How can meaningful and effective DEI work be implemented in higher education? How can universities better deal with harassment and discrimination cases? What do we need to build organizational cultures in academia that are less discriminatory and more inclusive from an intersectional perspective?

 

Speakers:

1. Dr. Mie Plotnikof, Assoc. Prof, Aarhus University, DPU

Mie Plotnikof is Associate Professor at Danish School of Education, Aarhus University, Denmark. Her research questions the performativity and micro-politics of dominant discourses, norms of difference, and power-resistance dynamics. Through critical approaches, she explores how such issues emerge and shape everyday life, with a specific focus on normative effects on subjectivity, practices and conditions of possibility – whether that be in educational, organizational or policy contexts. Mie co-organized a sexism petition circulated in Danish HE in the fall of 2020 and is co-founder of the award winning initiative www.sexismedu.dk.Her work is published in outlets such as Organization, Gender Work and Organization, ephemera, Scandinavian Journal of Management, and Organization Studies (amongst others), and in Danish outlets.

2. Dr. Sheena Vacchani, Professor, University of Bristol

Sheena J. Vachhani is Professor of Work and Organisation at the University of Bristol Business School, UK and INSPIRE Expert Consultant for the Horizon Europe Centre of Excellence on Inclusive Gender Equality in Research and Innovation. Her research explores social inequalities especially ethics, politics, and difference in work and organisation and how it relates to social transformation and social justice across multiple axes of oppression. She has a particular interest in craft work, materiality and embodiment, and a longstanding interest in using critical perspectives to teach and research leadership.

3. Dr. Mira Skadegård, Assoc. Prof, Aalborg University

Mira C. Skadegård is an Associate Professor at Aalborg University in Copenhagen, Denmark, and has her PhD in structural discrimination. She is also Senior Advisor in Social Sustainability and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). Mira's research focuses on structural and systemic forms of discrimination and oppression in everyday, educational, and organizational contexts, social sustainability and diversity, and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). Taking an interdisciplinary and intersectional approach, she addresses issues related to equity, diversity, structural discrimination, and human rights. 

Key Objectives:

1. Dealing with discrimination/harassment cases
2. Norm-critical leadership and org. culture
3. DEI work in universities
4. Whistleblowing and collective complaint