A few days ago, Jonathan wondered what role does pure luck play in an academic career. In my opinion, not too much, but don't discount it. Sometimes, it happens. Here is an example:
Earlier this year, I submitted an essay to a peer-reviewed journal. It was accepted in June with only some minor revisions asked, and I got the final acceptance two weeks ago. It will be in print in a few months. The essay analyses a novel from a fairly famous Argentine writer. This person, however, is better known for his public persona as an "intellectual" and for his essays (not academic essays, but in the tradition of the genre). He also writes fiction, but his novels from the past 20 years are anything but remarkable. His earlier novels, though, are wonderful. These novels often get mentioned in passing in articles, but there have been very few academic articles specifically about them. My academic article focuses on one of his early novels.
Today, I was reading an academic book that was published a month ago (so it was published AFTER I submitted my manuscript). The author is an up-and-coming star in my field (it's hir first book, several articles published in all the top journals, recently tenured at an R1). I see that part of a chapter is a study of the same novel I wrote about, so I read it. And I found out that hir analysis is pretty similar to mine. Now, to clarify things, s/he hasn't published any article about that novel nor is there any manuscript, draft or else on the Internet about it. Same applies to me. It was simple coincidence. I felt odd. On one side, I felt proud in an "great minds think alike" sort of way. Then, I realized that if I hadn't sent the article when I did, if I had waited six month, I wouldn't have been able to publish it, because what I wanted to say would had already been said. In this particular case, it was timing and sheer luck that helped me get the article published. I don't know if there is a moral to the story, except don't procrastinate, but it happens. And I consider myself a lucky person
Maybe not luck, but factors beyond your control, yes. Jonathan's first MLA convention, for instance, was the famous SF 1988, where everyone got jobs. That was because that was when he happened to finish.
ReplyDeleteI sort of object to the idea that there isn't luck because it's so American, so pull yourself up by your bootstraps, etc., and it so assumes that everything is fine if you work hard and work smart, etc.
It's not just at the professorial level, it's further down. My daughter is in better shape than she would be had I not adopted her. But she'd be in still better shape if there had been a magnet school she could have gone to, or if I could have afforded private school, so that she could have gotten into a better college and also done better in college, etc. I cite this example because she so resembles certain minority students I had when I worked at a fancier school, who were bright but not from college oriented families, and got shepherded in to our fancy school via magnet schools and had scholarships. Her luck being from rural Louisiana meant she's had a harder - much harder - road, and it's largely because of her that I resent the idea that "if you work hard enough, you will succeed."
So many people start behind.
I completely agree with you. As another example, I went on the job market on 2006-07. The year before everything crashed. Me and all of my classmates were able to get TT jobs (some better than others). The next year, the situation was completely different. And if my advisor hadn't pushed me to finish the dissertation (I wanted to take one more year), I would have been in a very different position.
ReplyDeleteRegarding your daughter's story: you don't need to tell me. I come from Argentina, where class is the first issue we consider in an analysis (it's not the taboo it would be here). And I am talking as somebody who came from a very privileged situation, as far as socio-economic status goes.
That 87 MLA (not 88) in SF was a high point. I still only barely got a job after someone else turned it down. It was my only job offer. It happened to be at an R-1 within driving distance of Purdue where my wife taught.
ReplyDeleteMy Kansas job was much less dependent on dumb luck. I positioned myself as the leading candidate for the job over the course of several years and made sure I stayed on good terms with several people in the KU department.
In neither case was it pure merit that got me hired. In the first case, it was chance and in the second, connections. Of course, I was and am hugely deserving (in my own mind at least), but that's never enough, is it?
I think luck and coincidence do contribute to shape a career, but they don't make it. I was probably the 3rd candidate in the job I currently have. It was offered to me, and it was a good match. It was also right timing. I had had one of those "Do you want this job, you have two weeks to respond" offer before the MLA (in a small college in the middle of nowhere). I didn't take it. A year later, with the collapse of the economy, I might have.
ReplyDeleteLuck will not get an article of mine published in "Revista de Estudios Hispanicos". It has to be good. But good timing can contribute to whether I can even submit an article or not, as the example of my post.
(God the MLA is funny. 1988, that's right, that one was in N.O. and I went and had 14 interviews, not all real but all fancy, but then only 2 on campus and 1 offer, which I only got because the two other candidates turned them down.
ReplyDeleteHighlights from that MLA:
1. Large state university that interviewed about 30 people for 1 position and the committee didn't know enough about fields advertised to really talk to the candidates, were learning about these fields from the interviewees. Interviewees started to realize it and tell each other ahead of time what they had told the committee, because it had become clear that they asked each candidate about the things they had learned from the preceding one.
2. Ivy league place had an interviewing committee of 2 in a tiny old hotel room and they were lying on the bed, with their feet up, shuffling through files and reciting: "If you finish your dissertation before you arrive, your salary will be... oh yes, you have finished your dissertation, sorry..."
3. I met someone who is now really famous because ze had most of the same interviews I had. We started realizing we had the same itinerary, and waving to each other.
... There was another famous one in NY in the 90s sometime, where I also hit the interview gold (and ended up with a great offer that didn't last 24 hours because the actual contract hadn't been sent when the state caught a hiring freeze). This was when Louisiana had budget cuts not as bad as those now, but that seemed really bad, and everyone was trying to move. Normally when one has a job one doesn't want one's senior colleagues to realize one is on the market but you just couldn't hide it -- they were, too, and
were creeping around the upper floors of hotels like graduate students. I'd run into them, on my way to meet an interviewing committee they appeared to have just left, and it could have been embarrassing but they'd grin and say "Good luck to us all!")
My interviews at the MLA were unremarkable for the most part, in less fancy places. I only remember two moments. One, a school trying to convince me that even though they do not have a tenure system, there school was a great place to work for because it was really fair. The other was an interview with another institution, that 5 minutes into the interview one of them just asked: "So we don't waste anybody's time here. We are looking for a TT position. But it would be a 4-4, and 3 of the courses each semester is Elementary Spanish. The 4th one can be an upper level language course or occasionally a culture and civilization course. Are you interested?" And I look at them and just said: "No". And that was the end of the interview.
ReplyDeleteI do remember a couple of remarkable moments in campus interviews. One at a really fancy SLAC (who did not interview at the MLA). It was for a one year VAP. I had a 30 minutes interview with the dean, where the dean proceeded to talk for 29 minutes straight about German philosophy (and no, besides quoting Benjamin a few times in my dissertation, it was completely unrelated to my field). The last minute ze looked at me and asked if I had any questions. I later read the Academic Jobs Wiki and found out that everybody had had a similar experience with said dean.
The other campus visit I remember was at a college 40 miles outside an interesting city. It was freezing cold (-3 Fahrenheit). The chair of the department, in our meeting, explained me what a wonderful place to work the college was, because the location allowed him to wake up at 5 in the morning every day to milk his cows and then come to work. I didn't get an offer from there either.