Twitter is (mostly) a meritocracy. Academia (mostly) isn’t. | More or Less Bunk
Success in academia depends upon whether a market exists for your services. I studied labor history in graduate school oh so many years ago. The year I got my current job, there were a grand total of two ads that even mentioned that specialty as part of the job description. I was very fortunate to get one of those jobs. However, had I studied something else, I would have had a lot more places to apply.
This seems self-evident to me now, but I really wish somebody had told me that while I was still in graduate school. You can be the best job applicant ever, but if you studied in a field where nobody’s hiring your merit won’t help you a bit. Likewise, if you’re applying for a job at a teaching institution and nobody taught you how to teach, that institution isn’t going to be willing to take a chance that you can learn when there’s an experienced teacher applying for the same job (and there almost certainly is in this day and age).
Coping in Grad School
Advice from Peg Boyle Single, author of Demystifying Dissertation Writing
Bystander Training and Other Acts of Management | Easily Distracted
Inside the curriculum, my first and last commitment as an academic is to create a safe space for unsafe thoughts, to explore different sides of difficult issues, to let heresies and orthodoxies walk hand in hand, to open up conversations wherever possible, to problematize and perturb. And to try, however I can, to make room at the table for all sorts of identities, all sorts of ways of seeing and being, while trying to make sure that everyone has to deal with their share of challenges and doubts.
Should I get a Ph.D.? | The Duck of Minerva
Second, you should think really hard about money. I’m going to repeat something that Tim wrote: “With rare exceptions, no Ph.D. program that is primarily or exclusively aimed at an academic career is worth pursuing if the applicant is not given a tuition waver upon admission.” Taking out loans for a Ph.D. program is a dicey proposition. Those loans are nondischargeable in bankruptcy, which means that although the federal government would have helped you make your debts disappear if you’d spent $100k buying clothes on your MasterCard, they will never release you from your obligations to pay back the $5,000 in tuition for that extra seminar on The Politics of Exotic Birds, even if you’re adjuncting for the rest of your life. (A corollary to “think hard about money” is “think hard about what the job market for academics is like.”)
The Simpsons - Comments about PhDs and Grad Students.
(Source: youtube.com)
Today In Landmark First Amendment Cases | Lawyers, Guns & Money
After he had obtained the signature page from his committee, Plaintiff inserted an additional, two-page section into his thesis without the knowledge or consent of his committee members. That section, entitled “Disacknowledgements,” began: “I would like to offer special Fuck You’s to the following degenerates for of being an ever-present hindrance during my graduate career….” It then identified the Dean and staff of the UCSB graduate school, the managers of Davidson Library, former California Governor Wilson, the Regents of the University of California, and “Science” as having been particularly obstructive to Plaintiff’s progress toward his graduate degree. Plaintiff later explained that he had not revealed the section to the members of his committee because he feared that they would not approve it.
Hugh Gusterson: An Education in Occupation | Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
Hugh Gusterson, great as always.
Study of Philosophy Makes Gains Despite Economy | Philly.com
Confirmation for my belief in the utility of the philosophy major.
2011 Methodologies Workshop | ISA-NE
“Interpretive and Relational Research Methodologies”
A One-Day Graduate Student Workshop
Sponsored by the International Studies Association-Northeast
5 November, 2011 • Providence, RI
Applications must be received by 1 July 2011. See the link for additional details.