Living and working in the contemporary university

The nature of academia is shifting. Contemporary ‘epistemic living spaces’ are always multiple: In the neoliberal university scholars must speak to several competing but overlapping regimes. Evaluation, excellence and the multiplication of mechanisms for assessment is one such regime; impact and income generation is another; the call for public engagement and responsiveness is another again. At the same time, older narratives about what it means to be a good researcher continue to circulate. This chapter explores what it means to live and work within these competing regimes, and in particular at the intersection of demands for public engagement and responsibilisation with other narrative infrastructures. Using data from a series of projects that have explored natural scientists’ experiences and career paths, and from auto-ethnographic notes, the argument is that the imposition of any regime is never complete. Academics become skilled at negotiating dual roles, running double accounting systems and using other techniques to protect their values or practices. They coordinate diverse realities of the university within their bodies and careers.