For many people what’s attractive about an academic career is the opportunity to be intellectually engaged: with students, with books, with colleagues, etc. Popular cultural representations of academia twist this into an image of the professor with his mind on higher things and detached from reality. Either way what gets called “the life of the mind” is central to both positive and negative representations of academic careers.
As you know, an academic job also involves a lot of mundane, practical activities including attending meetings, filling in forms, and so on. Sometimes it feels like those mundane activities crowd out the intellectual engagement, especially in the context of external “accountability”, increased student numbers, reduced budgets, and so on.
Where is “the life of the mind” in your academic job?
Does this suggest reading books and thinking big thoughts?
Spending time in an archive?
Interesting intellectual discussions with peers?
Interesting intellectual discussions with students?
Seeing students “click” with the subject you love?
Are you frustrated at how much of your job seems distant from this?
Is there a mismatch between the demands put on you for research productivity and the scholarship that you think is important?
Is it hard to get that intellectual stimulation from teaching because of increasing class sizes?
Are you frustrated by the mismatch between your desire to do research and the structural forces which require you to manage others doing research under your supervision?
Have you ever talked about scholarship and ideas with your colleagues? Or is most of your interaction about administrivia and student issues?
Does you career fulfill your expectations of the life of the mind?
Does your experience suggest this is an achievable goal?
Have you done anything to prioritize the life of the mind and diminish the frustrations other experience?
I’d love to hear your thoughts on this?
Positive stories of the benefits of an academic career.
Negative ones about the frustrations.
Let the aspiring academics see more of what the job is really like. And help me help people like you make their job more like the one they want.
Edited March 30, 2017.
As part of my Ph.D., I wrote a lit review on job satisfaction and stress in university faculty in Canada, the U.S., U.K., and Australia. It wasn’t horrible, but there were lots of problems.
The life of the mind is getting crowded out by higher student-faculty ratios, administrative workload (committees), and the need to apply for research grants.
Many faculty report a high degree of isolation from colleagues, with very little interaction when it comes to research and especially teaching.
Junior faculty (pre-tenure) report more problems, including unclear tenure guidelines, lack of mentoring and support, and being required to prep and teach new courses every semester. They fear asking for help or confiding in the same colleagues who will vote on their tenure in a few years.
Many report lack of support for teaching development. Some report being actively discouraged from wasting time developing their teaching when tenure depends on almost entirely on research.
A few universities do not come through with promised start-up funds or facilities for research.
A few universities hire multiple people on the tenure track and let them compete for 6 or 7 years for one tenured position.
In sum, the environment is more busy and competitive rather than contemplative and collegial.
I’m hoping lots of profs will chime in to say it’s all worth it and the life of the mind is alive and well.
Rachel – what a useful lit. review you did – is there any way we can read it?
My 2 cents on the subject -Ironically, 2 cents -a mathematical division of pitch, is too small for most untrained ears to hear! :)
I went back to school to complete a PhD in my mid 40’s…I have held many jobs (including ones that others envied) over the years and they ALL had similar considerations – politics, “unfair” practices, worries about tenure and trust, and dealing with seemingly hostile co-workers. I now teach one class per semester where I work overtime everyday and often complain that I do not have time to pursue my artwork…however, I also realize that this decision is MY choice…
We all have the potential to make choices. Do we allow ourselves to get caught up in the game or not?…It is important to learn what it is about the work that we are passionate about and focus on that. What works for us? I am convinced that if we follow our passions (and use our good judgement too) that we will end up in jobs that can satisfy. But, they may not be foreseen.
We must be very careful when asking others about their experiences because there are many unknowns – would those same people complain about something in ANY job? I know people who complain about their situations even when they don’t have to work and have complete financial freedom to use their minds in anyway they can imagine! Life attitude is key in job satisfaction.
I will conclude my ramble (and allow a run-on sentence!) by saying that when I get off into my own rants about why my university doesn’t care that my students’ assessments of me are in the 4+ range (this is a good thing :) ) nearly as much as they care if I won a SSHRC or how much I am publishing (and yes, I checked off those boxes too – for the potential job later in life!) or that the class I teach used to have 50 students now has 75 (and I am often up at 4am reading their papers), I also remember how I feel when students tell me that our class has changed their lives. Last week I had two students who went through trauma – they came to get advice and calm from me. And, two weeks ago when a dear friend of mine suddenly passed away and my son went off to the military during the same week, it was my students who wrote virtual hugs, and sent me music and poems to help me heal….that is when I know I am doing what I set out to do – communicate and care for others, no matter where it might be…and with that, I know that when I defend my thesis (spring!) I can allow myself to be satisfied with whatever position I end up in – as long as I remember that my priority is about connecting with others so we can make our lives full of love….If you hear an amen after reading this, I apologize!
Well.. I did eventually get to a place where I find this kind of intellectual stimulation on as regular a basis as I had wished. But it took time and some détours..
While I never really harboured illusions about how great academia would be, I still went through something of a disillusion, early during grad school (or even before grad school). I even became quite cynical, for a while.
Contrary to what some expect (and that you dutifully debunk), having fascinating conversations isn’t how most academics spend most of their time. I knew this, yet I was disappointed, in some ways. It’s easy to be isolated and academic isolation can be surprisingly painful.
But I did come back from all of this. While the notion of a sinking ship (or collapsing Empire) keeps coming through my mind as I discuss academia, I can even say that I’m not really cynical, anymore. Snarky? On occasion. Cynical? Not so much. And not as much as many colleagues I meet.
A few things happened. One is that I got to teach more and to establish myself in a department. It changes “everything.” I experienced something similar when I was full-time faculty on a teaching fellowship. But, even as a part-timer, getting to establish something over the years has a much stronger effect, in terms of intellectual stimulation. Students come to me to discuss fascinating things which affect them. Corridor discussions with colleagues are still rather rare but do tend to focus on interesting things. And learning/teaching workshops are a way to interact about important issues outside the department yet within the academic context. Not to mention that I still attend talks and other events at other departments and academic institutions. On occasion.
But, honestly, a large part of my intellectual stimulation comes from outside the Ivory Tower. Unconferences, University of the streets, informal get-togethers, social media.. I regularly get into fascinating stuff through all of these.
In fact, social media might represent the key context for my intellectual stimulation. Including your blog, obviously, or your shared items on Google Reader. But also discussions I have on Facebook, or even interactions through Twitter. There’s a lot of deep stuff, out there, and much of it isn’t in peer-reviewed academic journals constructed for/through the “Publish or Perish” model. I get a kick out of this.
Now, this isn’t to say that I get the same kind of epiphany as the first time I read Bourdieu (as a freshman) or, more importantly for me, the first time I read Jakobson (the following year). But I don’t expect this, anymore. Enough landminds have blown my mind, in the past, that the fields seems clear, at this point.
And there’s nothing really sad, about this. It’s not like Keith Richards’s veins or the cold heart of a Victorian headmistress. Au contraire! It’s more about finding beauty in any little thing, instead of admiring beauty in a single object. Sure, Earth-shattering realizations are rarer, for me these days. But I find insight in all sorts of things. Every single day.
It can be in an academic article about Greimas, Wittgenstein, and Memmi. Or in a blogpost about EduPunks. Or in a tweet about the latest gadget.
Depth’s in the eye of the beholder.