The Graduate School Ponzi Scheme

[lifealive]

The OP's assessment of the job market is accurate--as is the assessment of the unethical behavior of PhD programs. And ComeBackZinc is right to note that half the open positions aren't "open" anyway--they're inside hires.

 

However, I don't think the solution is to just not go to grad school. It's to go to grad school with your eyes open and cultivate other possible professions on the side. DO NOT ADJUNCT. By adjuncting, you're contributing to the destruction of the profession. (I hate to blame the victim, but it really is a problem that would stop tomorrow if people simply refused to be exploited anymore.)

 

On a personal note, though--and probably a totally unnecessary one that I will regret articulating--I often get eye-rolly when I come across people like the OP, and I come across them a lot. I don't know how you could make it through grad school and to the job market and just now experience this sense of wide-eyed shock about your job prospects. This reads like a rant from someone who's never had to deal with rejection before. See also Patrick Iber. "I can't believe this is happening to MEEEEE! I was one of the good ones!"

 

I have lost all patience with these people.

 

Well, OP, assuming you're earnest, here: take your own advice. Pick yourself up, dust yourself off, get your balls back, and look for another job where, as you say, you will be rewarded with a decent living. If you got a PhD from a top school, you should be capable of that much. You're not alone. A lot of us are making the same move. And above all, you weren't victimized by the profession.

[dazedandbemused]

 So, knowledge of the bleak job market aside, what should we all be doing to secure a better future for ourselves? To those who are facing the job market, if you could go back in time and confront your Ph.D.-seeking selves, what would you say, knowing full well that you were still carrying on in your doctorate? How would you advise yourself? 

 

 

I've certainly never been on the job market, but being a couple of years in and fully dedicated to it, I do think that everyone here should have a plan for how much they're willing to give up in order to make their dreams a reality. There have been some major changes to the way my department operates just in the last six months (although, so far, they've all been for our benefit), and it has forced us all to really come face to face with the realities of the market. Incoming cohorts are shrinking to account for the future of the job market. We've now got an extra year of funding added to the end because they're realizing that nobody gets jobs ABD anymore. I've already made the decision that I'd only dedicate two years to the job market after I've finished, because I would never be willing to let adjuncting become my career. Others will feel differently, but as long as you can clearly articulate how much you're willing to give and what kind of jobs you'd be willing to take, you at least can begin forming your plan B for when the shit finally hits the fan.

[lazaria]

I've certainly never been on the job market, but being a couple of years in and fully dedicated to it, I do think that everyone here should have a plan for how much they're willing to give up in order to make their dreams a reality. There have been some major changes to the way my department operates just in the last six months (although, so far, they've all been for our benefit), and it has forced us all to really come face to face with the realities of the market. Incoming cohorts are shrinking to account for the future of the job market. We've now got an extra year of funding added to the end because they're realizing that nobody gets jobs ABD anymore. I've already made the decision that I'd only dedicate two years to the job market after I've finished, because I would never be willing to let adjuncting become my career. Others will feel differently, but as long as you can clearly articulate how much you're willing to give and what kind of jobs you'd be willing to take, you at least can begin forming your plan B for when the shit finally hits the fan.

I've reached my upvotes for the day, but I would upvote this if I could. I like that you articulated needing to make a personal decision about where to draw a boundary line. (I also applaud your department. UTA's English dept has always impressed me as possessing a supportive and ethical atmosphere.)

Your recommendation also allows prospective academics to look at their personal skill sets and dreams in order to discover myriad professions to which they could fit.  

[VirtualMessage]

The OP's assessment of the job market is accurate--as is the assessment of the unethical behavior of PhD programs. And ComeBackZinc is right to note that half the open positions aren't "open" anyway--they're inside hires.

 

However, I don't think the solution is to just not go to grad school. It's to go to grad school with your eyes open and cultivate other possible professions on the side. DO NOT ADJUNCT. By adjuncting, you're contributing to the destruction of the profession. (I hate to blame the victim, but it really is a problem that would stop tomorrow if people simply refused to be exploited anymore.)

 

On a personal note, though--and probably a totally unnecessary one that I will regret articulating--I often get eye-rolly when I come across people like the OP, and I come across them a lot. I don't know how you could make it through grad school and to the job market and just now experience this sense of wide-eyed shock about your job prospects. This reads like a rant from someone who's never had to deal with rejection before. See also Patrick Iber. "I can't believe this is happening to MEEEEE! I was one of the good ones!"

 

I have lost all patience with these people.

 

Well, OP, assuming you're earnest, here: take your own advice. Pick yourself up, dust yourself off, get your balls back, and look for another job where, as you say, you will be rewarded with a decent living. If you got a PhD from a top school, you should be capable of that much. You're not alone. A lot of us are making the same move. And above all, you weren't victimized by the profession.

 

"Postdoc" says it all. Your mentality, tone, and recourse to the ad hominem attack serves as a useful demonstration of the obtuse protestant ethic that motivates the "unethical behavior." My point--and I'll make it one last time--is that doing well in graduate school requires a massive life investment. When you do come out to confront the realities of this devastated profession, the emotions are hard to imagine beforehand. I'm not going to quibble with the misinformed claims about adjuncting. People do it because they need to eat it, and they want to advance. The blame fall squarely on the institutions that exploit the adjunct. But I suppose you also blame migrant workers for being exploited? What crap. But it's predictable, neoliberal crap. And, you're right, I'm not "victimized" by the profession; I am exploited by it. And I'm not alone. 

[allplaideverything]

I will say that I went on the job market for poetry / CW jobs when I was finishing my MFA. I knew intellectually that it's super competitive, but I also really believed I was a strong candidate. Getting zero requests for more materials was pretty emotionally damaging, and it definitely has me thinking a lot more about job placement and prestige as I try to choose a PhD program, even though I hate that stuff. The emotional reality of being shut out is different than the logical understanding that it's a big possibility. Additionally, these "how many jobs you'll apply to" numbers are really interesting, and vary wildly by discipline. There were less than 30 TT jobs in CW-Poetry the year I was on the market.

[allplaideverything]

I genuinely don't understand the position that, since it's unlikely you'll get an academic job, you shouldn't do a PhD. Like, if you'd be happier working in marketing or HR or restaurants than you would be doing a PhD, absolutely you should go do that stuff. But if that stuff is your fall-back, and you'd be happier reading for a living for 5-8 years, that stuff will still be there later.

[ToldAgain]

Your mentality, tone, and recourse to the ad hominem attack serves as a useful demonstration of the obtuse protestant ethic...When you do come out to confront the realities of this devastated profession, the emotions are hard to imagine beforehand...

 

As long as we're talking about logical fallacies, your argument seems to be that you are very upset about not being able to join academia after grad school, or that it is difficult. From this piece of evidence, you assume that we will all feel very upset when we can't get a TT job, or when it is hard to do so. I am here to tell you that is a logical fallacy.

 

Warning heeded. Thank you sincerely for that. But I have read all of the warnings, and am the bringer of doom to my friends and family who are convinced I will get a job at Yale and write 1,000 books because my emails are funny.

 

Call me stupid or wrong for participating in the system if you like, but the statement, "Every PhD graduate will freak out when they can't find a job because they have invested their entire life into their PhD program and are but a rubbery husk without it, as a rule, just look at me," is false. If it is true in your case, I am sorry and I do hope it works out for you eventually.

Edited March 25, 2015 by ToldAgain

[ComeBackZinc]

I genuinely don't understand the position that, since it's unlikely you'll get an academic job, you shouldn't do a PhD. Like, if you'd be happier working in marketing or HR or restaurants than you would be doing a PhD, absolutely you should go do that stuff. But if that stuff is your fall-back, and you'd be happier reading for a living for 5-8 years, that stuff will still be there later.

 

Speaking personally, I feel forced to engage on job market stuff because people on here constantly say some version of "I know how bad the market is," and then turn around and say things that demonstrate that they really don't know how bad it is.

 

Look, I've said it many times: I made the right decision by going to grad school, personally. It's been a lovely, fulfilling time. And as with others on this board, when I started I had been on the job market for two years and got nothing remotely worth taking. So I totally get the sentiment you're expressing here. But here's the thing: it has to be really, actually true that you can do 5-8 years of very low paying work as a grad student, not get a job, and then just leave academia with a smile on your face afterwards. It's easy to say such things on a message board, when the idea is still theoretical. If people are really convinced that they can hand le this, good for them; it's none of my business. But I fear that there are many people who say such things to themselves when in fact those are just rationalizations that won't hold true in the long term.

[VirtualMessage]

As long as we're talking about logical fallacies, your argument seems to be that you are very upset about not being able to join academia after grad school, or that it is difficult. From this piece of evidence, you assume that we will all feel very upset when we can't get a TT job, or when it is hard to do so. I am here to tell you that is a logical fallacy.

 

Warning heeded. Thank you sincerely for that. But I have read all of the warnings, and am the bringer of doom to my friends and family who are convinced I will get a job at Yale and write 1,000 books because my emails are funny.

 

Call me stupid or wrong for participating in the system if you like, but the statement, "Every PhD graduate will freak out when they can't find a job because they have invested their entire life into their PhD program and are but a rubbery husk without it, as a rule, just look at me" is false. If it is true in your case, I am sorry and I do hope it works out for you eventually.

 

I am not making an argument. I am sharing some heartfelt experience (in spite of the backlash it seems to provoke from stalwart candidates). I am not looking for consolation. If anything, I want to voice the concern, the frustration, and the anger. I am not trying to quash your dreams or suggest you're not worthy of graduate school. But you should hear how it feels when you're on the other side. It's possible I could be teaching you sometime soon, and these are not things that can be openly expressed in the profession without facing a more pronounced form of the disdain you intimate. Regardless, you should know about the emotional undercurrents that are running throughout the academic community you want to enter. 

 

I wish everyone the best of luck, and I hope this has been some of use. We --the profession-- need to find a language to discuss what is happening to us. 

[ToldAgain]

So why can't these emotions be brought up? That's an interesting thought. Didn't we have an adjunct walk out just a few months ago? Isn't that an expression of the frustration and anger of people looking for work in the university system?

 

We all know what is happening, so what is the solution? Is there a solution, or do you think it is just grim and unfixable?

[poliscar]

I'm somewhat shocked that "inside hires, BS searches, and lateral moves" seem to be coming as a surprise. Yes, academia is about intellectual work—that should go unsaid—but it is also a social game. Top tier PhD programs give you access to academic social circles/communities, and information that you might not have otherwise. It's possible that taking advantage of these opportunities is "careerism," but it's also necessary. If you can develop a strong enough network within your field, you will know about inside hires, "nepotism," etc. There's also an equally likely chance that you will benefit from potential inside information and solicitations for applications. 

Part of me really resents and loathes the business-like side of things, i.e. networking, selling oneself, and clique-like organization. On the other hand, I can't really sympathize with people who want to remain ignorant to these realities. Yes, you may "believe deeply in the importance of teaching and research," but these aren't activities that happen in an insular, individualist bubble. I have trouble believing that some of this shock doesn't stem from the realization that academia isn't some sort of cloistered monastery, where everything operates on an honour system. 

On another level, I also want to speak a bit in favour of academia as a social system. On one level, yes, it does follow a somewhat corporate logic of in/out groups. At the same time, working academically within a social group can be a deeply intimate and productive activity. I'm thinking of specific social formations, like the groups around Post45, postmedieval, Feel Tank, and nonsite. Have these groupings helped their members acquire jobs and publications? Yes, of course they have, but I don't think they've emerged from a position of cynical careerism. When you start looking at things this way, I think it becomes less surprising that hiring ends up being somewhat of a closed system. Whether this is entirely ethical is up for debate, but I think that the idea of "fit" is more complicated than people want to admit. 

[lifealive]

"Postdoc" says it all. Your mentality, tone, and recourse to the ad hominem attack serves as a useful demonstration of the obtuse protestant ethic that motivates the "unethical behavior." My point--and I'll make it one last time--is that doing well in graduate school requires a massive life investment. When you do come out to confront the realities of this devastated profession, the emotions are hard to imagine beforehand. I'm not going to quibble with the misinformed claims about adjuncting. People do it because they need to eat it, and they want to advance. The blame fall squarely on the institutions that exploit the adjunct. But I suppose you also blame migrant workers for being exploited? What crap. But it's predictable, neoliberal crap. And, you're right, I'm not "victimized" by the profession; I am exploited by it. And I'm not alone. 

 

Nice assumption-making there. First of all, just because I have a postdoc, that does not mean that I have been successful in finding a job. I am actually in the process of leaving academia myself.

 

Second of all, your willingness to equate adjuncting with migrant labor pretty much says it all. PhDs are not factory workers, and it's an insult to appropriate that language of "exploitation" to talk about people who were in a position to devote seven years to getting a higher degree. You are indeed portraying yourself as a victim here--framing this as something that is "happening to us" rather than acknowledging that you have some agency here. Save the denunciation of "neoliberal" bullshit for when it really counts--for when it applies to the invisible poor who never had the opportunity to go to college, much less pursue a higher degree.

 

Our current economy is indeed exploitative--for everyone. But getting on here to write some angry jeremiad because it's happening to YOU now is just gormless. 

[Wonton Soup]

Yes, well I can tell you all my personal reasons for going into academia despite being acutely aware that the field, the humanities, and the university itself are in a state of crisis. After graduating with my MA I worked at some teaching jobs that were not related to higher education. It was absolutely miserable. I could feel my brain degenerating, my coworkers' teaching methods were horrifying, their politics were worse, and I felt like a widget in a giant educational machine. A complete, classic case of alienation. I can't even imagine what it's like in a non-teaching "industry" job. 

 

I'm going into academia because I know it's a place where I can gain some autonomy, become a better teacher and activist, and generally develop as a human in the whole sense of the word. And hopefully contribute to changing higher education itself, because it needs to be changed. Yes, I will try to publish and apply to TT jobs and get tenure, but secretly (gradcafe is anonymous right?) I don't really care if I end up in a non-tenured position at a "non prestigious institution" (the horror!) because 1) I don't buy into that elitist bullcrap, 2) I enjoy teaching in higher ed generally, and 3) whereever I end up, with whatever level of prestige, I plan on stirring stuff up so that hopefully in the future higher ed isn't the way it is now. 

 

To the poster who said "don't be adjunct because adjuncts THEMSELVES are the problem with the discipline" : with all due respect (which is none), 

#$^ off. 

[szdat]

where the greater fools at??

[lifealive]

 

To the poster who said "don't be adjunct because adjuncts THEMSELVES are the problem with the discipline" : with all due respect (which is none), 

#$^ off. 

 

I guess that was me, but I didn't quite say that. I do think that adjuncts are in a terrible position. However, I was simply making the observation that adjunct exploitation would collapse tomorrow if adjuncts refused to do it anymore. That is true.

 

And no, you should not do it if you don't absolutely have to. Your labor is worth more--your skills are worth more. You deserve a better job than adjuncting; you deserve a living wage with health benefits. You just do.

[rising_star]

Speaking personally, I feel forced to engage on job market stuff because people on here constantly say some version of "I know how bad the market is," and then turn around and say things that demonstrate that they really don't know how bad it is.

 

Look, I've said it many times: I made the right decision by going to grad school, personally. It's been a lovely, fulfilling time. And as with others on this board, when I started I had been on the job market for two years and got nothing remotely worth taking. So I totally get the sentiment you're expressing here. But here's the thing: it has to be really, actually true that you can do 5-8 years of very low paying work as a grad student, not get a job, and then just leave academia with a smile on your face afterwards. It's easy to say such things on a message board, when the idea is still theoretical. If people are really convinced that they can hand le this, good for them; it's none of my business. But I fear that there are many people who say such things to themselves when in fact those are just rationalizations that won't hold true in the long term.

 

ComeBackZinc, I'm out of up-votes so I'm sorry I can't upvote this! What you've written is soooo important. I think a lot of people start off grad school saying that they don't care if they can't get an academic job. I know I was one of them and I've known many others. Then, they spend 1-3 years trying to get a TT job and failing and have no clue what to do with themselves. They feel down in the dumps about it. They're reluctant to leave academia. They feel like their souls have been crushed. If you haven't gone through it, you really have no clue what it's like to get hundreds of rejection letters/emails (assuming they're even kind enough to reject you, that is!). You also can't necessarily say that you can get all those rejections and still be smiling about your life choices. Some people do draw the line after a couple of years, which I think is reasonable. I personally vowed to never adjunct unless I had an actual FT job and adjuncting was on the side. I also vowed not to spend more than 2 years on the market without landing a full-time academic position (so one year ABD and one year with the PhD in hand), which is less than some people advise. But, after a few years, your PhD gets "stale" and you'll find yourself passed over in favor of recently minted PhDs, ABDs from elite institutions, and current assistant profs seeking a lateral move. That sucks but it is also reality. 

 

lazaria, do internships to gain "alt-ac" work experience. Do informational interviews with people who have jobs you might want to have. Take courses in statistics/math/GIS if at all possible since those are marketable skills you can use to land a job after grad school regardless of your discipline. If at all possible, figure out what the trendy areas in your field will be in 5-8 years and add 1-2 of them as specialty areas now so you'll be ahead of the curve (it's worth noting that this is incredibly difficult to do). Go to the best program you can. Publish early and often in top-notch journals. And then realize that you can do every single thing I listed and still end up un(der)employed for a year or two after graduating with your PhD, during which time you will apply for hundreds of academic and nonacademic jobs and get rejected from most. Nonacademic jobs will deem you too qualified to be a receptionist or administrative assistant even as you're just concerned with having enough food to eat for the next week. 

[ComeBackZinc]

I'm somewhat shocked that "inside hires, BS searches, and lateral moves" seem to be coming as a surprise. Yes, academia is about intellectual work—that should go unsaid—but it is also a social game. Top tier PhD programs give you access to academic social circles/communities, and information that you might not have otherwise. It's possible that taking advantage of these opportunities is "careerism," but it's also necessary. If you can develop a strong enough network within your field, you will know about inside hires, "nepotism," etc. There's also an equally likely chance that you will benefit from potential inside information and solicitations for applications. 

Part of me really resents and loathes the business-like side of things, i.e. networking, selling oneself, and clique-like organization. On the other hand, I can't really sympathize with people who want to remain ignorant to these realities. Yes, you may "believe deeply in the importance of teaching and research," but these aren't activities that happen in an insular, individualist bubble. I have trouble believing that some of this shock doesn't stem from the realization that academia isn't some sort of cloistered monastery, where everything operates on an honour system. 

On another level, I also want to speak a bit in favour of academia as a social system. On one level, yes, it does follow a somewhat corporate logic of in/out groups. At the same time, working academically within a social group can be a deeply intimate and productive activity. I'm thinking of specific social formations, like the groups around Post45, postmedieval, Feel Tank, and nonsite. Have these groupings helped their members acquire jobs and publications? Yes, of course they have, but I don't think they've emerged from a position of cynical careerism. When you start looking at things this way, I think it becomes less surprising that hiring ends up being somewhat of a closed system. Whether this is entirely ethical is up for debate, but I think that the idea of "fit" is more complicated than people want to admit. 

 

I was born into the academy. I literally grew up on a college campus. I never had a non-cynical portrait of the academy to lose. But asking that job search committees fulfill their ethical and legal responsibility to have a good-faith search in which multiple candidates are given a meaningful chance to be hired is not a matter of naivete. It's a matter of basic moral and political conviction. The notion that the old boys network only functions to reward people who are good at networking, rather than to multiply received advantage, is what's actually naive. It's a replication of privilege, inequality, and social disadvantage. And it's also illegal. This country has a set of laws that mandate inclusive hiring practices, and all public universities are required by statute to have an open hiring practice. If you think that the insiderism and patronage you're describing don't hurt minority groups, then I assure you, you're mistaken.

 

What's more, people spend hundreds and hundreds of hours on their job docs. I have, personally. To solicit applications from hundreds of people, get their hopes up, have them work to develop unique job documents for your job for no pay, interview ten, and invite three to campus, when you know very well that only one person has a chance to get the job, that is unethical on its face. I'm sorry if you're too busy playing world's savviest academic, but that's a fact. 

[VirtualMessage]

Nice assumption-making there. First of all, just because I have a postdoc, that does not mean that I have been successful in finding a job. I am actually in the process of leaving academia myself.

 

Second of all, your willingness to equate adjuncting with migrant labor pretty much says it all. PhDs are not factory workers, and it's an insult to appropriate that language of "exploitation" to talk about people who were in a position to devote seven years to getting a higher degree. You are indeed portraying yourself as a victim here--framing this as something that is "happening to us" rather than acknowledging that you have some agency here. Save the denunciation of "neoliberal" bullshit for when it really counts--for when it applies to the invisible poor who never had the opportunity to go to college, much less pursue a higher degree.

 

Our current economy is indeed exploitative--for everyone. But getting on here to write some angry jeremiad because it's happening to YOU now is just gormless. 

 

I don't see how it's a misappropriation. How would you suggest we talk about academic labor? Or is it you're point, which I take it to be, that we shouldn't talk about labor? We should just pick ourselves up by the bootstraps, right?  Obviously, I'm not saying that migrant laborers and adjunct teachers are identical. I'm drawing an analogy that has structural similarities. Moreover, I was pointing out that your claim about merely choosing not to work a crappy job ignores a number of factors that contribute to working a crappy job. It's the same obnoxious rhetoric that is used to excuse concerns about labor at all levels from the field to the factory to the classroom. Your assumptions about privilege and labor demonstrate an ignorance for how we can find solidarity with other workers by stressing points of similarity rather than difference (but wait, you've never been an adjunct because you wouldn't stoop to that). The invisible adjunct who makes poverty wages shares far more with America's exploited than she does with a successful electrician or police officer. So before you tell me to check my privilege, why don't you recheck your sanctimony. 

[Appppplication]

 

 

On a personal note, though--and probably a totally unnecessary one that I will regret articulating--I often get eye-rolly when I come across people like the OP, and I come across them a lot. I don't know how you could make it through grad school and to the job market and just now experience this sense of wide-eyed shock about your job prospects. This reads like a rant from someone who's never had to deal with rejection before. See also Patrick Iber. "I can't believe this is happening to MEEEEE! I was one of the good ones!"

 

 

 

This. 

 

That's why I thought it was originally a troll. I was surprised by the tone and drama and (sorry) naivete. It seemed as if the OP really DIDNT know what she/he was getting into with academics.

 

AND, inside hiring, hiring through networking, hiring through recommendation is pretty much how all professional jobs work. That's not to say it's fair, but it should be no surprise. What to do about the inequalities caused by it is another question. 

 

I feel bad for the OP because her/his mentors let her/him down by not being real about academic life. OR the OP just didn't listen.

Edited March 25, 2015 by Appppplication

[ComeBackZinc]

I really would love to be able to flash forward to after everyone in this thread has finished their PhDs and see what they think. Because the endless waves of essays by embittered people with doctorates and no jobs, however I might get annoyed with them, does not come from nowhere. And I really don't think that everyone here is going to be as blase and over it all after more than a half decade of hard work and no money dedicated to a degree that leaves you with no meaningful material gain. My assumption is that a lot of the people writing this stuff still think, in the back of their heads, "I'm going to be the exception."

Edited March 25, 2015 by ComeBackZinc

[1Q84]

I genuinely don't understand the position that, since it's unlikely you'll get an academic job, you shouldn't do a PhD. Like, if you'd be happier working in marketing or HR or restaurants than you would be doing a PhD, absolutely you should go do that stuff. But if that stuff is your fall-back, and you'd be happier reading for a living for 5-8 years, that stuff will still be there later.

 

This is a helpful distinction for me. I'm just very worried when people get all pollyanna about grad school with stuff like, "Well I don't mind burying my nose in books for 5-8 years, to hell with the consequences." I would add that often the casual fallback option planning is far too casual. People need to realize that 5-8 years of studying for a degree that probably won't get you a job is a long time to not be earning and saving for whatever your needs may be in the future (retirement, family, home, etc.) It's just a huge chunk of deferred income (5-8 for the degree, but +2 years or so if you choose to try your hand at the academic job market; so that's 10 years of deferred income, people!) that can really screw with your life plans if you're not ready for it.

 

I hate the rat race and every other part of capitalist society that makes me worry about the crap I listed above, but simply ignoring it is not going to help me and my family survive.

 

And I think this is ComeBackZinc's point--if you go in with the express knowledge that you can walk out either unfinished or without a job with a smile on your face, then have at it. The awareness is what's key. Have Plan B's and C's that you're ready to move up in the queue at a moment's notice. Ph.Ds are not just a risky choice anymore, it's almost a sure-lose.

 

Unfortunately, like OP said, I really do think there's a lot of exceptionalism in these types of threads, so his or her warnings are very, very much needed for that reason.

Edited March 25, 2015 by 1Q84

[Sigaba]

I appreciate the OP's, and other's, words of caution. Yet, I do find myself unsure of what exactly to do with this information as during my undergrad and my MA I was frequently reminded of the harsh realities of the academic market.

 

 

 

 There are any number of institutional realities that have been hidden from you. You think you're aware of them, but you are not.

 

 

I am going to drift from my lane for a bit. I strongly recommend that aspiring graduate students focus on VM's point about institutional realities. There are wheels within wheels and curtains behind curtains. As a doctoral student, you will get to see behind the next curtain after the knowledge beyond would have been most helpful. The disquiet that follows may not just be "If I knew Y years ago what I know now!" it can also be "If I knew W weeks ago what I now know."

 

The salt on the wound will be the non verbal communication you have with your closest advisers. Why didn't you tell me? you will implore. At best, the unvocalized reply will be Because professional ethics would not allow me to say anything. Worse, the response will be a shrugging How about that. Worst of all will be the realization that, in fact, you were warned--by people like VirtualMessage, or by professors via subtle remarks and cryptic comments. (FWIW, I've received all three categories of replies. But I'm not bitter.)

 

IRT the question of developing "back up" plans. Remember--you are writers. Writers write in the public sector, too. Maybe do an outside field in the basics of technical writing/corporate communications. Learn about industries that are recession proof--e.g. healthcare. Maybe take a class or two on how to count beans and/or interpret a P&L statement. Keep out of trouble and your credit in order so you can get a security clearance. There's money to be made thinking critically and writing well.

[ToldAgain]

Sigaba, your post seems just as cryptic as you are accusing your professors of being. What are these institutional realities, explicitly, that we need to know about?

Edited March 25, 2015 by ToldAgain

[NowMoreSerious]

Nice assumption-making there. First of all, just because I have a postdoc, that does not mean that I have been successful in finding a job. I am actually in the process of leaving academia myself.

 

Second of all, your willingness to equate adjuncting with migrant labor pretty much says it all. PhDs are not factory workers, and it's an insult to appropriate that language of "exploitation" to talk about people who were in a position to devote seven years to getting a higher degree. You are indeed portraying yourself as a victim here--framing this as something that is "happening to us" rather than acknowledging that you have some agency here. Save the denunciation of "neoliberal" bullshit for when it really counts--for when it applies to the invisible poor who never had the opportunity to go to college, much less pursue a higher degree.

 

Our current economy is indeed exploitative--for everyone. But getting on here to write some angry jeremiad because it's happening to YOU now is just gormless. 

 

How can an appeal to "agency" ever, in any form, dismiss structural forces?  I'm only suspicious here because agency is often used precisely against workers such as migrant laborers, "Well they chose to come here!"  

 

Now I do agree with your point that some privileged people suddenly become concerned with labor issues, or overstate their status as a worker, when the economy hits them personally.  This is especially in cases where individuals have had the luxury to ignore these issues for most of their lives.  I don't know that this is the case with the OP.

 

However, I don't see an issue with connecting exploited "intellectual" labor with exploited "material" labor (in the conventional sense).  In fact, I think capitalist ideology is at its most effective when it is able to reinforce these divides, not the other way around. 

 

At least in the U.S. post-post Fordist era, we are seeing transitions and shifts occurring with the democratization of intellectual labor and the subsequent exploitation of that labor, complete with its lumpenization of them.  

 

In a very real way, though, I think this points to the need to co-organize and co-conspire across labor categories.  This is something that almost never happens anymore, except, at times, with worker-student type alliances between campus service workers and students.  

[1Q84]

Hey, look!

 

http://www.salon.com/2015/03/24/to_hell_with_academia_how_i_learned_to_embrace_my_evil_advertising_gig_partner/