ACADEMIA Letters

Faculty as Nonpersons at Pandemic U

Roscoe Scarborough

Introduction
The faculty at Pandemic U are alienated from students and colleagues. Synchronous online
instruction (“Zoom classes”) can easily devolve into a professor lecturing “into the void” of
black boxes. Faculty who teach asynchronous online courses are reduced to disembodied ad-
ministrators of online learning management systems. Face-to-face instruction in a pandemic is
also dehumanizing. Socially-distanced, pandemic classrooms are not conducive to facilitating
a dynamic and collaborative experience.
Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Erving Goffman’s concept of the “nonperson treatment”
characterizes the treatment and experience of faculty in higher education. Nonpersonhood is
especially apt for depicting the reality of contingent faculty. In addition, students and college
staff are subject to the nonperson treatment at Pandemic U.

Erving Goffman on the Nonperson Treatment

The sociologist Erving Goffman coins the term “nonpersons” to characterize people who are
treated as though they are not really present. Nonpersons are considered to be of insufficient
ritual status to be extended instrumental and social courtesies, often foregoing all acknowl-
edgement of a person’s humanity beyond transactional civilities. Children, the elderly, ser-
vants, panhandlers, and service-industry workers are often treated as nonpersons. Pandemic
U faculty experience the nonperson treatment in their transactional, alienating dealings with
administrators, and in impersonal, disembodied interactions with students in pandemic in-

Academia Letters, February 2021 ©2021 by Academia Inc. — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: Roscoe Scarborough, rscarborough@ccga.edu

Citation: Scarborough, R. (2021). Faculty as Nonpersons at Pandemic U. Academia Letters, Article 247.
https://doi.org/10.20935/AL247.

1
struction. Although faculty’s work is vital to the core function and activities of the academy,
their needs, viewpoints, and emotions are often ignored.

Faculty as Nonpersons
Declining enrollments, atrophying state appropriations, and the normalization of contingent
faculty appointments plagued academia before the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic- gen-
erated recession is exacerbating the dehumanizing treatment of faculty at Pandemic U, includ-
ing:

• layoffs, program elimination, and unfilled vacancies

• burgeoning course caps, higher teaching loads, and increased service responsibilities

• furloughs and reduced employer contributions to retirement plans

• elimination or delay of merit, cost-of-living, or promotional raises

• reduced funding or opportunities for research, travel, or professional development

• limited access to office space, technology support, printing, and other resources

Many faculty members have returned to campuses with unenforced or inadequate sanita-
tion and mask policies that rely on the personal responsibility of faculty, staff, and students.
Fear of reprisal, stigma, or job loss discourages requests for alternative work arrangements, es-
pecially for contingent faculty, pre-tenure faculty, and graduate students. One must choose be-
tween perceived high-risk work or safety and health. The nonperson treatment is pronounced
for contingent faculty and graduate students who work for low pay and often without job se-
curity, health insurance, benefits, office space, the ability to express schedule preferences or
course selection, or a voice in college governance.

Teaching and Learning at Pandemic U

So far, so bad. But it gets worse. The near-universal shift to virtual instruction in Spring
2020 eliminated face-to-face interaction with students and colleagues. Dynamic face-to-face
interactions were replaced with transactional virtual exchanges. Instruction now occurs in
dehumanizing and alienating modalities, including asynchronous online, synchronous online,
hybrid instruction, HyFlex courses with a fraction of students present, and socially-distanced

Academia Letters, February 2021 ©2021 by Academia Inc. — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: Roscoe Scarborough, rscarborough@ccga.edu

Citation: Scarborough, R. (2021). Faculty as Nonpersons at Pandemic U. Academia Letters, Article 247.
https://doi.org/10.20935/AL247.

2
face-to-face instruction. Additionally, instructors must be prepared to transition modalities,
at any time, in response to public health guidance or administrative decree.
Many faculty members remain confined behind laptop screens. Instead of facilitating an
active classroom with students taking a leadership role in their learning, faculty life is re-
duced to acting as an anonymous administrator of an online learning management system.
Synchronous online classes may have poor attendance or lack meaningful participation, es-
pecially as larger class sizes force sacrifices to best pedagogical practices. Questions and
application exercises often result in long periods of silence with no student response. This
dehumanizing experience is exacerbated for faculty who must adopt asynchronous instruc-
tion, which may be the only viable option at institutions that serve adult learners, low-income
students who lack computers, or students without broadband or reliable internet access.
Face-to-face instruction amid the pandemic is also alienating. Lectures occur in cav-
ernous lecture halls with enforced social-distancing and bans on group work. Mandatory
masks muzzle students, discourage participation, and hinder both verbal and non-verbal com-
munication. This setting prioritizes safety at the expense of collaboration and community.
Safety-minded attendance policies are often abused, resulting in poor attendance and low en-
gagement. HyFlex courses allow a small portion of students to attend, often with reduced
rates of attendance and participation.
The experience for students and staff at Pandemic U is not much better. The socially-
distanced classroom is a panopticon. Each individual student is masked and equidistantly
isolated in designated, physically-distanced seating throughout the lecture hall at a fraction of
capacity. “Involuntarily online” students must feel like nonpersons, disconnected from faculty
and peers. Similarly, many staff have long been treated as expendable, invisible nonpersons in
higher education. The pandemic exacerbates the already dehumanizing treatment of our staff
colleagues. College employees face layoffs, higher workloads, alienation, and heightened risk
at work as a result of the pandemic.
It is a tough time for everyone at Pandemic U. Goffman’s concept of nonpersonhood offers
a useful perspective into the treatment of faculty in a pandemic-induced recession and the
experiences of teaching virtually and face-to-face amid a global pandemic. Of course, there
is much variation in the experiences of faculty across institutions with various missions that
serve different populations. The ability to perspective-take and perceive reality from another’s
point of view is a starting point for realizing compromises that implement best pedagogical
practices, allow institutions to survive financially, and respect the physical, psychological, and
social health of faculty, staff, and students.

Academia Letters, February 2021 ©2021 by Academia Inc. — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: Roscoe Scarborough, rscarborough@ccga.edu

Citation: Scarborough, R. (2021). Faculty as Nonpersons at Pandemic U. Academia Letters, Article 247.
https://doi.org/10.20935/AL247.