“Take Charge of Your Well-Being!”: A Critique of Neoliberalism and Ableism in Higher Education Well-Being Initiatives

dc.contributor.advisorLewis, Rachel A
dc.contributor.authorFojtik, Garrett
dc.creatorFojtik, Garrett
dc.date2021-04-28
dc.date.accessioned2021-10-14T13:24:27Z
dc.descriptionThis thesis has been embargoed for 2 years. It will not be available until April 2023 at the earliest.
dc.description.abstractHigher education well-being initiatives are in need of analysis within critical scholarship on the neoliberal university, on corporate well-being, and within the field of critical disability studies. Despite the proliferation of well-being initiatives in higher education, which is embedded in systems of neoliberalism and ableism, such an analysis is currently lacking within the aforementioned critical scholarship. Through a multi-method approach that combines content analysis with critical discourse analysis, I examine the ways in which higher education well-being initiatives perpetuate these interlocking hegemonies – neoliberalism and ableism – through their discourses of well-being. Through this analysis, it is evident that higher education well-being initiatives perpetuate notions of individual responsibility and other normative values of neoliberalism, obscuring the harmful systemic conditions in and outside of higher education that impact well-being. These well-being discourses also perpetuate ableist, medicalized notions of well-being and an uncritical, unnuanced pro-cure politics. They also broadly serve to other students, faculty and staff with mental disabilities. While most higher education well-being initiatives across the spectrum of institutions perpetuate neoliberalism and/or ableism in some way, some Historically Black Colleges and Universities and some Tribal Colleges and Universities demonstrate productive approaches to well-being that are rooted in the meeting of tangible community needs. Additionally, at predominantly white institutions, the co-optation of anti-racist liberation movements is evident as an emergent trend in need of further research. Finally, I argue for an embrace of feminist care ethics, conjoined with a political analysis of oppression, resistance and liberation, as a more meaningful and liberatory framework of care in contrast to the normative discourse of well-being predominant on higher education campuses.
dc.description.embargo2023-04-28
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/1920/12148
dc.language.isoen
dc.subjectWell-being
dc.subjectNeoliberalism
dc.subjectAbleism
dc.subjectDisability
dc.subjectCritical Disability Studies
dc.subjectFeminist Ethics of Care
dc.title“Take Charge of Your Well-Being!”: A Critique of Neoliberalism and Ableism in Higher Education Well-Being Initiatives
dc.typeThesis
thesis.degree.disciplineInterdisciplinary Studies
thesis.degree.grantorGeorge Mason University
thesis.degree.levelMaster's
thesis.degree.nameMaster of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies

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