Mentoring as care: examining power and gender in faculty-undergraduate student relationships
Abstract
Abstract Faculty mentoring has become increasingly vital as U.S. universities confront unprecedented challenges, yet sociologists have neglected to examine this work through the lens of care labor. Through in-depth interviews with 44 strategically sampled undergraduate students who conducted STEM-related research, we reconceptualize faculty mentoring as complex care relationships embedded within institutional hierarchies. Rather than treating gender as a fixed identity, we employ a gender-as-relational framework to examine how mentoring becomes a dynamic space where gendered expectations and behaviors are shaped through interaction. Students’ narratives reveal two mentoring approaches: patriarchal mentoring characterized by authority and care mentoring emphasizing holistic development. A paradox emerges: while care mentoring creates transformative spaces that challenge established power structures, the burden of this labor falls disproportionately on women faculty, perpetuating systemic inequalities; however, there were some exceptions of men faculty embracing care mentoring. Our research not only deepens the understanding of faculty mentoring but also expands care work scholarship by revealing how care labor operates in unexpected domains—specifically, knowledge-producing spaces traditionally dominated by masculine authority. By analyzing mentoring as care work, we uncover how care practices function within institutional power structures where authority and nurturing unexpectedly converge.
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Record history
| When | Event | Field | Old | New |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-06-18 19:37:53.011249+00:00 | identifier_assigned | DSEID | DSEID-000-1579682 |