The Flawed Fairy-tale: A Feminist Narrative Account of the Challenges and Opportunities That Result from the Imposter Syndrome

Mallon, Sharon (2022). The Flawed Fairy-tale: A Feminist Narrative Account of the Challenges and Opportunities That Result from the Imposter Syndrome. In: Addison, Michelle; Breeze, Maddie and Taylor, Yvette eds. The Palgrave Handbook of Imposter Syndrome in Higher Education. Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 563–576.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-86570-2_34

Abstract

In this chapter, Sharon Mallon, a self-professed ‘benefits-class’ academic, uses feminist narrative methods to explore her personal experiences of the Imposter Syndrome. These reflections give voice to her evolution from a failed university drop-out to a lecturer at the institution where she eventually gained her undergraduate degree, all while dealing with complex and crippling feelings of fraudulence. The reader will explore the deep-rooted origins of these feelings and examine what they mean for the relationship we have with ourselves as educators. Suggestions are made for how we can challenge the notion that at any minute we might be publicly revealed as imposters, and instead use our sense of ‘imposter agency’ to demonstrate the deserved nature of our pedagogical authority.

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