I had a surprisingly good time at the Eastern. Of course this was mostly due to (A) running into and catching up with a lot of people, and (B) our little CocoonFest. In fact, that was sort of my takeaway lesson of the weekend. Aside from the horrors that are the job market, the real reason why these things are worth going to is the people. There are, as we all know, some real jerks in our discipline. Fortunately, there are a lot of good people, too. Get to know them, and try to develop and nurture friendships. It's totally worth it. Whereas once I went to these things feeling totally alone, I now go looking forward to seeing and talking to people I've missed. Good stuff. :)
The other thing I'd like to reflect a bit on are interviews. I, for one, got the distinct impression that there were far fewer schools interviewing at the Eastern than in past years. Further, only three were taking on-site interview requests. These both strike me as very good developments. By my lights, whatever epistemic advantages EAPA interviews have for hiring committees -- and I am skeptical (more on this in a moment) -- those advantages are more than outweighed by the (moral) disadvantages imposed on everyone involved. Let me explain.
First, I'm very skeptical about the evidential value of interviews. I've been on the market a few times, and in my experience just about everyone recognizes, at an abstract level, that interviews are kind of a crapshoot. Some very good people have "bad days" and not so good people "good days." The reasons why this is the case are innumerable. First, we all have good and bad days. Some days I wake up on the top of my game; other days I wake up groggy and stumble over my words. I expect this is true of most people. Second, EAPA interviews just throw all kinds of monkey-wrenches into the mix: people traveling in from far away, often with travel delays, time-zone changes, etc. Indeed, just consider time-zone changes. Jet-lag is a real killer. It can totally turn an otherwise sharp individual into a discombobulated zombie for a few days. I've seen it happen. These are just some of the reasons why I'm skeptical about interviews. There are all kinds of other, better evidence of whether someone is the kind of person a search committee is looking for: (A) philosophical acumen, (B) teaching ability, and (C) personal/professional qualities. If you want to know whether someone is a good philosopher, read their papers. If you want to know whether someone is a good teacher, look at their student reviews, faculty evaluations, and (say) a video-taped class session. And if you want to know whether someone is a total jerk, just ask around. I'm sure you'll find out (jerk-hood is all too easy for experienced jerks to hide in an interview; it's much tougher to hide over time!). As far as I'm concerned, interviews basically tell you this much: how a person who might otherwise be a great philosopher, great teacher, and great person functions over a randomly selected half-hour after a day or two of hectic traveling, time changes, stress, etc., in a highly artificial environment. In other words, I'm not convinced interviews are worth much of anything. I've seen brilliant, good people bomb interviews (and fly-outs) and half-wits absolutely nail them. Just sayin'.
Now let's turn to the costs of EAPA interviews. Everyone I ran into at the Eastern -- committee members, candidates, and finally, those without interviews -- said the whole process is horrible. EAPA interviews are:
- A horrendous time for committee members, who have to travel across the country away from their families to spend hours watching poor sods totally tank interviews (which, I imagine, has to be totally sad).
- A horrendous time for candidates, who spend easily a thousand bucks traveling across the country to enjoy four days of constant stress, and
- A horrific time for people without interviews, who spend a thousand bucks traveling across the country to spend four days of people asking them whether they have any interviews and watching those who have interviews talk about them constantly in public.
Skype interviews may not be perfect. Still, I think, given the overall epistemic limitations of interviews in general, and the costs that EAPA interviews impose on everyone, Skype interviews seem to me far preferable. That, at least, is how I see it. I expect others will disagree. Anyway, given how nice it was seeing people at the Eastern, I can only imagine how much nicer it would be if the practice of interviewing there became a thing of the past.
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