S. Worthen | Weblog

Pure medieval (history) IME is still a tough market -- there are enough candidates that even half-assed schools can be choosy. The market does seem to be opening up a bit -- anecdotally, I'm hearing that apps per job are down from about 150 to just under a hundred on average.

I was on the market for a full-time gig, aimed at 'teaching' schools, for 3 years, although I had FT visiting contracts that whole time. My impression, FWIW, is that the pure medieval jobs, especially at places with a 3-2 or lower load are still rarer, and go to people with both solid teaching experience and impressive research credentials.

Having said that, Medieval historians can kick ass in the pre-modern 'teaching school' market -- if they have a broader base of coursework and teaching experience. People with experience teaching the first half of the survey (world- or western civ) have a real advantage. I'm not sure why, but most of the pre-mod 'utility player' jobs do seem to go to medievalists. Oh -- also, since so many small liberal arts colleges have religious affiliations, they (especially the Catholic ones) seem to always want someone with training in a more traditional core, i.e., medieval.

Oooh! I have lots of opinions on *that*.

When's the roundtable? Hopefully I'll see you before then—text me whenever.

Jobs are a lottery. I was in a minor specialty, but with a strong publication record and good referees and had about a 50% success rate in getting to shortlists, and again about 50% record in being offered the job if interviewed, which is, I suspect, at the upper end of the range of experience. On the other hand, I almost never got grants, which is mainly down to being a Celticist -- no money in it, alas (I wrote good proposals: I know. When I drafted them for other people, they often worked). The thing to bear in mind is that it is never a level playing field. Mediaevalists tend to be a litigious bunch and there are many, many undercurrents, cliques and feuds which play into the whole thing. There are favoured candidate, 'heirs' and outsiders who are excluded because their sponsors are out-of-favour. And there aren't many jobs: it isn't a sexy area (the usual riff is that 'students don't want this'. That is not true -- students love mediaeval courses -- but modernists tend to bring in more money and thus have the whip hand)