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2020-7-26 05:11 |
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Another interesting article I read on humanities PhD degree
http://www.economist.com/blogs/f ... t_there_for_a_philo
It's hard out there for a philosopher
Feb 18th 2009, 1:12 by The Economist | NEW YORK
WHILE submitting my dissertation (that’s the final step in the process), I had a brief conversation with another soon-to-be PhD depositing his paper. His degree was in French literature. Economists are generally discouraged from socialising with students in other disciplines (despite the tempation to associate with humanities students and the accompanying aura of intellectual coolness economists lack). So, it was one of the few occasions, in six years of graduate school, that I actually spoke to someone in the humanities.
I told the French student how much I admired him because he must possess an intense passion for his field. After all, he was willing to spend so much time and energy completing a degree that left him with such poor job prospects (studying economics robbed me of any tact or sensitivity). The French student gave me a dirty look and told me he honestly never thought about the whole job thing until he went on the market, but now he wished he had studied something more practical.
Most economists love their field, but I know few who would have put up with graduate school without a high probability of a high-paying job at the end. The economics job market normally has greater demand than supply (though perhaps not this year). My advisor once called it unconscionable that professors in the humanities produced so many students whom they had no hope of placing. Of course, economists must spend their graduate careers pondering concepts like opportunity cost and labour markets with excess supply, so it’s impossible to plead ignorance.
William Pannapacker, an English professor, believes the problem goes deeper than humanities students being short-sighted or uninformed. He thinks it’s an outright conspiracy. He claims less than half of doctorate holders ever find tenure track faculty positions, yet he suggests that successful undergraduate students are duped into believing academia offers better job prospects.
It's hard to tell young people that universities recognize that their idealism and energy — and lack of information — are an exploitable resource. For universities, the impact of graduate programs on the lives of those students is an acceptable externality, like dumping toxins into a river. If you cannot find a tenure-track position, your university will no longer court you; it will pretend you do not exist and will act as if your unemployability is entirely your fault. It will make you feel ashamed, and you will probably just disappear, convinced it's right rather than that the game was rigged from the beginning.
In the past Mr Pannapacker has likened graduate school to joining a cult. There is some truth to that, but most occupations have some cult-like qualities (try speaking to a lawyer). I certainly got my share of flack for leaving academia, mainly from the professors who invested their resources into training me to do research and were disappointed with their return. But some professors also come from a place of genuine concern. Many view life outside the ivory tower as tawdry, tedious, and intellectually vacuous. They probably think that being an adjunct professor for less than minimum wage is a better alternative. They don't know any different.
Nonetheless, it seems like a labour market failure—so many bright students spending their most productive years preparing for a degree they’ll never use. Mr Pannapacker found it hard to translate his skills to jobs other than teaching. He was also disheartened to find himself competing with people ten years younger than himself, fresh from university, for the same jobs.
Of course he went back to academia. A graduate degree, in any field, increases your human capital; it teaches critical thinking and an ability to communicate abstract ideas. Humanities students may have a rough time convincing employers outside of academia that their skills are marketable, particularly since many employers do not realise that being a graduate student does not even resemble their own undergraduate or MBA experience. I imagine the more tenacious humanities PhDs thrive in industry and do not regret their degree.
Mr Pannapacker reckons the recession will seduce many people into graduate school to avoid the poor job market. Even if they get a fellowship, the opportunity cost of a decade of graduate school may make that a poor economic decision. Further, he sees the recession permanently lowering the number of tenure track jobs. In ten years he predicts even more excess supply. It's interesting to think that one outcome of the current recession may be a deterioration in the labour market power of humanities professors. |
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