More Rat Corpses

Eh, the title was a warning you were going to get another image like this one. So, if you clicked and are now disgusted by this new one I almost stepped on today, it's your own fault:

Really, I don't know why I am taking pictures of dead rats and posting them on my blog. This latest one I'm finding even more revolting to look at than the first one I posted. I think it's bigger. It was only about half a block from where the other one was, and I'm going to get to watch it decompose all week unless I take a different route. Just like the other one.

Is there something metaphoric here? The first time I blogged about a dead rat, I wrote that, having left academe, I was finding myself looking down at grim, ratty reality rather than up at academe's idealistic fantasies and self-aggrandizing delusions er self-deceiving fictions or  -- what is the phrase I'm looking for here? Hairy ass Life of the mind or something like that...??

But, really, academics are no less subject to the rat race than anyone else. If anything, more so. Run run run run run. But where are you running to? A tenure track job? Heh. Not if you don't already have one. Promotion? Sure, go for it if you're already tt -- but, really, if you're tt, do you have a choice? And while tenure and promotion will certainly make your life at least a little better in terms of salary and job security, what about the future of the profession? In the long run, if those who have tenure now don't work harder to use the privilege of their position to both preserve and reform the profession, there won't be anything but adjuncts a generation from now.

Run run run run run.

There's been a lot of buzz this week about William Pannapacker's latest take on fixing graduate school in the humanities. (go to my previous post for the link if you haven't read it already -- I'm too lazy to link again), especially about how the "satisfaction" of doing work you like is supposed to compensate for exploitation -- for using people for scut work and then disposing of them before they've had a chance to prove their merit, for taking advantage of their over-motivated willingness to do "satisfying" work for a pittance only to close doors as soon as they've earned the credentials to walk through them, for being worse in so many ways than the rat race so many graduate students think they're escaping through the Ivory Tower.

Run run run run run.

So often when I think of academe these days, I'm reminded of the title character in Ellison's Invisible Man. Specifically, I'm reminded of the scene in the first chapter when he dreams about his grandfather and the briefcase with the sealed letter, supposedly a letter of recommendation. His grandfather tells him to open it. Inside there's just another sealed letter. He opens that one. And there's another. Eventually, he opens the last one. It says, "To Whom It May Concern ... Keep This N----- Boy Running."

And, if I've run too far astray from rats, there's also the opening scene from Native Son, in which Bigger Thomas kills the rat in his family's apartment only then to use its corpse to torment his sister:

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The meaning? Let me quote from one of our students' favorite sources for explanification of those awful, mean, tough, long books we (in my case, used to) assign:

Symbolically, the rat is as "trapped" in the apartment as the family is; both are eating nutritionally deficient "garbage," none may escape and both are ultimately vulnerable to vicious murder.

Well, OK, so I'm exaggerating. Of course, it isn't as bad today to be an aspiring academic as it was to be black and poor in mid-twentieth-century Chicago. But you get my point.

Run run run run run run run run run.

Academe traps us like the rats that inhabit so many decrepit grad student basement offices (and I've seen 'em, too -- big fat ones that stink when they die under couches and no one notices for a few days).

Until you realize you're a rat and there's nowhere left to go but out.

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Stay tuned for updates, kids! It's gonna be real hot here this week, and that corpse is gonna be REAL pretty to look at by Friday.

Just Walk Away?

William Pannapacker's latest piece, unlike so much of his earlier advice here, here, and here aimed at warming prospective graduate students of the fate that awaits them, this time offers advice aimed more at current graduate students, professors, and other concerned parties about "how to fix humanities graduate education."

I read Pannapacker's 2003 piece as a second-year M.A. student, and, at the time, it rang hollow. I was convinced I was one of the few who would beat the odds, and, more importantly, I simply wanted to be in graduate school. I found the work -- reading, writing, thinking, teaching -- more satisfying than what I believed my other options to be. And I had a partner, family, and good credit to make the absurdly low pay I earned as a TA and later adjunct a mere insignificant inconvenience.

What I didn't understand at the time was the correlation between my willingness to work for less than a living wage and the dearth of "real" jobs every new Ph.D. has faced for decades -- a shortage exacerbated beyond all acceptable proportions by the recession. Pannapacker didn't make this correlation clear in his original or subsequent articles, until this most recent one. Even if he had, I'm not sure that, years ago, I would have digested its significance. I'm not sure I could have separated my in-the-moment desire to be part of an academic community from the impact the exploitation of contingent faculty had and has continued to have on the profession more broadly -- and that it would have on me as an individual later.

Doing "satisfying" work seemed like more than enough compensation. And, as I've said before, I think that very few people, myself included, who have completed Ph.D.s can look back and say -- whatever they may be doing now -- that graduate school was a waste of time, that it wasn't worth it, that they should've just gone on and done something else with that particular decade of their lives.

At the same time, what Pannapacker's most recent article does, finally, make clear is that it is impossible to ignore the correlation between the role graduate students play in providing undergraduate education at minimal cost to universities and the dearth of jobs they themselves will eventually face as they finish their degrees and seek full-time employment.

What Pannapcker has finally gotten around to saying is what I've been saying since my very first blog post, and again here, here, and here (not to mention numerous comments on other people's blogs). That is, I've been saying, as Pannapacker now does: Just. Walk. Away. As long as there is a supply of graduate students and recent graduates (because they hope for something better) willing to work for a pittance, colleges and universities have no reason not to continue A) admitting them to programs whose sole purpose is the supply of underpaid labor and B) paying them far, far less than they are worth -- and far, far less than they will need to support themselves and their families in the long-term. Ultimately, institutions have a vested interest in the status quo, while we (graduate students and recent Ph.D.s) do not. Organizing is a good thing, yes, but it's not enough. Institutions will never change until they have to -- and don't be fooled by the claim that the humanities don't make money for colleges and universities, that, were we all to walk away right now, humanities departments would simply shut down. The humanities are at the core of most undergraduate education programs. If there was a shortage of people willing and able to teach Freshman Comp, Intro to History, and Foreign Language I and II, institutions would find a way to attract talent. With money.

Our fault has been to love what we do too much and to be too willing to make sacrifices that are neither in our own future best interests nor in the best interests of the future of the profession -- nor in the best interests of colleagues who may be less able to sustain an existence as contingent faculty members after they graduate than we may be. Really, do we want a future in which everyone is an adjunct? Because, with the ever-increasing elimination of tenure-track and otherwise full-time positions, that's where we're headed.

And it's right that someone should start pointing this out to prospective and current graduate students -- that it's not just all about you and what you're willing to do on the cheap for the privilege of doing "satisfying" work for a few years. While I'm sympathetic to the response to Pannapacker expressed here, I believe that, once you understand this correlation, it is both selfish and unethical to continue to perpetuate the falsehood that graduate students are themselves not, to some degree, responsible for the current state of the profession.

I take responsibility for my choices, and that's why, once I came to understand my own complicity in perpetuating an exploitative system, I chose to walk away -- that and the fact that I believe our society needs to reckon with the discrepancy between SAYING a college education matters and PAYING for its true cost.

Leaving academe doesn't mean you don't love the life you're leaving behind. It need not mean a betrayal -- because you and your colleagues and your students are the ones being betrayed when you remain complicit with the current system.You can reinvent yourself career-wise on the outside and still pursue your intellectual interests. And you can find ways to teach -- to share your love of literacy and learning -- while still making a decent living and without continuing to perpetuate a broken system.

If you are a tenured professor or a professor on the tenure track, stay, if you like what you do. Do whatever you can to improve the working conditions within your own department, within your institution. Your students need you, and you are only a part of the problem if you ignore it. Because you have tenure (once you have it), you have the capacity to be part of a solution. Take action. Use your position to work for the best interests of the profession.

But, if you are an adjunct? No. The ethical thing to do, once you understand how the system works, is simply to walk away. If you stay, you will be taken for granted. You will be used up and disposed of for a pittance.

Walk away. You owe it to yourself, your students, and the future of the profession.Your talents do have value; and, eventually, those who need to understand this will.


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Inside the Idea Factory

Policy is manufactured, bought and sold, paid for, mostly, by those you would expect. Money and ideas go hand-in-hand. But, let's play devil's advocate. Really, what is so wrong with that?

While there are think tanks (and individual projects at think tanks) that lose money researching and promoting relatively unpopular and under-financed ideas, I find the following from here more often to be true:

"Modern think tanks are nonprofit, tax-exempt, political idea factories where donations can be as big as the donor's checkbook and are seldom publicized," notes Tom Brazaitis, writing for the Cleveland Plain Dealer. "Technology companies give to think tanks that promote open access to the internet. Wall Street firms donate to think tanks that espouse private investment of retirement funds." So much money now flows in, that the top 20 conservative think tanks now spend more money than all of the "soft money" contributions to the Republican party.

 All think tanks are really doing is providing products -- ideas and policies -- that their supporters demand. What's wrong, I repeat, with putting your money where your mouth is, or, as these things go, paying someone else to speak for you?

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Think tanks are like universities in some ways -- filled with clever, resourceful, ambitious people who care about ideas (and ideologies), but, again,

A think tank's resident experts carry titles such as "senior fellow" or "adjunct scholar," but this does not necessarily mean that they possess an academic degree in their area of claimed expertise. Outside funding can corrupt the integrity of academic institutions. The same corrupting influences affect think tanks, only more so.

Think tanks are like universities minus the students and minus the systems of peer review and other mechanisms that academia uses to promote diversity of thought. Real academics are expected to conduct their research first and draw their conclusions second, but this process is often reversed at most policy-driven think tanks.

I will say that it is absolutely possible for people to become experts on subjects they do not necessarily have academic degrees in -- and that's something all of my post-academic readers might keep in mind as they pursue other careers. You can have an active mind. You can think deep thoughts. You can even earn your living by thinking and writing. And you can do all this within the context of a "normal," nonacademic job that pays the bills - and more, if you are smart enough and driven enough. And there are certainly people here, people I work with every day and respect, who understand the subjects and policy issues they write about in great depth even though they don't have academic credentials affirming their expertise.

But there are also people, like the one I refer to in this little angry  post (whom I fortunately don't have to interact with regularly) who are where they are, doing what they are doing, because of their politics rather than any sort of in-depth knowledge of the issues underlying the policies they promote. Unlike the high complexity, low profile issues my office generally deals with (although tracing the money even here leads to very unsurprising conclusions), some issues are grossly distorted, misrepresented, and oversimplified. People with strong ideological  motives but little true expertise are easy targets and willing collaborators -- spokesbots, if you will -- for well-funded special interests.

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I'd be lying if I said there weren't also bipartisan collaborations and compromises that don't necessarily always please every donor. Libertarians and progressive environmentalists? Yes, such coalitions exist and differing parties are able to work well together. Both groups receive funding from so-called special interests and occasionally do find common  ground. But the question I leave readers with is this: Are all special interests equal? Are the "interests" of conservation groups or green industries that fund environmentalist think tanks -- whose "interests" at least in part are a greener world -- the same as the profit-driven "interests" of, say, a major insurance or oil company that funds a libertarian think tank?

Research Update and Project Outline

So here's another in my series of research updates aimed at tracking Project Dissertation-to-Book -- a series of posts mainly to keep me honest about my efforts but perhaps of interest to anyone working on a similar project, especially independently.

On Saturday, I finally made it up Grad U Library to return two Whole Foods bags full of books I could have (and should have) returned months ago. I don't know why I was hanging onto them. I had this crazy idea that once I got my head back into the project I might need them. But that was because I took a very long time getting my head back into the project after my defense last year. Once I finally did (within the last month or so) -- and made a new reading list for the project -- I realized I would not have any use for them and could always check them out again anyway should I need to.

So, thanks to Peaches and his air-conditioned car, back to the library they went. I also brought my new book list with me and checked out 5 books (off a list of 40 or so) I need to look over. Why so few? Because, with my new status as alumni borrower rather than faculty/grad student, I can keep books out for only a relatively short time. I need to efficiently go through what I check out from now on, take notes on what I need, perhaps make photocopies of parts I might want to revisit, and get the books back to the library. Plus, there was a stack I forgot to bring back that need to go back before August 1st. I need to get done with these 5 this week and then go back for more.

I've also been thinking about how the book needs to differ from the dissertation -- what needs to be revised, added, etc. Thinking about this before was a bit overwhelming, but, having actually begun the process of moving ahead, it seems much less so. What I have to do is actually not that overwhelming at all.

In a nutshell, here's an outline of what I have in relation to what I need to do:

Introduction to X
Parts of the original intro I like a lot and will keep, but a revised intro needs more contextualization, mostly historical. A lot of the material on my new reading list (a lot of which has been published between 2010 and 2011, i.e. after my diss was done) is aimed at this, at doing a better job of framing the project. Not the most exciting work but certainly not overwhelming.

Part One: Early Literary Responses to X
Chapter 1: In-depth discussion of Author A. This is done. Will change very little in the original except to cite a few important critics I left out. Mostly in footnotes.

Chapter 2: Discussion of authors B, C, and D who were contemporaries of A. Author B is done. C and D need to be written and all woven together. This chapter will take some work. A chunk of my reading list is devoted to this chapter. It will take some time but is absolutely manageable. This is the part I will work on first.

Part Two: Texts That Use X to Re-Imagine Past and Present
Chapter 3: Authors E and F that use X to look at the past. This is 100% done. A short version is a published article. No revisions here -- this is my favorite chapter, and I like it as is (and readers have responded similarly)

Chapter 4: Author G that uses X to look at the present. This chapter is mostly (and possibly all the way) done. What's already written does not need revision. Again, it's already published (was actually my first publication), but I think I may need to add another seection that contextualizes Author G within hir genre. My committee didn't think this was necessary for the diss, but I think it might be for the book. We'll see. Will deal with the intro, Chapter 2, and Chapter 6 first and then reevaluate.

Part Three: Texts That Use X to Think About the Future
Chapter 5: Authors H and I. This is 90% done. A condensed portion is a published article. It doesn't need major revision in terms of things I left out or that need to be substantively changed, but the prose could probably use some tightening up.

Chapter 6: Author J. This is completely new. Will be written from scratch. The primary text is one I love and really want to write about but didn't for the diss because I had written enough (page-wise) and didn't want to step outside of national boundaries. This author lies outside the project's original national boundaries, but I think I can make a case for including this text. It's an appropriate way to end. Considerable work here, but I think I wii enjoy doing it.

Conclusion
My original conclusion is OK but very short. Needs a little more substance. A little more writing -- not at all taxing. Will worry about this (and probably write it in a day) when the rest of the revision is done.

So, that's that. I have plans, and I have books. What else does one need?

The Worst Way to Start a Conversation About Literature

...is to begin with the question, "Have you read X?"

If it's a famous book, the person who hasn't read it may be put off by your presumption. If it's obscure, you may generate some interest, but the wrong tone can still make you come across as a pretentious ass.

A better way is simply to say,"I happened to be reading X the other day (or whenever) and I was thinking (fill in your thiught). What do you think of my idea (observation, insight, whatever)?" This or some variation of it will give people a chance to respond to you and your thought rather than putting them on the spot. They can talk about the book if they've read it, but they can also defer to you without feeling stupid.

You Can Deduct Unreimbursed Research Expenses from Your Taxes

If you're a professor, that is. The IRS says so right here (scroll down a ways to the bulleted phrase "research expenses of a college professor," but don't ask me how I stumbled onto this today -- trust me, it wasn't through the effects of my own curiosity).

I don't know what exactly this means for the unreimbursed research expenses of adjuncts since research is not typically in their contracts (although you could probably make a case for its necessity to furthering your career) and some of you savvy readers are probably way ahead of me here, but in comments to this post a ways back, Professor Zero mentioned the cost of gas involved in taking care of hir research needs.And so when I stumbled onto this bit of useful tax info I figured I'd post since a lot of people are having their research budgets cut and going to conferences/archives etc. becomes an out-of-pocket expense -- but a necessary one.

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I have nothing much else to say at the moment, so it's good my last post seems to have been so popular. In less than a week, it's already at number 8 in the top 10 most read posts here. Hopefully, a few of you are getting something out of it.

At some point, I do have to tell you about last weekend's visit to the Tea Party branch of the family of Peaches (Long story short: They were ecstatic to find out I work for Free Market Think Tank -- only to be shortly thereafter appalled when I revealed that I have not yet myself transformed into either an admirer of Sarah Palin, as they are, or "a delusional anti-government Randite fuckebagge" (no, I will never get tired of this phrase -- if you've been following the blog and my occasional comment elsewhere, you understand why).

But for now, it's too hot to think. That's my excuse, and I'm sticking by it, even thought I'm hiding out indoors in the air-conditioning.

Maybe so, and, apparently, there are people bored enough to have actually tried:

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Mmmmmm, that's got me thinking about dinner. Most likely salad (seriously, eggs in this weather?). But...does such an experiment count as research? That's the real question. Or, not, if you're like me and going it alone (honestly, I haven't made much progress since the last research update). Whatever. It's summer and such is how things go. Y'all stay cool, and, if you are in a position to do so, don't forget to deduct those research expenses!! Every little egg counts.

5 Myths About the Academic Job Market

JC's recent post about the "exciting opportunity" he was invited to apply for (one-year VAP position in Bumblefuck teaching 4/4) reminds me of how prevalent myths about the academic job market are, despite the fact that some of us are starting to wake up, smell the proverbial coffee, and point out publicly that the emperor has no clothes (and is butt ugly, too, and, yes, I know I'm mixing all sorts of metaphors and running on my sentences, but it's Saturday morning and I get to do that sort of thing -- because it's my blog!).

Anyhoo, the following 5 nyths about the academic job market are myths I wholeheartedly believed throughout graduate school, all the way until the very end, when I finally started to wise up and pay attention to what was happening to me and my colleagues rather than to what people said was supposed to happen:

Myth #1: If you do everything right, you will get a job.
This is an especially egregious myth to perpetuate among smart, highly motivated, highly ambitious graduate students. The idea is that if you write a stellar dissertation, publish at least one (preferrably more) full-length, peer-reviewed articles before hitting the market, teach a ton, present at a dozen conferences, win awards, and receive the highest accolades from your committee, then a job awaits you, even while you are still ABD.

This is bull$hit through and through. Every adviser, well meaning as they might be, will point to someone for whom this was true and tell their newest protégé(e) to follow so-and-so's example, and a job, too, will follow. What they neglect to say is that, for every person who did everything right and got a job, there are at least two or three others who also DID EVERYTHING RIGHT and DIDN'T get a job.

Most advisers don't perpetuate this myth maliciously -- they really do mean well and want to see their students go on to get tenure-track jobs and be successful. But they have selective memories. Confronting the truth would be painful and would probably also force them to confront some perhaps even uglier truths about contingent faculty in their own departments and the intimate relationship between the lack of "good" jobs and the overuse of adjuncts.

Myth #2: If you are willing to go anywhere and everywhere, a job awaits you.
While it is true that you increase your chances of finding a job by applying to everything and anything you might be remotely qualified for, doing so is no garauntee that a job will come of it. Again, for every person who applies for a hundred jobs in a given year, lands 2 interviews and 1 job (at teaching intensive regional college in Bumblefuck), there are countless others who did the same thing and got nothing. They're adjuncting or VAPing again and waiting to go through the whole application process all over again. Is it worth it? That's up to you, but, at the very least, don't believe that just because you're willing to go anywhere and everywhere and apply to a hundred jobs -- most of whch aren't even a good match for you -- year after year that eventually all your hard work will pay off. Odds are it won't.

Myth #3: Spending years taking VAP and postdoc positions will eventually pay off.
In most professions, having more experience is a good thing. In academe, most people have enough teaching experience by the time they go on the market the first time. As long as you can prove that you can independently design a syllabus and manage a class, which is clear from your having taught multiple classes during multiple semesters as an adjunct while you were ABD, you have enough experience for any committee considering your application. Year after year beyond that doesn't add up to anything and won't improve your odds. If you want to move across the country to take a VAP position because it pays better than your current adjunct gig and you haven't yet decided to throw in the towel, go for it, but don't believe you're making yourself a better candidate for the next go-around on the market.

Myth #4: The people who do end up with tenure-track jobs do so because they have the very best credentials.
See Myth #1. While it is certainly true that those who do get jobs are highly qualified, just because you got one doesn't mean you have better credentials than those who didn't. Committees narrow down their applications to the most highly qualified and choose to interview -- and ultimately hire -- those they believe would be the best "fit" for their department. You have no control over how "fit" is subjectively determined by each individual committee and, other than trying to style your letter to the job ad and the department's online description, you have no control over making yourself that one person who "fits" best -- and in some cases, while you might be good at the job, you really might not be the best "fit" and, should they hire you because you were clever enough to make yourself seem like the best "fit," you could well end up miserable.

Myth #5: Spending time working on a back-up plan is a waste of time and will interfere with the time you need to spend on making yourself the very best candidate for academic jobs.
As Myths #1-4 illustrate, putting all your eggs in one basket is just plain stupid. Spending 8-10 years in graduate school gives you more than enough time to build up your CV AND work on a back-up plan. Once you're done with your coursework, use your tuition remission to bank some practical skills. Just take a class here or there -- say, in accounting or technical writing or the language you studied just barely enough to pass the language exam. Or, once you have "enough" teaching experience, get some other type of job. My current job is a perfect example of the kind of job a graduate student could do "full-time" and still have time to work on the dissertation. I have more free time now than I had while I was teaching, I'm making nearly twice as much money (albeit still not much in the grand scheme of things), and I'm building a skill set that is actually marketable in the "real world" (my job type at a different kind of organization -- larger and for-profit -- pays quite well, but no one would have hired me in that context without the experience I'm now gaining). It's much better to do this while you're still a graduate student -- and, yes, you do have the time to pursue your academic goals at the same time you're working on having other options besides adjuncting when that first academic job search doesn't pan out. You have, literally, EIGHT TO TEN YEARS!!