In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

  • Unravelling the “Ponzi Scheme”? A Different Approach to Graduate Education in German Studies
  • Michael Boehringer

Graduate Studies in German: A Terrible Idea?

The rhetoric of crisis has been common currency in discussions on graduate studies in the humanities for as long as I can remember. And there is no question that, then and now, our graduate programs in German churn out far more PhDs than there are tenure-track or even limited-term positions at Canadian universities. Add to this picture the fierce competition for faculty positions from PhD holders from the United States and Germany, and it cannot surprise us that many commentators see graduate school in the humanities as a pyramid scheme perpetuated by faculty members and administrators alike, in the interest of keeping their own classes populated and retaining cheap labour for lowly undergraduate courses. Should we follow the example set by Thomas H. Benton (the pseudonym of William Pannapacker, himself a tenured associate professor) in advising prospective graduate students: “Just don’t go”? Is getting a PhD in German a “terrible idea because the full-time, tenure-track literature professorship is extinct,” as Rebecca Schuman writes in Slate magazine? Are we tenure-track or tenured professors abdicating our responsibilities as teachers? Are we indeed promoting “the self-interest of faculty members at the expense of students” as Mark Taylor would have it, if we don’t shut down our graduate programs or, at the very least, reduce enrolment to a trickle? Well, yes – and no.

Economic Paradigm and Ethical Practice

The answer, it seems to me, is not as simple as the black-or-white stance that many commentators advocate. In one sense, the critics are absolutely correct: our self-interest as faculty members is clearly involved when we accept new graduate students into our programs, both intellectually and pragmatically. As a rule, we love what we do; we engage in research to discover new knowledge and to explore new ways of thinking – and are excited to share these with our students. Also, a thriving graduate program may provide some modicum of protection against the ever-advancing demands of university administrators, and, increasingly, management consultants, to prove our value in terms of quantifiable [End Page 142] metrics and evidence of the job readiness of our graduates, calculating the ROI (return on investment) for the BIUs (basic income units) that populate our classrooms. But while there is substance to this critical evaluation, thoughtful commentators, such as the current president of the Modern Language Association, Michael Bérubé, or the Stanford Germanist Russell Berman, are calling for a serious rethinking of the purpose and goals of our graduate programs as well as of the career options for our graduate students, in order to prepare our students for a “diverse array of meaningful, socially productive, and personally rewarding careers within and outside the academy.” And it is here that we can see a different way to engage with the reality academe is faced with: to begin thinking of our programs without a view to academe; to see the “alt-ac” options – that is, alternatives to the academic career – as the primary focus of our programs, not as an afterthought for those who “do not make it” into academia; and to take our cues from those students who are among the best and brightest but who enrol in our programs without necessarily wanting to become professors just like we are.

This does not mean that we abdicate our responsibility to educate our students to the highest standards. It simply means that we acknowledge what we have known all along: most of our MA students don’t want to go on to a PhD, and, increasingly, many of our PhD students don’t aspire to an academic career in the first place. And this is what struck me about all the comments on graduate education from all sides of the critical spectrum: they were concerned solely with the PhD program, its exceedingly long time to completion (currently at an astounding nine years), its high dropout rates, and the dismal placement opportunities in faculty positions. But if we want to take the “alt-ac” options seriously, we should consider graduate school in...

pdf

Share