Talk:Spanish 2011-2012

Demographics:
ABD (early):

ABD (will finish this academic year): 2

Completed Graduate Studies in US:7

Completed Graduate Studies in Iberia (Spain/Portugal): 2

Completed Graduate Studies in Latin America: 1

Ph.D. in hand (one-year, VAP, Lecturer, post-doc, adjunct):6

Ph.D. in hand (unable to find academic employment at the moment): 0

ABD (almost done with Ph.D.) and currently in a one-year, VAP, visiting instructor, lecturer or adjunct position: 1

Assistant Professor: 4

Full Professor:

Lurker: 1

Depressed: 3 + 2 (specially when I realized I could "realize" Graduate Studies in the US") LOL + 1 (the market is always depressing).

The Insiders
Let's start talking insiders. Does anyone with his ear to the ground have news about positions that already have a favorite in mind?

Too Many Peninsular Positions
Peninsular speakers make up what, 10% of the Spanish-speaking world? (And the number of parlantes de español in the US is fast approaching--if it does not already exceed--that of Spain.) Why are there so many freekin peninsular jobs? Yea, Spain's great and all, but this Eurocentric crap is medieval.

The Euro-cultural conquest wasn't successful in much of Latin American anyway. But yet the nonsense continues, both in academia and with these idiots in black robes:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwjlFs99YDU

Funny, because as a peninsularist, I had the opposite reaction. I felt like there were a ton of Latin American positions and SLA jobs, and a paucity of Peninsular jobs. That said, I also didn't dismiss the work in those fields just because I don't work in the those areas. Show me the numbers and then maybe I will listen to your silly whining.

There are always too many peninsular ads, that’s nothing new. What I see this year is an abundance of Caribbean and Mexico ads. It’s a nice change, I’d say. What the other poster didn’t say is that for there to be a descriptive cultural demography, there should be 10 times more Latin American jobs than Peninsular, as the Latin American population is about 10 times that of Spain. (It’s a bit more than 10 times the Spain pop. in reality.)

To put some numbers on the peninsular stranglehold in this field: as of Oct 20 there are 8 Latin American ads and 4 Peninsular on the wiki (if we subtract generalist and linguistics). That means the Peninsular jobs are overrepresented by around 350%.

Since when is the number of inhabitants of a specific region the sole or main criteria to determine the "correct" "size", "relevance" or "representation" of an academic subfield? By this same logic, the OP should be demanding that 1 in every 5 academic job positions be on Chinese literature and that all Classics departments stop hiring at once.

The way things are, I think we should all be glad that there are even TT jobs being offered...

Since when? Umm the end of the feudal period. Maybe the emancipation proclamation...or the Bastille. Number of inhabitants SHOULD BE determinative as in theory the west is democratic. What this last poster notes about Chinese is precisely correct in spite of his/her ignorant sarcasm. The Humanities should examine the human condition withouth these medieval preferences that currently pollute Spanish study in the US.

That Spanish novels/arts/modismos are %350 more beautiful/relevant/important than, say, those from Colombia, is an untenable assertion -- and these nondemocratic structures that determine the "best" themes to study flesh out as cultural imperialism. If the US academcy were to saturate with a single Spansh-speaking culture it should be Mexican or Spanish-speakers from the US, for obvious reasons.

There is one point I would like to add to this discussion. There are many, many elements that come into play when talking about the job market, and a fundamental one has to due with its tempos. My particular subfield in Latin American studies was historically underrepresented until many departments began to open positions during the late 1990s and early 2000s (which is when I got my TT job). This means that practically all departments large enough to offer this subspeciality have rather young, tenured associate professors. Therefore, for some years now there have hardly been any openings in my subspeciality, and I don't think this will improve much for a rather long period of time. On the other hand, in my department and in those I am familiar with, Peninsularists are usually older professors who are now finally starting to retire, thus freeing up lines that .--the economy and deans willing-- will translate into more jobs for this speciality.

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For that same reason, one might argue that British literature is overrepresented in US academy. Perhaps, but both British and Peninsular literature are "the classics" of American and Latin American literature. And they will always be taught, get over it. I'm a Peninsularist, and I also believe this year there are a lot of Mexican/Caribbean literature positions. I'm glad for my colleagues in those subfields, what's the problem?

As for your assertion that "If the US academcy were to saturate with a single Spansh-speaking culture it should be Mexican or Spanish-speakers from the US, for obvious reasons," you're absolutely right. They are doing that very well, it's called chicano literature, it's part of the American literature curriculum, and it's beating the crap out of Spanish departments throughout the country. And, of course, it's taught in English. Doesn't that qualify as cultural imperialism?

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Estas son las peleas del pobre. Instead of asking for more new lines so everyone can work, we are arguing to substitute one for other. Of course, there is no money and universities are freezing hiring but this is the kind of in-finghting that institutions love to avoid hiring anyone. I can hear the Deans: "No problem guys, you figure it out and you get back to me. In the meantime, I give your line to English or French. I hear they are doing cool thing there..." It would be a lot more constructive to place our energies in trying to figure out how to grow and consolidate gains intead of undermining our colleagues in the field. When we do that we also unwittingly hurt ourselves.

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Lest we forget
Try doing Portuguese when 99.9% of departments, including the ones that brand themselves as "Spanish and Portuguese," are really just Spanish departments.

Format of this Year's Wiki
''This format is seriously deficient for the volume of info that will be on this page. There will be over 200 positions, and come MLA interview notification time, it's far too tedious to search for 20-60 universities. Sure there are a few obsessive-compulsive types that will be fine doing that, but the strength of the wiki as a public info-sharing space is the ease with which we can add info and READ info. I would change it, but I'm not on the market this year and I've got other things to do. But if it stays this way, I'm not going to update the 4-6 positions that I'll know about. I might not even update the position in my dept.''

A: This is how the person / people who put the effort into setting up the page chose to do it. One could argue that is it actually easier to navigate to the schools you are interested in because you can now see them in the "Contents" list at the top of the page. This basic format is followed by other pages that have as much (if not more) jobs (see Rhetoric/Composition 2012 & Communication and Media Studies 2011-2012). However, the people in this field should determine how they want the page set up. If you have strong feelings about it, please express them below. Furthermore, if you, or someone else, wants to reformat the page based on popular demand, go for it. This is a community endeavor. Una74 14:42, October 4, 2011 (UTC)

Please, it is possible to return to the last year format? Putting the entire list of positions is very tedious...

''Tedious compared to last year's section, are you kidding me? Last year there was one set of posts for the jobs, another for calls for interviews, and another for offers made. You had to do three searches! The new format has a contents section!! You don't have to scroll or search, just click on the job. ''

A: Page has been reformatted into a modified version of last year's page (following model of French and Francophone Studies 2011-2012). I am not reformatting this page again; further format changes are up to the users of this Spanish page. Una74 19:40, October 13, 2011 (UTC)

''Thanks for the effort Una74, but come on, this new format is nonsense. Everyone will be adding changes to each sub-section with a different format...meaning the page will be impossible to scan at a glance. The other way has a contents option at the top, which does exactly what this new format does--but it won't be clogged with useless info. Yes, the page looks fine now, but 6 weeks from now it will be cluttered and useless. Pages with far more positions that Spanish use the other format because it is streamlined. ''

''This is now reformatted back into the 21st century. ''