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[the_honey_badger]

I know of a recent History phd who is having great trouble getting a book contract because of *excessive* publishing---reportedly (and I trust the source),  Recent Doc easily landed a job with his six articles but since they are every single chapter of his dissertation, no "decent" (his word) U Press wants it.  One is in a first tier field journal but all of the others are in 2nd and 3rd tier sub-specialty or state journals. He didn't prme the pump in terms of interest, he sucked the well dry. Now he faces a "book" requirement at his R3 in just three or four more years and has to start from scratch with something else while doing his 3/3 teaching load and far from any research archives in his field. A case where even good advice (publish!) can backfire.

[katherineparr]

I can see how that would be a problem, but it's a slightly different scenario from the one posed by the OP.

Most of the CVs I see show publications that range from portions of the dissertations to related work. Often, graduates produce essay-length work in research seminars, etc., or chapters that don't really fit into the final diss.

That work can be published with no threat to the book contract. More, since the advice here has been to publish 1-3 essays, it sounds as though the person who published 6 (all from his dissertation!) really went overboard.

So I take your point, but I don't think it contradicts the general advice here at all.

[the_honey_badger]

I can see how that would be a problem, but it's a slightly different scenario from the one posed by the OP.

Most of the CVs I see show publications that range from portions of the dissertations to related work. Often, graduates produce essay-length work in research seminars, etc., or chapters that don't really fit into the final diss.

That work can be published with no threat to the book contract. More, since the advice here has been to publish 1-3 essays, it sounds as though the person who published 6 (all from his dissertation!) really went overboard.

So I take your point, but I don't think it contradicts the general advice here at all.

No, I don't think it contradicts the general advice but I do think that it is worth mentioning to the hyper-types that you can publish yourself into a corner. Particularly for those in fields where the "outlets" in terms of secondary or tertiary level journals abound.  A frantic summer of shaping every chapter into a separate article (which is what happened here) might not be in your interests simply to pump up a publications count.

[katherineparr]

True, and in history this is particularly important since we have to publish books. I think that sometimes we focus too much on what will get you a job, forgetting that you will then have another round of hurdles to jump.

If you kill your book in the effort to find a job...not good.

[bewildered]

I know of a recent History phd who is having great trouble getting a book contract because of *excessive* publishing---reportedly (and I trust the source),  Recent Doc easily landed a job with his six articles but since they are every single chapter of his dissertation, no "decent" (his word) U Press wants it.  One is in a first tier field journal but all of the others are in 2nd and 3rd tier sub-specialty or state journals. He didn't prme the pump in terms of interest, he sucked the well dry. Now he faces a "book" requirement at his R3 in just three or four more years and has to start from scratch with something else while doing his 3/3 teaching load and far from any research archives in his field. A case where even good advice (publish!) can backfire.

This is absolutely an issue.  Unless you're an established scholar who can sell a book based on your "name"-- and this is not generally the case for a first book-- most publishers will want to know that no more than 25-40% of your book has already been published as articles.

I know someone who published his entire dissertation as articles while trying to get his first TT job-- and it was at an R1 university-- and then ultimately he decided his only option was to write an entirely new book for his (successful) tenure bid.

[rodentmind]

I have several articles in print. One SCC asked me pointblank if I'd cannibalized them all from my diss. Fortunately, I was able to say, no, only 1 is from my diss.