Nancy Taber
Hall of Fame Class of 2022
Nancy Taber is a full professor and leading scholar in gender, militarism, and adult education, whose research addresses military organizations, post-secondary institutions, museums, and popular culture. She developed this expertise through doctoral work on military mothers, workplace learning, and ruling relations in the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF). She broadened the field of adult education with her innovative application of feminist antimilitarist theory and fiction-based research.
She has published six edited books, two journal special issues, 24 chapters, 47 peer-reviewed journal articles, 38 conference presentations, and seven short stories. She was an invited speaker at 28 international, national, and local events. She has been awarded more than $1 million (Canadian) in research funding. Her work has been cited more than 1,100 times.
Taber testified at the Canadian Senate Standing Committee on National Security and Defence, was a subject matter expert (SME) in the CAF sexual misconduct class action suit and settlement consultations, and participated in government roundtables. She was named one of the Top 20 Women in Defence (2022) for the positive effect of her feminist work for CAF cultural change.
Taber applies feminist antimilitarism to adult education by critiquing the ways in whichpatriarchy, capitalism, and colonialism intersect with militaristic thinking and exploring how public pedagogies, situated learning, and discursive framings can challenge gendered racialized militarized binaries. She developed an original master’s course—War, Gender, and Learning—and her innovative edited book, Gendered Militarism in Canada: Learning Conformity and Resistance, earned a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Award for scholarly publication. As a result of her research, she has participated as a SME in lawsuits, the Canadian Senate, and government policy work. She also has published short stories based on her research about women, war, and learning and four chapters that assist activists, professors, and students in conducting their own fiction-based research. In addition, she facilitates workshops about fiction-based research.
Her single greatest contribution to the field is her feminist analysis of CAF culture, policies, and practices, which resulted in her work as a SME in two class action lawsuits claiming gender discrimination, sexual harassment, and sexual assault in the CAF. She was invited to participate in related consultations on the issue of gender representation and diversity in the CAF. Thus, she has been recognized by the very institution she was critiquing as a key part of its efforts to engage in restitution. She is now furthering this work with journal articles and as co-director for a network funded by the Canadian government to work on CAF cultural change.
Taber has supported the field by serving as editor-in-chief of the Canadian Journal for the Study of Adult Education (CASAE) and other CASAE work. She serves as Brock University’s adult education undergraduate program director and graduate program committee member and served as Mount Saint Vincent University (MSVU) adult education committee member and program chair.
In addition, Taber has served in a variety of capacities with the Brock University Faculty Association (BUFA): as grievance officer (2015-2019), communications director, (2014-2015), secretary (2011-2012), and nontenured faculty member (2010-2011), as well as on the Collective Agreement Negotiating Team as deputy chief negotiator (2013-2014) and member (2016-2017). She also participated in the Ontario Council of University Faculty Association’s Grievance Committee, including presenting on key aspects of grievance work to support the learning of those working on grievance files.