Social science researchers and higher-education personnel have begun to recognize the unique and unequal experiences of first-generation, low-income, and working-class students, but what of those from such backgrounds that manage to reach the professoriate? What can we learn from their mobility experiences? What obstacles do they and others perceive standing in their way? Using original data on faculty and graduate students collected between 2018 and 2022, we analyze how diverse faculty (including graduate students) reflect on the relevance of social class background for upward mobility and success in academia. Results point to a shared understanding of ways in which cultural, social, and economic resources and resource constraints are influential although we also find noteworthy interpretational divergences by social location and identity. We discuss our most central results in these regards as well as their implications for building greater equity in higher education.
AdairVivyan CampbellDahlbergSandra L.2003. Reclaiming Class: Women, Poverty, and the Promise of Higher Education in America. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
2.
ArnerLynn. 2016. “Survival strategies for working-class women as junior Faculty Members.” Pp. 49–64 in Working in Class: Recognizing How Social Class Shapes Our Academic Work, edited by HurstA. L.NengaS. L.New York: Rowman & Littlefield.
3.
BarkerJudith. 1996. “A White Working-class Perspective on Epistemology.” Race, Gender, and Class1(4):103–18.
4.
BelenkyMary F.1986. Women’s Ways of Knowing: The Development of Self, Voice, and Mind. New York: Basic Books.
5.
BrookHeatherMichellDee. 2012. “Learners, Learning, Learned: Class, Higher Education, and Autobiographical Essays from Working-class Academics.” Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management34(6):587–99. doi:10.1080/1360080X.2012.716021.
6.
BrunsmaDavid L.EmbrickDavid G.ShinJean. 2017. “Graduate Students of Color: Race, Racism, and Mentoring in the White Waters of Academia.” Sociology of Race and Ethnicity3(1):1–13. doi:10.1177/233264921668156.
7.
BurrisVal. 2004. “The Academic Caste System: Prestige Hierarchies in PhD Exchange Networks.” American Sociological Review69:239–64.
8.
byrdderriaSiddiquiNoreen. 2024. “A Critical Examination of First-generation Faculty Scholarship: Demonstrating the Need for Intersectional, Empirical Analysis.” Journal of Diversity in Higher Education. doi:10.1037/dhe0000560.
9.
CalhounCraig ed. 2008. Sociology in America: A History. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
10.
CraneDiana. 1965. “Scientists at Major and Minor Universities: A Study of Productivity and Recognition.” American Sociological Review30(5):699–714.
11.
CraneDiana. 1970. “The Academic Marketplace Revisited: A Study of Faculty Mobility Using the Cartter Ratings.” American Journal of Sociology75:953–64.
12.
CuadrazGloria Holguin. 2006. “Myths and the ‘politics of Exceptionality’: Interpreting Chicana/o Narratives of Achievement.” The Oral History Review33(1):83–105. doi:10.1525/ohr.2006.33.1.83.
13.
CurlHeatherLareauAnnetteWuTina. 2018. “Cultural Conflict: The Implications of Changing Dispositions among the Upwardly Mobile.” Sociological Forum33(4):877–99. doi:10.1111/socf.12461.
14.
DewsC. L. BarneyLawCarolyn Leste. 1995. This Fine Place So Far from Home: Voices of Academics from the Working Class. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
15.
Dixon-ReevesRegina. 2003. “Mentoring as a Precursor to Incorporation: An Assessment of the Mentoring Experience of Recently Minted Ph.D.s.” Journal of Black Studies34(1):12–27. doi:10.1177/0021934703253680.
16.
EspelandWendySauderMichael. 2016. Engines of Inequality: Academic Ranking, Reputation, and Accountability. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
17.
EspinozaRoberta. 2010. “The Good Daughter Dilemma: Latinas Managing Family and School Demands.” Journal of Hispanic Higher Education9(4):317–30. doi:10.1177/1538192710380919.
18.
FewApril L.PiercyFred P.StremmelAndrew J.2007. “Balancing the Passion for Activism with the Demands of Tenure: One Professional’s Story from Three Perspectives.” NWSA Journal19(3):47–66.
19.
FogartyTimothy J.SaftnerDonald V.1993. “Academic Department Prestige: A New Measure Based on the Doctoral Student Labor Market.” Research in Higher Education34:427–49.
20.
González-SauriMarioRosselloGiulia. 2022. “The Role of Early-career University Prestige Stratification on the Future Academic Performance of Scholars.” Research in Higher Education64:58–94. doi:10.1007/s11162-022-09679-7.
21.
GrimesMichael D.MorrisJoan. 1997. Caught in the Middle: Contradictions in the Lives of Sociologists from Working-class Backgrounds. New York: Praeger Press.
22.
Gutiérrez y MuhsGabrielaNiemannYolanda FloresGonzálezCarmen G.HarrisAngela P.2012. Presumed Incompetent: The Intersections of Race and Class for Women in Academia. Logan, UT: Utah State University Press.
23.
HaneyTimothy. 2016. “‘We’re All Middle Class Here’: Privilege and the Denial of Class Inequality in the Canadian Professoriate.” Pp. 141–56 in Working in Class: Recognizing How Social Class Shapes Our Academic Work, edited by HurstA. L.NengaS. L.New York: Rowman & Littlefield.
24.
HarnoisCatherine E.IfatunjiMosi. 2011. “Gendered Measures, Gendered Models; Toward an Intersectional Analysis of Interpersonal Racial Discrimination.” Ethnic and Racial Studies34(6):1006–28. doi:10.1080/01419870.2010.516836.
25.
HarawayDonna. 1988. “Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective.” Feminist Studies14(3):575–99.
26.
HevenstoneDebra. 2013. “The Academic Employment Networks and Departmental Prestige.” Pp. 119–140. in Why Context Matters, edited by FriemelT. N.Cham, Germany: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschafte.
27.
HirshfieldLauraJosephTiffany. 2011.“’We need a woman, we need a Black woman’: Gender, race, and identity taxation in the academy.” Gender and Education24(2): 1–15.
28.
hooksbell. 1994. Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom. New York: Routledge.
29.
HurstAllison L.2008. “A Healing Echo: Methodological Reflections of a Working-class Researcher on Class.” The Qualitative Report13(3):334–52.
30.
HurstAllison L.2010. The Burden of Academic Success: Loyalists, Renegades, and Double Agents. New York: Rowman & Littlefield; Lexington Books.
31.
HurstAllison L.RoscignoVincentJackAnthony AbrahamLeeElizabeth M.BradyDavidKingColby R.DelaneyKevin J.McDermottMonicaMuñozJoséJohnsonWendiFrancisRobert D.WarnockDebbieVitulloMargaret Weigers. 2023. “The Graduate School Pipeline and First-generation/working Inequalities,”Sociology of Education97(2):148–73. doi:10.1177/00380407231215051.
32.
JensenBarbara. 2012. Reading Classes: On Culture and Classism in America. Ithaca, NY: ILR Press.
33.
KamensDavid. 1974. “Colleges and Elite Formation: The Case of Prestigious American Colleges.” Sociology of Education47(3):354–78.
34.
KosutMary. 2006. “Professorial Capital: Blue-collar Reflections on Class, Culture, and the Academy.” Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies6(2):245–62. doi:10.1177/1532708604268222.
35.
LamontMichele. 2010. How Professors Think: Inside the Curious World of Academic Judgment. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
36.
LeeElizabeth M.2017. “‘Where People Like Me Don’t Belong’”: Faculty Members from Low-socioeconomic Backgrounds.” Sociology of Education90(3):197–212. doi:10.1177/003804071771049.
37.
LeeElizabeth M.MaynardTonya. 2017. “In Class, Sharing Class: Faculty Members from Low-Socioeconomic Status Backgrounds and Status Visbility.” Journal of Working-Class Studies12(2): 16–33.
38.
LubranoAlfred. 2004. Limbo. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley.
39.
MahonyPatZmroczekChristine. 1997. Class Matters: Working-class Women’s Perspectives on Social Class. London: Taylor & Francis.
40.
MatthysMick. 2014. Cultural Capital Identity, and Social Mobility: The Life Course of Working-class University Graduates. New York: Routledge.
41.
McCallLeslie. 2005. “The Complexity of Intersectionality.” Signs30(3):1771–800. doi:10.1086/426800.
42.
MooreKyle K.Cid-MartinezIsmaelToneyJermaineSmithJason A.KalbAmber C.ShinJean H.Spalter-RothRoberta M.2018. “Who Climbs the Academic Ladder? Race and Gender Stratification in a World of Whiteness.” Review of Black Political Economy45(2018):216–44. doi:10.1177/00346446188136.
43.
MorganAllison C.LaBergeNicholasLarremoreDaneil B.GalesicMirtaJennieBrandClausetAaron. 2022. “Socioeconomic Roots of Academic Faculty.” Nature Human Behaviour6:1625–33. doi:10.1038/s41562-022-01425-4.
44.
MuzzattiStephen L.SamarcoC. Vincent. 2005. Reflections from the Wrong Side of the Tracks: Class, Identity, and the Working Class Experience in Academe. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.
45.
NevinAndrew D.2019. “Academic Hiring Networks and Institutional Prestige: A Case Study of Canadian Sociology.” Canadian Review of Sociology/Revue Canadienne De Sociologie56(2019):3389–420. doi:10.1111/cars.12252.
46.
OldfieldKenneth. 2021. “Structural Nepotism: On the Reluctance of Law Schools to Include Social Class Origins among Their Faculty Diversity Goals.” Journal of Legal Education69(22):239–67.
47.
OldfieldKennethJohnsonRichard GregoryIII. 2008. Resilience: Queer Professors from the Working Class. Albany, NY: SUNY Press.
48.
PadillaRaymond V.1995. The Leaning Ivory Tower: Latino Professors in American Universities. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.
49.
PageCharles H.1969. Class and American Sociology, from Ward to Ross. New York: Schocken Books.
50.
PonjuanLuisConleyValerie MartinTrowerCathy. 2011. “Career Stage Differences in Pre-Tenure Track Faculty Perceptions of Professional and Personal Relationships with Colleagues.” Journal of Higher Education82(3): 317–346.
51.
PosseltJulie R.2016. Inside Graduate Admissions: Merit, Diversity, and Faculty Gatekeeping. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
52.
PosseltJulie R.ReyesKimberly A.SlayKelly E.KamimuraAuroraPorterKamaria B.2017. “Equity Efforts as Boundary Work: How Symbolic and Social Boundaries Shape Access and Inclusion in Graduate Education.” Teachers College Record: The Voice of Scholarship in Education119:1–38. doi:10.1177/016146811711901003.
53.
Price-WilliamsShelleyMaatitaFlorence. 2019. “Critical Examination of Tokenism and Demands of Organizational Citizenship Behavior Among Faculty Women of Color.” Pp. 96–121. in Navigating Micro-aggressions toward Women in Higher Education, edited by ThomasUrsula. New York: IGI Global.
54.
RaisonTimothyBarkerPaul. 1979. The Founding Fathers of Social Science. London: Scholar Press.
55.
RamírezElvia. 2017. “Unequal Socialization: Interrogating the Chicano/Latino(a) Doctoral Education Experience.” Journal of Diversity in Higher Education10(1):25–38. doi:10.1037/dhe0000028.
56.
RoscignoVincentLeeElizabeth M.HurstAllison L., et al. 2023. “Mobility and Inequality in the Professoriate: How and Why First-generation and Working-class Backgrounds Matter.” Socius9. doi:10.1177/23780231231181859.
57.
RoscignoVincent J.BradyDavidDelaneyKevin J.FrancisRobert D.HurstAllison L.JackAnthony AbrahamJohnsonWendiKingColby R.LeeElizabeth M.McDermottMonicaMuñozJoséWarnockDebbieVitulloMargaret Weigers. 2022. Report of the ASA Taskforce on First Generation and Working Class Persons in Sociology. Washington, DC: American Sociological Association. Retrieved June 20, 2025 (https://www.asanet.org/sites/default/files/first-gen-college-students-task-force-report.pdf).
58.
RossDavid. 1991. The Origins of American Social Science. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.
59.
RyanJakeSackreyCharles. 1984. Strangers in Paradise: Academics from the Working Class. Boston, MA: South End Press.
60.
SmarshSarah. 2018. Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth. New York: Scribner.
61.
SmithDorothy E.1990. The Conceptual Practices of Power: A Feminist Sociology of Knowledge. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
62.
SolórzanoD. G.1998. “Critical Race Theory, Race and Gender Microaggressions, and the Experience of Chicana and Chicano Scholars.” International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education11(1):121–36. doi:10.1080/095183998236926.
63.
SoriaKrista. 2016. “Working-class, Teaching Class and Working Class in the Academy.” Pp. 127–40 in Working in Class: Recognizing How Social Class Shapes Our Academic Work, edited by HurstAllison L.NengaSandi K.New York: Rowman & Littlefield.
64.
SpaffordMarlee M.NygaardVicki L.GregorFranBoydMarcia A.2006. “‘Navigating the Different Spaces’: Experiences of Inclusion and Isolation among Racially Minoritized Faculty in Canada.” Canadian Journal of Higher Education36:1–27. doi:10.47678/cjhe.v36i1.183523.
65.
TokarczykMichelle M.FayElizabeth A.1993. Working-class Women in the Academy: Laborers in the Knowledge Factory. Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press.
66.
TurnerCaroline Sotello Viernes. 2002. “Women of Color in Academe: Living with Multiple Marginality.” Journal of Higher Education73(1):74–93. doi:10.1080/00221546.2002.11777131.
67.
Van GalenJane A.DempseyVan O., eds. 2009. Trajectories: The Social and Educational Mobility of Education Scholars from Poor and Working-class Backgrounds. Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Sense Publishers.
68.
VillanuevaVictor. 1993. Bootstraps: From an American Academic of Color. Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English.
69.
WakelingPaulSavageMike. 2015. “Entry to Elite Positions and the Stratification of Higher Education in Britain.” The Sociological Review63:290–320.
70.
WarnockDeborah. 2017. “Paradise Lost? Patterns and Precarity in Working-class Academic Narratives.” Journal of Working-class Studies1(1):28–44.
71.
WeedenKim A.ThébaudSarahGelbgiserDafna. 2017. “Degrees of Difference: Gender Segregation of US Doctorates by Field and Program Prestige.” Sociological Science4:123–50.
72.
WelschKathleen A.2005. Those Winter Sundays: Female Academics and Their Working-class Parents. Lanham, MD: University Press of America.
73.
YanErjiaZhuYongjunHeJiangen. 2020. “Analyzing Academic Mobility of U.S. Professors Based on ORCID Data and the Carnegie Classification.” Quantitative Science Studies1:1451–67. doi:10.1162/qss_a_00088.
74.
ZambranaRuth EnidDávilaBrianne A.EspinoMichelle, et al. 2017. “Mexican American Faculty in Research Universities: Can the Next Generation Beat the Odds?”Sociology of Race and Ethnicity3(4):458–73. doi:10.1177/23326492177164.
75.
ZambranaRuthRayRashawnEspinoMichelleEliasonBeth Coehand Jennifer. 2015. “‘’Don’t Leave Us Behind’’: The Importance of Mentoring for Underrepresented Minority Faculty.” American Educational Research Journal52(1): 40–72.
76.
ZandyJanet. 1995. Liberating Memory: Our Work and Our Working-class Consciousness. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
