Looking elsewhere: career options other than the tenure-track teaching position for M.A.s and Ph.D.s in English

Abstract

Today’s tight job market may seem daunting for graduate students and non-tenured folk working in English departments across the country. It often seems there is no or little hope of finding work; at best, one might find a position as an adjunct lecturer with a contract period of one year. The fear of continuing to be underpaid workers with no benefits is all too real to people finishing their dissertations and degrees. However, some of those trained in fields in which the market is tight have used skills developed during graduate school to find non-teaching jobs, both inside and outside the academy, that offer decent salaries and benefits, though they may have other drawbacks for those trained as humanists. For example, such positions may not include formal teaching duties or research opportunities. For this article, guest editor Keith Dorwick asked a number of individuals who had found work in a variety of nontraditional, nonteaching positions to meet at LinguaMOO and talk about their careers; afterwards, they were given transcripts of the conversation and annotated the transcripts. Four computers and writing specialists and one librarian gathered. The conversation was moderated by Dene Grigar, Assistant Professor at Texas Woman’s University. This article includes a version of that conversation as edited for print purposes, and the annotations and responses made after the fact by the participants (whose biographies appear at the end of the article).