I have a Ph.D. in English. When I first came across literary theory I asked "What is this?" Throughout graduate school I asked "What is this for?" Fortunately, I do not have to teach it. Unfortunately, some people waste years of their lives figuring it out because it doesn't lead anywhere, especially to a job.

Part 9? 9 paragraphs of this whiny rambling is too much. I've ignored the last few, but seriously, 9 parts? Surely the Chronicle can do better than this.

Did Dr. Rosicky answer the question? Since I have only your memory of what the exact question and context was, I can't be sure (maybe the questioner brought up, in a subordinate clause you have forgotten, a contrast with ordinary people with ordinary jobs). But you appear to have a well-developed capacity for whining, so I'll mention what I say to early and prospective graduate students to call their attention to what they are embarking on: I say (in a longer form than I'll write here) that if they don't think spending three years taking classes, several years more in preparing for exams, several more in researching and writing, then not finding a permanent job after 10 years of adjuncting is not worth it, then they should consider doing something else.

Maybe Dr. Rosicky was saying something similar, with a more positive emphasis!

Like Bajan, I have a Ph.D. in English. Unlike Henry's Dr. Rosicky, my dissertation director didn't hint. He came right out and said that literary theory is nonsense, and everyone in the profession knows it.

Of course, if the profession of English is based on nonsense, we must all hope that state legislatures don't figure that out.

What the penguin said: "Part 9? 9 paragraphs of this whiny rambling is too much. I've ignored the last few, but seriously, 9 parts? Surely the Chronicle can do better than this." This person was there when I was in grad school, 40 years ago -- but had the sense to get the hell out and find something he could stand doing.

Let's see, now. We're talking about a professor who (a) regards "all literary methodologies, even the ones he used in his books, as, at best, a game and, at worst, a silly waste of time"; (b) wishes he had never had kids; and (c) chastises graduate students by telling them they have it better than unemployed assembly-line workers. And Mr. Adams is upset by (c). OK.

Dr. Rosicky must be very disappointed in Mr. Adams. Adams did not get what Dad was telling him.

Sure, there's a world of difference between an assembly line worker and a grad student. Analogy is always suspect. But in this case the analogy fits. The assembly line worker probably doesn't have the education or the skills to easily do something else. We see it all the time when manufacuring jobs shut down. Here in North Carolina we still struggle with the loss of furniture and mill jobs. Those workers have to be completely retrained, with no guarantees that it will help them find something new.

A college graduate has many more prospects, regardless of degree: state or federal government, and many businesses require a college degree, and that degree doesn't necesssarily have to be in a specific field. Mr. Adams is demonstrating the silly idea that there are no jobs outside of academia for academics, and that just ain't so.

I see this in my own profession of nursing. Hospitals are cutting jobs due to the economy. Graduate nurses complain of being "tricked" into studying nursing, of the nursing shortage (which is still real). What they don't do is 1. look at other work places besides the hospitals, many of which are still hiring, or 2. look for a job away from where they currently live. Instead they just complain.

@bajan re literary theories. I had a similar experience when I was introduced to nursing theory: what is this, and what is it for? The answer is 1. nonesense, and 2. not for anything really useful. But you can't get a doctorate in nursing without sucking up and telling your profs how wonderful it is, even though it has no real use in the work world, and won't land you a job . . except perhaps as a teacher of nursing theory.

I suspect literary theories are much the same.

There are whiners in all disciplines. The skilled ones trick us into believing that their experience, or their view of their experience, is generalizable. Did all graduate students at Elite National U have the same experience as Mr. Adams? Are the graduate programs in all top universities the same as he describes? I think not. I believe that some people adapt to life by complaining; others address unfairness and inequities, which we all encounter, with a constructive and even grateful attitude. We need all views but I think I know who accomplishes more.

If literary theory is nonsense,can philosophy be deemed so too? I just really hate labeling for the sake of labeling - it's like labeling a ziplock bag that's full of items with labels on them.

I get this though, after driving an hour to get to campus, I share a 10x10 windowless cubby with 2 other girls (who are never really there). Grad school has been really isolating in some ways, and if I would have known about that I would have spent the money to do an online program from another university and just enjoyed my couch more.

While I understand the disliking the whining, I don't understand why those of you are you reading and continuing the cycle of whining? Be the change in the world you wish to see...

I still don't understand why Adams didn't drop out of grad school if he hated it so much and go do something else instead. That's what Dr Rosicky seems to be telling him in the story. It's also hard to understand how someone who seems so un-self-motivated and negative could in the end actually beat the odds and get a job as a professor.

I don't think you'll find any economists who say that "economic theory" is nonsense. Of course, there is plenty of argument about specific theories, schools of thought, and empirical results. But pretty much everyone would say that some theory is neccessary to make sense of the economic world and is more useful than none.

Theories are simply ideas; to claim literary theory as a whole as nonsense is, in fact, to be anti-intellectual. I have no problem if someone wants to attack a particular theory, but to invoke the whole category is, at best, lazy and disingenuous. There are plenty of legitimate complaints to make about our profession and graduate culture, but to rail against ideas . . . well, perhaps one shouldn't be an educator. Everyone is welcome to read for pleasure at their leisure; graduate training in literature demands that you study and understand theories of what literature is, does, etc. This seems no different to me than what is required of any graduate student of any discipline.

I went to college as an adult after working for years and serving in the Navy during Vietnam. Graduate school was wonderful (I was one of those soccer players). My professors were mostly great people. Discovering theory was enriching in many ways, frustrating in others, and absurd in some. I love being a father and a teacher and a writer, and nearly anyone who has ever worked in a factory would envy the freedom I'm given and the rewards I get in my work (and I'm a department chair. If "Henry" had such a colorless, depressing experience, it's because he takes a colorless, depressing approach to his life.

As someone who also got his Ph.D. at an elite national university, although in a social science department and not lit, my experience couldn't be further from this. My graduate school experience was everything it could have been, and included a reasonable social life--with fellow students, faculty, and friends outside the department. It's too bad Adams had such a crappy experience, but let's not assume it generalizes....

I for one have enjoyed Mr. Adam's saga. I've read it as a serialized grad school version of "The Paper Chase". As comedic reading Mr. Adam's pieces are a great way to start my morning. As for the "deeper questions" in his pieces I leave those to tenured readers with the time to contemplate their navel.

As an adjunct and a newly minted Ph.D. I love the break pieces such as Mr. Adam's brings to my day. Here's to another dozen grad school pieces and a multi-year serial about life on the tenure track.

Totoro chyan (10)
(Totoro wa, ryuugakusei no inu no onamae ga desu!
'Totoro is my exchange student's dog's name.')

It's Henry Adams who's writing these, not Adam Smith. I don't think he said anything about economic theory, or linguistic theory, or theory in physics, or the pricklier (versus) the gooier parts of cultural anthropology. The literary people generally, maybe always, use 'theory' in a way rather different from the use in the sciences.

And, no 11, theories are not "simply ideas", and a collection of vague ideas, hypothetical hunches, or alternative literary analyses and deconstructions are not a theory.

Yes, we must always kiss the chastening rod of academe.

Next up:

"Henry Adams is a whiner who doesn't deserve his tenured position. Now let me talk about how much I loved, loved, loved graduate school and didn't worry for one second about getting a job because I loved it."

Repeat 100X.

A clear and obvious problem is that there are too many grad students for the total number of jobs available. So, depending on your definition, there is no training that "leads" to a job.

So, why do we go to grad school? Personally, my experience was wonderful! I had more fun in grad school than at any other time in life. I learned a lot, in particular, how to draw boundaries. This is a lesson that you can apply to whatever endeavor.

Ultimately, life is a series of decisions that will or will not lead to where you think it will and although we desire that things will lead to a particular place, things clearly don't have to turn out that way. Moreover, I wouldn't classify success as having achieved your goals since missing them can lead you to a better place. So, the best of us prepare with contingencies and the worst of us ride the flow.

When I was a little kid, occasionally I would rapidly move or awkwardly bend some body part and say to my mother, "Hey, Mom, it hurts when I do this!" She would sigh, and say, "Then don't do that."

So long at the activity was not breathing or swallowing or some other survival-required activity (or something that hurts in a good way, like growth or exercise) this was probably pretty good advice.

The most disturbing part of this essay is that this person went into the field anyway, and now is in a position of influence with real live students and colleagues. And, presumably, so are at least a few others, such that he thinks that all faculty had the same experience. Shudder.

For the record... for me, doctoral work was not always sunshine and roses, and I would not voluntarily do it all over again. But most of the time I loved it, and when I didn't I learned something important and useful. Very little was complete nonsense, once I put in the effort to truly understand it. And I DID know others who hated every minute and declared that everything was poppycock and complained the whole way, and I'm glad most of them left academe and found something they loved (or, at least, hated less). I think we're all happier as a result.

Ah, where would we be without our regular dose of whining from Henry Adams! It boggles the mind that someone could be so universally negative about so many different things in a setting where apparently everyone else shared all this misery all the time.

Methinks Adams is just too stupid to have gotten anything valuable out of grad school and that his imposter syndrome has gotten a bit out of control (seriously, a 9 part series of whining?!). No wonder he doesn't understand literary theory.

Just coming out of an elite graduate program I can say that I have witnessed that "whiner" complex amongst people that have spent most of their young adult lives in Higher Education. They'll trot around 'represent'in" the sub-altern and then update their facebook pages through their iphones. I mean come'on. The hardest part about our jobs as scholars and teachers is dealing with these inane and lazy sods. Also, I have been wondering if these are the people whom later become the terrible department bullies that we contend with daily? This ain't the miltary, its easy work. You could get your work done in 20 hour weeks if you simply stop whining. How else could I an Indigenous poet write such great chapbooks?

@ velvis

"While I understand the disliking the whining, I don't understand why those of you are you reading and continuing the cycle of whining? Be the change in the world you wish to see..."

The reason I posted is that this is what an outsider (potential grad student, parent of college student, etc.) will read and use as a basis to judge the academic world. This (to put it nicely) pile of dog poo should not be what the world sees from us.

Adams has a temperamental aversion to self-reflection and self-criticism. His cries of victimization are too familiar to me from my fellow graduate students. Theory's too hard, theory doesn't mean anything, we have to read too much, professors don't suckle us to sleep, there's no time to do all this. Strange that many of us don't have any trouble meeting deadlines, getting work done, understanding theory, etc. It's a simple equation: grad school should be a 40-50 hour per week job. Most students think it's supposed to be an extension of undergrad, where they spent 20 hours a week, maybe, doing work, and spent the rest going to keggers and trying to get a date.

All that said, the emotional struggles that come with grad school are real and not properly addressed by our institutions. Adams shouldn't have to go to Dr. Rosinsky for support. They should have mental health services available. I have taken advantage of these services at my own institution frequently. They help. Even in departments with a healthy social life--mine is so-so...but many are much more social than i am with each other--the work is isolating. Our expectations become out of whack with reality. You begin to feel that just getting distinction on exams isn't an achievement, that just getting fellowships or publications isn't enough. We begin to ask an unhealthy amount from ourselves.

The Ph.D., for most, is an achievement in and of itself. It's dangerous to view it as merely an end to tenured employment--as though it's a professional degree like a JD (much respect). It's not. When you do this, and the tt job isn't coming, you make it too easy to say the ph.d. was all for nothing, that all your effort was wasted, that you would have been better off doing something. If this is true, it means to me that you didn't really care about what you said in your dissertation, that you were writing it cynically with an eye toward future advantage. If you write the dissertation with an eye toward your own satisfaction, toward completing work you are proud of, regardless of what other people think about it or how marketable it may or may not be, then you'll have a happy life.

Most of you need to take the undergrad PH 101 course Adams mentions. You provide plenty of ad hominem attacks, but you avoid the problems just like Dr. Rosicky did. Adams and friends took a serious set of concerns to an authority figure they trusted. A professor of English ought to be able to explain his profession to grad students and justify it as a worthwhile activity. Rosicky didn't do that. Real issues: Is literary theory really garbage? If not, defend it in ways an outsider can understand. What purposes does it serve? Can graduate study of literature be defended, or is it all a bait-and-switch to keep tenured professors from teaching freshman composition?

After receiving an undergrad degree in English Education, I taught middle school and high school English for five years before I decided to get a Masters in English Literature. I found my graduate coursework, including an introduction to literary theory, as well as teaching Composition 101 as a graduate teaching assistant, to be invaluable and rewarding. As I result, I became a better high school teacher. I am glad, though, that I taught for five years before I even considered the possibility of attending graduate school. When I finally did attend, I knew why I was there -- to become a better teacher.

The point is not that one should have dropped out of graduate school, for a graduate student goes into a grad program becaue she ultimately enjoys some aspect of the subject matter to take the risk, and in the case of the author, finish against the odds. The point is that graduate programs are ill structured, limited as to the preparation they give (i.e., why can't they also encourage other skills in addition to the traditional curriculum, like leadership or top notch computer literacy--not just using power point, word, excel and blackboard like programs), are filled with faculty members that take little responsability for the mentoring students that they themselves attracted or recruited to the program in the first place, and are simply too long (the dissertation format has to change) and too expensive because of it.

I hear many of my colleagues express what the author has and I have experienced it myself. We finish because we like some part of it enough to do it, or because maybe we are stubborn. But the point is that graduate school could be so much better.

Also, I am surprised at how many people grabbed onto the "theory" issue here...if you don't like it, don't do it, and if you feel it is too dominant, prove the subfield wrong. And for what it is worth, we all do theory in one way or another, the question is if we are justified to assume one stance over a different one...some just think it is worth putting it out there to consider. Theory isn't the problem, it is the reduction of the literary text to theory that is. We just don't do it well enough.

Now, I think the article makes a negative judgment toward theory, but the example is mainly used to show the gap between what many of us think we are getting into when we go to grad school and what we actually get into...and this problem goes back in part to our college preparation and advice.

Finally, the analogy bx assemply line worker who dropped out of high school and PhD graduate student does not work. The latter went to college, so the question is not whether we would be better off quiting college (we already decided against that), but if we would be better off quiting a particular kind of graduate program. And then, if others have it worse than I, it still doesn't mean I shouldn't consider making my situation better--that isn't being selfish but healthy (and even rational).

Sigh. I wish anonscribe were writing about these issues and not H.A., our whiner par excellence... To Henry Adams, and other grad students of your complaining ilk -- I'm going to tell you what your Dr. Rosicky should have told you then and there... (BTW Rosicky means "all dewy" in Czech)

"Henry, your complaints are highly 'unoriginal.' Go and rewrite your life... Into your 40 hour grad work week, fit in a social life, some physical exercise, cultural and spiritual development -- whatever you need to be a complete human being. Because things are not going to get easier when you get that coveted TT job...! If you don't know how to have a life now, you're likelynot be able to do so in the future. Alas, despite lit theory's proclivity for navel gazing, you'll certainly not be able to get far whining about your measly graduate existence... (aside perhaps writing a bunch of poorly received Chronicle columns ;-))"

As for lit. theory -- GROW UP! I wish my grad students would realize that once they submit their PhDs, their competition, their peers, their colleagues, their reviewers, their editors, their grant evaluators etc etc etc, will no longer be other grad students!! It'll be other profs, who know their theory. And there 's theory out there aplenty, something from everyone's taste... (Perhaps our whiner Henry here would enjoy reading Berlant on victimization, complaint and the politics of feelings)... It's all fine and good for a biochemist to claim that "evolution's all all nonesense" but that does not change the fact this biochemist would have torely on evolutionary biology for his/her labwork, his argumentation, his grant applications etc. Same with lit profs. If they actually do research, they likely do apply some form of theory...

25. cpaccace - June 11, 2010 at 05:13 pm said:

Finally, the analogy bx assemply line worker who dropped out of high school and PhD graduate student does not work. The latter went to college, so the question is not whether we would be better off quiting college (we already decided against that), but if we would be better off quiting a particular kind of graduate program. And then, if others have it worse than I, it still doesn't mean I shouldn't consider making my situation better--that isn't being selfish but healthy (and even rational).

I've generally regarded education as a source of freedom, and yet too many pre-academics mentally confine themselves to one path, do or die. Dr. Rosicky's comparison is apt simply because with more education comes more options, if only you are not too laden with tunnelvision to see them. Therefore, a person with more education has less about which to worry and complain. If you don't like your job or program, you need to calculate the point at which it is worth leaving. If you're not sure what to do next, you need to think about how to redirect your skills. People in the nonacademic world have to do this all of the time. It's funny that the traditional critical academic response to this blog entry is actually correct, even from a nonacademic perspective.

In short, I agree with three points I have seen posted in previous entries:

1. The author missed the point of his professor's response.

2. The author's graduate experience was fueled, in part, by his own poor attitude and misguided expectations.

3. It is worthwhile for critics to reply so that the author's perspective does not appear ubiquitous.

We all have complaints about our graduate experiences, some more than others, but some of the author's complaints involve an underappreciation for lessons I wished I had learned while I was a student.

Looking forward to "Axe to Grind, Part 10"...

I've been reading these columns for a few months, and while the content is always the same self-pitying mewling, the evolution in the comments has been interesting. For the first few, there was a chorus of sympathy, thanking the author for "telling it like it is." Over time, though, the commenters have gotten increasingly impatient with the endless stream of whining. It reminds me of moving to a new workplace and meeting a colleague who at first seems refreshingly iconoclastic, but who over time reveals himself to be just another bitter misanthrope. The fact that the Chronicle readership has a limited appetite for this sort of stuff is one of the more hopeful things I've learned in reading the journal.

One of the good things you can say for a PhD is that it produces people capable of writing such insightful and entertaining pieces as Mr. Adams. But then all these other PhDs write such embarassing tripe in response to him.

I don't know what to make of it. What percentage of Adams' detractors are the very baby boomers who collaborated in gutting the tenure system (which is why Adams and friends had such a difficult time getting jobs)? That would be very ugly, but pretty predictable (and you don't need any "theory" beyond the bit Freud not yet disconfirmed by actual empirical theories). Or, much uglier from my perspective, is it possible that a high percentage of English prof. gen exers actually are this kind of bland, vindictive company men? What combination of innate shittiness and Stockholm Syndrome (as a response to the very conditions Adams describes) could produce such misplaced self righteousness from members of the same generation that gave the world Nirvana? I'm completely lost here.

In any case, as a philosophy professor it is *extremely* weird to read all of the English professors above moronically trashing Mr. Adams hilarious and astute pieces. Here's my reading assignment to them. Go read "Lucky Jim" before you read Part 10. Don't deconstruct it. Don't start talking about alterity or the other or any other hot button word that bad readers of 1968 Parisian philosophy misplace a determinate article in front, or various forms of constructions or whatnot. Just read it and try to find in your wretched soul some laughter!

Then go read "Straight Man" and do the same. Then pick up some David Lodge. Then come back and join this conversation. Seriously, how literature professors could miss this is simply beyond me.

Some of Adams's instalments have been better than others, but I've found them consistently entertaining (and I had a decent social life in grad school and very much enjoyed teaching). Unlike a lot of commenters, I'm glad he has a tenure-track job.

Adams is also much more coherent than many of his detractors. For that reason alone he is more convincing than they are. Could someone tell me, for example, what realist123's post (#26) means? She (he?) of the post informing us that Rosicky means "all dewy" in Czech and yelling at grad students to grow up. Has she perhaps forgotten that Adams is no longer a grad student? What does the rest of her post mean? It is almost completely incoherent. Little wonder the poster seems to be drawn to "theory."

As a casual observer from the social sciences, it seems to me that the crisis in English & Lit depts. is a real, existential one, in two senses: 'who am i by profession'? and 'how in the heck will i support myself'?? Adams is voicing these existential concerns, in a somewhat masked or quasi funny/ cynical way, so as to avoid facing this double header crisis head on. My humble advice is that you--the generic aspiring writer--do not need to hang around a university for 10 odd years to be a great writer! Far from it, literally! That is actually the likeliest way to kill your joy and make flabby your talent and to assure you're not going to have much interesting raw material with which to work! If one has a passion for WRITING, be it fiction or non, poetry or prose, one just needs to get on with it! The real problem and conundrum is too much of a good thing makes the thing bad or boring or stale; perhaps becoming a professional academic kills the muse! looks & sounds like it to me, based on these articles and responses! As a muse-chaser myself, i find they do not dwell (long) in dark cramped cubicles, faculty kitchens, classrooms crammed with medicated undergrads. why on earth would they? better to search for them on shop floor, at rally (political or biker), in crowded street or dirt path, in forest or at beach. in jail. in brothel. in child's or childhood bedroom. ANYwhere but in a university. Maybe Adams et al would be better off in the retail shop (today's factory) by day and writing poems, songs and stories in their 'stolen' free time at night or weekends. Certainly they'd have more interesting things to write about (than the above), and then they'd feel pride in being a Ren(wo)man, or blue collar poet, a la Springsteen, Guthrie, etc. However, if you love TEACHING and working with students (subject is not really so important--good teachers can teach near anything), then go into academe. If not, then for goodness sakes, do not! If you love writing, just write! and then garden, turn tricks, sell weed, change oil, do whatever for cash. That ALL makes a writer and good writing; Academe lifestyle: NO WAY. BORING. No one wants to read about that but us, & we are a rather small and catty market, obviously. Americans' problem is not understanding yin-yang energy. In film, etc. they call it 'on the nose': becoming a Lit professor is way too 'on the nose' for most writers--it kills it. Adams--if you are a really good writer, bail out now: if you love to teach and can teach anything, then stay.

I have really related to some of Henry Adam's earlier essays (particularly the one about being thrown into the comp. classroom without any teaching experience), but this one is so overly negative that I find it hard to see his point. I can't help but feel upon reading his descriptions of Elite National University that either Adams is a bitter pessimist whose judgement is unreliable or ENU's English department is so extreme in its negative climate so as not to be representative of most departments.

I have found in my own English graduate programs (both MA and PhD) and most of my friends have found in their respective programs that professors tend to be fairly nice people. Yes, you get some egomaniacs and people sorely lacking in social skills, but I certainly never felt like anyone was out to discourage us or make our experiences any harder than they needed to be.

On a different note- I get so tired of grad students complaining about teaching composition. Yes, it's labor intensive but it can also be a lot of fun and very rewarding and in exchange you get a stipend and you go to school for FREE. Teaching is part of a professor's job responsibilities (one that I think should take precedence over research, but I'm probably in the minority on that)and if you don't like it, then be an independent scholar. It's a privilege; the whole thing is a privilege. That was what Dr. Rosicky was trying to say - in a world where less than 1% of the population gets a college education, the opportunity to spend several years pursuing a graduate degree in an area of passion and getting to pass on that passion in a classroom is an extraordinary luxury. Even if you come out poor and in debt and lacking job opportunities, the very option of spending time in a graduate program is just such a privilege that to complain about it seems entirely self-indulgent and myopic.

I really like this series. It's rare that anyone talks about the disappointments of academia with any candor. The trolls are always out there to invalidate that person's experience with any number of tactics, boiling down to:

The OP's experience doesn't matter. Only mine does.

I like a multiplicity of perspectives and I don't try to shut them down. Academia is not supposed to. No matter what my luck or experience has been (and for the record, I loved grad school and if I had it to do all over again, would have stayed a year longer just to soak up the environment), the poster's experience is valid. I understand it, even though I didn't personally live it.

His experience on the job market was obviously different/better than mine, but that doesn't mean that I can't learn from the essay. Recognizing the ridiculousness in our profession isn't the same as whining.

I take the point that literary theory (hell, the whole humanities) is stuff and nonsense. That doesn't mean that it isn't stuff and nonsense that I love and that means something to me and my community. Every industry is stuff and nonsense!

And a positive attitude in the face of very good evidence of the end of the humanities/corporatization of the university/ lack of a job "market"/exodus of talent from the profession/little opportunity for advancement for most PhDs strikes me as...naive. Do academics really want to be naive? So pardon the writer's pessimism about academia in general! Though I would never say it in front of my colleagues, in my heart of hearts I share it.

This reminds me of a faculty luncheon in which one distinguished full professor (who refused to shake my hand because of a fear of MRSA/female assistant professors) declared essentially "in my day, no one expected to get a job in academia after receiving their PhD. I fully expected to run a grocery store" at a table full of (all female) visiting and untenured faculty. If so, why had he been employed at the same university for 30 years? Essentially, he was telling us that we (young people) shouldn't have expected jobs like his. I remember thinking that it was like meeting a Chronicle troll in the flesh.

As long as people deny and invalidate other people's experiences, the world (and particularly the internet) will be an ugly place indeed. I'm not sure what I went into academia for (well, I went in for a tenure track job, but that didn't happen), but it wasn't to crow at others' misfortunes and disappointments.

Henry, all:

I can see why some might say that this article seems like whining, but perhaps there is something to extract from it anyway? What I hope are some helpful suggestions follow.

I am not in the English field but working on a PhD elsewhere. Perhaps the theoretical problems you see could be viewed as opportunities? For example, I work in two interrelated fields that many consider theoretically impoverished, but by working across disciplines and methods, I've been able to come up with theories that will be the focus of my PhD and that I feel will push the interrelated fields forward. The other benefit is that the new theory targets my personal interests and strengths, and so in many ways, I am crafting a niche for myself where I will at least have fun, and possibly thrive.

I find the process immensely rewarding and am having the time of my life! However, I do see considerable angst around me, and even some of it coming from a mentor. Thus, I think that the angst is real and should not be ignored.

Here are some suggestions, based on some things I learned. I also was out of school for a number of years prior to starting my PhD. I wasn't working in a factory, indeed I had what I considered to be a dream job (but that was very stressful relative to my life as a PhD student)! One thing I learned was to think more entrepreneurially. By this I mean, looking for opportunities within academic research where there are problems that could be solved, and that also fit personal strengths and interests. Also, you could propose-create classes (or assignments) that fit your own research area, strengths, and interests. Another trick could be to start a reading group that addresses some of the problems that you and peers are observing. If you make it in the afternoon, then it could conclude with drinks or food somewhere, thus helping address the isolation you described.

One factor that helps my general mood is living environment. I turned down offers from some more prestigious programs because they were located in environments (e.g., cities) where I knew I would not be happy. If you are in such a place, one possibility is to become a visiting scholar at a university in a city that might help you mood. I just re-read your article and see that you are a professor and so this might be a bit difficult. However, some universities seem to let professors buy out of teaching time when they get grants.

Hope that this helps,

---A PhD student who is in a good mood

As a current Ph.D. student, perhaps I don't yet have the "perspective" this author has. Yet I find that my advisors are invested in my work as well as their own, helpful and open, and willing to discuss the validity of all of the aspects of our work as academics. Perhaps the problem in this case is that pursuing the name of "Elite National University" on his diploma led this student to ignore all the parts of life that he now wishes he'd had in grad school, like having a life.

Also, here's an assignment for this author, or for anyone who is not loving the kowtowing, nonsense aspect of grad school: Go to any door in America. Any door. Knock on the door and ask the person who opens it, "Does your work involve some measure of nonsense you don't believe in? Do you have to bow before those with more power even though they seem less able than you?" The answer will be "yes." Always. This is not a problem specific to grad school; it is the nature of human beings working together.

Finally, as to teaching composition: if you are worried that what you do/did does not have any "real-world impact," then you should be teaching MORE freshman comp, not less. It is this kind of "service" course that actually offers real-world benefit to large numbers of students, many of whom have not had and will never have the monumental advantage of attending "Elite" anything. I taught at a community college for several years, and although I believe that teaching literary/textual analysis is beneficial and offers a real skill, it was teaching students who'd never had any opportunity for a worthwhile education how to write that actually added measurable value to their lives.

I love, love, LOVE all the comments about Brother Henry, here, "whining." The skulking premise under the masturbatory snootiness of these comments is that Brother Henry does not properly appreciate that he is "one lucky bastard." You see, he gets to spend seven years (how very Biblical!) in a stifling sardine can of stinking poseurs whose tri-partite gospel can be neatly summed up as "Fuck the students, fuck the taxpayer, fuck literature." No wonder Brother Henry feels the need to unburden his soul: the rarified air of the Ivory Tower reeks of the massive stinking corpse of intellectual inquiry, murdered at the bloody altar of the academic "research" career.

Meanwhile, middle- and working class taxpayers have desperately-needed cash ripped from their paychecks to feed the coffers of federal agencies allotting grants to country-club scholars who know that their "research" is complete bullshit. Like golf courses for the wealthy, these grants drain resources from those-who-need to those-who-play-expensive-games.

Taxpayers are willing to be bled because they honestly believe, poor things, that their children will really be educated by intelligent people with advanced degrees who truly care about student achievement. Brother Henry shows the university for the dirty fraud that it is in this regard.

Since the beginning of the Cold War, the university has been a whore, transforming its academic departments into corporate and government brothels. The successful academic learns how to spread his cerebellum for spare change from the Military Industrial Complex, the pharmaceutical industry, or other comparable John. Turning tricks is a dirty business, hence the doublespeak of faculty and their stomach-turning desire to retain a sense of scholarly authority with scathing remarks to graduate students.

Brother Henry, you were lucky to get through this steaming pit of corruption alive to see your worthy dream of instructing students in a small liberal arts college. I recommend, however, that you now actually learn how to teach, since your education in this regard reflected the corroded priorities of the particular academic brothel in which you found yourself. Hint: take a methods course in one of those horrid Education departments.

Butteredtoastcat:

Though my experience of your commentary is almost unbearably negative, one could extract a positive way forward from it. Your suggestion regarding a research method from education could be applied as follows (disclaimer, I am not from the English field, but am from a field similar to it!).

One could investigate what a story is (e.g., its role in society) and how one trains a learner to craft a story to serve that role. This would simultaneously advance a theoretical understanding that not only delivers an important social good (e.g., teaching college students to write) while also advancing a theoretical understanding that meets the standard of a contemporary research university. Such an understanding could advance the field of English composition, but could also be useful to stakeholders (e.g., even the ones you deride!), and therefore fundable. Even the military wants to know how to tell a good story, as does BP, and so do educators who are trying to explain things.

I suppose my feeling is that we should do what we can where we can (while realizing that every system has some flaws).

Also, though I am put off a bit by the negativity, I empathize. In former years I felt similarly. But in my case, this was because my career had not progressed as I had hoped. It was easy to blame "the system" for my situation, but doing so blinded me from positive steps I could take to fix my situation. Luckily, I now have the opportunity to start over again through my PhD research. This change of scenery really helped me out, and perhaps something like that could make you feel better too?

Best regards,

-A PhD student who is still in a good mood

I do hate to spoil the amusement, but I must tell you that my experiences as a grad student in musicology at Great Eastern Research University a million or so years ago (PhD 1960) were delightful. The faculty, most of them great men (since there were almost no women in those ancient days), were uniformly brilliant, gracious, helpful, and sometimes even fun. Looking back, I don't doubt that as TAs we were exploited, but we genuinely believed we were serving apprenticeships and were therefore not dissatisfied. In many wya, those were the best years of my life and I am grateful to the men and to the university that made them so.

I do hate to spoil the amusement, but I must tell you that my experiences as a grad student in musicology at Great Eastern Research University a million or so years ago (PhD 1960) were delightful. The faculty, most of them great men (since there were almost no women in those ancient days), were uniformly brilliant, gracious, helpful, and sometimes even fun. Looking back, I don't doubt that as TAs we were exploited, but we genuinely believed we were serving apprenticeships and were therefore not dissatisfied. In many ways, those were the best years of my life and I am grateful to the men and to the university that made them so.

@A PhD student who is still in a good mood

LOL!!!

Your quote, my friend:

"In former years I felt similarly. But in my case, this was because my career had not progressed as I had hoped. It was easy to blame "the system" for my situation, but doing so blinded me from positive steps I could take to fix my situation. Luckily, I now have the opportunity to start over again through my PhD research. This change of scenery really helped me out, and perhaps something like that could make you feel better too?"


In response, one should never let one's personal experiences blind one to the system of which one is a part. In other words, feelings, nothing more than feelings, is a rather uncertain way to go through life. If one is invited to the home of a murderous dictator, should one admire the gold-plated dining implements and be satisfied? Said dictator might have the finest taste in such implements--though gold plating seems rather kitschy--but does that cancel out the thousands brutally murdered?

In other words, my friend, it's not about the personal, it's about the political (with apologies to feminist theory). You can draw your smiley faces and down your Prozac, but in the end, the system is rotten from stem to stern and Brother Henry's series of personal remembrances reflect, like simple parables, the underlying political grammar of a truly fucked up system.

But since you're a bright-side-of-lifer, I offer you a bit of a soundtrack:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ECUtkv2qV8&feature=fvst

XOXO

The commenters who sympathize with Adams aren't just much more coherent than his humorless detractors; they're also a lot funnier.

I agree that the guy's supporters write better comments than his detractors do, but I'd still like someone to defend (in terms an outsider could understand) the graduate study of literature.

Obviously the article is meant to be ironic and entertainingly grim. Can a life spent in a stimulating and creative field, with plenty of new ideas and challenges, be all drudgery and disappointment, as the article seems to suggest. Where is the other place the author might have been that would have allowed his spirit to 'soar and grow'? You get the idea that it would have been the same for him no matter where he was. Was his graduate education completely without fulfilling intellectual development, for in this section of the story that seemingly omnipresent priority seems little worth mentioning.

In living you have to be somewhere doing something. There must have been some highlights there in grad school ... otherwise it seems you would get so depressed that you'd "fall down and not have the heart to get up". Since the author is sill an academic, you have to wonder if this grad school biography is for real ... or is it an exercise in writing ironical fiction? Since the background says Henry is still an academic, you have to wonder why Henry gave himself a life sentence to the "bait and switch".

Bernard Schuster
Arrive2.net

Arrive2 writes: 'In living you have to be somewhere doing something. There must have been some highlights there in grad school ... otherwise it seems you would get so depressed that you'd "fall down and not have the heart to get up".'

Years ago, I and my fellow grad students used to joke that PhD stood for "permanent head damage". The trajectories that many of us followed during and after grad school strongly suggested that there was an element of truth to this; and if anything, matters are even more dire today. If you look at the statistics about stress and depression in grad school, you will find that vast numbers of grad students are in fact so depressed that they can't function, or so stressed that they self-destruct, or "finish" in such terrible psychological condition that they are not only unable to find appropriate employment afterwards but simply unable to get their lives back on track at all; many spend years, or even decades, bouncing from one menial job to another (often with long bouts of unemployment in between) because they are too damaged to aspire to anything better.

But of course grad school is not the only place where one finds this sort of thing--and, indeed, it isn't even the worst. As Thoreau famously observed, "The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation," and this has been the case always and everywhere. What distinguishes many grad students from the average Joe or Jane is their vastly higher (and in today's economy, highly unrealistic) expectations of "success", the unnaturally prolonged deferment of gratification, a more delicate mental and emotional constitution which suffers exquisitely from every slight and failing, and a facility with language which allows and encourages them to put their angst into words instead of just drowning it with cheap distractions like most of humanity has done throughout the ages.

Of course these are the very characteristics which might have been the keys to greatness if their owners had been handled a bit more gently and given half a chance to develop properly. But instead we chew them up and spit them out because there are always more where they came from, and as a society we no longer have any patience (if indeed we ever did have any) with "whiners" and "losers". It's every man for himself now, and the devil take the hindmost! Never mind that if the devil picks us off one by one, in the end he'll take us all. That's for someone else to worry about.

I've wondered if Henry Adams is actually a troll looking to generate interesting comments. There are definitely problems in some areas of academia and some people have negative experiences in grad school. Therefore, there was initially appreciation for his stories. But after 9 chapters of pure negativity it is just too much for a lot of the commenters. I just drop by to be amused by the exchanges by those pro and con and see what new thing Adams has found to complain about.

Your friendly neighborhood troll...

We are a confederacy of dunces.

crimsontidefan writes: "A professor of English ought to be able to explain his profession to grad students and justify it as a worthwhile activity."

Says who? And why?

"the rarified air of the Ivory Tower reeks of the massive stinking corpse of intellectual inquiry, murdered at the bloody altar of the academic "research" career. "

Now THAT is poetry.

aydub1978: You're kidding, right?

Hiding from your composition students? Maybe that was a sign there was a problem in your career choice. Sheesh. . . .

Mr. Henry Adams, do you have any idea how ridiculous you sound? A life of the mind is a luxury and like other luxury items, you have to earn it by starting at the bottom and doing crap like reading unintelligible student product. How ignorant could you have been regarding what being a grad student/TA would be like? And as for the cynical comments regarding stupid taxpayers and their expectations for their children's educations--we're not that stupid, and many though not all expectations have been met by well-qualified instructors and professors who are gratified to be working in their chosen profession and probably don't waste much time whining and grumbling and practicing their condescension on the internet. Cheers.

I have attended graduate school in two departments. In one, the work was exciting, stimulating, intellectually focused, fun, incredibly demanding and difficult; the professors were focused on the intellectual growth of their students and a TA-ship was regarded as a way to help students get through grad school while learning a bit about professorial work. In other words, it wasn't cheap labor for the department, it was financial aid.

In the second department, the work was mostly boring and not intellectually challenging, many professors felt threatened by student intellectual development and seemed more concerned with maintaining a position of superiority over students, being a TA was a demeaning experience where we were viewed simply as cheap, disposable labor to teach classes professors did not want to teach, and we students were treated like "empty vessels" in the classroom.

Guess which program was English and which wasn't?

That is your problem, Mr. Adams! And your challenge--to not replicate your dismal experience with your students.

For the rest of you, English departments appear to be really different. Dreary, dreary, dreary...

Reminds me of Michael Beard, the protagonist of Ian McEwan's latest novel, who spends a week reading up on John Milton and decides that he's learned everything there is to know about literature and poetry. In other words, he is trained only to see the skin of knowledge, without ever penetrating to the wisdom that lies beneath it. But because he never sees that layer underneath - well, it simply doesn't exist.

An outsider must suspect that people hurl insults at Adams because they CAN'T defend graduate study of literature. I'd still appreciate it if someone would make an attempt in terms an outsider could understand. Or is it all "nonsense and everyone in the profession knows it," as carlhyatt's director claims?

And Dad was not even an international student cum single mom!

@crimsontidefan,

You are not getting much of a response because your request is the equivalent of an English professor showing an episode of The Office to someone in business and asking them to defend what they do (and at least The Office -- British version -- was funny). Don't get me wrong ... there is plenty to satirize in higher education, but this has to be the most long-winded piece of sanctimonious drivel I have ever read. 9 installments? (with God knows how many more coming?) Whose sole purpose, as far as I can tell, is to show the world that Henry Adams is morally superior to everyone in academe that he encounters? Unlike most satires of higher education cited in the responses here, Adams doesn't turn the lens on himself (except for perhaps in the first installment). Where does he learn about his own faults, his own frailty (other than he doesn't want to shower with his students)? Indeed, when does he grow as a human being, or even as an academic? I would love to know what people find funny about this. When he is not pointing a moralizing finger, he just whines, and not just about about his job prospects: "One of the few students who could afford a car;" "even though her worldly belongings amounted to so little that they barely filled the van," etc. etc. Let alone the absolute cynicism of "Better yet, in class discussions, Dr. Rosicky hinted at what other graduate students and I suspected: Literary theories were nonsense. . . I mean he seemed to view all literary methodologies, even the ones he used in his books, as, at best, a game and, at worst, a silly waste of time." Better yet?! We're supposed to respect someone like Rosicky, or someone who likes Rosicky for this reason (although I have to say, the fact that Rosicky loaned a student his minivan should count for something, even though Adams can't help but, once again, use what should have been an occaison to humanize a professor as an opportunity to highlight once again how bad he had it).

Ok. To your specific question. What exactly do you want people to defend? Literary theory? Fine. Literary theory is supposed to teach students that reading literature isn't just something you do "for fun" (Adams' works). It is a systematic attempt of understanding 1) why one intepretation of a particular work of literature may be better than another; 2) how different interpretations of said works of literature arise in the first place; 3)the ways in which literary language both draws upon and is different from so-called ordinary language; 4) the specific cognitive principles that are involved in understanding aspects of language generally conceived to be "literary" -- metaphor, narrative, etc; 5) how aspects of language generally conceived to be literary (metaphor, narrative, etc.) might be as integral to an understanding of a particular culture as the more "material" artifacts that culture produces. As well as countless other things I could list if this were an article and not a response to a series which is not much better than a tabloid.

Now what else do we need to justify?

@ "velvis" (#9): "While I understand disliking the whining, I don't understand why those of you are reading and continuing the cycle of whining? Be the change in the world you wish to see..."

I have an answer to velvis' question. Whining about whiners is what Homo Academicus does to signal his alpha status in the pack. In general, whining seems to be the defining characteristic of this species. A few more examples: 1) H. academicus complains about having to pay an extra $5.00 for transcripts; 2) it appears at all times miserably overworked -- but not overwhelmed, which is a remarkable balance; and 3) it must speak disparagingly of the bourgeoisie at least once a week.

Any other examples I'm missing? (And am I the alpha alpha, because I'm whining about whining about whining? Who said literary theory doesn't come in handy now and then...)

I'm a tenured department chair at a midwestern SLAC. My advice to our graduates is almost always NOT to pursue graduate school in the humanities unless they simply cannot fathom being fulfilled doing anything else-- and even then, making them acknowledge that a tenure-track academic job is an unlikely outcome. My own graduate school experiences (at Ivy and Big Ten universities in the early 90s) were in fact great fun; we did have soccer and vollyball teams, we had great social lives, and we did have real friendships with our graduate professors. Most importantly though, most of us felt fortunate to have the opportunity to spend a few years reading books, conducting research, and writing. While I wouldn't turn the clock back I certainly have fond memories of my experiences.

The more I read of these columns the more I am convinced that the author is simply one of those people we all knew in grad school, i.e. the chronic malconent that simply was never happy and wouldn't do anything positive to change his situation. In my cohort, at least, most of those people moved on well before taking comps and hopefully found satisfying careers elsewhere.

Literary theories are a huge waste of time. So, too, is graduate school in English, unfortunately. Nothing about the job prospects for English Ph.Ds has improved over the past 25 years.

russhunt writes:

"This person was there when I was in grad school, 40 years ago -- but had the sense to get the hell out and find something he could stand doing."

At the risk of sounding oversimplistic here, Why linger in a field and department that you despise? Adams does not really address this part of his problem. If he did, would he also have recourse to the kind of dichotomy he chastises "Dad" for in his "column"?

Russhunt, I am younger than you, but it seems to me that you hit the bull's-eye.

And one more thing...primal screaming? Adams' travails do not seem to compare with other 21st century terrors that provoke more spontaneous and painful screams from sufferers.

The screams from a theory-laden grad student...oh, the horror. The horror!

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