<p>DonnaL…love the poem.</p>
<p>So, if some of the business school folks see value in liberal arts, then why can’t they find employment?</p>
<p>[Multicultural</a> Critical Theory. At Business School? - NYTimes.com](<a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/10/business/10mba.html?ref=business]Multicultural”>http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/10/business/10mba.html?ref=business)</p>
<p>IF you search “stuff white people like” and graduate school the satire version of the same thing will appear</p>
<p>One overlooked point that Benton/Pannepacker (the author of the Chronicle piece) makes is that a self-supporting career as a humanities professor should be looked at in the same light as a career as an artist, musician or poet. Only a tiny, tiny percentage of aspirants in these fields will ever manage to support themselves, let alone a family, on what they will be able to make from their passions. The general public understands, by and large, that the life of an artist is financially uncertain and that there is a large possibility of professional failure. However, there is still an illusory belief that academe is a safe, solid bourgeois career choice “if you’re smart enough.” It’s not.</p>
<p>I finished my humanities Ph.D. in the mid-nineties. I applied for literally hundreds of jobs. I had the ability to wait out the job market because my husband with the boring job in business paid the bills, and I could focus on burnishing my publication record with some occasional teaching thrown in. The institution that employs me (I am an associate professor now) is not hiring new tenure-track people to replace the retirees. It is hiring short-term contract labor it can fire at will if the enrollment goes down or institutional priorities change. There are too many people with Ph.D.s who will work for virtually nothing. As long as that’s the case, the occupational outlook for humanities professors will remain bleak. I would never advise any of my students to go to graduate school in the humanities unless money and future security are not concerns for them.</p>
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<p>Oh, my, that’s a funny website! It’s funny because it’s true. I loved this:</p>
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<p>Not that I think grad school is a total waste, but I agree that there are subjects that seem to be nothing more than pseudointellectual navel-gazing. Which is fine, of course, if that’s what I want to do. I just have to accept the fact that few other people care about it enough to fund me as I do it for the rest of my life.</p>
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<p>I confess that this describes everything I want out of life, except maybe the complaining.</p>
<p>"Being in graduate school satisfies many white requirements for happiness. They can believe they are helping the world, complain that the government/university doesnt support them enough, claim they are poor, feel as though are getting smarter, act superior to other people, enjoy perpetual three day weekends, and sleep in every day of the week!</p>
<p>I confess that this describes everything I want out of life, except maybe the complaining."</p>
<p>lol…Come on…tell the truth…you like the complaining too. :)</p>
<p>Well…okay, you got me. 
But it’s only because the damned government doesn’t support me enough!</p>
<p>DonnaL</p>
<p>Interesting poem. I like “bottle green dress” and “somewhere night air,” and the ending is quite good, made me want to reread it (twice) so I did. And it’s an amazing poem for a 7 yr old. thx</p>
<p>Please pm me and have your daughter get in touch with my friend, a professor and a nationally recognized death penalty lawyer(argued before US Supreme Court). He will tell your daughter about her options .</p>
<p>mythmom, that is.</p>