing as a pleasure. In some ways we are like Gallop

(1982, 128) who reflects on being a teacher who experiences ‘a diffuse yet

unmistakeable pleasure when calculating grades at the end of term’. We (re)inscribe

discourses of pleasure in how our textual academic bodies (McWilliam 1997) work

intimately with text, meshing words to create sentences, paragraphs, arguments. We

produce pleasure in reciprocal, synergetic, and collective writing ‘constituted through

the narratives and storylines, the metaphors, the very language and patterns of

existence’ (Davies 2000, 37). Pleasure in writing comes with ‘a search for, a playing

with, a new way of speaking and writing that opens the possibility of encompassing,

even embracing, opposite and contradictory positions’ (Davies 2000, 38) in the texts

we produce.

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We suggest thinking about writing groups in this way is vital in a

contemporary academic climate that can be too rigidly focused on writing as a

product to the detriment of writing as a pleasure. We are not arguing writing for

productivity is somehow separate to writing for pleasure. Indeed, increased and

sustained writing productivity shapes many pleasurable rewards for academics

working in new university contexts. In many ways our approach aligns with other

successful writing groups documented in the literature, but ours may also reinvest

writing with new cultural meanings (Jones and Jenkins 2000). Our writing group may

offer up something more as a self-determining, peer-based, flexible, space in which to

enact writing and critique as pleasurable academic activities. It may be a space in

which we can, if we so choose, undermine the push to think about writing as a product

rather than a pleasure, and blur the distinctions between these discursive positions.

Our account shows how ‘certain ways of taking pleasure can and do offer up

subversive possibilities within a lived condition...While “fun” never escapes

rationality, it can and does trouble it’ (McWilliam 2000, 167). Troubling rationalities

that situate publication productivity as the only appropriate way of doing academic

writing was for us a part of what makes our writing group pleasurable. With the push

to publish currently dominating the work of universities in Australia and

internationally, our writing group is an example of how these groups can achieve so

much more than merely increase research productivity. It demonstrates the

importance of creating writing spaces in which the administrative functions of

academic life can be regularly cast aside to partake in the pleasure of writing and

review.

Acknowledgements: We would like to thank Dr Cassandra Cross for being a current, valued member of our writing group, and Dr Jennifer Duncan-Howell for being a valued past member.

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1. We all work within the Faculty of Law and law as a discipline has not required doctoral

qualifications as a prerequisite for academic employment.

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