You have /5 articles left.
Sign up for a free account or log in.
Getty Images
Senior faculty members frequently tell doctoral students in English and foreign languages to "just do research all the time" and to "view everything else as a distraction," said the author of a study being presented today at the annual meeting of the Modern Language Association.
That's a big problem for Ph.D. students and the institutions that may hire them, according to the author. The study analyzes the 1,658 job postings that the MLA listed in 2015-16 to look at the skills being sought by hiring departments. About three-quarters of the job listings listed at least one skill associated with what are called alternative-academic jobs -- skills like public outreach, assessment, administration and curriculum development. In fact, some of these skills were significantly more likely to be listed than were traditional skills such as advanced knowledge of British or American literature.
Because the overwhelming majority of the jobs listed were for positions for which teaching and research are the stated priorities, the data challenge the idea that those coming on the market today are going to find traditional academic jobs and can best prepare with more and more research, says Beth Seltzer, the study's author.
Seltzer should know. She earned her Ph.D. in Victorian literature. But her job at Bryn Mawr College (in which she's very happy) is as an educational technology specialist.
Seltzer said that she did the analysis because she hopes it will prompt discussion about the nature of doctoral training. Many new Ph.D.s in the humanities and other disciplines are exploring alt-ac careers in parts of academe beyond the faculty. But what her findings show, Seltzer said, is that those seeking teaching positions also need alt-act skills. And Seltzer said she doubted many were picking them up from those faculty advisers who are focused on traditional faculty jobs at research universities.
Here are Seltzer's findings.
Percentage of MLA Job Listings Seeking Alt-Ac Skills, 2015-16
| English Jobs | Foreign Language Jobs | |
| Advising | 24% | 22% |
| Administration | 23% | 25% |
| Curriculum development | 23% | 22% |
| Working with diverse populations | 20% | 16% |
| Public engagement | 17% | 12% |
| Digital writing/media | 15% | 5% |
| Digital scholarship | 14% | 6% |
| Professional/technical writing | 14% | 6% |
| Technology/online teaching | 12% | 16% |
| Assessment | 8% | 7% |
| English as foreign language | 8% | 5% |
| Grant writing/fund-raising | 7% | 7% |
| K-12 connections | 5% | 3% |
| Editing/directing journal | 5% | 1% |
| Writing center work | 5% | 0% |
| Event organizing | 2% | 2% |
By way of comparison, Seltzer found that only 2 percent of jobs (in English and foreign languages) listed comparative literature as a key skill, only 13 percent of English jobs listed American literature as a key skill, and only 12 percent listed British literature.
The research comes at a time of an ever-tightening job market for new English and foreign language Ph.D.s.
MLA leaders have strongly encouraged Ph.D.s to consider nontraditional careers and have spoken of the importance of reforming doctoral education. Paula Krebs, the new executive director of the MLA, has been involved in efforts to get research university leaders in the same room with those (generally not those at research universities) who are hiring new Ph.D.s. And other scholarly organizations have moved in the same direction, saying that graduate programs and graduate students need to think broadly about career possibilities and training for those options.
But Seltzer, like many graduate students, reports that the substance of most doctoral education is still focused on the traditional careers -- even as the job market has indicated interest in skills beyond traditional research.
