How has the 2022-23 philosophy job market seemed to this point?
Within the following visitor put up, Charles Lassiter (Gonzaga) takes a have a look at the information, sharing details about tendencies within the quantity and sorts of jobs on provide, and about which areas of specialization are most wanted by hiring establishments.
(A model of this put up beforehand appeared, in two parts, at Professor Lassiter’s weblog.)
[photo by J. Weinberg]
The 2022-23 Philosophy Job Market So Far
by Charles Lassiter
Hey associates. We’re going to have a look right here on the main cycle (July 1 – December 30). That is when most job posting occurs. Right here’s a have a look at postings throughout all job varieties:
Bear in mind 2020? Oof da that was a tough yr. Anyway, we’re trending a bit increased than typical on junior posts relative to earlier years. In actual fact, the pattern for junior posts during the last seven years has been extra jobs. Open rank, postdoc, and senior posts are down barely however nonetheless inside a normalish vary traditionally. Visiting fellowships are up barely, however nonetheless inside a traditional vary. In case you need the numbers for junior, postdoc, open rank, and non-academic, listed below are these:
Let’s zoom in on junior positions:
This one is difficult to interpret. Development strains (not included) counsel that the TT market has been trending downward over final 7 years, however that features 2020, which is an outlier. Excluding 2020, we discover that the market is trending in direction of having extra jobs. Even so, it’s not an enormous pattern. The NSF’s Survey of Earned Doctorates studies that there have been 399 new PhD’s in philosophy in 2021. So despite the fact that it’s an upwards pattern, it’s not transferring quick sufficient to accommodate all the brand new PhD’s.
So there you’ve got it. The job market isn’t trying all that completely different from pre-2020 ranges. Some slight will increase however none vital sufficient to breathe a sigh of reduction heading into the market. I’ve mentioned it earlier than and I’ll say it once more: the American Philosophical Affiliation and grad applications must put extra time and power into non-academic profession paths.
What about areas of specialization (AOS)? Right here’s the massive image:
A observe on methodology: In circumstances the place a number of areas have been listed, I’ve counted these individually. So this isn’t a tally of all jobs in the marketplace. Moderately, it’s a tally of all the roles marketed in one of many 5 most important classes on Philjobs. So (e.g.) there are a hair below 50 jobs in metaphysics/epistemology. However some adverts listed meta/epist or historical past of phil because the AOS they have been searching for. Right here, every of these was counted individually. I opted for this methodology of counting as a result of I’m assuming that any disjunctions in AOS’s for job adverts can draw from two completely different applicant swimming pools: that’s, that AOS swimming pools are unique. (I do know this isn’t all the time true however go together with it as a simplifying assumption for the mannequin.) For (for example) a job advert searching for an epistemologist or an ethicist will get listed right here as a job for an epistemologist and as a job for an ethicist. So if Jack is an epistemologist and Jill is an ethicist, the job advert counts as an inventory for Jack and for Jill individually. In a nutshell, I’m counting jobs by AOS from the standpoint of job seekers below the belief that a number of AOS’s have mutually unique candidate swimming pools.
Let’s zoom in on a number of of those, beginning with worth idea:
Ethics dominates, adopted by social and political philosophy. We’ll get to “different” in a second. Sadly, phil of artwork is on the backside with two adverts.
Value_other is a catch-all for particular areas that don’t match neatly into any of the opposite classes. It was a hodgepodge of seemingly grant-specific areas, e.g. citizenship, media ethics, and many others. However there have been 3 adverts for AI ethics and a couple of for ethics and tech. So there are extra job adverts for ethics and tech/AI than there are for phil of artwork or phil of intercourse and gender.
Let’s take a better have a look at historical past and traditions to see what’s up there:
Carving up this knowledge was a bit trickier. Some adverts simply had “historical past of philosophy” with none element. Others mentioned “non-Western”. For the previous, I listed historical, medieval, and trendy as overlaying a generic “historical past of philosophy.” And for non-Western, I listed Asian, Africana, Indigenous, Indian, and Latin American as proxies. So once more, remember that these aren’t complete job counts however relatively (roughly) jobs for which one may apply if one have been an skilled in (say) historical or Latin American phil. Given these assumptions, historical is in biggest demand.
Non-western traditions are on the map, however not in large demand. “Africana” confirmed up in 13 adverts whereas “indigenous” confirmed up in 4. Although it’s value noting that Africana is in increased demand than various subcategories in worth idea.
Now science, logic, and math:
Philosophy of science is main the way in which with comparatively few alternatives for different subfields. What’s up with the opposite class? It is a seize bag of: historical past of science or medication or know-how; AI; the metaphysics of science; postdoc adverts which might be too particular to labeled wherever else (e.g. a challenge on episodic reminiscence).
Lastly, metaphysics and epistemology:
Seven jobs for philosophers of thoughts? 9 for epistemologists? Yeesh. what’s within the “different” class? 5 philosophy of know-how positions, a social epistemology, and a few animal cognition.
What’s attention-grabbing about this from my view is when there are repeated cases within the “different” class. This means the emergence of an vital subfield that isn’t but counted among the many normal choices, or a minimum of not in any apparent manner. Resolution idea has a subcategory on Philjobs, however philosophy of know-how doesn’t. Nor does historical past of science/STS, despite the fact that phil tech and historical past of science every had extra adverts than resolution idea. I’d say that historical past of science/STS and phil tech are established subfields. A colleague of mine who works in phil tech as soon as described it as fringe. Kirby, should you’re studying this, I don’t suppose it’s fringe any extra.
Let’s now filter AOS by junior positions and post-docs. Right here’s what that appears like:
So tendencies for junior positions largely observe that of all positions. Most are in worth idea, adopted by open and historical past/traditions. Issues are a bit completely different for postdocs, with the best variety of positions being marketed as open.
In speaking with my pal Nader Shoaibi, I’m wondering if digging into the small print makes the image a bit drearier than the numbers right here say. I’ll use myself as a take a look at case. If I have been going in the marketplace, I’d apply for open jobs and jobs in philosophy of thoughts. I’d apply for every little thing however would actually be taking a look at tenure-track jobs—that’s the place the safety is at. Filtering for these values, there are 36 jobs: 33 open and three in philosophy of thoughts. I acquired my PhD at Fordham, so let’s be sensible about my job prospects. I do know, I do know… that one person went from Oklahoma to Harvard. Improbable for them however clearly an outlier. At a non-prestigious college, I can lower the Ivies and many R1s from the checklist. And let’s take jobs exterior the US off the desk as a result of I’m not a celebrity and a college exterior the US is unlikely to pay for the prices of hiring a foreigner. That leaves me with 16 openings, all marketed as open.
That’s all to say that the numbers don’t look nice within the huge image and issues solely go downhill when stepping into the weeds.
I’m hoping to get some assist quickly for taking a look at AOS tendencies since 2015. It’s lots of knowledge to wash. However I’ll remember to let you already know when that’s out there.
As all the time, if there are another analyses you’re excited about, please let me know!
