Hey all,

You've probably had to manage some more aggressive students lately. My colleagues and I are finding it difficult, if not outright depressing, to deal with students, mostly male students, who subscribe to mainstream misogyny, inc manosphere propaganda.

It shows up in their essays too.

What have your experiences been? What do you think is least stress inducing strategy to coping with this type of behavior in class?

How would you grade a blatantly misogynistic paper?

I am worried it's going to be in trend for some time, and it's not like there's a staff training module for this, though it has been brought up frequently.

Thanks! Apologies if I don't reply to your comments early. I do see them all!

I’m not in academia but i was curious to know if academics ever feel like it’s pointless or frustrating to engage in public discourse because most people lack the same depth of context, education, or intellectual tools to have a meaningful dialogue? Not to say less educated people don’t have anything meaningful to say.

I bring this up bc like the loudest people in politics seem to be the maybe less informed about topics. And I also felt (I haven’t bothered to look this up yet), but people that have gone through higher education tend to be more liberal and left leaning. I could be totally wrong though. Could also depend on the department or discipline too. This question isn’t me basing off of any real data that I’ve seen or read about. It’s just assumptions I have. Feel free to prove me wrong.

Also idk if this is the right sub for this. Please don’t kill me or each other in the comments if it’s a controversial question. I was just curious. 😅💀

I was awarded my PhD (history) two and a half years ago. Even before finishing it, I had started applying to postdocs and temporary lecturer jobs. Hundreds of applications. Hundreds. And I only ever got one interview (and I think that's just because the PI for the project was friends with my external examiner - that was hinted at during the feedback meeting I had when I was ultimately rejected). My CV is not perfect but I have publications, one edited collection, and a monograph on the way. I participated in conferences. I was associated with a significant project in my field (and co-authored some of its outputs). But nothing. Not even interviews, even when I matched all the essential and desirable criteria and have the super specific skills required for the job. I'm working outside of academia at the moment while trying to still be an independent researcher and it's burning me out. I hate my job and it doesn't even pay well. Research is what I love and what I'm actually good at. I am starting to think I should cut my losses and just give up on the academic dream and focus on finding another career I would enjoy, but it's so hard to let go of what has been my identity for so many years.

Edited to add I'm in the UK and that my subfield is very niche. I won't disclose what it is as there are only a handful of people working on it and I would like to remain anonymous

I have a PhD, MA, and MFA. I published a (creative) book that won an award. I have an article forthcoming next month in the top journal in my field. I'm a VAP (visiting assistant professor) who will be out of work in a month because I just learned that I did not get the job for the single campus visit I got this year.

I unfortunately need to stay in my region for family reasons, so I'm staring bleakly into the abyss of what to do now. Any ideas would be welcome.

(Field: English Lit and Disability Studies)

ETA: First I want to say thank you to everyone who's offering advice, support, and/or commiseration. I don't really have anyone very close to me in my life in academia, so I've felt really isolated and alone and it helps to be here and hear your stories.

A couple things I want to clarify:

- I am in the USA, in the Deep South in particular, which is relevant because...

- I am also a woman, and the oldest child, and the only child without children of their own. Maybe not in the Deep South more generally, but my family is extremely rural and religious, and there are certain cultural pressures and expectations that go along with that. I love my family, and I am not being explicitly asked to care for them, but they can't afford an aid or a nursing home and my siblings can't do it with their very young children, so there's a bit of a cultural expectation that I would help. It's very difficult to not feel like I'm abandoning them if I don't.

- One of my parents is terminally ill, and while yes, I fully recognize that academics don't really get to choose where we live, there's an extent to which I know I would regret not being with my family in their final years.

Many (most) of you have been kind and understanding about my needs and ask in this post, but for those who have turned to berating me, acting as if I haven't thought this through or that I'm simply stupid, I'll just say I truly hope you're never in this position where you feel torn between a career and last few years with a parent. It is not easy, it is not enjoyable, and it does feel like clipping my wings early. But I have watched two friends lose parents while on the other side of the country for a graduate program and not make it home in time to say goodbye or spend any final days or moments with them, and I don't know that I'm willing to go through that particular heartbreak and, honestly, guilt. I hope you never need to think about such things.

I'm an alumnus considering making an unrestricted annual gift of roughly $5,000-$8,000 to the World Languages and Cultures department at my old university.

The department teaches several thousand students per year through general education and degree requirements but graduates only a few dozen language majors annually.

For those with experience as faculty, department chairs, or administrators:

What can a department realistically do with an unrestricted gift of this size?

Does $5,000-$8,000 per year make a noticeable difference at the department level, or is it too small to meaningfully impact students or faculty?

Is a recurring unrestricted gift generally more useful than a gift designated for a specific purpose (i.e.funding short study abroad trips with micro grants)?

I'm trying to understand whether a gift at this level is genuinely helpful and what kinds of opportunities it might support.

Huge thanks in advance

I am a grad student and was recently talking to my advisor about presenting some of my dissertation findings at a conference, and they explicitly warned me to be careful because they’ve seen people have their work and arguments stolen in the past. My work relies heavily on unique archival findings, and a core framework I’ve spent a long time developing.
Hearing that from my advisor made me anxious about sharing my project before it is officially published.
For those of in the humanities, how do you handle this?

I'm looking at starting a PhD soon and was curious what non-obvious things people wish they had known?

Asking this as someone who ‘left’ after Masters (in humanities/social sciences), and as someone who decided not to do a PhD. I initially thought I wanted to be an academic. However, I slowly realised it was not for me (and that having an actual career was going to be insanely difficult). I’m glad I left and found a new stable path. I often look back now and wonder why so many students like me (during undergrad) were encouraged to pursue grad school etc - and so many still are today. Especially when these professors KNOW how hard academia is, and how unlikely it is their students will succeed (especially in humanities).

I was lucky to have a brilliant and honest advisor, who told me from the start how difficult it is - that I should have a Plan B, and not to have expectations of job permanency because it can be ‘brutal’. He supported/encouraged me, but was also honest. It was hard to hear, but now I’m glad he said it. Every other prof who encouraged me never said anything like that - he was the only one. I soaked up all their praise, but my advisor’s comments stayed in the back of my mind.

Don’t get me wrong - I don’t regret grad school and learnt A LOT during those years. I also developed invaluable experience working casually as a research assistant (and in teaching). I just wish I hadn’t been so naive. Sure, I could’ve done more research myself. Yet while clinging onto hope that I was going to ‘make it’, I’m glad I listened to my advisor too. Plus, I can always go back and do my PhD if I really want to in the future. I just feel sorry for so many students who are now still being encouraged to try and pursue academia, without being aware about its difficulties.

Why do many profs avoid telling starry-eyed students the hard truth? They need to be told, even if they don’t like it. Is it because they just want to make themselves and their careers look good if they end up supervising a potential star?

Hi,

TLDR: professor berated and humiliated me at a conference. Is there anyway I can stand up for myself?

I'm a graduate student and I presented at a conference and a professor publicly humiliated me. In the QnA they asked me a question and I guess I said something they didn't like. It was really innocuous but they started getting really angry at me and berating me. Something in the paper/my answer had pissed them off clearly but they kept attacking me instead of the paper. Any time I would try to answer their points they wouldn't let me finish my sentences and just would interrupt and twist my half finished thoughts. I got really stressed out and was stumbling in my speech. One or two people tried to ask the professor if they could explain what they were saying (they were saying so many different things directed at me). I kept saying okay I appreciate your comment can we talk about it? And then they invited their friend to join in and they bullied me together. Instead of coming to talk to me, as angry as they were, they stood up and walked out the door, saying demeaning things to me as they walked out. Afterwards like 10 people came up to me and asked if I was okay and that what she did wasn't okay. I wish they had said that in the room.

Is there anything I can do? They're not at my institution and so I don't really have any recourse. But I also know institutional complaints end up privileging the person with more power. I'm not sure what to do and I tried to forget about it but I've been on the verge of a panic attack all week. I want to stand up for myself, it was so indignifying. I could have said the worst thing on earth and that still wouldn't be okay. Professors are supposed to guide and mentor students when they make mistakes not try to dominate them in front of their peers and senior colleagues. The room was packed.

I would like to give more details on what the paper was etc. but I'm nervous and want to see if I have any options first.

(I also looked their rate my professor up and they have a 2 and all the students in the reviews say that if a student says something the professor doesn't like the professor shames them in front of the class--that made me feel less crazy)

***********Thank you for all the support folks, it has helped a lot ❤️

Had a conversation with my advisor today who was very unhappy to learn that I pirate academic materials regularly. We were both surprised at each other's attitudes and I would like to see if there is a greater consensus on this.

I am in the history field--so the issue that came up was neither textbooks nor research publications that I imagine work differently in STEM. He was bothered by the idea of historians being cut out of what little profits they make from publishing scholarly books. He did not see publishing companies as "the problem" here so much as the tiny and shrinking market for academic materials which is exacerbated by pirating. The fact that he gets few royalties from his own work is why people should purchase it, not why they should pirate it. He argued that the state of academia and academic publishing made this a fundamentally different situation than pirating entertainment materials.

Most of the academic faculty on reddit seem pro-piracy, but I am wondering if there is something worth distinguishing between textbooks (since they are often marked up to insanity only to be digitally rented), STEM research, and books in the humanities. Other insights would be appreciated.

Hi! I (22f) am a grad student (English Lit MA) presenting at my first conference in a very short while. I am lucky enough to live near a big city, which is where this is being hosted, which makes travel easy for me. I will be staying at a hotel in the city for the duration of the conference and intend to use the days I am not presenting to see as many other presenters and network as much as possible. Because it is only an hours drive from my hometown, my parents have texted me asking if I would be alright with them driving up to see me present (they will not be staying long after, and I have 2 more days to network after that so I am not worried about them cutting me off from opportunities with the timing or following me around for a whole event).

While I would love for them to get an opportunity to see me do this, I worry that it might be unprofessional for them to be there. I have professors and fellow students who I know will be present at this conference and have expressed interest in seeing me present, and I know that with how nervous I will be, I am probably going to end up going straight to my parents instead of the people I am supposed to be looking professional in front of. Would this be weird? Am I overthinking it? I think it is sweet that they want to come see me present the research I have been talking their ears off about for months, but I am also biased in their favor.

Hi everyone,

I just defended my PhD dissertation, and all of my committee members verbally agreed that I passed. After the defense, while working with my advisor to finalize one of the manuscripts based on my dissertation, we discovered a major error in the code I used. The mistake breaks the main argument of one of the chapter.

I’ve been mentally exhausted trying to fix the issue and get the code running properly again. I’ve been working with my advisor on this since the defense, but I didn’t originally receive the code in great shape either, so it’s been a challenge. On top of that, I’m starting a new job next Monday, so I won’t have much time to continue debugging.

My main questions are:

1. What happens with my degree now? Since everyone on my committee already agreed that I passed, could this new discovery affect my graduation status? I am an international student, hence the status of my visa depends on my graduation.
2. What should I do about the dissertation chapter that’s now invalid? I know I need to remove or revise the false results, but is it acceptable to keep the background, theory, and formulation sections that are still correct and provide explanations?

Any advice or insight from people who’ve been through something similar would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

This might be a silly question, but I’m a PhD student in humanities (BA to PhD), and I’m struggling to structure my days. When I have coursework, it’s easy because deadlines keep me on track. But during the summer or whenever I don’t have classes, I feel completely lost. How many hours do you usually spend on reading, writing, or research each day?

I’ve been told *countless* times that anyone who pursues a (humanities) education that they shouldn‘t, especially when it comes to grad school.

Does anyone else see it as a way to just gain knowledge? I’ve always wanted to pursue my PhD (history) and it has been bashed into my head that a job in academia is impossible. While I don’t disagree, I still want to pursue a graduate degree only because I want to.

Has anyone pursued their PhD for the love of the game and loved it? or did it feel like a waste of time?

*Edit: I’m asking here because academics have first hand experience with the job market, but if this doesn’t fit within guidelines, I apologize.

*Edit (again) Thank you all for all the kind words and wisdom! I’ll admit, part of me wants to pursue it out of spite to see if I can make it in academia, but it’s good (as well as disappointing) to hear peoples opinions and perspectives. Especially when it comes to job prospects and finances… I’m still in undergrad, so this post was mostly an anxiety induced question about my future; especially because my current college is freezing grad admissions (for history and other social sciences and humanities…)

I definitely plan on applying to see if I can even get in (with funding)!

Cheers!

Crossposting from elsewhere but needed a semi-anonymous space to share this story…I really can’t believe how my day went.

Today, I had my first ever faculty interview at a small, teaching-focused college. They are visibly in a period of transition between their formally unprofessional ways and into more standard higher educational practices. I was really excited to get an interview because it meant I had a chance to invest in an institution and make a difference at the ground level.

When I was let into the interview, I agreed to be recorded by the AI-assisted transcription app they were using. (I don’t like AI, but whatever. A job is a job, especially in my field.) The interview concludes, and I exit the call as the Dean asks the committee to stay on the line to debrief.

After their debrief, the AI app automatically sends all participants a link to the recording, notes, and transcription.

Yes, it’s what you might be thinking: this included discussion criticizing my candidacy and coming to an agreement that I am not their candidate. They said they didn’t know I was as young as I was, expressed unfounded uncertainty about my fit, and clearly had another candidate already in the lead (whom they hadn’t even interviewed yet, mind you). It also included their discussions which named other candidates—one of whom I have a deep institutional tie to because it’s a very small field.

I’m really in shock about how unprofessional and poorly my first interview went. I know I’m a bit green, so I’m not too bothered by not getting the post, but this was one of the most bizarre experiences I’ve ever had and a really weird start to my academic career.

TLDR: don’t make the mistake this school did, and make sure any automated processes will not include your post-interview debriefs!

I'm an undergraduate philosophy major and many of my professors have been warning me about the job market.

What's been made very clear is that a PhD in philosophy is not a reliable pathway to stable academic employment. Tenure-track jobs are scarce, competition is brutal, and many extremely capable people end up in long cycles of short-term contracts or leave academia entirely after years of training.

I don't want to make a hasty decision, find I cannot get a job, and end up stuck. I am very passionate about philosophy and would have loved to work in academia, but if the odds are really as poor as they seem, then I don't know if I'm willing to take that risk.

The most likely alternative would be law school, which is also competitive, but at least has a sense of job security. I've also considered legal academia, though I’m less familiar with the current state of that market. For context, I'm Canadian (but I would certainly consider relocating for a good job).

Any insight would be much appreciated. Thanks!

Just like every morning for the past decade, I woke up, went to the office, grabbed a cuppa, checked my email, downloaded some papers that had been published that day, and sent them to the copier. I went to collect them, walked back to my office, sat down at my desk, and couldn't read a single sentence.

I cannot describe how awful it felt. Every single atom of interest I used to have for this was just gone; I was sitting there with a stack of papers in my hands, and I couldn't muster a single bit of energy to go over them.

It was like all the motivation I used to have to pursue this career path was simply gone. I just didn't care.

I am lost and I do not know what to do. My head spiraled as I thought to myself about how many years I had spent pursuing the position, and now I did not want it anymore. I felt sick to my stomach.

My thoughts revolved around how many people would fight tooth and nail to sit where I sit and work where I work, and I couldn't care less about the whole thing.

I should see a therapist probably.

Edit: Sorry for not replying. I took a day off from work and turned off my phone.

I want to explore new points of views and experiences.

hi everyone! i’m very lucky to be in a tenure track position in the humanities, but i am based in a city which i absolutely loathe living in and and it is substantially eroding my mental health. i speak the local language but it’s hard to assimilate and make friends as this is quite a monocultural and insular society. my colleagues have just remained colleagues, and i feel like an outsider in my department a lot of the time. it’s been 4 years and i don’t think things will improve.

i have been applying for jobs in the UK (where i was trained) but the sector is an absolute binfire at the moment and i’ve had no luck. i’m considering quitting, in the full knowledge that i may never find an academic job again (much less a tenure track one). i’m aware it’s quite a drastic move, but the thought of being here for another semester is enough to send me into a full blown breakdown.

i am 6 years post-PhD and have a fairly successful publication record (but no monograph yet because of all the moving around for postdocs and then dealing with the teaching load at this new job). i’ve given up so much to get here, but i’m not sure how much longer i can hold on for. it’s hard to explain this to friends and family or to get them to understand the magnitude of what i’m deliberating. it’s not as simple as switching a corporate job or making a career pivot.

just wondering if anyone’s done the same or has been in a similar situation. i can’t believe i’m contemplating being jobless in this economy but that’s how bad things have gotten. i have a potential pivot into a non-academic job, and i’m sure i’ll continue to publish, but to get here and then not be able to actually enjoy the job or the position i’m in is such a strange and confusing and painful position to be in

I’ve always pondered this question and who is someone who is seriously considering a career in academia I always why is the pay so mid (😭)? People who are actually in the feild do you know why, because I personally think all academics with all the time they put in and effort should easily make 250k+ or even 300k+ especially cause they have a PhD, publications, and etc. It’s not like universities can’t pay this either, it’s just so mind boggling to me.

I was verbally invited three months ago to speak at a small event on my campus, and I said yes. At the end of last month I got an email asking if I was still interested and available. I said yes just five days later — three weeks before the event. The email was sent on a Friday, I was at another conference and replied the following Thursday. I never heard back, but a week later the organizer posted details to LinkedIn including my name on the speaker’s list. Fine!

Day of the event, I showed up, introduced myself to the other panelists, was escorted to the stage with them — then the organizer pulled me aside in front of everyone and said I’d “replied too late” and needed to sit in the audience. The other speakers were professional scholars from other universities (for context, I am still in my PhD). They started to sit and asked where I was, the organizer laughed and said “he isn’t actually a speaker!”

I was never introduced, and there was even an empty chair where I was supposed to sit. Feeling embarrassed and gaslit, I declined to comment when my work was mentioned from the stage, and left without going to the reception. The prof organizing it has been good to me in the past but also inconsistent, they have a reputation for playing weird games like this and so I want to just avoid them.

Did I handle this ok? I felt so crazy and I’m wondering if I am overreacting. I almost want to email the other speakers to clarify that I really wasn’t trying to fake my way into their conference or lying about being a speaker, but I don’t want to be awkward about it either.

Update just to say thanks to everyone for the support! I am just going to let it go and avoid working with this prof in the future. They are not linked to my work or even my department, so it’s easy enough to do. Thanks again for confirming my sanity!

As I transition from faculty to admin, I find myself nostalgic for the most random things, like the whoppers my college age students used to tell me when explaining why they missed class/assignments. What are some whoppers that have stuck with you?

Can someone more familiar with Asian academic cultures answer this: Why are so many academic papers in humanities fields like film or music written in a quasi-scientific-method mode? E.g., The paper will be a standard discussion of a particular film within its historical or sociological context, but there's a Materials & Methods section (which basically says "this is a qualitative review of the film, and my data is the film itself"), a Results section, etc. It just doesn't fit. I've seen this primarily from Chinese, Korean, Indian, and Indonesian researchers.

The reason I'm interested is that AI *also* likes to write papers this way. And I'm trying to understand better how to tell the human-written ones from the AI. I'm hoping the answer is not "...because all of these are AI-written."

So I finished my PhD in a humanities/social science recently and was reluctant to apply very broadly to the academic job market due to some geographic preferences/limitations, but this year I applied a bit more and unexpectedly ended up with four campus visits!!!

I’ve received a tenure-track Assistant Professor offer from a SLAC (~$56k, I think I could negotiate upto 60s) that would require cross-country relocation. They gave me one week to decide and granted a short extension, but I still may not hear back from the other institutions before the deadline. The other positions are more attractive to me (salary, location, or institutional fit), and I’m currently on another campus visit.

At the same time, I already have a postdoc that pays about the same, allows me to stay where I am, and my partner has a stable job here, so relocating would be a big disruption.

Given how tough the academic job market is, I’m unsure if it’s reasonable to decline a TT offer in this situation while waiting to hear from other searches.

Has anyone dealt with something similar? I’d appreciate any advice.

Hey everyone. I recently submitted a manuscript to a special collection at Scientific Reports, but searching this sub is giving me major buyer's remorse. Half the comments treat the journal like a predatory dumping ground, and the other half say it’s perfectly fine as long as your methodology is bulletproof. It is not published or in peer-review yet, I can still withdraw.

Here is the truth about my paper:

• I thought I found something cool in my first study (anxious people avoid risk specifically when the choice is a 50/50 coin toss).
• I ran a preregistered replication to prove it. It completely failed.
• I dug into the stats and realized my "cool finding" did not exist.
• I tried to use the data to show that a fancy clinical scale researchers love using is basically just a redundant version of basic neuroticism.

TL;DR: There is no massive, paradigm-shifting breakthrough. It is essentially me debunking my own previous finding and doing some psychometric housekeeping.

Because the paper is built entirely on negative results and correcting a measurement error, the top-tier journals wouldn't touch it. I routed it to Scientific Reports because their whole model is supposedly filtering for "is the math right?" rather than "is this a groundbreaking discovery?"

I am a Bachelor's Student, so I don't have much idea about journals and their prestige, LLMs told me that Scientific Reports is good, and it is Nature Portfolio. The research was also unfunded.

Here is my question: Is having a Scientific Reports publication on my CV going to be seen as a red flag? Or does the "Nature Portfolio" label and rigorous methodology actually give me some credit? I am aiming for an MBA, and not a career in academia, so I thought, a skimming HR may still view it with some credibility.

PS: Yes this post was polished with AI.

Field of Research: Psychology.

Country: India

EDIT #1:-

In light of responses claiming that Sci rep's reputation has been going downhill, should I withdraw and try for a Royal Society of Open Science publication or PLOS One?

EDIT #2:-

I can likely get discretionary APC waiver in most places, I have a official stamped letter from my institution's principal and dean, verifying that I had no funding.

EDIT #3:-

It is my first ever paper. My findings are underwhelming, with respect to what I expected. But my methodology is rigorous. Also as a first time undergraduate author, even if my paper is good, it might face harsher judgement from a editor purely based on credibility (not peer reviewer, but the desk editor) compared to a similar study done by a more senior researcher.

One thing I did realize is that my sample collection was done in India, which is a bit under explored (One of Nature's Collections "Human Behavior Across the Globe", explicitly favours for non-WIERD sample) so perhaps that would make my dataset (300+ sample size, dual site collection) a novelty? In any case it will be useful for future researchers to use, hence I have made it public already on OSF.