Considering leaving grad school ABD, but need advice

[Anonymous Questioner]

As you can probably imagine, this is a pretty stressful time, so I'll try my best to articulate my question clearly, but it may reflect my messy mental state.

I'm currently in my fourth year of a PhD program in English Lang and Lit. I arrived to the program wide-eyed and idealistic, believing deeply in the university's ability to advance knowledge and wisdom. I believed that by joining the ranks of the professoriate, I'd be evading the trappings of corporate/professional life and devoting myself to the life of the mind. The COVID-19 pandemic and various other institutional factors have revealed that this is not at all the case, that the idealism I had been chasing is not present at elite universities, and that professors are often the same uncurious careerists that dominate other lines of work. Additionally, as a creative writer of erudite kind, I had imagined that pursuing scholarship would have a direct carry-over to my creative endeavors. As it turns out (and I admit that it was probably naive of me not to realize this earlier), scholarship is a profession with very specific professional imperatives--being interested in ideas (even complicated theoretical ideas that are at home in the academy) is not itself constitutive of pursuing scholarship. In my course work, I excelled because I loved discussing ideas. My prelims exam also went extraordinarily well. But since taking the exam, I have realized that I have no "intervention" to make in the scholarship. I don't care about the obscure details of some scholarly debate, defending or challenging someone's "intervention," offering my own. This has nothing to do with what initially drew me to literature and thought.

During my time in the PhD, I have been able to teach my own composition courses. This has been the most rewarding part of the job. I adore my students and love teaching. On the one hand, procuring this PhD (for which my only remaining task would be writing and defending my dissertation) will help me get a teaching job. On the other hand, embroiling myself in scholarly debates that I don't care about in order to compete on a hostile job market for a job where there will be professional imperatives to embroil myself further in such debates seems like a nightmare. And such a job might not even exist anyway! I have two years of fellowship, such that I won't be teaching for the rest of my time here.

Ultimately, my question is this--if my hope is to leave the scholarly profession, but pursue teaching and my own creative work, does it make sense for me to leave this PhD? I hold an MFA in creative writing as well as a scholarly MA (which I earned en route to this PhD). I could try to teach at community colleges or at other types of higher ed jobs that don't demand PhDs. A part of me suspects that it's too late to leave, that my best course of action would be to squeeze out this dissertation in whatever way I can and then move on, potentially leveraging it to get the sort of job I actually want. But then again, devoting another 1 - 2 years of my life to downright pointless scholarly myopia seems like not the best way to achieve my teaching and writing ambitions.

My committee as well as other faculty in my department think it would be a mistake for me to leave, that my talents in our field would be wasted if I did so. However, I suspect that these folks have rose-colored glass on with respect to the job market. They are mostly older people who have had tenured professorships for decades. Their situation is not mine. Even in the last 2 years alone, the professional landscape for humanities PhDs has changed dramatically.

Writing the dissertation has me paralyzed. It is my first time struggling in this program. I found course work and exams far easier than many of my peers found them, but nevertheless, I'm now completely immobilized. What do you think I should do? Thank you for reading!

Edited February 11, 2022 by Anonymous Questioner

[PsyDuck90]

There honestly isn't much of a situation where having the PhD will be a detriment, but there will be occasions where not having one may close off some opportunities. As my chair always like to say, the best dissertation is a done dissertation. This does not have to be your magnum opus. Treat it like any other coursework assignment you've had over the years. Get it done, get out, and pursue what you want out of life. 

[Sigaba]

On 2/11/2022 at 6:00 AM, Anonymous Questioner said:

What do you think I should do? Thank you for reading!

I think that you should confer with your professors. If you leave your program now, will their disappointment impact the quality of LORs they will write on your behalf as you look for work?

On 2/11/2022 at 6:00 AM, Anonymous Questioner said:

Ultimately, my question is this--if my hope is to leave the scholarly profession, but pursue teaching and my own creative work, does it make sense for me to leave this PhD? I hold an MFA in creative writing as well as a scholarly MA (which I earned en route to this PhD). I could try to teach at community colleges or at other types of higher ed jobs that don't demand PhDs.

What happens if you end up competing for these kinds of positions against applicants who the same academic degrees and career goals--and doctorates as well? 

[Beals]

Do you think you could actually finish your PhD in the two years of funding you have left? You use the word 'paralyzed' which implies the answer is no. Personally, I don't see the point in spending two years running into a wall and making no progress, and then upon reaching the end of your funding either leaving the program anyway (and thus having been miserable for two years to no end) or taking on heaps of contract work while trying to complete your thesis (and thus extending your misery for extra years).

I think if you can do as PsyDuck suggests and bang out a mediocre thesis just to get it over with - go ahead and do it! If that's what you want! But if you're in anguish ... is it worth it?

Which leads to my next question - you're interested in teaching. At what level? Only CC? Would you be interested in teaching at the high school level?  I have heard that hiring criteria is quite different for those schools (rather than at a uni) as they don't care about research, so you very well might be able to get a job without a PhD (even with a PhD you still face the chance of not getting a job - having a PhD doesn't guarantee anything, for any job).

From my perspective, if sounds like you already know what you want to do. It sounds like if you stay a certain amount of misery is guaranteed - I guess the question is whether enduring the misery is worth it to you. Good luck making this decision - it sounds like a tough one.