ABSTRACT
Against a backdrop of the growing crisis in higher education, the economic fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic and a longer-term precaritisation of the youth and graduate labour market, the last 2 years have witnessed an increased visibility and promotion of flexible, entrepreneurial and often digitally mediated forms of self-employment addressed at young women, including the ‘side hustle'. With media declarations such as ‘the university side hustle has come of age', universities themselves have begun embedding initiatives that seemingly help students launch a ‘student side hustle' as they turn passions into entrepreneurial projects. The student side hustle has been advocated as a feasible way of not only supplementing income while studying but also investing in one's future employability in the context of increasingly uncertain graduate outcomes. In this article we connect the emergence of the student side hustle to a broader postfeminist landscape in which (young) women are invited to engage in entrepreneurial self-employment through the promise of ‘passionate work', financial autonomy and time-freedom. We demonstrate that in the context of higher education, where women outnumber men and dominate the degree subjects increasingly badged as ‘low value' due to declining graduate outcomes, institutional incitements to engage in the student side hustle are distinctly gendered. Crucially, we contend that this framing and promotion of the student side hustle – in which women become the ‘poster girls' of entrepreneurialism – works to facilitate and sustain the myths and ideals of postfeminist success while masking the ongoing crises and gendered inequalities that underpin contemporary higher education and the graduate labour market. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of European Journal of Cultural Studies is the property of Sage Publications, Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)
ABSTRACT
The article offers a qualitative examination of compounded precarity in creative work during the Covid-19 pandemic. Drawing on repeated in-depth interviews with twelve creative workers operating in the creative industries in Ghana, we examine one of the most prevalent practices for navigating, coping with, and managing compounded precarity: that of hustling. We empirically identify and discuss three interrelated practices of hustling in creative work: digitalization, diversification, and social engagement. We present a new way of conceptualizing creative work in precarious geographies by theorizing hustling, and the associated worker resourcefulness, improvisation, savviness, hopefulness, and caring not merely as an individualized survival strategy, but rather as an agentic and ethical effort to turn the vicissitudes of life into situated advantages and opportunities, and even social change.
ABSTRACT
In response to societal grand challenges, professors have unique opportunities to effect change, repurposing their expertise to deploy relevant, timely, practical, and research-backed knowledge for the betterment of communities. Drawing on scholarship on postcrisis organizing, entrepreneurial hustle, and social entrepreneurship, we provide a firsthand, real-time case description of a three-day "virtual idea blitz" organized in response to the COVID-19 crisis. The event was organized and executed in less than a week and ultimately involved 200 individuals, including entrepreneurs, coders, medical doctors, venture capitalists, industry professionals, students, and professors from around the world. By the end of the weekend, 21 ideas with corresponding pitches were developed in five thematic areas: health needs, education, small businesses, community, and purchasing. We describe how the community was rapidly rallied, and we discuss the key learning outcomes of this spontaneous entrepreneurial endeavor. We provide evidence from participants and mentors that showcases the value of the time-compressed virtual idea blitz in accelerating social entrepreneurial action. We offer practical guidance to academic, community, and professional institutions that would like to replicate or build upon our approach to stimulate the formation of community and to coordinate efforts to thwart the ongoing threat of COVID-19, as well as other societal challenges that might emerge in the future.