EnglishLiterature 2009-2010

English Literature Jobs for AY 2009-2010
GUIDELINES FOR USAGE:

Post school names and deadlines. Add materials requests, interview requests, and campus visit requests as they happen. Add any other pertinent information that you might know about the status of a given search.

Please refrain from removing information from this page. Even out-of-date or trivial information may be of historical interest to readers. Editing that improves clarity or renders information more concise is encouraged.

Last year's job search page: English Literature Jobs for AY 2008-2009

How about creative writing? And English Education? English Ed has been lumped in with Children's Literature. Feel free to update and check in (11-12)

Subfields
Generalist and Open

Medieval

Early Modern/Renaissance

Restoration and 18th c. British

Romanticism and Victorian

Modern and Contemporary British

British Open

Early and 19th c. American

20th and 21st c. American

African American

Other Ethnic American

American Open

Anglophone and World Literature/Postcolonial

Canadian Literature

[]

Children's/YA Literature/ English Education (Updated 11-18)

American South

Critical Theory

Drama, Speech, Film & Media Studies

Irish Literature

Environmental Literature

Comparative Literature

Rhetoric/Composition

Queer/Women's/Gender Studies

This Year's Cancelled Jobs--The Economy Strikes
Bridgewater State (Massachusetts), British and Irish Modernism

Colorado State University, Anglophone and World Literature

East Tennessee State University, Modern British

Hillsdale College, General

Johns Hopkins, African American Lit.

Johns Hopkins, Comparative Lit
 * Q: what is the source of info that this job has been cancelled?  Email notice 11/11

Lehman College, CUNY, 19th century

Long Island University, Modern and Contemporary Poetry

Miami University, American modernism 1900-1950

Miami University, Romantic Poetry

Northern Arizona University, African American Lit.

Rider University, Literary Theory

Scripps College, Gender Studies

SUNY Stony Brook, African American Lit.

SUNY Stony Brook, Medieval

SUNY Stony Brook, Comparative Lit.

U of Alabama-Huntsville, Medieval

U of Miami, Late Med. Early Mod.

U of Illinois, Chicago, Gender/Women's Studies

University of North Carolina, Greensboro Post-1945 British Lit

University of Puget Sound, Rhetoric

University of Richmond, African Literature

University of South Carolina, Rhetoric

University of Vermont, 19th century

University of Virginia, Postcolonial

Villanova University, 18th C. Novel

Western New England College, modernist literature and creative writing

Xavier, Early Modern

Comments and Questions
Anybody know why the JIL has been down since Thursday night, 11/6? (11/9/2008) Yes-- They were down for scheduled maintenance Thursday midnight to Sunday 5pm. Should be up now.

Just wondering if anyone knows anything about the search in British Romanticism at UC Boulder. (it's a mid-career to senior search) They said they were likely inviting candidates to campus in early November. Anyone heard anything further? (11/15/2008)

Q: I would like to add to this conversation:  I interviewed with a major East Coast Div I school last week over the phone (standard, TT, AP search) - They indicated that their next step would be to fly in candidates for the final interview. Is anyone else noticing this year's financial pressures weighing against U's using MLA? I suppose I don't really care (as long as I get an interview :)), but I am wondering how the economy is altering the nature and timing of this year's interview process. Has anyone noticed anything unusual about initial contacts, first interviews etc. this year? (11/16/2008)
 * A: I haven't noticed this myself, although it doesn't seem too surprising. I'm responding, though, for a different reason: Did the school indicate when the on-campus visits would be? This is important, b/c, ethically speaking, they shouldn't be speeding up the process too much. They should wait for MLA and allow you to make a fully informed decision. Last year, my partner went on an on-campus interview at a school that was using this accelerated process; he was offered the job and had to decide whether or not to take the job right before his convention (where he had several promising interviews set up). It was agonizing to make that choice. We later found out that there are regulations in place to prevent this sort of thing from happening; the school could have (and probably should have) been censured. Anyway, just one other thing to think about! (11/17)


 * A Yes, I have noticed this. Three weeks after the application deadline on one job, I received a request for an on-campus interview. I went for the interview during the first week of November (crazy time with the election), and the decision is expected before Thanksgiving. I noticed a trend toward bypassing MLA last year too, but this year it seems more pronounced.


 * A This might not always be the case, but with economic pressures being what they are, some departments want to get positions filled/contracts signed before the admin put a freeze or cancel that particular search.


 * A I had an early flyback too, in October. Honestly, it made the other application materials I was preparing at the time feel rushed. Expecting candidates to prepare a job talk and travel months ahead of time in the middle of all of their other application/teaching/etc responsibilities is asking a bit much. Not to mention the financial problems associated with having to buy a suit at the last minute, airfare, etc in the middle of paying to send out dossiers, applications, etc. I had to eat a lot of rush mailing fees on top of everything. There should be a way to protect applicants from this, although I tried to make the best of it by saying "it's good experience." Of course, it is their market, and we end up jumping when they say so...(11/17)


 * A Wow, this is really troubling to hear. I have always appreciated how the MLA format, however painful it might be, protects applicants.  There are a lot of other fields where applicants are much more vulnerable to the whims of the university.  There must be a mechanism to report such abuses anonymously to the MLA.  I would encourage anyone with relevant experiences to do so.  (11/18)


 * A Another way in which the MLA format protects applicants is by allowing the lucky few with offers some negotiating leverage, finally. I had an early phone interview with a university that told me they were bypassing the MLA in order to get the best candidates first. So, that's another reason for the early schedule, to prevent applicants from negotiating.


 * A I'm in another MLA field, not English, but I'm about to leave for a campus visit in a couple of days and I have a phone interview with a pretty good public research university tomorrow (about which I had about a day of advanced notice). I had heard of smaller schools doing things like this, but these are both good, if second-tier, research institutions. This does seem to me to be incredibly rushed and it seems to me related to both punctual economic pressures (that is, the kind that might send us all back home to our parents), as well as--as someone wrote above--a desire to evade potential bargaining power (11/18)


 * A I think I liked this wiki more when we all complained about the job interviews we did NOT get... that way I actually had something to contribute.


 * A We'll have more than fodder for that in the months ahead. Stay tuned!