Déja vu: at this time two years ago, I was scrambling to line up adjunct teaching or other contingent academic work. Now, after a full-time visiting appointment at Stanford in the interim, I'm entering that phase again.
Since October, I've applied for ~15 tenure-track jobs in my area (television, new media, and/or convergence), interviewed for 7, and conducted campus visits for 2. In the process, I've had the occasion to learn about and reflect on the academic job market. There's always the outside chance of an end-run, but I think it's now safe to say that I won't be starting a permanent position in the fall.
In the course of my emerging career, I've absorbed a certain radical narrative about the humanities and higher ed in the US. It circulates in online networks outside the purview of my grad school advisors and peers, among a certain set of academic twitterati, interdisciplinary centers and organizations, and education hackers. It goes something like this: Today, the university is in crisis. As PhD students, our professors are out of touch with how to train and prepare us for the realities of over-production and under-employment. Teaching is as important as research to our profile, but college pedagogy is hopelessly ill-suited to the interests and needs of students today. The humanities are under siege from privatization and anti-intellectualism, and in order to survive our institutions must change. Open scholarship, digital tools, and interdisciplinary alliances are the future. To succeed (at least in the cutting-edge discipline of media studies), we must stand out by demonstrating connections and competencies in this broader project in addition to traditional academic achievements and skills.
This narrative has resonated with and shaped my values as a scholar, which I would summarize as follows:
- my research is tied to my identity, my passions, and my social context
- my academic work should reach multiple audiences
- intellectual production is collaborative and non-rivalrous -- it's more productive the more it's shared
- my teaching should continually adapt to incorporate my students' concerns, investments, and knowledges
- critical and cultural theory are key 21st century literacies
- media theory and practice mutually enrich each other
- my reason for being a professor is to cultivate critical media users
- my reason for being in academia is to participate in changing it
- my job is to experiment and innovate
My wish for a career as a professor is that I will work in a position that affirms these values. I'm well aware that this probably doesn't describe the majority of tenure-track jobs. For the most part, I subscribe to the notion of "fit" -- i.e. hiring committees are looking not for the BEST candidate but for the best fit for a department's particular culture and requirements -- and I understand that finding the right "fit" for me may require patience spanning several years.
If I find myself re-evaluating the system at large, it's primarily the result not of my condition of overall joblessness but of my participant observation of the constitution, process, and result of one particular search. Unfortunately, it's not appropriate for me to describe the specifics publicly, and certainly my perspective is limited. Suffice it to say that, within the beaurocratic mire of the tenure-track, it seems that even very unconventional positions may be filled based on very conventional criteria.
My experiences are inadvertently rewriting my narrative, and I feel a particular responsibility to share these thoughts because, barely a month ago, I participated in a workshop at the SCMS conference on "Blogging, Tweeting, and Posting: Online Media Community Building and Scholarly Promotion." With whatever authority was granted me by this venue, I reiterated the proposition that yes, the titular activities will give you a leg up on the market by offering you name recognition, academic networking, and cutting-edge cachet. I would like to retract this optimism, which now appears premature.
I'm succumbing to a suspicion that the ponderous institutional weight attached to tenure-track hires works to advance the most conservative, middle-of-the-road candidates -- not, in fact, the ones who stand out as unique. In fact, I think there may be divergent logics at work in shortlisting vs. eventual hiring: that innovative touch (the blog, the open access publication, the public lecture, the artist talk, the multimedia assignment, the course website) may be attention-getting enough to land you the interview, but as a group of people with varied backgrounds and status must reach consensus on a finalist who can then pass muster with upper echelons of the administration, will it really get you the job?
So I begin to wonder: will I ever find the "fit" I'm seeking as a tenure-track professor? Now, I'm not saying that I'm giving up on this endeavor just yet. Throwing in the towel after one year on the market would be hubris -- the mantra of rejection should always be: It's Not About You. That said, after struggling with depression for some time now, it's telling that I'm now experiencing a new sense of agency over my future. I'm starting to ask: what if I don't assume that I must follow this normative path -- what other possibilities for my life can I envision?
Meanwhile, looking toward next year's market, I'm re-evaluating my strategies.
Here's how I've been spending most of my time since finishing my PhD:
- teaching (the vast majority): developing seven courses that experiment with multimedia pedagogy
- posting and writing about my teaching
- learning (the hard way) about the conceptual and institutional challenges of media studies programs
- cultivating scholarly connections at Stanford and online
- participating in conferences and more unusual events like THATCamp and DIY 2011
- co-editing a special issue of an online journal
- keeping up with news and happenings in my field via twitter
Here is the only thing that will strengthen my candidacy for tenure-track jobs:
- a book proposal under contract with an academic press
Given this conjuncture, I have to make some changes in my life to focus more on the latter and less on the former. No more new courses, for one, but I also intend to decline any further unorthodox or online projects. I have promised or planned further documentation of my Stanford teaching -- including a blog post about using Elgg as a course platform, a blog post about my evolving strategies for grading, recordings of some lectures, and a "TV show" showcasing student videos -- that is hereby abandoned on the basis of these new priorities. I will also be taking a hiatus from twitter.
As for next year, I don't know yet where I'll be -- in a postdoc, adjuncting in this area, or somewhere else entirely. But now -- as a result, I must emphasize, of access to financial and emotional support from my family -- I have choices.