Women and Feminism in Higher Education Scholarship: An Analysis of Three Core Journals

Today, more women than ever before are active participants in higher education. For example, more than 50% of all undergraduate students are women and the numbers of women graduate, professional, and doctoral-degree recipients and faculty are increasing ("The nation," 2003). In fact, for the first time, American women have earned more doctorates than American men have Thus, the purpose of this article is to investigate the academic literature in the field of higher education, using gender and feminism as lenses due, in part, to the increased presence of women in the academy. By analyzing data collected from three leading journals in higher education, The Journal of Higher Education (JHE), The Review of Higher Education (RHE), and Research in Higher Education (ResHE), I hope to better understand how feminist scholarship and how women are treated in the scholarly work contained in these journals.