The Benefits of Expanded Academia

Dr. Randy Lewis, Professor and Chair of American Studies

You’ve probably heard of expanded consciousness but have you heard of expanded academia? It’s less trippy but still pretty valuable— and it’s legal in the state of Texas!

Let me explain.

Last week Dr. Rebecca Peabody (Getty Museum) met with a few grad students in American Studies and History for a wonderful conversation about what she calls “expanded academia,” her phrase for the broader landscape of academic and quasi-academic jobs that exist beyond the tenure track paradigm.

I suspect that the room was filled with people who are trying to figure out if typical academic jobs make sense for them. Fortunately, Dr. Peabody had a lot of good advice. She encouraged us to recognize how many choices we can have if we are willing to work within a larger ecosystem.

Indeed, what I took away from her talk was how much agency we are leaving on the table when we decide to say “nothing matters except that tenure track job—I’ll take it no matter what the cost!” That sort of academic tunnel vision can limit our sense of what is possible with our PhD.

Where does that tunnel vision come from? Increasingly it’s not coming from faculty; for instance, our department has an incredible record of placing people in expanded academia over the past 40 years and has been immensely celebratory of all of the various outcomes. We have never valorized one outcome over another but perhaps the phrasing is part of the problem now; there is something odd about the expression “alt-ac” because, as Dr. Peabody points out, few people are “in or alt” in some simplistic either/or way. For most PhD’s, the career path is more serpentine than straight line.

After all, graduate work in American Studies can prepare us for positions in administration, advising, curation, journalism, and other fields. For this reason Dr. Peabody talked about the importance of “same preparation, multiple outcomes” rather than “preparing for one outcome.” She suggested that academic skills are very transferable—even more so than we expect. She also talked movingly about “iterative self-discovery as an important life skill” and how your feelings of self-doubt along the way are not a sign of weakness.

I loved the way she started by sharing her intellectual biography in a way that wasn’t about maximizing cultural capital: e.g., the “my many brilliant accomplishments!” model that you hear at many academic events (is vanity simply inverted insecurity?). Instead, she was explicit about filling in the gaps in her own CV to show what a circuitous route we often take to our jobs.

Is it easy? Of course not. She talked about the very real struggles of being a new PhD, filled with uncertainty about her job prospects but pretty certain that a standard academic position sounded like a deadline-infested drag. Like most people straight out of grad school, she said that she struggled at first. She talked about needing to write her book’s introduction in a two hour window at a Starbucks (which was as long as she could be away from her newborn twins), and about being a first generation college student in Iowa before landing in prestige machines like Yale and the Getty.

It’s important to hear stories like this. Relatively few people go from a PhD program to an amazing postdoc or an attractive TT job nowadays–it was always difficult but feels particularly tricky in 2022. Most people are like me: in the 1990s I worked in publishing in multiple positions, taught at different levels including a high school, worked in a museum, and even dabbled in journalism (well, I was an unpaid “contributing writer” for a NY magazine, which at the time seemed like it might be a career path). You can see these elements on my own CV, but not the fact that I also worked as a night janitor in a bank, a UAW organizer, an undergrad counselor, among other gigs—all before I took an assistant professorship (and all while trying to write and publish on the sly!).

Back then I was convinced that success was only possible if I landed an assistant prof gig, but reality is much more complex than such Manichean scenarios.

The upshot for me: maybe don’t put all your emotional eggs in one professional basket. There are so many ways to use the skills we gain in American Studies, and many of them (in my experience) offer as much or even more joy, community, and dignity than the often elusive TT line (and yes, it was elusive even in 1995!). Instead of having the narrow mindset of “I must grab any TT job that I can get, even if it’s in place that irritates me on every level,” think about what really matters to you.

This is why I appreciated it when Dr. Peabody talked about the importance of not letting your career be your number one priority in your life (to the extent that your circumstances allow. Economics are always weighing heavily on this matter). I get it. After spending 6+ years in grad school, it can be very hard to say “maybe I’ll end up teaching at a nice college or maybe I’ll do something else that is just as great.” But I recommend that flexible mindset when you embark on grad education in the humanities and social sciences. Giving yourself choices is the first step to actually having choices.

Obviously I found her talk very empowering—and was grateful to Annie Maxfield and the Texas Career Engagement office for making it happen!