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A look at the 2020-21 job market, such as it was

Courtesy, as usual, of philosopher Marcus Arvan (Tampa); an excerpt:

[T]he actual number of junior TT jobs in philosophy advertised this year on PhilJobs appears by my tally to be 118, down from 224 last year. So, unfortunately, compared to last year, junior TT jobs this year appear to be roughly half of what they were last year….

In any case, here's a summary of what I found:

TOTAL (junior-level) TT jobs advertised in philosophy = 118

  • Open AOS: 29 jobs (24.6% of all TT jobs advertised)

  • 'Core areas' (mind, language, metaphysics, epistemology, logic) = 7.5 jobs (6.4% of TT jobs)

  • Value theory (ethics, social, political, law) = 51.6 jobs (37.8% of TT jobs) 

    • Ethics & Applied Ethics (biomedical, environmental, AI ethics, etc.): 38.25 (26.3%)  
    • Social, Political, Law, Econ: 12.13 jobs (10.3% of jobs)
  • Science (including philosophy of technology & AI) = 13.8 jobs (11.7%)

    • Philosophy of Science: 4.2 jobs (3.6%)
    • Philosophy of Technology: 6.1 jobs (5.2%)
    • AI/machine learning: 1.25 jobs (1%)
    • History of life-sciences: 1 job (1%)
  • History = 7.15 jobs (6.1%)

    • History (open): 2.75 jobs (2.3%)
    • 18th-19th Century: 1 job (1%)
    • Medieval: 1 job (1%)
    • Ancient: 2.4 jobs (2%)
  • Social identity (race, gender, feminism) = 8 jobs (6.8%)

    • Feminism & gender: 3 jobs (2.5%)
    • Race & African-American philosophy: 5 jobs (4.2%)
  • 'Non-western': 7.7 jobs (6.5%)

    • Non-western: 2.45 jobs (2.1%)

    • African philosophy: .5 (.5%)

    • Asian philosophy: .25 jobs (.2%)

    • Buddhist philosophy: .5 jobs (.5%)

    • Caribbean philosophy: .25 jobs (.2%)

    • Chinese philosophy: .25 jobs (.2%)

    • Indigenous philosophy: .25 jobs (.2%)

    • Islamic philosophy: 1 job (1%)

    • Latin American philosophy: 1 job (1%)

  • Continental philosophy = 1.4 jobs (1.2%)
  • Philosophy of Religion = 1.5 jobs (1.3%)
  • Aesthetics = 0 jobs (1 job in Art History)

As in prior years, the "core" is no longer very core on the job market, unless it turns out all the "open" jobs are going to philosophers in the "core" (some are).  19th- and 20th-century Continental philosophy continues to be outrageously neglected, despite it being one of the most fertile periods in the history of philosophy, hugely influential across all the humanities and social sciences.   See Professor Arvan's post for the details of how he calculates the preceding.   Comments from readers welcome.

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One response to “A look at the 2020-21 job market, such as it was”

  1. There was barely more than one TT philosophy job *per state* in the US. Out of over 4000 colleges and universities. That is terrifying, and highlights how the APA's sole and total mission should be pushing the importance of philosophy tout court before we are marginalized as classics.

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