Power Women

A Review of Power Women: Stories of Motherhood, Faith, and the Academy

Nancy WangYuen and Deshonna Collier-Goubil (editors)
Power Women: Stories of Motherhood, Faith, and the Academy.
Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2021.

Review by Flyck Clift

There is power in a good story. The power of Power Women: Stories of Motherhood, Faith, and the Academy lies in the personal testimony of the professor-mothers which frames each chapter. These voices of expertise from experience provide challenging but crucial perspectives on the American wing of ‘the academy.’ This book is intended to arm women ‘with knowledge and wisdom as [they] journey through motherhood and the academy’ (p. 4). It explicitly hopes that women will ‘find resonance, receive encouragement’ and glean tips from its pages (p. 213). I, a woman, can affirm this outcome, but this book is invaluable for so many more. Any administrators committed to creating equitable workplaces, or men and women committed to supporting women in the academy, or anyone who values women will benefit from reading these accounts.

The division of the content into four areas of navigation – academia, motherhood, multiple callings, and support – allows a great breadth of material to be covered. The chapters are geared towards sharing experience and thereby offering knowledge and wisdom, but practical tips for ‘how to…’ interwoven in these stories. In reading this book you can discover how to juggle multiple roles (e.g., Jenny H Pak, PhD – Chapter 8), how to think and speak about mothers in academia (e.g., Maria Su Wang, PhD – Chapter 1; Teri Clemons, MS, SLPD – Chapter 3), how to seek support or to be support for mothers in the academy (Part 4). These practical offerings are specific on things like how to balance university teaching with home-schooling (Yvana Urana-Hernandez, PhD – Chapter 10). Such a broad range of material means a reader may dip into one chapter or section to explore a specific area of motherhood and the academy.  It can be imagined that reading this book in conversation with others would be more powerful still. This is the hope of the editors and the questions provided on page 221 offer a way for this book to become transformative for the reader.

If you are a woman journeying in, or weighing up the pros and cons of academia, if you are a university administrator or faculty member seeking to support women in your college, if you are a family member seeking to understand and support your wife/ sister/ daughter/ mother through academia, if you are a man seeking to grow in your understanding of the experience of women - whoever you are, this book is a worthwhile read. It is an invaluable resource offering knowledge, encouragement, and important food for thought. It will also move you: if you have a heart you will likely feel sorrow and some rage. Fortunately, if you are willing to hear and learn you will also feel awe, revelation, and hope for the academy and for women within it.

Flyck Clift  - BA, BNSc, MDiv - works as Academic Counsellor in Student Support at Ridley College, Melbourne. Flyck is also a determined encourager of women pursuing God’s calling through theological studies.