Making Moves: Navigating the Job Market Toward a Sustainable Career

• In Event: Talking Faculty: The Linguistic and Professional Choices of Black Faculty in U.S. Higher Education

Abstract

Objectives: The diverse experiences of Black scholars in the language sciences are often situated within broader sociopolitical forces that shape access and opportunity. Since the 1970s, efforts to address inequities in faculty representation—through affirmative action, diversity hires, cluster hires, and Target of Opportunity Programs—have aimed to open institutional pathways (Aguirre, 2000; Allen et al., 2024; Tierney, 1997; Kurtulus, 2016). Yet, these initiatives often remain opaque in doctoral training, perpetuating systems of exceptionalism and marginalization (Shah, 2019). For Black language scholars, unfamiliarity with such programs highlights deeper institutional dynamics that obscure how internal policy, budgetary constraints, and state- and federal-level politics can impact potential entry into lasting careers.

Paper 2 examines the challenges Black language scholars face throughout the academic pipeline, from securing research positions to ensuring they are set up for promotions and tenure, while revealing the often-unspoken rules required to survive and thrive in academia. It offers a conceptual framework for understanding how institutional structures, historical diversity efforts, and political contexts shape the professional trajectories of Black faculty in U.S. higher education; and it draws on personal narratives from Black professors and their allies to illustrate the diverse paths into the language sciences and the common challenges encountered along the way.

Theoretical Perspective: The chapter situates the stories of Black language science faculty within a framework that acknowledges overarching structures of racial capitalism that impact the lives and possibilities of emergent scholars.

Methods & Data Sources: Over the course of a year, 2022-2023, I interviewed 15 language science faculty and higher-level administrators across varying institutions about their experiences on the job market. The scholars interviewed were selected because they either identified as Black and a scholar in a field concerned with studying language or because they have been involved in the recruitment and hiring of Black scholars into tenure-track positions. Scholars ranged in rank from postdoctoral fellow to full professor with 3 of the 15 having held administrative positions in their universities. Interviews were then analyzed using a thematic analysis approach which searched for four interconnected factors that shape the professional lives of Black language faculty: (1) institutional structures; (2) norms and ideologies; (3) raciolinguistic processes; and (4) faculty experiences.

Results: During the coding process, six overarching themes encapsulated the experiences of faculty interviewed: (1) Academic and Intellectual Loneliness; (2) Prayer/Spirituality; (3) Mentor(ship)/Support; (4) Intellect; (5) Merit; (6) Labor. These themes provide us with a map of the current experiences that Black faculty have during and after their job searches, while also providing us with a guide for how to move forward.

Scholarly Significance:
This chapter introduces institutional and scholarly structures that Black language scholars must navigate from entering graduate school to securing an academic position. It outlines how diversity initiatives within U.S. higher education have led to the hiring of more Black scholars, while also critiquing how these initiatives often fall short of addressing the entrenched white supremacist norms of professionalism and fit that continue to shape academic life.

Author

• Aris M. Clemons, University of Tennessee