Drew on extensive archives from 10 graduate employee unions' Web sites to examine their publicly presented identities (marginalized workers and future professionals), ideologies (traditional and professional unionism with little focus on social justice), and strategies (disruptive protest and professional politics locally). (EV)

The cultural landscape of graduate employee life in the research university faces significant change. Ten years ago just a handful of recognized graduate employee unions existed. Today, more than two dozen campuses have recognized unions and another two dozen or so are in the process of organizing graduate student employees. The extant literature…

This qualitative study of graduate employee unionization seeks to explore the critique graduate student organizers have of the contemporary academy. The number of unionized graduate employees has increased by 175% since 1990; close to 40,000 graduate employees are now unionized. Data were collected using a multisite case study approach, a method…