EN 
ID 
This organised panel explored the state of knowledge work in neoliberalising Indonesia using a feminist lens. Indonesia has an increasingly vibrant knowledge economy where universities are gradually geared to produce marketable education and research services efficiently, causing rising precarity and casualisation, especially among early careers and women academics. The panelists unpacked the contradictions within the neoliberal reorganisation of universities, encouraging a critical discussion on ‘academics as neoliberal subjects’ who could articulate grievances about the nature of knowledge work by shaping a collective academic will based on everyday practices and engaged theoretical understanding of the social and cultural world.
This panel emerged from what we refer to as the Epistemic Gathering, a monthly virtual forum in which participants shared updates on their article-writing progress. The Epistemic Gathering took place throughout 2024 and resulted in a forthcoming special issue to be published in 2026 in the Asian Studies Review journal, besides this panel.
Chair: Dr. Annisa Beta (University of Melbourne)
Speakers:
- Indonesian Early Career Women Navigating the Neoliberal Higher Education by Nur Rafiza Putri (Universitas Nasional and Asia Research Centre Universitas Indonesia)
- Slow Down or Speed Up: Indonesian Early-Career Women Scholars Experiencing Time in Academia by Dr. Asri Saraswati (Universitas Indonesia)
- The Micropolitics of Care of Indonesian Universities by Dr. Yulida Pangastuti (Universitas Gadjah Mada) and Dr. Zulfa Sakhiyya (Universitas Negeri Semarang)
- Who gets things done? Exploring invisible labour among women academics in Indonesia by Dr. Fitri Hariana Oktaviani (Universitas Brawijaya)