Academia's indentured servants - Opinion - Al Jazeera English

Academia's indentured servants - Opinion - Al Jazeera English:

Academia's indentured servants

Outspoken academics are rare: most tenured faculty have stayed silent about the adjunct crisis, notes Kendzior. Last Modified: 11 Apr 2013 11:19

Sarah Kendzior Sarah Kendzior is an anthropologist who recently received her PhD from Washington University in St Louis. RSS

"To work outside of academia, even temporarily, signals you are not "serious" or "dedicated" to scholarship," writes author [AP]

On April 8, 2013, the New York Times reported that 76 percent of American university faculty are adjunct professors - an all-time high. Unlike tenured faculty, whose annual salaries can top $160,000, adjunct professors make an average of $2,700 per course and receive no health care or other benefits. Most adjuncts teach at multiple universities while still not making enough to stay above the poverty line. Some are on welfare or homeless. Others depend on charity drives held by their peers. Adjuncts are generally not allowed to have offices or participate in faculty meetings. When they ask for a living wage or benefits, they can be fired. Their contingent status allows them no recourse. No one forces a scholar to work as an adjunct. So why do some of America's brightest PhDs - many of whom are authors of books and articles on labour, power, or injustice - accept such terrible conditions? "Path dependence and sunk costs must be powerful forces," speculates political scientist Steve Saidemen in a post titled "The Adjunct Mystery". In other words, job candidates have invested so much time and money