I often get asked why I chose to write under the name The Wimpy Academic.
Sometimes the question is curious.
Sometimes it is concerned.
Sometimes it is quietly disapproving.
One day I finally asked myself the same question.
I looked up the word wimpy.
Weak. Timid. Lacking courage.
For a moment I wondered:
Have I boxed myself into a corner?
Am I handing people the vocabulary to dismiss me?
And then I realised, that discomfort is exactly the point.
Academia trains us to put the armour on early.
To speak with certainty even when we are unsure.
To hide struggle behind polished CVs.
To treat vulnerability as something to overcome, not something to understand.
Calling myself wimpy was never about weakness.
It was about honesty.
Writing as The Wimpy Academic gave me permission to talk about what we rarely name out loud: the doubt, the weariness, the tiny joys, the grief, the gratitude. It allowed me to write about the Kevins and Karens of academia – not as individuals, but as patterns of power. And it allowed me, just as importantly, to thank the Davids (David DeRemer), Collettes (Colette Henry, FRSA, FAcSS) and Adams (Adam Lindgreen) – the generous, steady people whose kindness will never appear on a metrics dashboard.
Through these posts I’ve written about promotions and rejections, about moving countries, raising children, navigating gaslighting, and trying to do decolonial work in institutions that don’t always know what to do with it. Along the way I have made friends I may never meet and had conversations I didn’t know I needed.
So no, I am not embarrassed by the name.
If being wimpy means being willing to feel, to question, and to stay human in a system that rewards detachment, then I am happy to remain exactly that.
As this year ends, I’ll keep writing as The Wimpy Academic, not because it is safe, but because it is the most honest way I know to stay here.