The (other) 'I' Word
Not the self-involved and self-obsessed that plagues me today. Nay. It's that most horrifying of terms to contemplate: "Independent Scholar". If adjuncts are invisible, how much further down the food chain is the Independent Scholar? At large job-acquiring-conference not long (enough) ago, and, in fact, at conferences generally, there's the namebadge phenomenon. Not that any given academic from any given institution is necessarily elitist, nor would I consider myself to be institutionally elitist (that is, I don't care where your degree is from or where you teach, but I'm a bloody snob when it comes to the quality of your work, your thoughts, your words). But there is, of course, a certain set of assumptions that get prompted by the institutional affiliation displayed proudly in black on white for all to see. And read. And judge. Much like mating plumage or the card game 'war'...
(Speaking of which, someone should really get around to a searing analysis of the psycho-social rituals of name-tag placement, name-tag-reading-etiquette by gender, age, level of myopia, etc. Plus, always, name-tag-typo-fun!)
Which is a roundabout way of getting to my anxiety: if academic unemployment continues, how long until I need to replace my institutional affiliation of freshly printed PhD with "Hung Out to Dry, Probably 3rd Rate, Approach with Care, Read Label Carefully Before Washing, and May Have Other Unsavoury Habits"? And is the stigma a construction born largely of my own fear? Or snobbery? Sigh.
(Speaking of which, someone should really get around to a searing analysis of the psycho-social rituals of name-tag placement, name-tag-reading-etiquette by gender, age, level of myopia, etc. Plus, always, name-tag-typo-fun!)
Which is a roundabout way of getting to my anxiety: if academic unemployment continues, how long until I need to replace my institutional affiliation of freshly printed PhD with "Hung Out to Dry, Probably 3rd Rate, Approach with Care, Read Label Carefully Before Washing, and May Have Other Unsavoury Habits"? And is the stigma a construction born largely of my own fear? Or snobbery? Sigh.
posted by itinerarium at 3:21 PM
2 Comments:
great post on independent scholar hell; interestingly, the hell, or at least limbo, continues (although unaccompanied by starvation and a lack of health assurance which makes the insecurity much, much more pathetic and elitist) throughout: so, those at better schools look down at those at worse schools; some avoid this by keeping their university of origin on the ids (great read not as an abbreviation) for as long as possible; then people use their visiting universities as id upgrades (absent the tell tale 'visiting' of course). and, apparently, or so I've heard, even many at the top of the food chain harbor doubts that the rest of us know that they don't deserve to be there (which is obviously what we think!)
Jodi -
'id' had me laughing out loud. As far as 'limbo', i think a particularly perceptive observation. The academy (more perhaps in its American incarnation than in the UK, but still largely applicable) generally strikes me as built around Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt. It keeps everyone off-balance by constantly denying sufficiently general affirmation for all but a very small number to actually believe there's any correspondence between prestige of institution and prestige of individual. The terms get changed (article, book, acclaim, reviews, what have you done for us lately, etc.) the carpet yanked in different directions, and the nametag pronouncing an identity and affiliation becomes somehow more durable and definite than any answer to 'will i end in academic heaven or hell'.
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