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Each year, some of our readers request a thread to commiserate about the job-market: a place to share news about interviews, questions about particular jobs, and so on. Here's a thread for this year's market. Feel free to share away!
(Note: I've included a permalink on the Cocoon's right side-bar so that you can find this thread for the rest of the season).
Hello all,
I’ve been flogging myself again this year applying for jobs. Feel the pain!
Anyway, every now and then I come across a job that wants a ton of specialized materials. It seems immoral to make an applicant spend an entire day trying to apply for your job. Also, sometimes jobs ask for redundant materials, which is confusing and stressful.
This UK job does both. It asks for all the below in addition to answering a redundant series of questions about your teaching experience, publications, and so on that they make a point of insisting you answer. So, when applying, presumably you’d end up repeating yourself constantly.
A cover letter which includes the following summary information: Area(s) of Specialisation, Area(s) of Competence, start date of graduate work, PhD completion date (or expected completion date), number of publications in peer-reviewed journals or edited collections;
2. A standard cv;
3. A research writing sample (maximum 10,000 words);
4. A publication list, with peer-reviewed publications starred, followed by a descriptions of future plans (max 1,000) words) eg. future article or book plans, elaboration of research themes or projects, possible grant applications, future speaking invitations, conference or workshops plans;
5. A teaching statement (max 1,000) words) eg. modules you might like to teach at Leeds, experience of teaching, statement of approach to teaching, experience of teaching in different formats or evidence from course evaluation questionnaires.
Regarding the teaching statement for a UK job. UK jobs seldom give you much room to teach the way you want, having to follow the department’s assessment policies etc. So, a US style teaching statement seems to be the wrong sort of statement. I wrote a US style teaching statement for applying to US jobs, but it would be useless here I think. Also, teaching statements are never asked for in the UK. So, it’s not like UK applicants will be used to this or have one prepared. It’ll take them hours and hours!
Notice the ‘description of future plans’ isn’t a simple research statement either. It’s also not simply a research proposal or project proposal. It’s a custom thing they want.
I suppose all the redundancies have something to do with the bloated out of control admin in the UK. Anyway, no thanks! I might be a masochist, but I’m sore enough already!
In this extraordinarily bad job market (if ‘market’ is even the right term for the mess we have to deal with), can departments please work to streamline applications? Don’t force us poor underemployed or unemployed philosophers to spend entire days working on single applications that we have 1% chance of getting interviews for anyway!
Thanks!
I agree with you UK postdoc, this is completely immoral. Granted, I am sure most of it is due to administrator demands, but in that case the administrators are being immoral. And I believe the faculty have a duty to try and resist this to whatever extent they can.
I applied to two jobs in Europe last year (non-uk) and each took me almost an entire day. In addition to a CV, they asked for like 10 individual documents listing things that are obviously included on a CV. For instance they wanted a separate document with publications, with presentations, teaching experience, education, etc. Completely pointless. I also had to answer two pages of random questions, and there was specific instructions to NOT tell them to refer to your CV, personal statement, or research statement etc.
I ran into a job at Oxford once that required you to mail in your application. Yes, paper and ink, and a postage stamp. I actually did it, but to no avail.
Come to think of it, I remember a US university requiring a snail mail application a few years ago. I didn’t bother with that one.
About 10-20% of UK jobs seem to ask for tons of redundant materials. I personally feel I don’t understand how to apply for those kinds of jobs. Do they really want me to copy and paste the same stuff from my CV over and over in addition to supplying my CV?
I wonder whether there is some secret I don’t know?
The Leeds requests are rather dubious anyway: specifically, asking for the start and (expected) end date of graduate work is a nice, convenient way to weed out those who have had a non-linear path through no fault of their own. Beyond that, I think you are both exactly right about the ever increasing redundant time consuming demands.
The U.K job ‘market’, if you can call it that, is absolutely shocking. It now seems that the best most of us can hope for – at least, if we are not well-connected – is a temporary teaching contract that, even if advertised part time, will very likely become much more than that (see the recent UCL ad for which the pay is appalling). I’ve made the choice not to apply for such things this year since they are unlikely to lead to anything whilst eating into research time. Better to have a non-academic p/t gig and research around that as far as I can tell.
But .. we all know how bad it is. I’m just grateful we have a blog like this where we can commiserate, and be open about the situation, without fear of any sort of reprisal.
Is this anyone else’s last attempt to land a permanent job? This is my third attempt at the job market, and I promised myself that I would leave academia if I couldn’t land something tenure track this year. No VAP’s, no post-docs. I’m not even applying for those. I have already applied for some specialized non-academic jobs.
I ran into two US jobs last year that required snail mail applications. One of them I did not apply. The other I sent everything by email anyway, although I’m sure it was ignored.
This is my last year trying to obtain a decent job in philosophy. Been a long and tiring process. I’ve paid for it psychologically, physically, and financially.
Second and if unsuccessful last run at the job market. Applied to 60+ last year, 1 interview on Skype (AOS not in demand). Applying to significantly less now. Have to avoid committing the sunk cost fallacy.
It’s my last year on the market. I have a CV that would suffice to get tenure at most research universities. If this isn’t enough, nothing will be.
Judging from the studies and how last year turned out, it seems like being a white man is just too big a hurdle to overcome.
JobSeeker: Ditto, ditto, ditto, and ditto.
Except of course, for all the white men I know who got jobs. I know several personally.
Amanda,
It would be nice if we could talk about these issues with a little sympathy, and cool it with the snark.
The point you make is not a good one. The question is not whether there are white men who got jobs, or whether white men got a certain proportion of jobs. The question is whether it is possible for a white man, like me, to get a job. The answer appears to be no. If you are a woman, it is highly likely you will get a job. If you are a man, it is highly likely you will not.
I am the one who is snarky? Kinda rich coming from a person who said, “being a white male is to hard a hurdle to overcome”. Like clearly, that must be the reason you are not getting hired. It is amazing that you say it appears it is not possible for a man like you to get a job, when plenty of white men get jobs every year. So, um, it does appear possible. (you didn’t say likely, ‘possible).
And I am supposed to be sympathetic, because clearly, women have it easy these days. If you pay attention to my comments on here, I almost never talk about being a woman. That is not something I think about much. But to act like you know the reason you are not getting a job is because you are white man, based on the fact that it is slightly more likely for a woman to get a job, is just making yourself feel better. Women are getting hired almost in exact proportion to the number they are graduating. (I think slightly higher). Not to mention, we make a tiny proportion of the overall tenure track market, especially elite schools. Maybe you should think about the best way to market your CV, because having a publication record good enough to get tenure at a research school will put you out of the market for like all teaching jobs. Not sure if you went to an elite school, but the research market is usually only for those at elite schools. This very well could explain why you have not gotten a job. Not being a white man, having a publication record that means it is likely you are to jump ship.
By the way, women are MUCH more likely to specialize in ethics rather than MandE. Schools are hiring much more in ethics rather than MandE. That alone could explain the slightly higher chance that women are more likely to get hired. So don’t act like you know it is because a woman is a woman. Maybe that happens sometimes. But to claim that I should have sympathy toward you, like it is some kind of fact women are getting jobs just because of their gender, well that needs a better argument. Because there are a lot of things that can explain the slightly higher rate of women getting hired. If you want to have a real discussion, and set forth a hypothesis, then do so. I don’t have an issue with that. I don’t have an issue with saying women AT TIMES get hire unfairly. But I do have an issue with acting like its an obvious fact your race and gender explain why you didn’t get hired, and therefore we should all feel sorry for you.
So let me repeat myself. White men get jobs every year. So it would not appear the fact you are a white man is not what is stopping you from getting a job, full stop. That is not a sufficient condition. But it is good to know that people like you will assume that if I get a job it is because I am a woman. I would ask for a sympathy, but I’m not that kind of girl. Nonetheless, every time a man (or woman) attributes my success to being a woman, it kinda sucks, fwiw.
It’s an established fact based on Jennings data that women have an advantage on the job market. That doesn’t mean all women have it easy. Amanda has had a tough time of it. I think the women plugged into the ‘more women in phil’ community get networked into jobs. Not all women are part of that community or agree with it.
A white male from a non-prestigious program who works on core philosophy is probably in the worst position in this market. But not all women are in a good position. I think that’s important to understand. I think only those women with the right connections are going to have an easy time with the market.
Hi Jobseeker,
I’m sure I saw some data on the discrepancy between male and female hires recently, any ideas?
The only caveat I would add is: if you have a certain background. At least in the U.k, where it’s extraordinarily rare to see someone from a non-traditional background, and/or someone who has taken a non-traditional path through their studies, secure a permanent post. Then, if you are not well-connected, it’s more difficult still.
We have also reached an insane situation where we’re (usually) expected to have a research profile rivalling that of a more senior academic. Many academics simply would not be competitive in the current climate yet somehow see fit to pass judgement on those who do not get jobs (“work hard and you’ll get a job” says one ‘academic’ in my dept. who was last seen publishing in 2006 – there should be repercussions for those on the gravy train like this).
There are massive issues in the discipline, and I am continuously baffled by the silence from those who can genuinely effect change.
Riiiiiiight. That’s why the list on PhilJobs of new appointment has only women’s names on it. You keep telling yourself that, champ.
JobSeeker,
You are not the only job candidate who has a CV that would get them tenure at research schools. Many women and people of color have CVs just like yours and do not have jobs. The problem is the market, which is terrible for everyone. (And, in your case, the problem might be arrogance and your attitude if you express these sorts of things in public.)
Women and people of color (along with members of other underrepresented groups in the discipline) have to work extra hard to be where they are. The profession is waking up to this issue – if you want to be in it, you should too.
I am truly sorry that you have struggled on the job market. I feel for you and everyone else who has worked so hard to get a Ph.D. and follow their dreams. But, the system is not fair and not everyone will get a job. Blame the system, not women and colleagues of color.
“The odds of women obtaining a permanent academic placement within two years is 65% greater than men when all else is held constant,” according to an analysis discussed by Carolyn Dicey Jennings, Patrice Cobb, and David Vinson (UC Merced) at the Blog of the APA.
http://dailynous.com/2016/05/03/gender-the-philosophy-job-market/
Everyone: It’s fine if you want to discuss this issue respectfully. But please, no snark. I’m not going to allow any more snarky comments. The Cocoon is a supportive forum. Please respect its mission.
Contra JobSeeker, it might be the case that women have a higher probability of obtaining a job than men, while the claim that “[i]f you are a woman, it is highly likely you will get a job” is false. Everyone’s chances are low.
Having been privy to hiring procedures a couple of times, I do know that at least some schools have a bias in favor of hiring women and minority philosophers for several reasons. Often, it is simply because it is the only way they can actually make a hire, given certain bureaucratic structures within their colleges and universities.
In any case, holding the belief that “I won’t be hired because I am a white man” is irrational, at least practically if not epistemically. Do you think holding this attitude and stewing on it is going to make it more likely that you get a job? Perhaps it makes it more likely that you will plan for a career outside of academia, which would be a rational move in my opinion, but everyone should be doing that anyways. As I said, everyone’s chances are low.
To change things up a bit, has anyone heard back from any jobs? I know it is stipl quite early, but I thought I would ask.
I couldn’t agree more with Number Three’s sentiment: it’s a crap job market for everybody, and most people come out disappointed. I’m a white dude on the market for the second time, and I sometimes find myself tempted by the small comfort that some kind of discrimination explains my lack of success. But though that thought is tempting, it’s also a recipe for racist and sexist resentment, and that’s just not who I want to be, job or no job. So instead, I think about how I know plenty of people who eventually left philosophy and are doing perfectly fine in their non-academic jobs. It’s not the end of the world if we don’t get permanent jobs in philosophy, and the frustration of the job market isn’t worth turning yourself into a worse person. The job market sucks, but we don’t have to.
I would also add that, one of the criticisms of the CJ report is that it treats postdocs like “non-permanent” positions. The thing is, many people from elite schools, many men, take 2-5 years in a prestigious postdoc and then get a research job. The CJ report would act like these men are simply not getting permanent positions, when really, they are taking a bit longer to get a research job because they are spending years at a prestigious research post. Women are more likely to be in hot fields like feminism and ethics and focus on teaching. Why that is is an interesting question too. But when you look at the numbers of faculty at top research schools, they are overwhelming men. (Which arguably, could have something to do with the specialties that research schools lean toward).
Do sometimes schools have a preference for hiring women? Yes. Does that mean that women overall have an advantage based merely on thier gender? No. Simply women getting hired more is not enough to say that, because other things about women (like their AOC) could explain that. So it is not true that we know women have an advantage, full stop. There are various advantages and disadvantages that women have, and it is hard to weigh them all. I am beginning to think it is a big disadvantage that so many men I know assume women have it easy. I am told that a lot.
People of every race and gender get hired every year. And I know women and non-white persons who struggle year after year to get a job. The market is tough for everyone. I know people from top schools with amazing records that do not get hired, while their MALE colleagues with much less impressive records do get hired. It is hard to understand, no doubt.
I have a permanent job, btw. It started out as non-tt and I just recently (last few weeks) negotiated to tt track.I knew when I took it there was a good but not guaranteed chance this could happen. It took me two seasons and I had a research post first. Many people have told me I got the job because I am a woman, as opposed to my publication record, interesting area of research, teaching experience, other experience, letters, etc.
I haven’t heard anything back interviews-wise. But committees seem to be moving: one that asked only for contact information from my references recently received my letters from interfolio. This was about 3.5 weeks after I submitted my application. Though perhaps that was just a bureaucratic delay and they ask from everyone.
On another front: a search committee (not in a philosophy department, with a much earlier deadline) asked for a copy of my full dissertation. Anyone had something like that before? I’m >3 years out at this point, and I have newer (better, I hope!) things published on the topic, so I’m a bit curious about this request (I sent it, obviously).
The chance that someone will want to see my dissertation fills me with dread.
Thanks to those of you who have continued the conversation respectfully.
One person did attempt to post a comment that I did not approve. I did not approve it, because in my judgment it was snarky (see my earlier comment). If you’d like to make your argument without the snark, I’m happy to post it.
The dissertation-obsession of search committees irritates me. It smacks of head-in-the-sand faculty members who haven’t recognized that (a) most people who are going to apply for their job are >3 years out from their PhD, and that (b) everyone is publishing like crazy to try to get a job.
Same story for transcripts. (Looking at you Fullerton.)
I think that the original commenter complaining about not getting hired due to the fact that he’s male was, as Amanda explained, saying something that he was not entitled to. Nevertheless, I think that the following comment by Amanda is unhelpful:
“People of every race and gender get hired every year. And I know women and non-white persons who struggle year after year to get a job. The market is tough for everyone. I know people from top schools with amazing records that do not get hired, while their MALE colleagues with much less impressive records do get hired. It is hard to understand, no doubt.”
Imagine telling a person of color who was upset that there is a huge achievement gap between black and white Americans that “people of every race and gender get hired jobs every year; that you know women and non-white persons who struggle year after year to get a job; that the economy is tough for everyone” and so on. That person would be right to mention that s/he is concerned about the way that being a person of color affects your chances in the U.S., even if some people of color do well and some white people do poorly.
So, the most relevant info is the group statistics. Now, there might be ways to explain those statistics that are compatible with their beings no injustice. But anecdata do not seem very pertinent.
I have no problem with the suggestion that sometimes white males are not treated on merit alone, because sometimes there is a preference to hiring a woman. My objection was the suggestion that someone knows the reason that they personally are not hired is because they are a white male. Nobody knows that, or even has very strong reason to believe that. That are far too many compounding factors. Men are treated unfairly sometimes. So are women. And so are minorities. The latter two of course have a much longer systematic history of such unfairness, but it is understandable that anyone is upset at being treated unfairly.
Hey Amanda, I’m sure you deserved your job. And congratulations! However, putting that aside, I believe the data we have has tried to account for research area and other things. Nothing is perfect, but our best evidence does seem to suggest women have an advantage. Not every women, but in general.
Although it’s always good to question empirical findings and look for alternative explanations, I think it would be irrational to be to quick to explain away the findings in question as anomalies, especially given that there is a strong movement in philosophy to increase the number of female philosophers. It wouldn’t be surprising if this movement were having an impact on hiring, in fact, the opposite.
From reading your posts it wasn’t clear to me whether you agree with the program to increase the number of women in philosophy through preferential hiring. Some people aren’t. I think rational and moral people can disagree with this program. However, if you agree with it, I wonder why you are so eager to explain away the findings showing that the program is working?
I recently had two video interviews for schools that had mid-October deadlines. That struck me as very early and fast. I won’t complain but I’m not even done submitting half of my apps.
I only know of one case in which I was not hired because of my race/gender, and a white woman, with a much worse CV, was chosen instead. I suspect that this happens more, but I do not know.
In any case, it is eye-opening to look at who was hired last year, especially at top schools.
Pendaran I do not agree with preferential hiring. Although it does happen, and I have seen it happen.(And I agree with you that rational people can disagree with it)
Again, my disagreement is not that preferential hiring doesn’t happen, but I would say that the extent to which it happens is not enough evidence for anyone to claim the reason they did not get a job is because they are a white male. The effect of preferential hiring is not strong enough for such inference to be reasonable.
The reasons I do not agree with preferential hiring are not because I don’t believe women don’t have it rough in philosophy. I do think there is some discrimination. But for the most part, I do not think this discrimination explains the low number of women in philosophy. Moreover, I don’t think affirmative action is the right answer in this instance. I think some of the disparity in total numbers between men and women in philosophy is explained by a woman’s tendency to like other disciplines more. I don’t believe we should try to correct this.
I have spent a long time looking at the statistics, and I think it shows an overall very slight advantage to women, when everything is taken into account. But I disagree that everything was taken into account. I know, for instance, several people at my own university that were not included in the survey. I think it did weird things when people did not have an AOS. I do not think the AOS was accurately taken into account. There is no way to really distinguish between research and teaching people,etc. So I think it is messy, at best. Notwithstanding, I do thank CJ for the job and I think there is a lot to learn from her survey, and if she continues doing it I’m sure it will improve each year.
Oh, one more thing I was trying to say. The fact that women are overall more likely to be hired does not mean it is because of preferential hiring. It could be that women happened to have the right CV’s for the positions. My guess is preferential hiring played a small role in the already small advantage.
Hey Amanda,
I can’t say I agree with you that there is only a very slight advantage for women. The data seems to suggest women are 65% more likely to obtain a permanent job. Yes, I get that you have some issues with the data. However, I guess I am more prone to believe it, for I’ve seen and heard of so many examples of preferential hiring. If you look at philjobs appointments you can easily find many examples of it too. It seems widespread. Now, I agree this isn’t the best data to use. I’m just saying that my best attempts to collect evidence seem to be more or less in agreement with the more scientific data.
You have more than once said that perhaps what explains the data is that women happen to work on areas that are more popular/in demand at the moment. In reply, this may very well be true, but what’s in demand is not separable from the program to increase the number of women. The discipline is changing the subjects it studies so as to increase the number of women. What was core philosophy now seems to be peripheral. Maybe those against preferential hiring would be more in favor of this approach. However, it has a similar effect. Men are excluded from jobs that they would otherwise be able to apply for, interview for, etc, and so have a harder time on the market.
Having said all this, I do not think that preferential hiring for women is the only non-merit based aspect of hiring in philosophy. Prestige bias is a big deal. There has been data on this as well. Basically you have to get a PhD from a top program if you want a research job. It’s almost impossible to work your way into one, no matter how good you are. Whereas people from top programs are hired with no publications all the time. Totally unfair. Cronyism is also a large part of who gets hired I suspect, at least I’ve seen that dynamic at work in the UK BIG TIME. Others have posted on this website and elsewhere saying that cronyism is a bigger issue in the UK than the US, because the UK is a small country where it’s easier for networkers to be widely known. Sounds plausible.
So, yes I do think there is quite a bit of preferential treatment of women in today’s market. But no, I don’t think that’s the biggest/only issue facing job candidates. Thus, if you have a good CV but no job, you cannot know for sure what factor is working against you the most. So, here I do agree with Amanda in a sense. Also, it would be a mistake to just blame the system for your predicament and not try to improve your CV, well at least up to a point. I think eventually one does really have to move on and probably the way to do that is to tell yourself it’s not your fault, that there are just too few jobs and too many dynamics working against you. As for me, my deadline is Jan.
The Phylo jobs wiki seems to be defunct this year. I’m partially grateful, because it was just one more think to check neurotically, but it did provide some arguably useful information about when to give up hope on a place. A replacement thread on the meta-forum page popped up recently, but I’m loathe to get any information from that troll-filled cesspool. I know I would trust this information more if it came via this blog, but there is also an argument to be made that it’s better to ignore such things altogether, for the sake of one’s mental health. Marcus, any thoughts on this?
Round two,
Yes, there’s a strong argument to be made that it’s (psychologically) more healthy to ignore the job wiki. This is my third year on the market. The first year I made extensive use of the wiki. The second year I didn’t look at it–except in a few instances of akratic weakness. I found that looking at the wiki caused me a lot of unnecessary pain and distress. You don’t need to be reminded every day of every job you’re being rejected from. Far less painful to gradually come to the realization you’re not getting a job after a month or two. I also found it easier not to get my hopes up for certain jobs when I wasn’t constantly checking their status on the wiki. That being said, the wiki can be useful for people in some circumstances, e.g., you get an offer and are waiting to see if you’ll get another one. But unless there’s a good reason why you need to get job information sooner rather than later, I’d avoid it.
Hi Pendaran,
Yes, you are probably right that the tendency to hire in feminism and related areas is connected to the other general desire to increase women in philosophy, diversity, etc. I wouldn’t say the same about ethics. I think the tendency to hire in ethics has more to do with what will bring students to classes and increase enrollment numbers.
I completely agree with you about prestige. And I think the problem many men have is they do not come from a prestigious program, but yet they attempt a job strategy which tends to only work for those in prestigious programs. (women who try this have trouble too, but less women do) That strategy is writing a dissertation in MandE and publishing in top journals.The original “job seeker” I responded to said that if a publication record good enough to get tenure at a research school is not going to him a job, “then nothing will.” This isn’t true. What is more likely to get a job is less prestigious publications and more teaching experience, among other things. Now it might be true that affirmative action like measures are making it more difficult for an MandE AOS to get a job than would be otherwise, but even in ethics it is very possible to publish oneself out of teaching jobs.
Now to be clear, I don’t agree that the way things work is right. I think prestigious bias is awful, and very hypocritical of a profession that pretends to be egalitarian. I think it is unfair that persons with great publication records often get pushed out of teaching jobs. (although I get why some search committees are hesitant of this). I would like things to change. But until they do, certain job strategies just work better than others.
At the end of the day, there is simply far more talented philosophers than permanent jobs, especially TT jobs. Now hiring is far from merit based, but even it was merit based this would be true. I think there should be a push both to have more generous non-tt track positions (that make living a decent life possible) and also a push for the profession to prepare people for jobs outside of academia.
I also wish the wiki was being updated though I echo the ambivalence about its value.
“I completely agree with you about prestige. And I think the problem many men have is they do not come from a prestigious program, but yet they attempt a job strategy which tends to only work for those in prestigious programs. (women who try this have trouble too, but less women do) That strategy is writing a dissertation in MandE and publishing in top journals.The original “job seeker” I responded to said that if a publication record good enough to get tenure at a research school is not going to him a job, “then nothing will.” This isn’t true. What is more likely to get a job is less prestigious publications and more teaching experience, among other things.”
To get more teaching experience, one has to first get a job. Absent that, there isn’t much obvious to do other than try to publish. However, I agree that too many publications in good places can have an impact on ones ability to get teaching jobs. The profession isn’t very clear about what it values, and what students are told seldom has much connection with the reality of the job market.
Anyway, nice having this chat with you.
What’s deeply frustrating is that having publications in fact seems to cancel out any amount of teaching experience one might have. I’ve got a fair number of good publications. I’ve also taught well over thirty courses (taught; not TA’d or whatever.). But I’ve been told (by people I trust) that my publications have cost me jobs. I’ve considered sending teaching schools a CV that simply omits some of my publications.
Actually, what do you all think of that strategy?
Pendaran, in the US it is often pretty easy to get teaching experience. Yes you need a job of some sort, but often it is not a great job and one a grad student could get. I know in the UK it is a completely different story, and people who are considering a UK PhD should take that into consideration.
Tim, you might be a good fit for prestigious slacs. They are a type of teaching school where publications don’t hurt and actually help. But yes, for many teaching jobs prestigious publications could work against you, even with teaching experience. I don’t know about leaving them off your CV though, it would be easy for them to google you and maybe find them. But I don’t know, ethics aside it might work. Something else is to be selective with what letters you use. Like, if you have letters from research stars talking about your research, you might not want to use those. When I was applying to certain teaching jobs I was very aware of the situation, and while I never did anything directly dishonest, I certainly made strategic choices.
“But I don’t know, ethics aside it might work. Something else is to be selective with what letters you use. Like, if you have letters from research stars talking about your research, you might not want to use those. When I was applying to certain teaching jobs I was very aware of the situation, and while I never did anything directly dishonest, I certainly made strategic choices.”
In my view, given how unjust the market is, we have very little obligation to be honest with employers. The question is can you get away with it.
Yet another rant.
Re: Amanda first comment in this thread (1 day to apply to EU-jobs).
I am currently applying to a job in Italy. I am pretty sure one day will not be enough. The bureaucratic requirements are so annoying.
(For those interested in Italian jobs, the website for all faculty jobs is this: http://bandi.miur.it/profcalls.php/public/cercaJobs )
Perhaps the discussion should slightly alter in terms of the “job market”. Since the market is obviously terrible, maybe some interest should be devoted to alternative non-academic jobs that might actually be preferable to the standard-run academic job. I say this as an individual that was on the market for a number of years who landed a TT job two years ago. At present, I’m happy that I have a job, but having an academic job is not necessarily my first choice. The pay is terrible. I’m stuck in the middle of nowhere. The crew (department) are great–so no complaints there. All said, my academic job is a crappy job with nice people. Personally, I would abandon academia given the right alternative. I have a rule of thumb that I now follow — “The right (academic or non-academic) job in the right place” and I’ll take it. How about a research position in government? Or working with secret service (they hire academics, esp., with logic-language-linguistic skills)? Other than that, there should be discussion of other non-academic opportunities out there that people are choosing to take. I have a number of friends from grad school who (intentionally) took different routes. Some landed middle of the run jobs. Others landed really interesting jobs (that I’m even jealous of at some levels). In other words, academia “ain’t all that” so we should stop idolizing the academic job and start looking at BETTER jobs. I think this job market blog should thus be expanded to include such options, searches and success stories.
Tim, I think that Amanda makes some good points. If this is truly an issue then you might consider some additional ways of emphasizing that you really are committed to teaching:
Move your publications section down on your cv.
In your discussion of your research in your cover letter, focus on how it connects to your teaching.
Make sure that your teaching statement is as kick ass as it can possibly be.
Incorporate pedagogy and teaching oriented items in your service as much as possible.
Join the American Association of Philosophy Teachers and add that to your organizations if you haven’t already. Also try to get on one of their programs and/or publish something in philosophy pedagogy.
These are just some ideas that come to mind, but I have no knowledge on whether they would help or not.
Sorry Italian anonymous, it is very annoying indeed. But with the rough market, often it seems there is no choice but to jump through the bureaucratic hoops. I have some friends with EU academic jobs, and I guess in day to day academic life the bureaucracy can be pretty rough as well. Funny, because the US bureaucracy is plenty bad enough, amazing it can be even worse!
“In my view, given how unjust the market is, we have very little obligation to be honest with employers. The question is can you get away with it.”
Seems alarming.
Is the reasoning something like the following: (i) When engaging with unjust people or systems one no longer has a duty to act morally. Or perhaps it is this: (ii) it is not immoral to be dishonest in one’s dealings with unjust people or systems.
The first seems obviously wrong. There might be something to the second. In any case, B. Williams argues for a similar thesis in Truth and Truthfulness.
Italian anonymous,
It once took me about 4 hours (spread over several days of back-of-and-forth) to apply to a workshop at an Italian university, so it’s unsurprising to hear that it takes even longer to apply for a job! An absolute joke.
Cite your publications as “select publications”.
I served on search committees at two very different institutions, one a state college, and one a research institution. Let me give my perspective.
1. There is preferential hiring, especially at some institutions. This is supported by the data from the APA study. Deans and other administrators create hiring goals, which includes goals about having faculties that represent society. That is a reality. Even for those who object to this, it is the only way to get a position in the department sometimes.
2. There is NO penalty for publishing in excellent places, or even publishing a lot in good places. What I find is that people have an exaggerated sense of what an excellent journal is. Assume there are at most 20 excellent journals. I have talked with junior people who said they have four articles in excellent journals. When asked where they were published it turns out ONLY one of the journals is excellent. In one case, one of the journals was a liability (it was almost a predatory publisher – that shows very bad judgment and ignorance).
3. Teaching statements are not taken very seriously. They are most often too long. They all look the same. They sound like crap – they are laden with the latest lingo. Instead just provide evidence that you care about teaching, that you want to teach, that you are a good teacher (and if you want to go all out, that you are a reflective teacher).
4. There is a lot of prestige bias. I have sat on committees where people were passing over candidates from unranked programs for people whose accommplishments were no different, but who came from top-20 programs. The people on the committee who do this the most are those who have nothing but their prestige (an Ivy league degree and shitty publication record after 20 years). As a member on a search committee it is hard to push against all injustices. You pick your battles, and you have to work with these same turds for years to come.
5. The killer for most people’s application is their letter of application. I do not think most people are getting any help with their letters. Marcus has talked about getting a consultant. You do not need to pay for that. You should either get a faculty member to help – they owe it to you. They are paid to help. Or ask Marcus – I have even helped people from this site before, mediated through Marcus in one case.
People put very odd things in the letters. They go on and on about their research and nothing else. What does that say about your priorities or your balance? They mention irrelevant things, like computer skills. Pitch yourself as a serious academic. They provide exaggerated assessments of their accomplishments. They say they have 4 papers in great journals, when they have four paper, and one is in a great journal. They say too much about teaching, and often quite silly emotional things. The committee wants to know if you are going to go into the classroom and do your job, and be professional about it. That is they key thing we need.
6. In general, I think you are judged on the basis of your best accomplishment. So, your publishing potential will be evaluated on the basis of the best journal you published in. This is why prestige of school ends up counting. It indicates how good you are (or were at one time). Is that fair? Surely not. But that is the reality. If he/she got into Harvard she must be good … we will just give them time. The many others from elsewhere do not get that chance.
7. In publishing what does count against people are long lists of publications in obscure journals. It looks like the person just wants to publish. I see journals listed that I have never ever heard of before. And sometimes you see a list of 10 publications and you have only heard of one of the journals. It is better to slow down, and start trying to publish in more selective and recognized journals. You do not need to be in the number one journal. But you should try to publish in the top-20 sometime. After that aim for the top-10.
I had a hard entry into the profession. I was 5 years in VAP-type positions. So I am not speaking from some vantage point of privilege. I am now routinely invited to speak at good places.
Ryan,
It’s ii that is much closer to the proposition I assert. Ask yourself what obligations you have to be honest about your race in a system that discriminates based on race, for example. Anyway, I think ii is pretty intuitive. However, it should be modified slightly so that it is stated thus:
ii*. It is not immoral to be dishonest about things which an unjust system will treat you unjustly for, e.g. race, prestige, age, etc.
Tenured: Thanks for weighing in. However, I’d caution against drawing general conclusions about the job-market in general on the basis of your experience. My last two years on the market, I interviewed at exactly 20 schools, most of which are liberal arts universities (and about 30 schools over my 7 years on the market)–and I’ve served on two search committees at a liberal arts university, as well. Here is my (very different) experience:
(1) There CAN be a penalty for publishing in top-ranked journals. Most of the faculty at the liberal arts universities I interviewed at did not have publications in top-ranked journals. They did not have publications in Mind, or Nous, or Phil Review, or Phil Studies, etc. They tended to have publications in lower ranked journals. They also did not ultimately hire candidates with publications in top-ranked journals. When I went to on-campus interviews at these schools, I was routinely complimented for my “amazing” publishing record…though I have no publications in top-20 journals. On a similar note, despite having no top-20 publications, my publishing record was “better” than many of the people who were interviewing me. I have also heard people express caution about candidates with publications in top-journals, on the basis of “flight risk” concerns.
(2) Teaching statements ARE taken seriously. Many teaching-oriented schools are not just looking for someone to show up and teach competently. At such schools, when it comes to tenure and promotion faculty may be primarily evaluated on the basis of their teaching–and T&P committees can care a great deal about commitment to teaching, innovation, etc, things that teaching statements can quickly demonstrate. As you note, many teaching statements say similar things, making it immediately clear whether someone is a really committed teacher or whether their priorities are elsewhere. At liberal arts universities, people care about these things–and a teaching statement can make a real difference.
(3) If there is prestige bias at all, it is INVERTED. The vast majority of schools I interviewed did not have faculty from ‘Leiterific’ programs. They did not have faculty from Harvard, or from Princeton, or NYU, and so on. Their faculty instead appear to come from mostly lower-ranked or unranked programs. There are good reasons for this. First, the priorities of people coming from top-programs (e.g. research)–as demonstrated by their CVs and teaching materials–may not fit the priorities of the hiring institution (e.g. teaching). Second, there is the flight-risk problem. Someone coming out of NYU with publications in Phil Review may not be happy with a job with a high teaching load, and might leave such a job for greener pastures. Finally, the ADPA report bears this out. When it came to full-time placements at research institutions (with PhD programs), highly Leiter-ranked programs had the best placement records. However, when it came to placement records on the whole, many low-ranked programs and unranked programs fared far better than highly ranked programs. This data supports the hypothesis that prestige is an advantage for research jobs, but not an advantage (and perhaps a disadvantage) for teaching jobs.
(4) I agree with you on cover letters. Many cover letters and other materials have altogether the wrong tone. The biggest errors are self-aggrandizement (“I have X publications in the best journals”) and trite, emotive phrases (“I am a passionate teacher…”). It is absolutely VITAL to come across professionally. This is especially something I’ve noticed in mentoring people, as well. Many people do not appear to have received good advice or mentoring in terms of putting together good, professional materials.
(5) Candidates may not be hired on the basis of their “best accomplishment.” At smaller liberal-arts universities, departments can have all kinds of NEEDS that are important for them to address. The department may need someone who can teach course X. The department may also desire someone who has administrative experience, or who has demonstrated an interest and willingness to engage students outside of the classroom. Given how many candidates have similar publishing records, it can be these SMALL things that make the difference in the end.
(6) Only publishing in journals no one has ever heard in can of course be a disadvantage. But, this bears repeating: at teaching-centered institutions, no one may care a bit about whether a candidate has published in top-20 journals. The places I interviewed at were not stocked with faculty who published in top-ranked journals. Many of them didn’t have many publications at all, and the publications they did have were often in lower-ranked but not obscure journals.
(7) Hiring a job-market consultant is not for everyone. Though several people I know who used one (including myself) got a job immediately after hiring one–which is why I myself recommended it–the vital thing is that people actually get sound job-market mentoring somewhere. This is why the Cocoon offers a free mentoring service. In my experience, the level of mentoring some job-candidates receive from their PhD programs is abysmal. I’ve met candidates going on the job-market for the first time in mid-September who’ve told me they don’t have any materials together and received no guidance from their advisors on what their materials should be like. This is unacceptable…but my experience is that it is shockingly common–and, from my experience mentoring people myself, lack of mentoring shows up clearly in job-candidates’ materials (and not in a good way).
“Many cover letters and other materials have altogether the wrong tone. The biggest errors are self-aggrandizement (“I have X publications in the best journals”) and trite, emotive phrases (“I am a passionate teacher…”).”
The first part of this goes explicitly against a lot of advice I’ve been given.
Hi Postdoc: Let me clarify. My sense is that it is good to list some of the journals one has published in (viz. “I have published articles in journals including Philosophical Studies, Analysis, and Nous”). What I think does not come across so well is self-aggrandizement (viz. “I have published in some of the highest ranked journals in the field”). In other words, I think it’s a matter of tone. It’s good to show that you’ve published in good places. It’s not good to look like you are full of yourself or trying too hard to impress. Understatement is a good thing.
I’ve been told that given search committees are having to go through hundreds of apps that the more self aggrandizement the better (I guess up to some point?). You have to stand out. But here lies the problem: there is little agreement on what makes a good application. I’ve heard x and not x so many times as to make it impossible to know what to do exactly. My hunch is just as is the case with publishing that there is little aggreement on what is good. I agree there are different job markets (teaching, research, etc), so might make sense to have different cover letters for teaching vs. research schools. But we should be careful with how fine-grained we make our advice. That goes for tenured and Marcus.
Postdoc: fair points. I think the fact that ‘tenured’ and I apparently have such different experiences supports your general point. Different search committee members can look for very different things in an application. While I have a hard time believing that most search committee members would respond positively to set-aggrandizement—and the people I know who followed my consultant’s advice not to be self-aggrandizing did very well on the market after following advice to avoid it—it is of course possible that I’m wrong. It might be good to hear from more search committee members here, to see if there is any kind of consensus. Perhaps I’ll post a new thread asking them!
Does anyone know if we are going to use the Phylo wiki or if the Philosophy Smoker Blog will post a job market thread again this year?
I am going to go add a few jobs to the wiki later today. You should too. If we all contribute, it can be a great tool (or a terrible time waster as you nervously check it a million times a day).
Thanks!
Curious George: no idea, but you can use this thread to report those things!
Questions about being a “flight risk”
I understand that search committees worry that some candidates fresh out of a PhD program might be flight risks. But I wonder if search committees would have an equally strong worry about other kinds of job candidates, e.g. candidates applying from post doc positions, or VAPs, or other assistant professorships.
If so, are there any non-obvious ways to communicate that, while you have decent pubs, you just want the damn job for which you’re applying for its own sake?
I am a mere first year assistant professor. However, I had a lot of interviews in my two years on the market. And I have close friends at both research and teaching schools who have talked to me about their experience on search committees.
Anyway, my overall impression is much closer to Marcus’s than to tenured. While tenured describes what sounds like what goes on at a research schools, the stats do not bear this out at all for other schools. Actually, I have recently been looking at people who have been getting hired at research schools, and have noticed a pattern. There are often people with much better publication records (i.e. publications in top journals) who get passed over for someone with a less impressive but more focused record. For instance, someone who is known as a player in field X, and has maybe one top publication, lots of chapters in edited volumes, and a number of publications in good specialty journals.Prestige for PhD granting institution is still a thing. Now this is just what I got at looking at maybe 10 recent hires, but I thought I would mention it.
As for the cover letter, I think the advice to aggrandize yourself is bad. I know it is given, but people who say things like “I am an amazing teacher” or “I have an amazing publication record” really do not come out in the best light. Just state the facts like a professional.
Lastly, I was complimented on my teaching statement a number of times, so it seems at the least some search committees notice it.
I’m chair at a decent not-so-small liberal arts school with a 3-3 load. I’ve been on two searches and chaired two more. No one on any of these committees has ever penalized a candidate for having stellar publications. Some of my colleagues like seeing publications in Phil Review, some don’t know that Phil Review has such a lofty reputation, and some don’t really care one way of the other. Relatedly — even though we recognize that many applications have a fuller c.v. than some of us, we appreciate our good fortune in this respect. And we don’t have prestige bias either way. We have extended offers to folks from unranked and top-5 schools.
For most of us the teaching statement is important. There isn’t any one right way to do it, just try to provide concrete evidence that you are an effective (or at least reflective) teacher.
The worst mistake I see is in cover letters. Some folks — usually but not always from top programs — write very minimal letters. Those will do you no favors, as we make our first cut on cover letters, CVs, and letters of rec. There is a lot of advice out there, some of it likely contradictory, but if you’re applying to a teaching school, talk about your teaching!
Thanks for the perspective slac chair, it is great to hear from a variety of people who have done a search. I am shocked some of your colleagues don’t know that phil review has a great reputation though. Interesting.
Some folks think that journal rankings do not track anything of merit and so don’t pay any attention to such things. Others are in their own corners of the philosophical world and, unfortunately, don’t get out much, and so have no opinion on journals beyond their subspecialty. Yet others work primarily in history, etc. etc.
The relentless emphasis on journal prestige can give candidates the impression that all search committee members are super impressed with pubs in Nous, Mind, PPR, Phil Review, etc. But it’s not true across the board. (Though it’s surely true in most cases.)
Slac chair writes: “The worst mistake I see is in cover letters. Some folks — usually but not always from top programs — write very minimal letters. Those will do you no favors…”
Back in my grad school days, I was told this is what grads from highly-ranked grad programs were coached to do: write really short (1-2 sentence) cover letters–ostensibly, if I recall, to project “confidence” and let their CV, program prestige, and writing sample do the talking.
Perhaps this is how they are still coached? If so, seems they are receiving bad advice, at least when it comes to applying to teaching schools.
Two sentences? Wow. I am curious if ANY schools like a 2 sentence cover letter. Maybe they do. But then why even bother asking for one? Do schools really need a piece of paper that says, “Hi I am X and I am applying for this job…”?
Honestly, I have no idea why employers require so many materials. They’re just making us jump through hoops for the privilege of applying.
1. Whether you have a strong cover letter has more to do with how well you’ve been coached to write cover letters than how good of a philosopher you are, or on whether you can afford to hire a job market consultant. There is a reason why PhDs are not awarded based on cover letters!
2. Teaching statements strike me as again having more to do with whether you’ve been coached how to write them than anything else. It isn’t obvious what a teaching statement is supposed to be, what a good one is, how long they should be, etc. Outside of coaching you’d have no idea.
3. What does the research statement really add over your publication list? Anyone looking at your list can see what you research. If you have a long list of publications, it’s pretty clear you can publish no problem. So, the research statement just seems to be a useless cog in the machine. I think more useless than the others. They also force a degree of certainty on your future plans that’s artificial.
4. Teaching evaluations? If done right (I mean done empirically, with questions designed to track useful things) these would probably be worth having a look at. However, as it stands, every school has their own versions, some good, some bad, and few based on any empirics.
In sum, the current job market makes young unemployed or underemployed or overworked philosophers spend weeks (even months maybe) working on application materials. Every job seems to want something slightly different on top of it. However, none of these materials have much to do with anything.
If they want us to jump through hoops, why don’t they just literally make us jump through hoops. We can include in our applications a video of us doing this or other exercising.
Arguably, this might actually help with the obesity epidemic!
Seems that this is a holdover from not so long ago when you actually mailed your application? So you needed a sheet of paper on top explaining why you were sending this package of documents to the department for the unfortunate person opening all that mail. (When the application is to be sent to an email address, the body of my email is essentially just that: two sentences explaining why I’m emailing them.) And of course, then, a holdover in terms of advisors giving more recent applicants advice based on the peculiarities of their own application experience.
I got my PhD at a high-prestige program, I wrote extremely short (3 sentence) cover letters for R1 jobs, and got a reasonable number of interviews at R1s. Also, I now teach at a R1/PhD granting program, and we don’t ever read cover letters when we are hiring. (Or at least, no one who I’ve been on two different hiring committees with reads them.) (Amanda: in our case we wouldn’t ask for them, but the program we use for applications requires a cover letter. It’s a mere formality in much the same way that journals will often require these things when submitting.)
Also, the strategy we were advised to take (in the program I got my PhD in) is to write longer/more detailed cover letters for teaching schools/slacs and shorter ones for R1 schools. I suspect this is fairly standard advice across “prestigious” programs. Marcus I get the sense that you think that people at these programs are completely out of touch with the teaching-centered-school job market, but in my experience that isn’t true at all. Students from my program had trouble getting jobs at teaching institutions, but it wasn’t because we didn’t know what we should be doing in order to be appealing to those institutions–it was because it was extremely hard for us to develop an application that actually was appealing to teaching institution (lack of a lot of opportunity to teach, flight risk fears, etc. etc.). And the department was actively trying to change some of these things (e.g. find us more ways to get teaching experience), and we were constantly given advice to figure out outside ways to get teaching experience.
Hi anonymous: Thanks for chiming in!
I wouldn’t say I think people at those programs are out of touch. I guess I just found it a bit disturbing that slac chair was reporting receiving very short cover letters from graduates of such programs. That made me wonder whether graduates from some of those programs may not be receiving the cover-letter best advice (given that I had heard in the past that graduates at some such programs are coached to write short letters).
It sounds like your program did a very good job mentoring its grad students in this regard. Unfortunately, I’ve met students from other programs in recent years who clearly aren’t receiving such good mentoring (I’ve even met some whose programs give little or no job-market mentoring, if you can believe that!).
Hey everyone,
How frequent is it for schools to skip first round straight to flyouts invitations? I know some top departments do it but I’m curious.
Is it just me, or are there lots more epistemology jobs this year than usual?
There are so few jobs that after you divide them into all the specialities it’s kind of a joke. So, I’m not sure if there are more epistemology jobs. There certainly aren’t many metaphysics/mind jobs. haha!
Duuuuude. This whole applying to things bit is really getting me down.
I am very tired of doing it.
Did anyone else get an email from Stanford requesting information about gender/race/disability/vet status, etc?
Why do some schools include this in the application and others ask for it by email?
Is it generally safe to assume that schools that gather the information via email do this with virtually every candidate rather than at a long list stage?
Anon,
Most universities are obliged to collect data on race and gender. They have to show that efforts are being taken to ensure that such people are not victims of bias. At some places, the institution may be aggressively trying to meet hiring targets, and will ensure that some minority (under-represented) candidates are given a fair shot at the job. HR departments review these data, and even follow up on it at some places.
If anyone was wondering why the job ad at Nevada, Las Vegas was so specific, check out their current VAP. Good for him. It’s almost obviously a fake search so should we even bother applying?
I think if a school wants to hire a VAP they should be allowed to just hire them. It does no one any good that they are required to pretend to do a search. Rarely an outside candidate will actually win over the VAP, but it is rare I think, and I also think that is unfair to the VAP who was probably lead on about getting the job.
Amanda: I too think schools should just be able to hire people they want to hire. However, it is not at all clear to me that “Rarely an outside candidate will actually win over the VAP”. I’ve known a few “inside candidates” get passed over for outside applicants, and have heard this can be because a search committee can become unexpectedly enamored with someone else. In fact, I’ve even heard some say that this can happen precisely because the “inside candidate” is a known quantity, whereas an outside applicant can stoke the imagination of a committee about how great they might be (viz. a “grass is greener on the other side” effect).
Hi Marcus,
I think in general, a VAP doesn’t have a better chance of getting hired. In fact, for reasons you say, I think in general they have worse odds. I should have been a bit more clear. It is only when the faculty have indicated that they want to hire the VAP, and arrange a job ad that clearly favors the VAP, that I think the advantage is to the inside candidate. But maybe you meant in even these cases there really isn’t that advantage? If so, then I think it is pretty messed up for search committees to give their own VAP such hope and then crush them down. The market is emotionally hard enough. And while rejection is never fun, I imagine it is a lot harder when it is by people you know and especially when they have indicated you are some sort of shoe-in.
Okay, so it’s worth trying. I agree with you guys it would do everyone a favor to not pretend this is a genuine search and to hire the person they want to directly. Or else just put up a job ad that is not specifically tailored to the one person in the world who is a fit.
Hi Amanda: Thanks for clarifying. You write,
“But maybe you meant in even these cases there really isn’t that advantage? If so, then I think it is pretty messed up for search committees to give their own VAP such hope and then crush them down. The market is emotionally hard enough. And while rejection is never fun, I imagine it is a lot harder when it is by people you know and especially when they have indicated you are some sort of shoe-in.”
Fwiw. I’ve heard several stories of exactly this sort of thing happening.
The usual way it goes, or so I’ve heard from others, is that the committee can go into the search preferring the “inside candidate”, but then become infatuated with a different candidate. In other words, even though no one intends any harm, at the end of the process the committee can support hiring someone else because they become convinced another person would be a better hire, and they feel obligated (either to their department, institution, or themselves) to “hire the best person for the job.” Seems heartless, I know…but I’ve heard more than a few stories.
Yikes, that must be rough. But I guess I can see how it happens. Everybody has some flaws. So if you are around they can see them. With people you don’t know you can pretend they are flawless.
I went on a flyout last year and didn’t get the job. I later found out they hired a 5th year assistant professor who was basically an associate. He really wanted the job for location reasons. It is a weird situation when you are interviewed and a committee already has a strong preference for another candidate. I even heard of one case where they offered the job to another candidate and still flew out “backups”. This surely feels deceptive. On the other hand, most of us would choose to interview anyway if we knew we only had a small chance of getting the job. So maybe there is nothing unethical about it? I’m not sure.
I see one potent reason to play this fool’s game—even if you odds are nil, getting a fly out might give you some leverage for other potential offers. Maybe.
A question about VAPs:
My department all but guarantees a 7th year of funding for folks who don’t land a job. We like living here for the most part. My partner has a career here and there’s reason to believe that they might have leave that job if we move. Is there any circumstance under which it would make sense to take a one year VAP?
You mean a one year VAP instead of a 7th year of funding? Would you have to teach in your 7th year? If it is a research year I would for sure take advantage of that funding and spend a lot of time working on applications. In your circumstances, I think the only reason I would take a 1 year VAP is if it was at a prestigious place, or a place where there is a chance of it turning into a tt position.
I think maybe the only circumstance under which it would make sense would be if you lack much teaching experience and couldn’t get more variety during your 7th year. For instance, at my PhD program, there isn’t much teaching opportunity and the students you do teach are not your average students. I had some flyouts last year where this was clearly part of the concern: that my experience wasn’t extensive enough or with a broad enough student population. I got a VAP this year with a broader student population (and luckily, one I didn’t have to move for) and although it has been rough doing that and being on the job market, I definitely feel like getting the extra experience will be beneficial for me (usual caveats apply since I am on the market myself). It’s also forced me to be a lot more efficient on the job market than last year as well.
I’m about to lose it with these schools that require transcripts. Even undergraduate transcripts. Sometimes, OFFICIAL transcripts. Should I send my GRE scores? SATs? How about I go home and copy my report cards from elementary school too. Seriously.
I know I shouldn’t be looking at the wiki; but given that I have no self-control, I figured I’d at least ask for clarification about this one thing: What does “applications acknowledged” mean? Some places I applied to sent emails confirming acceptance of the application. Surely that can’t be what “applications acknowledged” means, since that doesn’t really tell us anything useful about where they’re at in the process–especially since some of these places sent those notes out prior to their own deadline. But if it means something else, like the committee reached out to particular people to say “Just wanted to let you know we’re looking at your appllication”, then that might be useful info, but I’m curious how relevant that is to the overall process.
Any clarification would be helpful here. Thanks in advance.
Sincerely,
Confused
Confused: Generally it means that they sent out some kind of email to candidates (e.g. “We’ve received your application”) … sometimes this is from an automated system. Sometimes it means that they have come up with a “long list” and asked for additional materials (letters or more teaching materials or something like that), so it might represent a cut. But it might not. I wouldn’t read too much into the separation at the bottom of the page there, between “applications acknowledged” and “past deadline”. IMO it can mean so many different things to different users of the wiki, so it’s no use guessing what it means in a particular instance.
When a school holds skype interviews and moves to flyouts, do they usually notify those who were interviewed by skype but do NOT make it to that next round of on campus interviews? Or is radio silence to be expected?
It could go either way anon. I would say 50/50 chance, and I have a fair bit of experience with this. It might actually lean a bit toward the not notifying. Also, even after the flyouts they don’t always notify the persons who didn’t get the job. Both I think are really rude. But not notifying after a flyout is beyond the pale. I think there is just no excuse for this kind of disrespect, unless it is some weird administration rule. I know I have had schools that have contacted me and said, “We offered the job to someone else, but if they decline you will get the job.” This type of thing is easy to do and very much appreciated.
Anon: my experience is that more often than not, you’ll get radio silence if you’re not invited for an on-campus interview…followed by a PFO email a few weeks or months later. I think it’s a terribly callous practice, but not uncommon.
So yesterday I got a PFO from a 2016 season job. lol, thanks I thought I was still on the short list….
One reason for a long period of radio silence is that schools sometimes dip back into the first-round pool if none of the flown-out candidates work out (bomb the interview, take another position, etc.). We’ve done that in the past. So we don’t want to tell folks they are out of the running, since they are not. Imagine you are Skype interviewed in December. Flyouts are in Jan-Februrary. The school won’t know it needs to return to the pool until late February perhaps. I’m not suggesting this is a common occurrence, but it does happen.
In my (unfortunately) relatively limited experience, every school that has skype interviewed me ended up contacting me more or less personally (the email was never sent from HR, always from the SC chair or contact person). But I have had to wait insanely long periods for some jobs (including once after a campus visit). Sometimes they waited until someone accepted the offer to contact first-round interviewees (at least those that were still in the running). Sometimes they just waited for incomprehensible reasons (before fly outs even took place). But I have to say that, in general, I find excessive delays rather unpleasant and disrespectful. I’d be totally fine with them being honest and telling me I’m not their first choice but they might contact me if anything changes.
This whole process is so inhumane anyway.
Another gem in WTF studies: the Penn State Altoona job posted just TODAY on Philjobs with a NOVEMBER 16 deadline.
Post skype interview thank you notes. Do you do them? What do you say?
Slac chair— it’s still a terrible practice, and that’s no excuse. You can tell people exactly where they stand: “we have agreed on a short list and you are not among thefinalists for the position at this time. However, …” etc. . To do less than that, after a first round interview, is inconsiderate in the extreme.
I was a hire that was not an original finalist. I appreciated that the chair was upfront with me throughout the process. And if you dip into the first round interviewees again, it’s not like they’re under any delusions. They know what’s happened. So why not just send them an email update?
post-Skype interview notes:
I take these to be polite and wish everyone in society would do things like this more generally. That said, they make no difference to me in terms of you getting the job or not.
post-Skype interview notes:
I take these to be polite and wish everyone in society would do things like this more generally. That said, they make no difference to me in terms of you getting the job or not.
post-Skype interview notes:
I take these to be polite and wish everyone in society would do things like this more generally. That said, they make no difference to me in terms of you getting the job or not.
I usually send a thank you note to the search chair to thank them “on behalf of” the entire search committee. Is that cool, or should I send personal emails to everyone who interviewed me?
Number three sending a note to each search committee member seems a bit over the top to me, but I’d be interested to hear from others. What do you think Marcus?
Hi Amanda: I just wrote up a reply to your question, but then it occurred to me that since I’m currently on a search committee for a non-TT position, it might not be a good idea to say anything. It’s rather unclear to me what is appropriate to say or not say publicly while one is in the process of a search… :/
Oh okay. I will have to live in suspense!
I think people are missing a major issue here. At some USA colleges HR departments have taken control of the hiring process – or been given control. And faculty are not permitted to communicate information about the searches. Colleges are afraid of litigation. So they are putting protections in place. This is one downside of American culture. In the last search I was involved in, even after the search was over, the chair of search committee would not give any applicant information about the search (out of fear). I was not going to override her decision.
The bureaucracy is even worse in Europe. But anyhow, maybe fear is the reason. But then I guess things must vary a lot by institution, because there is a fair number of colleges that do update candidates and treat them with respect, so it can be done at least at some places. Also, I am suspicious that a tenured professor would have much to fear by sending a polite email.
It looks like a non-trivial number of schools are going straight to flyouts this year, skipping first round interviews. There are many possible explanations (target of opportunity hires, people not updating the wiki earlier, only the most elite schools are doing it, etc.), but I’m wondering if the explanation is that some departments are abandoning first round interviews because they’re skeptical of their efficacy. If so, I hope that’s an emerging trend. Skype interviews are in some ways an improvement over APA interviews, but they’re still a bad practice. Marcus has done a nice job in the past of summarizing the social science on interview effects here. I’ll just add that I’ve had multiple Skype interviews marred by technical problems despite taking all precautions to avoid them. And coming across well over Skype introduces even more skills irrelevant to whether you’d be good at the actual job. The first round interview can’t die fast enough as far as I’m concerned.
There’s a discussion about this already on the metaforum, but it’s going the way things often go there.
Going straight to flyouts might be the right choice. But one downside is it leaves less room to assess how you are doing as a candidate. For instance, if you had 8 first round interviews, this would suggest you are doing something right to appeal to search committees. It would provide information that the way you changed your cover letter (or whatever) worked.
Amanda, you’re right about that. I’ve heard people say they would have given up had they not at least been getting first round interviews in years before finally landing a job. But there are other ways departments might provide news value to candidates (asking for additional materials, notifying them they made the short/longlist, etc.).
First round interviews also send confusing signals. If I get 10 skype interviews and one flyout, does that mean I botched the other 9, or that I just barely made the first round list at a lot of places? Sure, you can ask how you did, but that’s awkward, and you’ll never get the full story. And of course there are many other sources of evidence that you are on the right track, professionally. I think the news value of getting first round interviews for candidates does not outweigh the costs of introducing further irrationality into the interview process, let alone the cost of everyone having to go through these ordeals.
I wish our discipline would take a closer look at the mechanics of our hiring practices. They’re little more than cruel wastes of time for everyone involved.
I disagree. Think about how normal businesses operate. You send in your resume. You get a call if they’re interested. Otherwise, nothing. Sure there are exceptions, but the exceptions are just that — exceptions.
Academics live and are groomed in a pampered world. They expect to be treated like they are in on the process just because they’ve submitted an application letter. They expect updates, reports, feel-good rejection letters. Come on.
The world is not your playground.
When is a reasonable time to stop expecting interviews for applications due in the (late) fall? I’d rather not rely wholly on the wiki.
Sorry if this sounds harsh, but I think you can stop expecting interviews now.
Source: I’ve had about a dozen interviews in the past three years for applications that were due in the Fall. Only one of the interview invitations came after New Year’s (first half of January), and this was for a place that went straight to on-campus interviews.
Peter: I was notified of 4 first round TT interviews last year after 1/9. One of those applications was due after the first of the year, though. Some schools will probably always be delayed until after their semester starts before extending invitations.
On the other hand, at least in my areas, there are not many jobs left this cycle that have not scheduled interviews yet.
Some unsolicited advice: you will be happier if you set expectations low to begin with. Forget about jobs the second after you submit your application.
I had 5 interviews after today’s date a year ago. And each year seems to be getting later, so my guess is there is still more interviews to come.
Like James and Amanda suggest, I think the job market is elongating; last year at this time, I had not yet had 4 of the 5 interviews I ultimately had. This year, I had more interviews early on, but I was just notified of another one (a job with a mid-November deadline) this week. So I don’t think it’s done yet!
So suppose you have an interview and someone says “tell me about yourself.” What, on earth, are you supposed to say in response to this question?
“So suppose you have an interview and someone says “tell me about yourself.” What, on earth, are you supposed to say in response to this question? ”
You’d surprised how many people are incredibly boring when answering this. If I ask something like that, I just aim to see if the candidate is passionate about life/anything. In short, I would recommend being honest and being passionate about what you enjoy to do.
I’ve had people say “oh, I don’t do much you know”. As if I’d like to spend the rest of my career with them as a colleague. I don’t care if you like football or fidget spinners, as long as you like something and are passionate about it.
“So suppose you have an interview and someone says “tell me about yourself.” What, on earth, are you supposed to say in response to this question? ”
You’d surprised how many people are incredibly boring when answering this. If I ask something like that, I just aim to see if the candidate is passionate about life/anything. In short, I would recommend being honest and being passionate about what you enjoy to do.
I’ve had people say “oh, I don’t do much you know”. As if I’d like to spend the rest of my career with them as a colleague. I don’t care if you like football or fidget spinners, as long as you like something and are passionate about it.
“So suppose you have an interview and someone says “tell me about yourself.” What, on earth, are you supposed to say in response to this question? ”
You’d surprised how many people are incredibly boring when answering this. If I ask something like that, I just aim to see if the candidate is passionate about life/anything. In short, I would recommend being honest and being passionate about what you enjoy to do.
I’ve had people say “oh, I don’t do much you know”. As if I’d like to spend the rest of my career with them as a colleague. I don’t care if you like football or fidget spinners, as long as you like something and are passionate about it.
SLAC tenured Professor & chair: I appreciate you sharing what you look for in an answer to that question. However, on whether questions like these should be asked at all, see my comments and empirical literature on questions like this.
While one might think a candidate’s answer to a question like that may be predictive of how they will actually be as a colleague, the science is clear: it simply isn’t predictive. The person someone appears to be answering questions like these is often poorly reflective of who they really are on a day-to-day basis. For example, I can be awkward and withdrawn with people I don’t know well, and am not particularly fond of talking about myself (blog posts notwithstanding!). I’m just shy and find it difficult to “act natural” and “be myself” in contrived situations with strangers. Nevertheless, I’m passionate about a great many things—music, politics, physics, etc.—and have been complimented on how clearly my passions come across in my daily professional life by students and colleagues. Conversely, there are people who “talk a good game” in interviews and cocktail parties who nevertheless aren’t very good people you’d actually want to be a colleague with (and who, for all you know, may be vastly overstating their passions simply to impress in an interview!).
Worse still, evaluators’ ratings of answers to questions like these are known to be more predictive of evaluators’ personal and demographic biases than they are predictive of anything having to do with candidates. The science here is unequivocal: questions like these are a problematic hiring practice. I’m going to post a podcast by my spouse (who specializes on the science here) in the next day or two.
So, I’ve just learned, yet another time, that I was not a finalist for a job. I’m having a hard time converting first rounds into fly-outs, and yet I’ve been told many times, first or second hand, explicitly or tacitly, that I interview just fine. I had one campus interview two years ago, zero last year, and so far only one coming this year. I’m starting to think this might as well be a fluke given how few of them I’ve had. This might be my only chance, and so I should give it all; at the same time it’s hard not to despair in the face of repeated failure. How does one not let failure erode one’s confidence?
Hi Nick
I do not know you, but here are my two cents: do not give up if you still want a job in philosophy.
There are many reasons first rounds do not convert to on campus interviews, and even when you make it on campus, you may only have a 1 in 3 chance.
I had two on campuses in one year where there was an inside candidate, and another the year before. You usually do not know til you get there. And even if there is one, there is always the chance that the insider will leave for a better job elsewhere.
Thanks Brad. Not giving up. Still, it’s pretty depressing that some candidates manage to convert a majority of their first round interviews and I convert so few, while having no clue why. I’m a white male but I don’t like to think that’s a significant factor, so I’m just left guessing.
It might be nothing you do wrong, but just that you weren’t at the top of the list to begin with. I think a fair amount of Skype interviews have favorites, and so if you are 1 of 12 or 1 of 16 the odds of getting an on campus interview are not high. I think the exception is getting a lot of them, and those who do probably have some prestige which explains why they are at the top of many lists. Anyway I have a friend who on three years on the market got only 1 interview, and applied to 225 jobs. He ended up getting the job for the one interview and is doing very well. So make the most of your fly out.
To be clear 1 total interview, not just one fly out….
Amanda: quite right – it only takes one!
Nick: would you mind me running a post on your initial query on how to not let stuff like this erode your confidence, along with some of the helpful replies you received? It’s an issue I struggled with a lot, and which i suspect a good number of other candidates do as well. Anyway, I thought it might be a good idea to highlight and discuss more in a new thread.
Marcus, of course not, thanks!
Amanda, thanks. I know it only takes one and hope this one will be the one. In a way having a decent number of first rounds is good, so I shouldn’t complain, but this makes it all the more frustrating when this ends there. Anyway, maybe the new thread will make it seem all so normal.
Nick, how many first-round interviews are you getting? If it’s 5, and you’re converting 1, that’s not so bad. If it’s 10, that’s odd. If it’s 15, there’s definitely something wrong with how you’re presenting yourself and you should try to get to the bottom of it.
Also, sorry to say, but the fact that you’re a white man is a huge disadvantage for you. You all have been disadvantaged for a while now, but last year things seemed really acute and this year seems to be going the same way. There are many jobs where your application will not be taken seriously, and sometimes you will be interviewed despite having virtually no chance of moving on. I can’t say too much because I am junior.
Does anyone have any advice about whether coauthored research should be presented as a job talk? I’ve got a paper that will work excellently for the audience and is the right balance of generalist interest and showing off my AOS. But are the odds too high that a committee may look at the talk unfavorably because it is coauthored?
(My coauthor is fine with it. I’m just worried about its reception by the committee.)
We’ve talked about this before. Maybe Marcus can provide a link? I think the consensus is this is a bad idea. Some faculty are judgmental, and will look down on it. Sadly…
Amanda: I can’t find where we talked about it. I’ve tracked down a few discussions of whether it’s a good idea to use one’s writing-sample as a job-talk–but I haven’t been able to find anything on co-authored pieces.
For what it is worth, I have the same general sense as you–that it’s probably a big risk, given that people might wonder how much of it was the presenter’s work.
But this is just my sense. We could run a discussion thread on it if you like, D. Just let me know!
We discussed using co-authored work as a writing sample. Using it for a job talk strikes me as different on several counts. For one thing you’ll be presenting, hence whether you master the material is easier to demonstrate (or harder to fake). Second, it’s feasible to flag your talk is based on co-authored work and weave it into a slightly broader presentation of your own research. Third, co-authored work is evidence of collaborative research, something that is increasingly valued by many departments and schools. Social scientists rarely present single-authored work. Since we’re increasingly expected to work across disciplines, I don’t know what that shouldn’t mean opening ourselves to some of their standards.
I’m saying all of this also because I’m hoping to use a co-authored paper for a potential job talk that fits a particular job description really well. I also have anecdotal evidence of a co-author who based all of his job talks on a co-authored piece last year, flagged it at the onset and was apparently not the worse for it.
Nick: I hope you’re right! As you say, co-authored papers are totally standard in many other fields.
As with most things on the job market, it surely varies by committee. Given what I know about some professors being so anti co-authored papers, personally I would be worried that one of those folks would be on the search committee. But I would love to be wrong. I think it would be nothing but a benefit to philosophy if we started, respecting, encouraging, and taking seriously co-authored work as a matter of normalcy rather than the exception.
JuniorFaculty –
It’s too early to take stock; I’m still waiting to hear from a few places. But, counting only TT jobs (or equivalent), here’s where I stand:
2016-17 (incl. a late spring 2016 app): 5 interviews / 1 fly-out
[plus 1 non-TT interview and 2 postdoc interviews, one of which worked out]
2017-28: 5 interviews with places I’ve heard from / 1 fly-out / 2 places I have yet to hear from
[plus 1 non-TT I have yet to hear from]
So, it’s not so bad, but it’s not so great either. Fingers crossed for the one fly-out.
As for being a white male, I suspect that’s a factor. At least I know women were hired for most of the jobs I interviewed for in 2016-17. And given how every single interview has included questions about diversity so far, I believe my odds are not improving.
So I had four (TT) flyouts last year. I got one. White males were hired at two others. I don’t know about the third. Maybe white males have less of a chance getting hired, percentage wise, then others, but as a note of encouragement many of them get hired every year.
And they get hired over women, like me.
Amanda, you got four flyouts, which is a lot. The point is, I suspect (but really that’s a defeasible suspicion) that women are, other things being equal, more likely than men to be finalists. From what I gather here and there finalist pools very often have one male at most. Of course he might get hired over women, nobody denies that. So, I am somewhat encouraged by the fact that it happens, but I really have to wish that may female co-finalists don’t do great for it to happen.
And I’m setting completely aside whether it’s fair or not. I’m actually not quite sure what I think about it. Honestly, if it’s really ceteris paribus, I’m fine being at a disadvantage against women.
I was once advised (and pretty sure I might have seen it written on this thread as well) that it’s good to present work in progress for a job talk because this demonstrates that you’ve got more material in the works. If you do so, then it might also be a good idea to make sure that its a WIP for which you have a very decent draft already written up! Some hiring institutions have asked candidates to circulate the paper that they are presenting. Does anyone know how common this is?
Why would it be relevant that a woman is hired over a man, unless the presumption is the woman was not hired on merit but because she was a woman? Everyone keeps pointing out that this or that woman was hired over them. Why point this out? It seems plausible the reason one is pointing that out is to say there is a good chance she didn’t deserve the job, but was hired for affirmative action reasons. This is not exactly a supportive thing to keep hearing over and over, and it seems a humble and decent response (when one doesn’t know why one wasn’t hired) to assume the other person was at least equally worthy.
For what it’s worth, it drives me equally nuts over at some feminist oriented blogs when women claim that there was clearly some sort of discrimination against them and that is why they didn’t get hired. I think women say this far too often when there is no evidence of it in their particular case, or at least very defeasible evidence. None of this is to say that both men and women are not hired unfairly, or that the “odds” of women getting hired is higher. I just think it is not in good form to imply that the reasons one is not succeeding is due to race or gender unless one has very good reason to think so, in their particular case.
I am fine with people trying to fight for or against affirmative action as they see fit. But to just go around and mention that there is a good chance that the reason one was not hired is because someone else was hired without merit (i.e. without being the best candidate) is unfair to that person. If one has an explanation of why one would mention the odds of women being hired is higher, or that a woman was hired instead of them, for a reason other than to point out it wasn’t a merit based hiring, please let me know. The last time we talked about this someone said something like, “Well I looked at her CV and I was a better candidate in every way…” Right, as if (1) one can objectively tell who the better candidate is by looking at their CV, and (2) the person knows just what that search committee was looking for and, (3) the person who didn’t get hired is an objective judge of the situation. If it was any other circumstance it is the worst type of manners to to point out that your “competitor” “beat you” even thought he/she was not better. Sportsmanship at it’s worse.
Let me be clear this is not directed at you Nick, but at the broader discussions.
As for you, 5 first rounds and 1 flyout is about right, as someone said. I had 4 flyouts and I think like 15 interviews or something, so you are right on par for the course it seems.
Lastly, as I’ve said, I am NOT in favor of hiring women for any sort of affirmative action reason. And yes I have seen it happen and I wish it didn’t. I am not in favor because I think it is unfair. And second because I have to go through my entire career with everyone reminding me that “Well the odds were really in your favor….” I also hate the way people will insult a woman by implying she wasn’t hired because of merit (even though the person has no way of knowing) and then as if to make themselves look better says, “But it’s fair because I’m in favor of preferential hiring’. Nothing could be more patronizing. Well I know these women are not the best for the job, but because I am a good person I want her to get the job anyway, and then I will point out that she didn’t really deserve it and the odds of deserving men getting jobs are low….”
Hi Humanati,
Of my four flyouts last year, and 5 tt flyouts over all, I was asked once to circulate the paper. And indeed it took me by surprise and I think it ended up hurting me, maybe even costing me the job; the quality of my draft was not great. I am good at presenting unfinished work and it was fine in my other job talks. I am probably not rare in this? But anyway I got some pretty critical comments of my draft which I think were fair, but I had no idea I would have to send one and they didn’t tell me until the last minute.
Amanda, I think you misunderstand. No one is – at least I am no – claiming that women are not hired on merit. The situation is fairly simple to understand. There are way too many qualified applicants. More often than not, hiring committees would be fine hiring all finalists, if not most of the shortlisted. OTHER THINGS BEING EQUAL — as I emphasized — among two equally qualified candidates one of which is a woman, she has better odds of getting the job. Simple as that. It is based on merit, since we’re assuming her rivals were equally good, but she’s hired on affirmative action grounds. We know there’s immense pressure from HR, admins and faculty themselves to do this.
Being aware of this is not saying anything against you or your merits, or those of any woman for that matter.
Thanks everyone for your thoughts on coauthored job talks. I guess (like a lot of the market) it really comes down to a gamble. If I can find a non-collaborative talk that equally suits a generalist audience, that may be the way to go. If not, I’ll have to weigh what is worse: potentially alienating my audience, or potentially making them think I’m not capable of producing high-quality research independently.
Marcus – if you think a thread is something that could generally help Philosophers Cocoon and its audience, I’m sure it would be helpful. But for my purposes, I probably just need to consider the benefits and possible downfalls of each my possible job talks in light of the above dilemma.
Hi Amanda. Thanks for the response. Fortunately, I had chosen a piece of work for which I had a polished written draft! But I also came very close to choosing work with a less polished written draft that had slightly more exciting ideas. Good thing I went for the safe option. I didn’t expect to be asked for the paper to circulate.
Nick as I said my response was not directed at you but the broader discussion. The quote I gave above of another discussant should give you an idea of what that broader discussion is like. And if you are assuming that women who are hired on affirmative action grounds are equally qualified, it would be helpful to make that clear when you talk about these things.
Humanati I’m glad it worked out for you. And I’m glad you brought it up so others can be aware of the issue. I’m not sure how I feel about the “fairness” of this asking for a draft practice. It is sort of asking like a second writing sample, which search committees are free to do of course. But when they ask for a second writing sample it is clear what they are asking for. Since it is not the norm to be asked for a draft prior to a job talk, it seems a bit…inconsiderate to ask unless this is done far in advance.
Just as an example, I have never heard someone say this: “3 women were hired on the flyouts I went on, while I am sure all of these women are just as qualified as me, it is still frustrating that….” Or perhaps, “Even thought women have a higher chance of getting hired, I have no doubt that most of the women who are hired are equally qualified when compared to male competitors…” Or, “As a white male you may have a hard time. This is not because less qualified women are hired instead of men, but simply because in a competitive market diversity needs can be put forth in matters of ties…” No I have never heard anything like this. Rather usually the talk is about how women have less publications, etc.
I did a little analysis of recent hiring practices in the Leiter Top 20 departments. (I lost interest after that.) Perhaps these data will be interesting to people; perhaps not.
[1] There are 57 tenure-track Assistant Professors in these departments. 46% are female and 54% are male.
[2] The female TT APs have published, on average, 3.2 peer-reviewed papers (median 3.0). The male TT APs have published, on average, 5.0 peer-reviewed papers (median 5.0). (I counted 1 book = 4 papers)
[3] A more interesting measure, I think, is the “density” of publication: the number of peer-reviewed papers divided by the years out from the PhD. The average density for female TT APs is 0.9 (median 0.7). The average density for male TT APs is 1.1 (median 0.9).
[4] For me, the most striking feature of the data was the large number of elite TT APs who have produced no or almost no research. This would be not so surprising if it were limited to just-hired ABDs. But it includes many people who had prestigious, multi-year post-docs, or who have been APs for several years already, or both. There is one top department–I won’t say which one–which has several APs, many of whom have been there for years, and none of whom seems capable of producing quality research.
[5] On the other hand, in culling through the data, I came across some truly impressive young philosophers (e.g. Alex Worsnip, UNC). But there are not too many of these; perhaps 20% of the CVs I looked at struck me as very impressive.
[6] One interesting question is how to weigh co-authored pubs (I counted single-authored pubs and co-authored pubs identically in the above analysis). Many of the APs with top publications (e.g. Mind, PPR) co-authored them with very senior philosophers (sometimes their advisors). How should these count? When I think about it now, I am inclined to say not much at all.
Amanda, I don’t know how specifying “other things being equal” didn’t make it clear that I was makin gender-based comparisons other things being equal… But let’s set that aside. I have heard people say the things you say you’ve never heard. That’s actually the claim that’s most often made—simply that women are being advantaged over equally qualified male candidates. And that’s not just happening at the campus visit stage. As I said, finalist pools rarely (though sometimes) include more than one male. It’s hard to think this is purely merit-based. So it’s not like instead of tossing a coin between the top two candidates they’ll pick the woman. The odds are increased earlier on.
But again, it’s worth repeating that this may not be unfair and that this may be justified.
PS, Amanda: you seem to have been quite successful, and it’s implausible that this should not be based on your merits. I don’t mean to take anything away from you.
Well we had a very long discussion thread and not a single person said this. You can go look in the archives if you like. And I read an even longer thread on daily nous and again no one said this. I am glad that you think what you do, and that at wherever you do your reading people think this way too.
I am also am glad you think my success is due to my merits. But again, I have been told, by people I very much respect, that it is because I am a woman. Well, perhaps no that directly but they have said things to me like, “Amanda, let’s be honest, as a woman you have an advantage in every way.” And also, “Don’t you think your interviews are explained by the fact you are a woman…” When someone says my interviews are explained by the fact I am a woman, perhaps I am sensitive, but it seems to suggest that they are not explained by the fact I merit them.
DataB, thanks for making my point. And yes, it is surprising that many people at top research schools have not published much. At least surprising given the perspective many people would have you believe.
Amanda, here’s what I think is going on.
Many people are being hired, especially by top departments, because they are female. Full stop. Most of these people work on something related to gender, race, or sexuality. Most of these people have thin or non-existent research records. I do not want to name names here, but you can browse the websites of Leiter Top 20 departments. There are plenty of examples.
Then there is everyone else. If you’re not part of the “elite” group described above, gender matters but it is not decisive. You have an advantage, Amanda, because you are a woman–but it’s just an advantage, and there are many forms of advantage. Nevertheless, you are not entitled to say that your success is purely “due to [your] merits”. Your success is, in part–perhaps in small part–due to your gender as well. You cannot have things both ways. A man who comes from NYU is has an advantage because of his pedigree. And so on.
A big problem is that the outrage leveled against the “elite” group I described at the outset gets wrongly “exported” to people like you. I don’t know you, but assuming you have some good pubs, I don’t think it’s such a big deal if you get a bit of advantage because you are a woman. Like I said, there’s plenty of unjust advantage to go around. But the hiring at top departments, which I described at the outset of this post, is really crazy. It’s bad for men, for women like you, and for the profession at large.
1) I have yet to see any data that is well-worked-up enough to conclude anything remotely like, “Many people are being hired, especially by top departments, because they are female. Full stop.” I’d love to see how those data account for the many, many confounds.
2) And, while DataB seems to be working with reasonable data (though is one fifth of a publication a year that big a deal, tbh?), the anecdata that is admitted in this discussion by many others is something else. “From what I gather here and there finalist pools very often have one male at most”? Come on… I don’t think I have ever been in near proximity to a job search where this was the case. Is it ever the case? Sure. “Very often”? I doubt we’ve got the data to back that up…
2) Even supposing that being female is widely advantageous on the job market, it is surely one of many, many factors that are widely advantageous. Good at schmoozing? Huge advantage, for getting that famous advisor, for getting your name in at conferences to help work up papers for publication, and for getting yourself interviews and then the offer. Work on certain hot areas of ethics? (NB – Race, gender, sexuality are hot topics, but they are far from the only ones. Can we get some more effective altruism papers please? How about another half dozen philosophy of law hires?) Huge advantage. You particularly good at being a bro? That’s a great way to get a huge network! That the internet guys fetishize gender (when they’re not busy getting dailynous threads to over 100 comments, that is) is both exhausting and revealing.
I never said anything even remotely close to that I was hired purely because of merit. I think anybody who is hired in this market today owes some of it to luck. And I don’t know what you are getting at when you say I can’t “have it both ways.”
As for publications, it is not only women who lack good publications at top place is it? Your problem dataB, is you seem to have accepted the false dogma that publications is the most important measure of merit. Even at research schools it is not. As I have mentioned, from what I have noticed those getting hired at research schools tend not to have the “best” publication records, but those that seem to stand out in a special way, as in they are a player in their field or they contribute something unique. Your data means little unless we accept that the best measure of merit is some traditional ranking of elite publications.
This is not to say there isn’t prestige and female bias in hiring. As I have said all along I think there is both. And I have said all along I strongly disapprove of both. What I don’t think is that from the macro economic truth that there are these biases, that any one person can know in any individual case that these biases explain why any person was or was not hired. As white guy above says there are too many confounding factors. And that has always been my issue: people thinking they know in their case that bias explains why they don’t have a job, or why a particular other person does.
Nick, here is a great example of what I am getting at:”I don’t think it’s such a big deal if you get a bit of advantage because you are a woman. Like I said, there’s plenty of unjust advantage to go around.” See DataB thinks I have an unjust advantage, but as a decent guy, he doesn’t think that is “such a big deal”. Thanks, data, I appreciate you approving of my unjust advantage.
Hey Amanda,
I don’t want to be a part of the whole “women in philosophy have an advantage” discussion that’s been going on here – no good can come of it. But there is something else you’ve said on this blog a couple times that has rubbed me the wrong way. It’s this idea that good candidates aren’t necessarily the ones who publish the most, but rather those who are “special” or “unique” in some way. I think you’re right that being “special” in this way is probably what explains why a lot of people get jobs, but I don’t think that this tracks real merit, as you’ve been arguing. It’s also not the sort of thing that makes for good advice for people struggling on the market. It strikes me that such vague ideas as “specialness” or “fit” are precisely where non-merit-based factors are most likely to slip into the process. Say what you will about counting up the number of publications a person has, or how well-ranked the journals are, but those are concrete, verifiable contributions to philosophy that reflect real work and real approval from peers in the field. It’s not unreasonable to think of that as a good measure of merit. But when a job applicant gets invited to an interview or offered a job for some other reason – that they’re viewed as “player” in the field or that they’re considered “special”, and this isn’t reflected in their actual contributions to philosophy, that smells awful fishy to me. As far as the advice that “publications aren’t all that matter, you need to be special” goes, I really don’t know what a person is supposed to do with that. It’s vague and misleading: being “special” is often not something that’s under your control, any more than “fit” is. Let’s call this what it is: a crapshoot. If a person is searching for fairness or meritocracy, the philosophy job market is a bad place to look for it.
Round Two: I wasn’t defending the “special” thing. I was just describing what I noticed. I don’t know what you are supposed to do with it either. If someone hires someone with less publications, it could be because they think their research is special in a way other persons research is not special, or they are seen as a player in the field. Whether this is fair or not (and I am not taking a stance on that, as I have mixed feelings and I don’t want to take the time to go into it), I do think it is what happens. My point is that simply because someone has less publications does not mean the search committee did not try to make a merit hire. You could argue their conception of merit is fishy, which is fair enough. But I’ve talked to plenty of research professors and they have strong opinions on what is good philosophy, and these opinions do not always track publications. Again, this is a descriptive claim. I am not defending them. I don’t know how wide spread it is. But from both conversations and looking at hiring records I think it happens. (FWIW I have a lot of publications, a few in top places, most in good speciality journals. )
By the way, because I am a strategic person, I think a lot of times I sound like I am making normative claims when I am making descriptive ones. The truth is, we do not having a hiring system that calculates publications and comes up with a merit score. I might support this system, but we don’t have it. So I guess it just puzzles me when so many people focus only on publications when trying to get a job, when the evidence suggests this is not the best strategy. You can argue that it should be, but it isn’t…so I don’t know where one will go with “should be” either. As for what is “special”. As has been said many times here before, the key is to stand out from the rest. One might do this via what you work on, or something else, but the key is to stand out. And since there are thousands of ways to stand out, yes, that advice is very non-specific which might frustrate people looking for concrete advice. Alas, I try to work with the world the way it is rather than how it should be. My advice would be that once one gets a solid publication record under their belt, each extra publication is of diminishing marginal utility, and it might be better to try something else, anything else. (I do think it is worthwhile getting that solid publicstion list first).
Straight White Guy writes:
“the anecdata that is admitted in this discussion by many others is something else. “From what I gather here and there finalist pools very often have one male at most”? Come on… I don’t think I have ever been in near proximity to a job search where this was the case. Is it ever the case? Sure. “Very often”? I doubt we’ve got the data to back that up…”
Okay, but this is not the only “anecdata” we have. Just in my personal experience, on two occasions I’ve been told by people on a hiring committee that I had no chance because the job just would be going to a woman (and I’m not one, at least not in the old-fashioned sense). They then publicly denied this, of course. And many times–maybe 6 or 7 times–I’ve seen departments hire women who were, by any objective standard, absurdly less “qualified” than the average person on the market, and when I knew there were far better qualified men who’d been ignored. No degree, no publications, no experience, no “pedigree”, etc. (It does still puzzle me though: surely there must have been some women who were far better qualified, and “fit” just as well. But maybe what happens is that the better women get scooped up by fancier schools leaving the rest with some slim pickings when it comes to meeting their diversity-equity “goals” or “visions”.) And many people have observed or experienced similar things.
True, this just a series of anecdotes and so perhaps counts for little. (Though, interestingly, equally “anecdotal” evidence is regularly taken to count for quite a bit when determining whether women are being treated unfairly, or whether there is a “chilly climate”, etc.) But then, given various plausible assumptions, we would be unlikely to have “the data to back that up” even if it existed or could be generated. We know that all these institutions are under intense pressure to hire women; almost all have explicit policies to that effect. We also know that, of course, it would be unwise for them to publicly admit that sex alone was a significant factor in hiring decisions, even though it’s highly improbable that it wouldn’t be given the obvious pressures and the policies, and so on.
So the absence of appropriate “data” is probably not a good reason to dismiss an otherwise plausible hypothesis supported by (a lot of) anecdotes plus a sprinkling of common sense.
Even aside from anecdotes, we can just consider the broader social-political situation. In a world where the “under-representation” of women is taken to be a very serious problem urgently in need of constant moralizing discussion and policy-making, how likely is it that there wouldn’t be some kind of tendency to hire women (in part) because they are women? In fact most institutions will just explicitly say that they’re making all these efforts to hire women, in particular, which just does mean, given some facts about the world, that they’re trying not to hire men. Of course they’re not going to tell us in much detail how exactly they meet these goals of theirs–because often the details would make them look bad. But it’s silly to pretend that we have no rational basis for thinking that they’re actually doing the only thing that could be done in order to achieve the goals they’re always telling us about. There just are a lot of very qualified, competitive, impressive men on the market; if your goal is to not hire too many of those, and hire more women, you just do have to systematically prefer female candidates. What else could they possibly be doing? Finding male-female pairs who really are “equally qualified” and equally appealing in every other respect and then only at that point opting for the woman? Come on. This scenario of overall equality or even anything close to it is astronomically unlikely (and quite apart from whether the people being compared are both men, man and woman…) The guff about “equally qualified” is just window dressing and ass covering…
Thanks again for proving my point Serf. And making it even more explicit. See Nick, most people in this camp think equally qualified is BS, and the women are less qualified. Or at least most people in this camp who post. Not only are women hired because they are women, but the best women are hired at top places, and so people who are not at top places must really be the bottom of the barrel. I am so tired of responding to the same arguments. People will believe what they want it seems, even philosophers. As far as for class when it comes to being a good sport, it seems many philosophers aren’t the type to care about this kind of virtue. “And many times–maybe 6 or 7 times–I’ve seen departments hire women who were, by any objective standard, absurdly less “qualified” than the average person on the market, and when I knew there were far better qualified men who’d been ignored.” Amazing. So examples men give that support their position count and are convincing, and when I give counter examples I’m told that they counter examples are irrelevant. No wonder why hardly any women openly post.
I could point to 20 men at top departments that don’t seem to be as qualified as others on the market. But these are not pointed out as examples. It is the women that are pointed out as examples. Interesting. And the fact that white men have been hired over me is irrelevant, or if not irrelevant, must really speak poorly to my ability since I couldn’t even get a job in spite of the advantage. As for the women on the market at my department who still haven’t gotten a job, I bet people like Serf are surprised they managed to get their PhD.
After reading these posts, how would any woman who lacks a job feel about writing about her struggles? She would have to have a whole lot of courage and self-worth, knowing what so many readers would think of a woman like that. There is post after post about how she has an advantage, and that women who do get hired are less qualified, and that all over the place women are hired because they are women in spite of competing against less qualified men. I really wish there wasn’t affirmative action, so women didn’t have to deal with this. And I wish more women agreed with me.
I know I’m the beneficiary of a female “bias” on the job market. Of course it would be nicer to believe that I’m just better than all other candidates, or at least, not worse, but I have a hard time believing that’s the case. I see my brilliant male friends work hard and flounder on the market. Most are lucky to get one interview. I am not more talented or hard-working than they are. My first time on the market, I had nine first-round interviews. NINE. Five flyouts, several job offers. I was hired into an all-male department. ALL of the first round interviewees were women. Would I have gotten the job I have if I were a man? Erm, no.
Does it sting a little to be reminded that were I not a woman, I would not be so successful? Yes. You know what would sting worse? Not having a job. Men have it pretty bad in this market. It’s salt in the wound to demand that they pretend it’s not happening, to spare our feelings.
Amanda, I think you’re missing my point altogether. I agree that there are many (many many) men who get hired despite being less qualified or “good” than other applicants (let alone others “on the market”). That’s because there are many ways in which merit (if we can call it that) gets ignored in favor of other things. Nepotism, classism and snobbery, “pedigree”… All kinds of things.
However, it would be absurd to suppose that being female is not one of those non-merit factors, when all institutions are under massive pressure to hire more women (and tell us they’re doing that, and enact policies to that effect, etc)
There are, of course, some cases where A and B might be “relatively equal” under some very broad metric. When you take into account just how fine grained and finicky and idiosyncratic any one search committee is, however, then add the systemic pressure to hire women, the likelihood that A and B really are “equal” or that “equal” is not going to be defined in a way that tends to favor the woman, is very low.
What do you make of my own two experiences: being told before anyone even saw my application that the job would go to a woman? Do you think that is likely in the absence of powerful systemic forces? Or do you just think those forces are probably at work only in those two departments?
Also, to be clear, I don’t think I’ve said anything that implies you are less able or accomplished than lots of men. For all I know you are much better at all this than I am, anyway; it seems that way. I am saying merely that, epistemically, it would be weird to think there is no trend toward hiring women even when they’re plainly less qualified. That could be true even though many women are talented, deserve their positions as much as anyone could, and even though many suffer other kinds of arbitrary or unjust discrimination. Some may even be treated unfairly because they’re women in some respects, though that would be atypical and usually not a “systemic” matter if I’m right.
TT Lady,
Thanks for saying all that. I appreciate your objectivity and humility, and your empathy for the many floundering men like me. Naturally I agree with this:
“Does it sting a little to be reminded that were I not a woman, I would not be so successful? Yes. You know what would sting worse? Not having a job. Men have it pretty bad in this market. It’s salt in the wound to demand that they pretend it’s not happening, to spare our feelings.”
And there’s more salt too. Not only are the men told it’s not happening but, quite often, it’s implied that a man who complains about it (or just notes the fact) is for that reason a loser and woman-hater. Because these policies are supposedly good for women and girls. And for me that last part seems especially stupid and nasty. Three little girls and one woman depend on me. When I’m told I can’t even be considered for a job simply because I’m a man, it’s not just me (the ‘privileged’ one) who then suffers. My wife and kids are thereby deprived of the security and happiness they would most likely have by now, were it not for these supposedly pro-female policies. And, often enough, they’re deprived so that some childless and (relatively) carefree 20-something can have really nice dental benefits and vacations in Cuba. Or whatever such people do with all that money. The whole thing seems to depend on some very narrow and blinkered understanding of the common good. Atomized individualism. Females are important insofar as they are “individuals” (and grown ups) and, it seems, insofar as “equity” for them as individuals tends to undermine the well-being of families and communities. But, yeah, lots and lots of salt.
As I have said all along, I have never denied there is female bias. I don’t know how many times I have to say I agree with that. And that I’ve seen it.But here is one more time. But Serf you claimed you knew in PARTICULAR cases that a woman was hired because she was a woman. You were not just making claims about a trend. I doubt people know in particular cases.
As for interviews, it doesn’t matter how many interviews a woman gets, what matters is the job she got (or didn’t). And whether in that particular job she was hired because she was a woman. If so, she benefited from female bias. If not, she didn’t. So I don’t think every woman benefits, because I don’t see interviews in themselves as a benefit. She only benefits if she got the job. And if departments are giving token interviews to women, I would say that is a detriment. It gets a woman’s hopes up and takes up her time for no good reason, so that is not a benefit.
TT lady I don’t know who you are, but your experience was nothing like mine so I don’t know what to make of that.I was never part of any flyout that was all women, and men were hired instead of me 9 times when you count postdocs and TT hires. I was hired by a department that is 50% women. So I guess I have a different perspective. And honestly, I don’t have “brilliant” male friends not getting hired. I have friends as good as me or slightly better, but I don’t consider myself brilliant.
Also it is a terrible mischaracterization of everything I have said to say that I demand men should pretend that female bias isn’t happening. On almost every thread I have written I have made it clear that I believe it happens. I am hardly demanding that people deny that it doesn’t. In every case this is what I have a problem with, and what I don’t understand people find it so hard to understand: I deny that people can know in particular cases that someone was hired (or not hired) because of gender. Trends are find to talk about. When you talk about particular cases and particular people. (1) Your epistemic ground is shaky, and (2) You hurt particular people. And yes, I think decency calls for not trying to hurt particular people when we can help it. But it especially calls for that when the accusations made are not supported by good evidence. There is good evidence for trends. There is not good evidence for particulars.
Serf, do you really think the fact that you have kids means you have more of a claim to a TT job? We really need to revamp hiring if that is true. And it won’t have anything to do with publications.
Serf, this is why I keep writing. The over statements and things that are not true. Really, that you cannot be considered for a job because you are a man? How can one even have a conversation with statements like that. That is just like the feminists who say they are not considered for a job because they are a woman. Bot are equally false.
And in case I need to say it again. I am against affirmative action, I always have been. I think it happens and I disapprove. But to say men cannot even be considered for a job is just silly.
Serf sorry I guess you were referencing times you were told by search committee members you have no chance. Well, I’m sorry that happened and I disapprove of it. Pretty irresponsible of search committee members to tell you that. Were you a finalist?
Amanda, I am sorry. I certainly did not mean to imply that we know in particular cases, or that we should speculate in particular cases. I do know, however, that men had very little chance of getting my job. I’ve also been told to my face that I got a fellowship because I’m a woman. Didn’t feel good. But the fellowship allowed me to finish my dissertation while caring for 3 young kids: that felt good. Obviously our experiences are different, but given the statistics, mine doesn’t appear to be an outlier.
I agree that there’s no reason to tear a particular person down. The job market is super shitty. There is a bias on the market, and some (sure, not all) women benefit from it. Not all men are harmed by it, but some absolutely are. What does it feel like to be that guy, who sees lots of people getting jobs, some of which he feels he would be a better fit for, if not for his maleness? Is he required to think that those people deserve that job, but not him? So, yes, it can be super irritating when people point at a particular person and say “She didn’t deserve it”. They shouldn’t say that. Nevertheless, of all the things that are irritating and terrible about the current job situation in philosophy, this ranks pretty low on the list.
Hi Amanda,
I’m not sure whether having kids means I have a stronger claim (morally, or something) to a job. The idea doesn’t seem crazy to me. Affirmative action began (historically, and epistemically) from the idea that hiring decisions should be based to some extent on broad social aims–such as, for example, fairness for women, opportunities and ‘role models’, and so on. I’d say that if these kinds of things are legitimate factors in hiring and promotion and the like, then certainly support for children and families is an important social good that might well be taken into account.
Actually I have no principled objection to something like affirmative action (unlike you, maybe). I just think it’s been implemented for the wrong reasons and dishonestly. But if there was some general honest trend toward hiring people with kids for secure positions, that would make sense to me. Who most needs security and benefits? Who’s most likely to commit for the long-term to the institution? How does it benefit society in the long run to systematically disenfranchise dads? There are lots of reasons why this would make sense. I’d have no real objection either if they wanted to give some preference to the poor, or to people who’ve suffered unusual hardship, so long as these people were still highly competitive in terms of “merit”. I can’t see any reason in principle why moral or social values shouldn’t be factored into such decisions.
Anyway the main point was that it seems absurd and callous to worry endlessly about the plight of some 20-something new PhD with no big responsibilities, then give them the nice comfy well-paying jobs, while expecting people with families to do all the shitty work for less pay. If the welfare of females is so important, why is it okay to penalize female children or female adults who depend on men financially just so that other female adults can have nice jobs?
I disagree that it was irresponsible for the committee members to tell me these things. It didn’t harm me, or anyone else, and at least I knew that not getting an interview was not (necessarily) just because I was judged to be no good at the job.
No, I wasn’t a finalist. I was told in both cases that I wouldn’t even be considered prior to any applications having been received. Of course the situation might not be quite so egregious in some other places. Who knows.
What is truly irresponsible, and much worse than that, is that the people in charge don’t clearly tell everyone how their process works. It’s very harmful and insulting to the hundreds of male applicants to lead them on, letting them think they have some real chance of being hired–or a real chance at being interviewed, even–when in reality all of their efforts are entirely futile. If they just said “No men need apply” or “No white people need apply” that would save many people a lot of work and stress and dashed hopes. In some government recruiting systems back in the 90s they used to do that.
“But Serf you claimed you knew in PARTICULAR cases that a woman was hired because she was a woman.”
Yes, I claim to know that it happened in at least two particular cases, on very strong evidence. I was told it would happen by multiple people on the search committee. Also I knew in one case that the school had a simple numerical system for “equity” such that, once the percentage of female faculty was below number n, it was virtually impossible for them to hire a man without violating their own explicit rules. In other cases I have more than enough information about the institution’s policies, the people on the committees, and the kinds of applications received, in order to conclude with very high confidence that, yes, various specific women were hired (partly) because they are women.
I’d agree that I don’t have very strong evidence wrt all particular cases. But I have good enough evidence wrt many, and enough evidence about those together with general trends to be highly suspicious in cases where the woman hired just seems to be very uncompetitive in comparison to any merely average job seeker these days. E.g., no degree or publications, or even just a degree and one or two so-so publications. There are just way too many super-impressive people on the market.
One of the things that keeps shocking me over and over is the number of interviews Amanda and TT Lady announce having. NINE first round interviews? Jesus. I’ve had fewer than that in three years on the market. (And yes pubs player blah blah…)
I’ve had zero this year so far. None. Not a single first-round interview.
The response I expect is ‘Well, Tim (no, not my real name), you really need to reexamine your materials then, or publish more or..’ Here’s the thing: I hired Kelsky to help with my materials. And I did some of the job-mentoring stuff offered elsewhere. And I (literally) have published almost twice the amount that is required for tenure at the institution where I currently have a temporary position. And no, not all of them are epicycle pubs. And there are several areas where I’m one of the `go to’ people to ask.
Yet I’ve had zero first-round interviews. My application is not being taken seriously, it seems. I would love to explain this (this fact, the general one) by anything other than my being a white male. But it’s hard to come up with anything nearly as plausible. And, lest the inference be missed “I won’t be hired (at all) because I’m a while male” does in fact entail “I won’t be hired for this or that particular job because I’m a white male.”
Tim
You should have someone review your file, including your letters, which you cannot see. I have done this once for someone who wrote into Cocoon – with Marcus mediating. Perhaps Marcus would facilitate it, or do it himself, or you can get someone else to do it. There might be a letter that should not be there, or there might be something in your materials – your cover letter – that is messing things up.
Surf: Notice how as soon as you suggest an affirmative action measure that benefits YOU all of a sudden affirmative action is not problematic in any way. If you had your way, what would you be saying to women who are upset becasue they could not find a job because of a lack of children or because they have spouse with a good paying job? I think the point of this thread is to bear in mind this kind of role reversal.
I do need to point out though that it is illegal in the US for a job committee to even ASK job candidates about their marital status or children, let alone make hiring decisions based off of that.
The US is not a place that is friendly to families. I would be the first to admit that. However, the reason it is not friendly to parents does not have to do with the hiring practices at philosophy departments. It is unfriendly to parents because affordable childcare, healthcare, education and the rest of it is not an option.
Remember everyone that there is more to life than a philosophy job, being highly educated means there are lots of other good paying jobs one could enjoy that has security and can support a family.
Guess My Gender (though I won’t):
You’re mischaracterizing my view. I didn’t say that I’m simply in favor of some kind of AA (which would benefit me). Rather, I said that the idea doesn’t seem crazy to me; that I have no principled objection to that general kind of policy; and that preferences for parents (and other people) would make sense to me. Iow, I would find the reasons far more convincing. However I’m still not sure whether, in the end, such policies would be a good idea. Maybe I should have been more clear about that.
You seem to be suggesting that, to the extent that I would or might agree with some form of AA for parents (and others), that is because it would benefit me. Well, I don’t know how you could know that. It”s also possible that my attitude is based on good reasons, some which I’ve already suggested. For example, I believe that support for kids and families is a far more important and fundamental social good than the career prospects of individuals–especially when those individuals are doing something that typically has a low social value to begin with (in my opinion).
It’s possibly worth adding that what I’m imagining would also benefit people other than me, and possibly at my expense. I’m not poor and I never have been, and I’ve never faced any particularly great obstacles in life (unless sex-based discrimination counts). If I was being turned away in favor of someone who was the first in his family to finish high school, who grew up in the ghetto and paid for his education by working at McDonald’s, or whatnot… well, that really wouldn’t bother me morally or philosophically, though of course I’d be bummed not to get the job (and I’d be angry if the powers-that-be were dishonest about such things)…
You ask what I’d say to “women who are upset because they could not find a job because of a lack of children or because they have a spouse with a good paying job”. Well, I’d say that their feelings are understandable, and that such a policy is intrinsically unfair; but I’d also argue that the well being of families and the larger society is much more important than their career prospects. And I’m pretty sure that this argument is much more compelling wrt family-based AA than wrt sex-based AA: it’s just true that society as a whole has a greater interest in supporting existing families and children rather than providing high-end careers with perks and benefits for single 20-somethings or 30-somethings. We could debate that, if you like, but my point is that (as far as I can tell) there is a principled difference between this kind of response to those who lose under the kind of AA I’m imagining as compared with a similar response to the people who lose under actual AA.
Your point about the illegality in the US of asking about marital status seems irrelevant. Many of our laws are bad. So maybe these ones are bad and should be changed.
This is a thought-provoking claim:
“The US is not a place that is friendly to families. I would be the first to admit that. However, the reason it is not friendly to parents does not have to do with the hiring practices at philosophy departments. It is unfriendly to parents because affordable childcare, healthcare, education and the rest of it is not an option.”
I agree with you in some respects. But here’s a further line of thought that might deepen the explanation: One reason why we need “affordable childcare” and many other things is that society has decided to treat the careers of individual-women-qua-individuals as very important and intrinsically good things. In reality the vast majority of women are going to find their greatest satisfactions in life as mothers, and these “careers”, which for most of them are actually just soul-destroying servitude to some impersonal entity, make it impossible for them to have the kinds of lives they really want.
What we now call “affordable childcare” is really a pretty sad thing, when you think about it. What would be ideal would be for parents, especially mothers, to be able to care for their own children at least for the first few years of the child’s life. If only parents could “afford” childcare by having a father with a decent job and benefits, and a mother who could do what most women desperately want to do once they actually have babies and toddlers: STAY HOME and care for their kids, love them and teach them and watch them grow.
But we’ve made that impossible, in part by flooding the market with female competitors who drive down wages for men and exclude them from jobs–even prior to the crushing effects of AA on men.
The main reason why the US is not ‘family-friendly’ (I think) is that rapacious global capitalism is not. The US is not family-friendly for the same reason that it’s not friendly toward anything decent, human or normal. As Marx predicted, all culture and tradition and beauty must eventually be destroyed by capitalism; so now we’re apparently at the phase where families are to be destroyed, and beyond that even the basic human understanding of sex and sexuality… and beyond that, who knows what will come next; but clearly the end game is some kind of utterly atomized, dehumanized society. Feminist AA and other ‘leftist’ trends are an essential part of the process; the banks and corporations love atomization and hate families, communities, nations and cultures… The state hates these things too, of course, since they represent sources of solidarity and power and loyalty that are not (yet) under state control…
I am not saying women shouldn’t have jobs outside the home. But I think that for most, once they realize just how shitty most of those jobs are, and how deep their connection is with their children… They will tend to strongly de-prioritize “careers”, at least for many years. I don’t think I’ve known even one woman, even with a fancy “career”, who didn’t find that, once she had a child, those work projects and relationships suddenly seemed a bit empty and beside-the-point.
So one further reason against actual AA (and perhaps in support of some other kind) is that actual AA creates a situation in which both sexes are being directed away from the form of life that would be most fulfilling, on the whole, for them. At least, that’s a reasonable theory is we can place any stock in near universal cultural traditions, or what is known of human biology and physiology, or what almost everyone seems to just feel and intuit deep down… If instead we are to go by trendy left-wing sociology or corporate Human Resources literature, then perhaps this additional argument fails.
“Remember everyone that there is more to life than a philosophy job, being highly educated means there are lots of other good paying jobs one could enjoy that has security and can support a family.”
No offense, but this strikes me as cheery bullshit. I’ve spent years looking for some halfway decent job outside of the academic gulag and I’ve never been able to get an interview. A philosophy PhD, or mine, at least, certainly has not given me the option of “lots of good paying jobs” let alone jobs that provide security. I’ve been offered data-entry or copy-editing (on a contract) and… nothing else. Guess My Gender, if you really have any solid ideas about these “lots of high paying jobs” I would love to hear. But I do mean something solid and specific, not just something like “Philosophers are valued by corporations because they think critically” or other such nonsense.
Maybe it’s me. Or maybe I haven’t been able to look hard enough while teaching as an adjunct. Who knows. But it doesn’t sound plausible to me.
I want to offer one point that hasn’t been raised yet: there is evidence that sexism affects teaching evaluations in a concrete and measurable way, in that students systematically give lower evaluations to female teachers compared to male teachers (even in controlled studies with the same person instructing online using a male vs. female name). The same is also true for instructors in other marginalized groups (e.g., non-white, presumed to be working class, presumed to be LGBT+, non-native English speaker, having a visible disability). This means that seemingly objective measures of teaching merit — how good are the candidates’ evals? – are not really objective: the minority female instructor likely has to work a lot harder and do better at teaching to get 4.5/5 evals (say) than would a white male candidate. (For example, see: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10755-014-9313-4)
There’s also a lot of empirical evidence that people’s CVs are assessed differently due to demographic differences – identical resumes with male names are presumed to be more competent than those with female names, for example, and the same is true of typically white vs. Hispanic or African-American names. (For example, see: http://gender.stanford.edu/news/2014/why-does-john-get-stem-job-rather-jennifer).
This might pop up in other ways, as well: philosophy is a field in which there are strong presumptions of “genius” – we assume that the stars of our profession must have some roughly fixed amount of smartness or philosophical ability, and getting the same (or better) results through slow hard work is not as valued. One pernicious effect of this is that men (and white people) are significantly more likely to be perceived as “geniuses” than are women or minorities. (See https://qz.com/959409/philosophers-are-the-original-tech-bros/)
None of this is to suggest that there is no “female bias” at all in hiring, or that the scales completely even out. But there is at least a case to be made — and of course, this would require robust empirical analysis of the sort I’m not able to do in a blog post – that some hiring or assessment preferences for women/minority candidates is a sensible, realistic antidote to the ways in which the teaching and research of women and racial minorities is systematically undervalued (and in some cases, the work of white men over-valued.) That is to say, there may be some reason to think that that (given the sorts of features mentioned above) a minority woman candidate whose CV is equally “objectively good” (whatever that means) as a white male’s has actually had to work harder and achieve more in order to reach this same result.
To be clear, I’m not suggesting that anyone in this market has it easy, including white men! And there are surely ways in which they have it especially hard. But the conversation should not ignore the other ways in which women/minorities have it hard, especially if these can lead to similar amounts of effort/”talent” producing different results.
Tim: I don’t mean to contest that there are significant gender effects in hiring (the ADPA report indicates that there are). However, I am not convinced that those effects (whatever their causes) explain why you received zero interviews. I was on the market just a few years ago (during the time the ADPA data was collected), and in my last two years on the market (as a straight white male) I received 7 and 13 interviews, respectively.
This makes me wonder whether there might be some other explanation for your job-market performance. If you don’t mind me asking (and no worries if you do):
(1) Which part of the Leiter-ranking does your grad program fall under? (To avoid identifying your program, you need not be precise–just give a range “top 10”, “30-40”, etc.)
(2) What types of journals are your publications in? (Top 10?, Top 20?, Top 5 specialist?)
(3) How broad is your teaching experience?
(4) How good are your student evaluations?
Here’s why I ask. Following something Amanda has said before, my sense is that certain types of job-market strategies are likely to work well for graduates from certain types of programs but work poorly for graduates from other types of programs. It would be helpful to find out whether your case coheres with a working hypothesis I’ve been thinking about…
Serf I agree that if a committee is only going to hire women they should advertise it like that. Although, I don’t think that should ever happen (but it does.) The reason I think the committee members were irresponsible is that it seems the inns and outs of search committee decisions should be kept private, for many many reasons. Well, either private or 100% out in the open. I don’t think search committee members should have the discretion to tell whomever they please private going ons in the meetings. (although it isn’t that big of a deal).
There is female bias. There is prestige bias. There is bias toward certain topics and backgrounds. So given that there are plenty of different biases. And given that (roughly) half of all hires every year are white men, I just don’t know how any white man can know that their gender explains why they are not getting a job. Of course, if, like Serf, one is directly told their gender explains things, then you can know why you didn’t get that job.(sort of, because there is no guarantee you would have gotten it if the department wasn’t set on hiring a woman. perhaps the same woman would have gotten it.) Still, most people aren’t told this. And it would only explain why one person did not get one job, not why they didn’t get a job overall. I just think it is an epistemic mistake that any one white guy thinks that being a white guy explains why he didn’t get a job. Too many confounding factors.
I will repeat one thing I have said is that I still think far too many people think getting top publications is a good strategy for getting a job, when it often isn’t. So if people think gender explains why they don’t get interviews, maybe they should think about their overall strategy. I think top publications is a very poor strategy for people from low ranked schools, especially past a certain number. One might just consider this possibility, since one obviously cannot do anything about their gender.
Random other fact: At my university many women have been on the market many years and do not have a job or have had many interviews. This might not mean anything overall, but in case one thinks almost every woman gets lots of interviews, they don’t. And for these women it must really suck, because they feel like they are failing in spite of this huge advantage. Maybe they are. Just something to think about. I do not mean to tell anybody what they can or cannot talk about.
Serf,
I am curious what you mean when you talk about people with “no degree” getting a job over you. Do you mean they are ABD? Because, as far as I know, no one other than Kripke has a tt job without a PhD.
Hi Amanda, I can think of 5 women I know personally who got jobs ABD, with no experience or publications. (I didn’t mean they got hired no degree then stayed on and got tenure with no degree!) I don’t think I know of any cases where similar men got jobs. But in these cases they did, of course, get degrees at some later time (after being hired). Most then also published something, if only dribs and drabs over the next dozen years.
Still, given the glut of highly qualified and accomplished job seekers for many years now, getting hired or even seriously considered while meeting none of these basic standards is mind boggling. (Though all 5 I’m thinking of seemed to feel this was no more than what was due to them.)
I agree with you that a white man can’t reasonably assume that, for any job he didn’t get, the reason was his race and sex. But he can reasonably assume that, on the whole, he often didn’t get interviewed or hired for that reason (assuming he applies often and over a few years, without knowing much about many particular failed applications). The only exceptions might be white men who are at the very top of the top of the profession by all other metrics. It would be silly to think otherwise, given what we all know about policies, politics, and so on.
Serf,
The bias toward women exists not because it is beneficial for those women. I don’t think individual departments are motivated by such abstract considerations re: advancing the careers of women generally as a societal good. Departments are more likely to hire women because it is beneficial for those departments to have a gender balance on their faculty. The administration or other departments or students may be getting on their case about their gender imbalance. Maybe they feel that to attract more majors, they should have more women on the faculty to attract, particularly, female students.
Also, I’m a bit puzzled— you seem to be operating on the assumption that men on the market are more likely to have children than women? Idk if that’s the case, but I see no reason to believe that women on the market are all (or much more likely to be) single and spending their vacations in Cuba, while men are all (or much more likely to be) married with kids.
Also, I am a woman who has no desire to stay at home with my children. I love my kids. I love picking them up from daycare. I love the days we have when, energized by work, I spend time focused purely on them. I find my work more, not less, meaningful after having children.
Hi TT,
I didn’t mean to imply that (actual) AA exists “because it is beneficial for those women”. What I meant was that the official justification for it is that (supposedly) it is good for women, and that (supposedly) that’s good for society (in making it more fair or ‘equitable’ or something like that). Would you disagree that this is the kind of justification typically offered? E.g., “We’re helping women overcome unfair obstacles and discrimination” or “It’s good for philosophy/society to have women better ‘represented’ in the discipline’”…?
Of course, the real causes might have little to do with anyone consciously aiming to improve anything.
You’re right, of course, that individual hiring committees are not motivated mainly (if at all) by some wish to improve society. But then we have to ask why they tend to think it’s “beneficial for those departments to have a gender balance on the faculty”. This is hardly a self-evident proposition–that achieving some nebulously defined “balance” is not just good, but so important that it’s worth systematically privileging female applicants. I don’t think the main reason is that they just have empirical evidence that doing this attracts more female students. And for that matter, why is it important to attract female students? Maybe you’d have just as many students with an all-male faculty, even if they were mostly male students. Why would that be bad? (Is it bad if most nursing students or English students are female? Personally it seems to me it’s neither good nor bad in itself–it all depends on how things came to be that way, what the effects might be on people or society…) None of this is desirable except given certain ideological assumptions or value judgments which are shaping the whole culture over many decades.
…
No, I’m not assuming that men are more likely to have kids than women. I just meant that it’s absurd to worry about “privilege” and hardship for a class of people (women in general) who just are clearly not particularly disadvantaged or poor or saddled with big responsibilities–especially when there is another class (including lots of women) who clearly are in that situation, and a sub-class (the men with kids) who are being systematically treated as if they were “privileged” and comfortable… in order to then assign the worst and most precarious jobs to a sub-class who’ll in fact be most adversely affected, along with their dependents…
If you personally are happy with your situation, good for you. Still I’d suggest that on the whole the emphasis on having a “career” is deeply misguided and in the end disappointing for most people, and especially for young women. Pretty much all the evidence and experience available to us suggests that, on the whole, this is a very poor value system and form of life for most women. Though, again, I think “careers” and jobs are mostly bad for most people; it’s just that, for various reasons, this focus is especially bad for young women–and by the time they realize it might have been a big mistake, many of them have already missed out on a lot of more fulfilling experiences and projects… One problem with academic treatments of these issues may be that the kinds of people who get heard–relatively successful academics–are such an unrepresentative and tiny sample of humanity; but they typically seem not to realize just how different they are from most people. What works for them, given their very unique career paths and their fairly unusual temperaments and values, is not likely to work for most people.
Serf: I disagree that this (creating an equitable society, or correcting for disadvantage) is the type of justification offered. The main consideration I’ve heard from faculty members who think it is a good thing to have a gender balance on faculty is that female students are being driven away from the male-dominated department. And no, it’s not just that one attracts majors who look like them (so the #s would stay the same), but rather, those would-be majors who are women look at the department, get a feel for the social interactions among students and faculty, and think “not for me” because of how male-dominated it is. This does happen. Whether this happens regularly enough to make a large difference in numbers, I don’t know. Another consideration I’ve heard is that women are less likely to harass their students, and more likely to create an environment in which students feel supported if they are subject to harassment. Also a real thing: men who are accustomed to being taught by women treat their female peers with more respect. These are all pragmatic considerations about one’s own department (including making the experience of female students better), not grand considerations about creating an equitable society, or correcting for whatever disadvantage women have (relative to men) in philosophy. But I have seen responses like that of “AnotherPerspective” above, in response to allegations of unfairness. I think such responses are a bit wrong-headed, since hiring someone is not an exercise in discovering who is most deserving of the position, but rather, discovering who is the best person for one’s own department.
TT,
I think we’re talking past each other.
Yes, of course, the main justification you’ll hear from faculty members is stuff to do with “gender balance” in that department, etc.
At the same time, there are much larger and older forces at work in society as a whole which largely explain why individual people or departments nowadays are so concerned with this kind of stuff. Or so it seems to me, anyway. I mean, in 1920 (let’s say) there were very few people in philosophy or any discipline or any sector of society worrying publicly about “gender balance”. Now it’s almost impossible to find any line of work or profession or hobby that isn’t regularly being examined and re-examined and criticized on this basis. (Not “enough” female video game designers or rock drummers or rappers or philosophy of math specialists… etc.) Surely you’d agree that the broad change across the whole society, including various particular philosophy departments, is due to larger political-social-economic factors?
I’m simply saying that policies and preferences at the micro-level of some little philosophy department don’t merely reflect the ideas or interests of some handful of people directly involved. These are mostly just cogs in a big machine responding to pressures and incentives from much higher up, and from long before these people even got involved… Do you disagree?
A few thoughts about other points you raise, to do with ‘pragmatic’ considerations…
A lot of this seems to be theorizing about how the sexes interact, psychology and socializing, etc. I don’t know how to assess some of these claims. For instance, I was taught by a fair number of female professors throughout my schooling. Since I was always (I think) pretty ‘respectful’ toward women, I really have no idea how that experience might have affected me. My general sense is that most guys who are interested in philosophy or other highly nerdy intellectual pursuits are already pre-selected in these respects–you’re not generally going to get too many super-high-T macho men who aren’t ‘respectful’. (I realize many feminists have a different impression, but I just can’t believe it based on my own experiences.)
In any case, I’d just add that there are so many more obvious things going on psycho-sexually-socially in this context; so the overall picture hardly supports the idea that “gender balance” is a worthy ideal.
One thing to bear in mind is that, for most men, the presence of young nubile women is going to be VERY distracting. It’s going to induce all kinds of behaviors and vibes that, if we really are concerned with purely philosophical aims, are probably not so great. When I was a grad student, it was simply impossible for me to concentrate on Plato or Frege when I was surrounded by these gorgeous young things. I loved it, of course! But it wasn’t exactly conducive to philosophical excellence. Much of the time I felt I was competing with other guys in class, or the male professor, for the approval or attention of the ladies. And it was impossible to just talk philosophy with the more enticing ones; there was always, on some level, something like flirtation or sexual evaluation at least–the better the debate or discussion or exploration, the more sexual it became. How could it be otherwise? Talking and getting to know someone of the opposite sex intellectually (if you’re into that one) is intrinsically sexy if you’re an intellectual (and if the other person isn’t so unattractive in other ways that it’s a non-starter). And I’m pretty sure this goes on for women too, if not in quite the same way.
So, of course, given these inevitable human dimensions of “gender balance” and unisex institutions, you then get all kinds of problems. Men competing with each other for female attention. Women competing with each other for male attention. Men thinking that they’ve been encouraged to make a move, then “harassing” someone as a result. (Not to say that there is no genuine harassment–just that “harassment” is a predictable effect of our whole societal set-up.) Many male professors holding attractive women to very different standards than male students. How could they not? The males are instinctively perceived as highly threatening sexual competitors. The females are instinctively perceived as non-threatening, alluring, a source of psycho-sexual validation… And other males, embittered or resentful, becoming misogynistic… Just scratching the surface here.
To me it still seems utterly ludicrous that I’m supposed to interact in the same way with a bunch of 20-year old dudes, who have zero effect on me for the most, along with similarly aged girls, who are primal lust objects for pretty much all men of all ages. I’m expected to act like some kind of sexless robot, when half of them are prancing into class with insane T/A cleavage, heels, etc. It’s not humanly possible. Of course I do my very best to evaluate them impartially. But come on. In effect, the situation is that female sexual power is almost entirely unconstrained while male sexual desire is supposed to be shameful (‘inappropriate’) and, if acted on even just a bit, possibly illegal and career-destroying. (All traditional norms of female modesty and restraint are bad, while traditional norms for men are maintained and amped up…) This weird unnatural situation is not good for anyone. I can’t imagine it’s particularly good for education or philosophy.
Of course some might say I’m just reporting on my own twisted weird psychology. No. I’m just a regular guy, just being honest. Men who deny having these feelings are either very unreflective or else they’re just trying to get social approval for having (supposedly) enlightened and virtuous attitudes.
All that to say, I’m just not sure that “gender balance” is good in any way, let alone something that’s so valuable we should be working towards it. (And I’ve really only mentioned a few ‘problematic’ dimensions of “gender balance”…)
Lol I’ve had many very attractive male professors and grad students friends, but I think working with them philosophically has been not difficult at all. Indeed, the fact that I might find an interlocutor ‘sexy’ is something I might spend 30 seconds thinking about and another 2 minutes joking about. That’s it. In fact, I have a good friend who I am attracted to, and who is attracted to me, at least in the sense we both find each other good looking. However we have a great, purely platonic philosophical friendship. I think this is what grown ups do for goodness sake. Sure attraction might be there, but if you are not 14 you get past that very quickly. As a young attractive woman I have no problem having philosophical friendships with males who may or may not be attracted to me. It really makes no difference. (Of course, on occasion someone might have a “crush” where they get very nervous or what not, but I think it takes a lot more than someone simply being attractive for that to happen.) And besides, that is part of life.
If one were to take a TT position at a community college, then do you think that the chances of being taken seriously as an applicant for university positions in the future go out the window?
I’m …. speechless. And done engaging.
Hi Amanda,
“As a young attractive woman…”
I’m sure things are very different for women, and very different for young attractive women. But I was mainly talking about how things are experienced by men (young/attractive or not). When you say it “really makes no difference” I have to wonder about that. Sex is a very powerful force in human life. In the old days, I assume a lot of really important things happened in the universities as a result of sexual relationships or sexual favors or sexual pressures and dynamics that nowadays would be considered totally unacceptable (though they still go on anyway). Now we have an increasingly complicated legalistic scheme for trying to manage sexuality. You don’t even that sexual dynamics lead to all kinds of ‘implicit bias’, for example? Like, for example, a senior male prof might treat “an attractive young woman” or her work very differently than in the case of an unattractive woman, or a young man? I don’t know. Common sense or everyday experience seems (to me) to suggest that this would be a very strong tendency.
Hi Serf,
Yes, I may have been overstating the “no difference”. Indeed if there is anything the recent flurry of sexual harassment stories has taught is that far more of this stuff goes around than many realized. And I’m sure some people are treated differently for the reasons you say, at least sometimes. Whether women are treated better or worse I think varies, but different yes. And yes I’ve had to deal with creeps in philosophy. I guess I just figure it’s life that a certain percentage of people will be like that. Personally I was kind of confused by #metoo because I just thought it was obvious that being an adult woman meant you have run into creeps here and there.
Anyway, I do think, at least, a lot of people can have philosophical friendships in spite of attraction. And yes, I have never been a young man and the biology works different there. I guess in my experience most men are initially flattered when I tease them, and once we get past that then we can usually be friends. But, you have a decent point this isn’t always the case. I feel some of the worst of it is actually women who dislike each other because they feel to be in some sort of competition. I get along with men easier than woman in philosophy and I’m not sure why. Anyhow I would certainly want my high schoolers (if I had kids) to go to single gender school as I think they could learn better. But past high school even if these things interfere,I think we need to try our best to deal with it. And even if we can’t get rid of the tension entirely, we can do well enough where a philosophical community is still possible in spite of attraction.
To be clear, I didn’t mean to suggest all sexual tension and different treatment comes from harassers or creeps.My guess is some male professors will treat attractive women better and that would be a benefit. But I also think it is just as likely that they might not take her seriously so it is a detriment. Or, they might just feel awkward and hence she gets less feedback. In the end I think the positive/negative treatment that comes from being an object of attraction to others balances out.
Thinking Things Over,
My guess would be this is not true at teaching schools at all. It would likely be true for research schools. But if you are able to have the CC job and still do decent publishing (not great or top) I think you would be an attractive prospect for many teaching jobs. What do you think Marcus?
Amanda: I completely agree. I could easily see someone moving from a full-time CC position to a TT position at a teaching-focused four-year university. It would just be important to publish and excel as a teacher. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone move from a CC to a research school.
As an additional aside, I’m not sure I would worry too much about moving from a CC to a 4-year university. I hear full-time CC jobs are awesome: that they can pay well and be a heck of a lot less stressful than a job at a 4-year…
Thank you for the encouraging responses. 🙂
Hi Amanda,
I agree with most of that. I was going to mention all the “harassment” stuff myself as an example.
The following seems easy to explain:
“I feel some of the worst of it is actually women who dislike each other because they feel to be in some sort of competition. I get along with men easier than woman in philosophy and I’m not sure why.”
That’s because they are in competition, whether they consciously realize it or not. There are only so many attractive men to go around. No one wants to settle for the men other women don’t want. Quite probably, if you’re young and hot and good at philosophy, the women are jealous, resentful or insecure; the men will have different responses. That’d be one natural explanation, at least. (Then there’s the intellectual-professional competition too, of course! But that kind of competition tends to have a sexual dimension as well…)
I find it interesting that we nowadays think we’re so sophisticated and knowledgeable about sexuality while ignoring all this stuff that would have been common sense to our great-grand-parents. Or we pretend not to know.
For example, men just are WAY more easily turned on by visuals, WAY more fascinated by sheer physical sex. And no, this isn’t something that goes away after age 14. This is just what almost all men are naturally like. In old-fashioned cultures, women dress more modestly in part to protect themselves from unwanted attention, but also in part as a kindness to men.
I suspect that many women simply don’t believe this because it’s foreign to them, or because it seems gross or weird to them. And men typically won’t be honest with women about this stuff, for obvious reasons. But as one piece of evidence (if any is really needed!) consider the behavior of gay men: this is how men act sexually when there are no women involved to influence the proceedings. Yes, they really are inconceivably promiscuous–like, in some studies, many of these guys report 100s of sex partners yearly. (And do lesbians do that?)
On campus, men nowadays are being bombarded with this crazy hyper-stimulation. Sorry if this is impolite, but it’s worth mentioning just to indicate how insane this is: years back when girls starting wearing yoga pants, I realized that in some cases I could see distinct vaginal lips. Or, at least, I could very easily make out fine details of each ass cheek. I mean, what the fuck??? And now this is normal. I wasn’t trying very hard to see, though it was also kind of hard not to look. I shouldn’t have to see vaginas when I’m trying to concentrate on my job.
Officially, guys are being told something like this: “These female human beings are no different from you; they’re just ‘fellow students’ who are here to study and get their credentials; it would be ‘sexist’ to regard them as mere sex objects… blah, blah, blah… Now be a good boy, get back to your calculus homework.” While everything they see around them is basically screaming “Fuck!” non-stop directly into their nervous systems. Talk about cognitive dissonance. I’m pretty sure that putting guys into this situation–worse, RAISING them in this for their whole lives–results in serious unrecognized health problems. And then we give the ones who can’t get a girlfriend porn as a release, I guess. (We’ll see how that works out long-term.)
I’m not saying that women shouldn’t be dressing to attract interest from men (or rather, the men they want to be interested). But it’s just insane to set up this situation where many of them are quite literally indistinguishable from streetwalkers, and then expect a bunch of super-horny late-teen guys to treat them as if nothing sexual was going on.
What’s a man supposed to do? Not even looking and enjoying the spectacle is emasculating. Looking is immoral. There’s nothing you can do.
But I don’t mean to suggest it’s only a problem for men. Of course the culture creates all kinds of new and special problems for women. Obviously most women are not benefiting in the long run from a system where they have to give men sex before they can even be sure there’s going to be any kind of personal relationship. (They’d better, because if they don’t there are lots of other girls who will…) All that is causing serious long-lasting psychic damage to women, in particular. Especially for them, all that cheap meaningless sex and ‘dating’ physiologically diminishes their capacity for bonding deeply to a man. (Science is now just beginning to understand the mechanics.) Then there’s all the nasty long-term effects of the pill, abortion, etc. Overall it’s probably far worse for women in many ways than it is for men, even though a lot of this stuff was supposedly all about helping women, liberating them, etc
Anyway, yeah… It’s very unclear to me why it’s supposed to be so great to have men and women participating “equally” in everything!
I just want to say that I’ve been following this thread for useful and interesting discussion, but Serf’s confessional rants about Darwinism, philosophy, sex and whatnot are not just off-topic but completely off-putting as well.
Well Serf, we have gotten far off topic from managing philosophical relationships in spite of natural human biology. But fwiw, I agree with most (not all) of what you say. Although I myself would never be that blunt out of fear of alienating people both professionally and even friendship wise. Which is interesting…
Let’s entertain Serf’s picture of sexuality permeating all social relationships for a minute, along with his idea that this creates a great obstacle for men when they seek to interact with female colleagues and female students (as they become distracted by their sexual desires), and we bring this back to the original question Serf posed of whether “gender balance” in a philosophy department is even a desirable goal.
If we work with Serf’s assumptions then his suspicion appear to be right: gender balance among faculty is not desirable. Given the way that he has described things, however, this is because men cannot work under sexually charged situations, whereas he suggests that women can. So, the logical conclusion would seem to be that philosophy departments should be run by women, as women will not be distracted by students wearing yoga pants or other sexy clothing and are so adept at tuning out sexual currents that they are often (happily) oblivious to what Serf suggests is really going on in men’s minds as they navigate the world. In fact, a similar line of argument has been put forward by Dana Nessel campaigning for the position of Michigan Attorney General
Serf might respond that even this will not do the trick. I was thinking only of the plight of male professors, but what about the male students? Male undergraduates will still be condemned to lose themselves in a sexual mist when a female student in yoga pants walks into the classroom and sits next to them, or their female professor wearing a pencil skirt turn around to write on the board. Ok, so what now? It would seem that the only way to overcome this issue completely would be to have fully sex-segregated schools and universities. Women teach female students and men teach male students.
But does this even truly solve the problem? What about when those women want to present their work at conferences? Their male colleagues at the now all-male universities are entirely out of practice in encountering women who can debate philosophical issues on the level of a professional philosopher. Adding fuel to the burning fire of desire, these are men who have dedicated their lives to philosophy and thus they are likely to be sapio-sexuals, only heightening the sexual allure of these female professional philosopher. Perhaps the male professors will end up treating their female counterparts dismissively, or patronizing them–but whatever the case may be, one thing seems certain: Given Serf’s set of assumptions, they will not be able to engage with them in a philosophically productive manner. Ok, so sex-segregated conferences now appear to be necessary.
But why would this be a problem only in academia? If this is how the world works, then I don’t want my sister consulting a tax attorney who can’t get over the idea of her sweet behind! He will just be more likely to perform a miscalculation or overlook something of importance. So, if we are working with the assumption that men’s relationship to their sexual desire is such that they cannot work productively in sexually charged situations and the only way to deal with this is to remove “sexual triggers” because there is nothing men can do to off-set the power of sexual attraction, then we find ourselves tumbling toward the idea that our society needs to be segregated by sex on all levels.
But does this even solve the problem? We have been working under a strong hetero-normative assumption this whole time. Remember, Serf also has cited gay men as being just as powerless toward their sexual desires (while lesbians, insofar as they are women, are not, see Serf above). Ok, so, a sex-segregated society appears to have only solved the issue for the women. What now?
I could continue (send all gay men to live with the women? give up on the male-sector of society and subjugate them fully to the female-sector?), but at this point I think that it is clear that we should give up the project of eliminating all possibility of being “sexually-triggered”, reassess the assumptions about whether sexual attraction must necessarily ruin one’s ability to function intellectually, and look for a different route. I agree that sexual attraction and desire is something that is present in more interactions than many people would like to admit. I do not, however, believe that this must be detrimental to one’s ability to function professionally.
Hm: the obvious answer is we do away with men! Either that, or we just try our best in spite of sexual attraction, which I do think is an issue we will always have, although I do not think the problem is nearly as dire as Serf proposes.
What I find most amusing about Serf’s latest bout of confessional diarrhea (though I will admit that there is stiff competition on this front) is its emphasis upon how immensely difficult it must be for the swarms of (apparently) lecherous men in philosophy to restrain themselves when a woman attends a philosophy seminar in yoga pants. However difficult it may be to fully immerse oneself in The Phenomenology of Spirit when a female philosopher saunters by in pants that reveal “fine details of each ass cheek”, one doubts that it even approaches the difficulty of getting through the vicissitudes of grad school and the job market while a non-trivial number of those around you can’t seem to pry their eyes away from your “liberating” attire!
Thinking things over,
I am inclined to think that it is near impossible to move from a permanent position at a CC to a typical 4 year state college. I cannot imagine any of my colleagues (now or former) giving such an applicant consideration. So I would not hold out hope for that possibility.
I am struck by the fact that people think it is odd that their fates are sealed by a decision that they made when they were 22 – to go to this grad program rather than another. Clearly, their fate to go to a grad program of whatever rank they chose was also determined, to a large extent, by their decision to go to a certain four year college, a decision made when they were 17. You get the picture … I think the USA is a lot more like Japan or Korea than most “middle class” Americans realize.
Humanati: one solution to the last problem would be to dress more modestly. I know that’s a strange idea, but it just might help everyone concerned. On the other hand, it could be that some women are aware of their sexual power and enjoy exercising it. (But then perhaps as a favor to other females? A gesture toward leveling the playing field?)
Hm: Good idea. I hope in the near future white men will just drop out of the humanities altogether. They’ll be happier and so will everyone else. Another option is a return to 19th century norms, but that’s unlikely. Trouble is, a group that prevents its own men from leading and achieving will soon be dispossessed by some other more masculine group. So, either white sharia or the old-fashioned kind seems to be the long term prognosis.
Serf: I am going to ask that we turn this thread back to its topic – the actual job market. I think the discussion has strayed quite far afield away from that.
Fate: Thank you for the honest take. I am in a fixed term position at a 4-year university and weighing the options for the future. Many things about a CC position seem desirable (financial stability not be the least of them), but it seems that I would need to seriously entertain the possibility of never making it back into a university setting… Much to consider.
Thinking Things Over: ‘Fate’ May be right that it would be near impossible to move from a CC to a state college. Be that as it may, I think it is still possible to move to a teaching SLAC. While I cannot speak for my colleagues, I would be very surprised if they or others at similar kind of university would hold a CC job against someone with a great teaching record and good research record.
Each committee is different, but my experience as a grad school adjunct who was good friends with the TT members at a state college makes me think a CC person would be considered just as well as anyone else. This is different if the school has a grad program in philosophy, which would make it a research school. I also adjuncted at a fancy slac and I think they would be unlikely to consider it, well, because they are fancy. I would say fancy is the key.
Fate: Yes your academic career is largely determined by how well you did in high school. I think this speaks to just how not egalitarian academia usually is, since there is a huge correlation between wealth and going to a fancy high school which gets you into a fancy college.
Marcus
I do not get the distinction you draw between a 4 year state college and a teaching SLAC. I think they amount to the same thing, with the same basic prejudice against the CCs. Am I missing something in the distinction you are drawing?
Fate: judging by some of the things you and others have said on the blog about state colleges, I gather they may place a greater premium on research than some of the non-elite liberal arts universities I have experience with (as an interviewee, friend of people who work at such places, etc.). For instance, I have heard it said a number of times on the Cocoon that state college search committees care about Leiter rank, journal rankings, etc. My sense is that while private liberal arts universities come in different flavors (size, ranking, etc.), a good number of them seem to attach much less value to Leiter rank or journal rankings, in some cases looking at both of these things not even as positives in a candidate, but as potential negatives.
Indeed, my sense is that there is a real spectrum of school-types and what they look in candidates. On one far end of the spectrum, there are R1’s, which seem to care a great deal about institutional prestige, Leiter rank, and high ranking journals. Elite liberal arts universities seem close to R1’s in these regards, while seeming to attach substantially more weight to teaching. Somewhere further down the spectrum—I gather from what I have read over the years at the Cocoon—come state schools, which still seem to attach significant weight to program ranking and journal rankings, but less so than R1’s and elite SLACs. Then there are what I will call “tweener” SLACs and MLACs,, which are not elite, do attach some value to research (wanting a peer reviewed publishing record from candidates), but do not attach much value to Leiter ranking or journal rankings—attaching less value to these things and far more to teaching. Then, rounding out the far other end of the spectrum I will call “teaching primary” SLACs and CCs, which don’t attach much value at all to research, only teaching. For instance, I have friends at very small teaching SLACs who have not only gotten tenure but promoted to full Professor with only one or two publications in low- to mid-ranked journals (which would never fly at “tweener” SLACs).
My sense is that there are all of these types of schools, and perhaps more in addition—and that they all differ substantially over their hiring priorities and what they look for in candidates.
Another type of school is one where philosophy is combined with either political science, religion, or history, and there is a master’s program within the combined department but not philosophy. These schools tend to have 3-2 teaching loads and care about rank and research but not nearly as much as R1s.
Anybody figure out how to upload letters to the Sam Houston State University application? It doesn’t seem there is a way to handle confidential letters. Who has their letters of recommendation on their computers? I’m puzzled about this.
ABD4ever: I emailed the search committee chair, and he said I could submit them directly to him. I’d send an email asking and confirm this, then have interfolio send them directly. Good luck with the search!
Endless Apps: Thanks! I gave that a try. Good luck to you as well!
Apologies in advance if this question has already been addressed here (in which case I’d appreciate if someone could provide a link).
I’m preparing for an interview in the UK, and I’m unfamiliar with that system. I will give a half hour presentation, and the instructions make it sound like a cross between a teaching demo and a traditional job talk.
I’m not particularly inclined to use powerpoint or even a handout, since the topic is very accessible, the positions/arguments very straightforward, and the timeframe is short. Is this a mistake?
I would like to solicit people’s opinions on something, if I may. Though it is only somewhat indirectly connected to the job-market; it may be of interest given the (historical) importance of the APA for job seekers.
The APA’s website lists Feb 15 as the closing date for submissions to the Eastern division. I understand this to mean that one can make submissions through the 15th. When I logged in I found that closing date Feb 15' meantFeb 15 12.00AM’, so the submission date is in fact the 14th. Am I right to feel duped? Is it reasonable to think that the 12.00AM Feb 15 cut off should be on the publicly viewable website, and not just on the website you must first pay to access?
Woeful that is very odd. I would have thought the same thing you thought.
Thanks, Amanda.
Has anyone ever requested a refund for their APA membership?
I’m sorry to say that being able to submit is the only reason I have to join the APA – the new journal and other changes notwithstanding. If they can’t be upfront about their submission procedure, whilst also demanding people pay to access that procedure, then I not sure they should be able to keep my money.
Does anyone know how much time usually elapses between a UK interview and either (i) an offer or (ii) rejection? Some have advised me that if you’re their first choice, then you’ll usually receive an informal phone call on the same day. Others have reported that you can sometimes get an e-mail offer from HR the next day, and that’s the first you’ll hear of it.
I’ve heard it’s the same or next day. I had a European interview once and asked around.
What are the normal interview practices for non-TT positions like postdocs, VAPs, and adjuncts? I’ve only ever witnessed searches for TT positions, where candidate visits are a pretty big deal, last several days, involve a job talk, etc. But do VAP candidates also give job talks? Or teaching demonstrations? Or is it just an interview? What about postdocs? It seems like some postdocs don’t do interviews at all, while others do…maybe? I recognize that this probably varies a lot, but it’s something I’ve become curious about (now that I’m almost certainly going to be applying for some VAP jobs).
In my experience it varies. I’ve Skype interviewed for a VAP position that was also planning on doing flyouts, and I’ve Skype interviewed for a VAP position that wasn’t planning on doing flyouts.
My PhD program usually does Skype interviews without flyouts for VAPs.
There is no standard process for hiring VAPs. Some schools do both Skype and fly outs. Some only do Skype. Others do only fly outs. And some schools hire VAPs with no interview whatsoever!
Thanks! No interviews at all is really shocking – VAPs do a lot of teaching, you would think departments would be more interested in learning about them before making a hire.
Postdocs vary as well. I’ve had four flyouts for postdocs. The one postdoc I actually accepted hired me with no interview at all. It was just an application and then an acceptance letter.
Round two: I’ve had two rounds of Skype interviews for a VAP. My postdoc didn’t interview at all, but a colleague was interviewed for his. Like the others said, it seems pretty variable.
Has anyone heard anything at all from SUNY Oswego about their 1 year visiting position?
Does anyone have any guess about how long it takes from last flyout to first offer?
Has anyone heard from U Manitoba yet?
Peter: I only have one recent experience to go by, but they had a hiring meeting one week after the last flyout, and got back to candidates within two days of that meeting.
What do women wear to a job talk? And what do they wear to dinner and such the day before? Do you have to be all professionally decked out as soon as you step off the plane?
Asking for a friend. I dressed super casually – as in jeans and decent shirt. So no you do not need to be “all decked out”. I don’t think what you wear matters much as long as you aren’t like wearing a halloween costume. If you have an interview at a conservative Catholic school this might be different.
Asking for a friend: just a separate data point. I teach at a good R1 (in a liberal area of the country) that is not conservative or religious (but I don’t think what I am about to say is normal or standard for R1s, I suspect it’s on the extreme side). It would be an extremely bad idea to show up in jeans to anything here–I’ve never even seen anyone wear jeans, ever, in my department, even on non-teaching days. I’d say here even stepping off the plane that way wouldn’t be a good idea; the culture is just one where people dress extremely professionally all the time. I don’t think anyone is going to punish you for dressing up, but some places (like, plausibly, my department) might for dressing down–even if people do it subconsciously. For my flyouts I dressed as professionally and conservatively as I could without feeling personally deeply uncomfortable for days I was actually on campus, and for other days (e.g. airport, dinner the night before, etc.) I tried to look put together but not like I was going to a business meeting–so I’d wear some kind of more professional-but-casual pant, or a skirt, and something bland on top. (I was torn between Amanda’s attitude and people telling me I had to wear a suit–I didn’t wear a suit, because I felt like it was just too incongruent with my personality, but I did dress more professionally than I ever have for anything before. And now that I’ve seen job candidates who don’t look professional–I think that it has some sort of subtle (or perhaps not so subtle!) negative psychological effect on people.) But ymmv and obviously you have to be comfortable in what you wear. Other advice is to have stuff that is professional enough in layers (e.g. a blazer that you can take off and still look professional enough) because it might be 90 degrees in the room you’re giving a talk in, you might be nervous, etc.
One thing I would add is be yourself: people can tell when you aren’t. But do that with knowing the school and culture. Perhaps dressing down has worked well for me because that is how I am. I find that philosophers dress more casually than other disciplines, but I don’t change how I dress when I go to other discipline conferences. In general, I would say the west coast is much more casual than the east coast – but each school varies.
Amanda
That was too good … a Halloween costume!? At first I thought, no one would do that! Then on reflection …
From my experience, you can feel weird in a suit in Appalachia … people just do not dress that way. But when you sit down with a dean (almost anywhere) it is nice to have at least a nice jacket on, anywhere from Mississippi to New York.
Has anyone ever had a flyout, sent thank you emails afterward, and then never heard from the school again until your received a PFO from the HR department? The flyout went reasonably well, I thought, but doesn’t even seem relevant.
I just find this to be in extremely poor taste.
Number Three that does seem to be in ridiculously poor taste, especially given the anxieties we all have about the market.
I would also like to ask whether it is unusual/bad taste to email to “check-in” after a fly-out. I’ve been totally in the dark about the process since I got back home. Does one only find out that they did/did not get a job once they get an offer/someone else accepts it?
I also would never wear jeans to a flyout.
I wear black or brown pants, reasonably nice shirt (maybe button-up, or something which could be called “business casual” — a nice “blouse”, like from Banana Republic) and a cardigan.
I’ve also worn a woman’s suit jacket with different color pants. I try and wear something that I would be comfortable giving a conference presentation in — not too fancy, no full-suit. Culture in different parts of the country will be different, but I would think that jeans– even in California — might hurt you. Step off the plane looking professional, and don’t stop looking professional until you step back onto it. You don’t want them to notice your clothes. I would give the same advice to men: avoid the business suit, avoid jeans. Nice pants and a button up-shirt, tucked in, no tie, would be perfectly fine. A different colored jacket, if the weather is cool, would also be fine.
I wore a navy suit with a sweater or professional shirt underneath for all of my flyouts, although not on travel days (except for one flyout where I went straight from the airport to meet with the university president and then gave my job talk). On travel days, I generally wore a non-suit blazer with professional shirt and business pants. I don’t think you need to wear a suit (although I would wear a blazer if you don’t wear a suit), but there are several reasons why I decided to. I found the suit helpful in part because it reduced my sartorial choices and removed the focus from my clothes. YMMV, of course, but for me the suit jacket felt a little bit like armor. Although I was obviously more dressed up than the average professor in a suit, that’s perfectly fine for a job interview and it’s better to be overdressed rather than underdressed. I would be careful about making assumptions about local culture (departmental and administrative) without really good insight into the particular school; while it is generally true that the East Coast is the most formal, the most formal department I visited was in the South and a West Coast school wasn’t far behind.
haha well I guess maybe the two jobs I was offered in jeans was in spite of them. (I mean that seriously…)
Number three: I had that happen once. I thought it was extremely rude. Well, it IS extremely rude. Perhaps even the Platonic form of rudeness.
Should candidates who had on-campus interviews expect to hear anything over spring break? E.g., a PFO if the first choice candidate accepts?
AnonX from my experience, and what I have heard from many others, a fair number of schools simply do not contact you if you get the position. Some do let you know by email, but it depends because usually the candidate has two weeks to except so they wait until after that has happened.
For whatever it is worth, whenever we invite anyone to campus I explicitly acknowledge the difficulty in traveling whilst looking professional and suggest that people dress comfortably during travel and whatnot and to worry about clothing after the air travel is done.
For whatever it is worth, whenever we invite anyone to campus I explicitly acknowledge the difficulty in traveling whilst looking professional and suggest that people dress comfortably during travel and whatnot and to worry about clothing after the air travel is done.
For whatever it is worth, whenever we invite anyone to campus I explicitly acknowledge the difficulty in traveling whilst looking professional and suggest that people dress comfortably during travel and whatnot and to worry about clothing after the air travel is done.
Its been a little over two weeks since my on campus interview. I’m not sure whether I was the last candidate. The thing that worries me is that my references have not been contacted for the reference check. Is this a bad sign? Or is it too soon to tell?
Tealeaves: My sense is that there are two likely scenarios—either (1) they had other candidates to campus after you (and so haven’t made any decision), or (2) they are done with flyouts and their first offer went to someone else. Either way, you still have a chance. It seems unlikely to me they would contact references after the flyout stage, as that is usually done prior to initial interviews.
Thank you Marcus: In this case, I was told to bring a list of my references to the on campus for HR. I’m assuming they intend to do something with them, though I know not what. My concern is that they would have at least contacted my references by now if I was going to be the first offer. Though I suppose you’re right that it all depends upon whether there were more interviews after me. They’ve also had spring break in the interim, and they are a very bureaucratic public school.
I should have asked for a timeline. Do you think it would be fair to contact them once I am four weeks out from my interview?
TealLeaves is this a UK job? The reference thing (asking to bring it to HR) is very not typical for the US.
Amanda: Its a US job. Just an atypical US job. For instance, the on campus was with the dean only.
The dean ONLY? Wow that is a super atypical job. Given that it is so atypical, I am not sure any regular norms would apply.
TeaLeaves
If the Dean is handling things there are two explanations that come to mind. The Department is really screwed up, and are deemed incapable of handling a search. Or there may be an inside candidate and they are trying to give a veneer of objectivity.
This might be more of a reader query, idk. I’m in the US, first year out of PhD, second year on the market. I do fairly original research and am told I interview well, but have no pubs, and I’m kind of old. My question is, should I flag the reasons for these things in my cover letters? (Namely, my MA program was only a 2 year program in name at the time, and I actually got the “grad students should not try to publish or go to conferences” advice when I started my PhD program.)
I don’t want to be a making-excuses kind of person, but if it needs to be said, I’ll say it.
My 2 cents, for “slightly old”: I can’t imagine how bringing those things up in a cover letter would do you any favors. Even if they are good excuses, they are excuses, and when read against a stack of stellar applications, your cover letter should be confident and positive, not defensive.
Furthermore, I’m not sure if they are good excuses: anyone who has paid any kind of attention to the job market over the past few years should have been able to piece it together that pubs matter. So even if you started your PhD program with that advice, that doesn’t explain why you haven’t wisened up over the last two years. Appealing to it as an excuse both draws negative attention to your weak points AND makes you look like you’re pretty far out of touch with the profession.
As someone in a similar position, my sense is that if the lack of pubs and time to degree are going to seen as negatives, then you should simply take this loss on the chin and look to compensate for it elsewhere by using every word of your cover letter and supporting materials to showcase the originality of your research and its promise for future publications.
I might, however, keep watered down versions of those excuses on hand if you are ever asked about these issues point blank in an interview. That seems like the appropriate place to bring up some mitigating considerations.
I agree you should definitely not say anything. I think saying something will almost certainly come across as a negative. Just sell what you do have. And by, “sell” I mean state confidently yet professionally without embellishment. (Not sure if you were asking about saying anything about being old, but don’t! There are more and more older philosophers than ever before, and most people don’t care. For those who do care, saying something won’t help.)
Hi. Just stumbled on this site today. I graduated with a 2:1 in philosophy 20 years ago and went into teaching (primary state sector uk) which has been ok on the whole. However I’ve been thinking of a career change for a while. Is there anyone here who would recommend going down the MA / phd route for a try at an academic life? I’m guessing the answers will be negative as some of the comments here paint a bleak picture of the job market, but I thought I’d ask! Thanks
Unless you are independently wealthy, I would absolutely advise against getting a PhD in philosophy.
Thanks for the reply – appreciate it. I could probably fund a Masters and could continue work alongside it if I went part time, but even then it doesn’t seem as though it would open many doors, even in the long run. Shame as I’ve always valued my degree and know I’d do well in further study. Have never stopped reading it, having ‘discovered’ various thinkers and read them independently long after graduation. The thought of 20 more years at the chalk face seems to have made me hungry for a new direction – probably not unusual. Years of expensive study to wind up, if I’m lucky, on a lower salary – coupled with a highly competitive and insecure job market – is possibly not the way to go. Any other thoughts on the matter welcome.
I think the practice of the never ending job cycle needs to be fixed. It is utterly absurd to me that application deadlines for visiting positions are as late June 29th. That is, this is when they begin reviewing applications.
I understand these positions may open suddenly and is beyond the control of the search committee, department, or university.
But . . . .
How is anyone applying for this kind of position supposed to make any decisions about their life?
Like signing a new lease?
Having jobs ads continue to roll in this late makes it so that the cycle never really ends!
As a consequence of the cycle never ending, neither does the anxiety.
Is there any remedy to this situation?
Hi anon: thanks for raising this important issue. I’m going to run a post on it!
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