Doing Things the “Crip” Way: The Beauty of Challenging the Status Quo in Academia

In academia, we’re often taught there’s a “right” way to do things—a standard path that involves rigid expectations, an obsession with productivity, and a tendency to prioritize speed over care. But what happens when we disrupt that path? When we embrace a “crip” approach, we’re not just challenging the status quo—we’re bringing creativity, beauty, and radical change into how we live, work, and thrive as academics.

What Does It Mean to Do Things the “Crip” Way?

Crip, short for “cripple,” is a term reclaimed by disability communities to emphasize the value of doing things differently—of finding new ways to navigate spaces that weren’t designed for us. In academia, doing things the “crip” way means embracing flexibility, questioning norms, and allowing space for slowness, rest, and care. It’s about recognizing that the traditional structures of higher education weren’t built with disabled people—or many marginalized people—in mind, and that we don’t need to fit into these boxes to succeed.

The Creativity of Crip Approaches

When we do things the crip way, we open up space for creativity that’s often stifled by rigid academic expectations. Take, for example, the way we organize our time. Instead of following the relentless demands of publish-or-perish culture, we prioritize rest, reflection, and pacing ourselves. This allows us to approach our work with fresh perspectives, making room for innovation that often gets lost in the rush to produce.

Crip time isn’t about moving slower for the sake of slowness; it’s about allowing the time and space needed to think deeply, experiment, and engage meaningfully. It’s a rejection of the academic pressure cooker that insists productivity is the ultimate marker of success.

Challenging the Status Quo

Crip approaches challenge the assumption that there’s a singular, linear way to be an academic. It means questioning practices that perpetuate exclusion—whether that’s how we design conferences, how we grade, or how we approach “professionalism.” As crip scholars, we refuse to be ashamed of our disabilities, reject the notion of being “neutral” academics, and instead bring our whole selves into their work.

By embracing a crip approach, we also reimagine what accessibility truly means. It’s not just about following guidelines or providing accommodations—it’s about creating an academic culture where access is a priority from the start. That includes everything from making events more inclusive to how we design our classrooms and syllabi. It means being creative in how we teach, mentor, and collaborate.

Every Disruption Matters, Big or Small

In the crip approach, no act of disruption is too small. Whether it’s something as seemingly minor as adjusting how you structure your office hours or as big as rethinking how research is conducted, every challenge to the norms of academia is important. Each disruption chips away at the rigid structures that often exclude and exhaust so many of us.

Maybe it’s as simple as refusing to hold back-to-back meetings or making sure your conference presentation has accessible materials. Or maybe it’s radically shifting your teaching philosophy to allow for more flexibility in deadlines and participation. Whatever the scale, these disruptions matter. They signal to others—especially students and colleagues—that academia can be different, that there’s room for approaches that prioritize humanity and care.

These small, everyday acts of resistance add up. They create ripples across our institutions, showing that change doesn’t always have to come in sweeping reforms; it can happen through incremental shifts. When we challenge the status quo—whether in small, personal ways or through larger systemic efforts—we’re contributing to a more inclusive, accessible, and compassionate academic environment.

The Joy of Crip Scholarship

There’s a profound joy that comes from doing things the crip way. When we refuse to conform to traditional academic norms, we carve out space for our authentic selves to shine. We build connections with other scholars who are also resisting the pressure to perform academia in a certain way, and together, we create communities where it’s okay to rest, okay to work at our own pace, and okay to bring our lived experiences into our scholarship.

For example, in my own work, embracing a crip approach means creating more inclusive, participatory research that centers lived experiences. It’s also about building mentorship relationships that don’t follow the traditional hierarchy, where students are collaborators and partners in knowledge production. Doing things the crip way brings a different kind of joy to academia—it’s not about striving for perfection, but about embracing the process, the messiness, and the humanity of the work we do.

The Benefits of Crip Ways in Academia

The crip approach to academia benefits everyone, not just those of us with disabilities. By slowing down, focusing on accessibility, and challenging rigid structures, we create a more inclusive environment for all scholars. We make space for creativity, critical thinking, and the kind of deep intellectual engagement that’s often sacrificed in the name of “productivity.” It allows us to build a more sustainable, humane version of academia that values care over competition, community over individual achievement, and equity over status.

When we do things the crip way, we’re actively reshaping what it means to succeed in academia. We’re showing that there’s not just one path to a successful academic career—and that sometimes, the path less traveled is the most rewarding of all.

Final Thoughts

Doing things the “crip” way in academia is an act of radical defiance and creativity. It’s a way of reclaiming our time, our bodies, and our work from the relentless demands of the neoliberal university. It’s about showing up as our whole selves, challenging the status quo, and building an academic world where everyone—disabled or not—can thrive.