How can we help you? (October 2020)

Now that it's been a month since our last "how can we help you?" thread, it's time for another one.

For those of you unfamiliar with this series, this is a chance for you to post openly or anonymously in the comments section below on anything you could use help with related to the profession. After you post your query in the comments section, I will then post new threads for readers to discuss your query.

Please feel free to ask questions on anything (within the Cocoon's mission) that you could use help with, including but not limited to:

• Life and work in the COVID-19 era
• The job-market (applying for jobs, etc.)
• Issues in the profession (including issues of social justice)
• Graduate school
• Publishing
• Teaching
• Work-life balance
• Personal struggles
• Etc.

Fire away - we're here to help! Finally, I again have one new(ish) request: because these threads are getting so many comments, many of which provide preemptive responses to people's queries, it is getting very difficult for me to keep track of everything. So, while I know some of you like to respond to other people's comments, I'm going to ask that this thread only contain initial queries, and for everyone else to please wait until I post a new thread to discuss the issue in question. (If I ever miss posting a thread to discuss a query, all you need to do is let me know!)

Comments

[T]

1. Is it advisable to publish dissertation chapters before the final defence?
2. Can one incorporate published articles in one's thesis (say, if you published an article early on in your PhD but it is directly relevant to your thesis)?

Thanks!

[Club]

I am the faculty advisor for our undergraduate philosophy club this year. Can people share some ideas about events and activities (online or in-person with social distance) during the time of COVID-19?

Thanks!

[Búsqueda]

How long should a diversity statement be for R1 jobs and postdocs?

Many of these job ads ask for one, but none of them specify length.

[Caught Up in it All]

I'm a grad student who is wishing that there was not so much pressure to publish in order to get jobs. I naively thought that grad school might be a time to just read things because they are interesting, and even (gasp!) take time off from writing altogether to focus on deepening one's understanding.

I acknowledge that sometimes reading widely and deeply does benefit one's own writing. At the same time, in my experience, many philosophers do quite well without being particularly well-read. Slightly more cynically, it seems that many philosophers can thrive as long as they read just enough to not look completely ignorant of what's come before.

My question is this: to some extent, is engaging with others' work best thought of as a duty to the profession? Even if there are not particular professional rewards, it seems like we might just owe it to each other and those who've come before to dedicate time to others' work.

[triple anon]

I am a first-time journal guest editor. I'm wondering if anyone has recommendations for sources on the practices and ethics of editing philosophy journals. In particular, I'm wondering what to do about a paper that has received both 'accept' and 'reject' recommendations. It seems to me be worthy of an 'accept asking changes,' but I don't want to seem disrespectful to the reader that suggested rejection.

Thanks in advance!

[New Tutor]

I'm currently tutoring for the second time (I tutored last semester, though it was cut very short for obvious reasons). It's a pretty simple introductory ethics course and I'm familiar with the material. However, I still find that I get really nervous before tutoring, both on the day and also, usually, the night before. This is really draining, and I also think the nerves impact my teaching ability. Whilst I know that this is not uncommon, I feel like the topic doesn't get discussed often. Do others feel similarly to me? And should I just expect the nerves to disappear over time - or are there useful strategies for dealing with them?

[Ed]

Are there any refereed, non-invite-only journals, where it is possible to submit article-length, non-anonymous pieces written in the first-person, that are respectable ("high-ranking", or whatever)? In other words, are there any open-submission equivalents to Philosophical Perspectives or Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume? I'd like to expand on some previously published work but not expand so much as to write a book. And I don't want to dance around the fact I'm the author of the previously published work.

Thanks!

[Drowning Student]

I havn't been able to get much work done in the last nine months on my research because of a problem that is new for me, and I wonder how typical it is for others in academics - emotional pain.

I'm an upper year PhD student who has their dissertation mostly complete. If I needed to, I (and my advisor) feel like I can wrap things up in a month. That has been the case for almost a year now. Also, I've been on the job 'market' since last year.

Every word I type about the thoughts I have on my area of research feels like a scab ripped from my mind. I feel relatively fine writing about anything else. Besides what I imagine are the typical anxiety about rejection and imposter syndrome, I'm feeling a lot of grief and sense of loss among other complicated stuff I cant put really well to words. I'm already not great at taking the time to dwell on writing material to polish things up. Now it's more than just an executive functioning/attention problem. Working on my research and material related to it in my job applications has become a sort of feeling management problem. It makes me wonder if I have a toxic relationship with academia, that this is something that will keep getting worse for me and I'm better off cutting ties with the profession, or whether its because of the context I'm in (covid and job searching despair), that I'm failing to see things objectively.

I've dealt with depression before and this feels different. It feels like grief and loss, less of an autonomous mood and more of a reaction to my world. Does this resonate with anyone here? Is this a sign I should take, that I'm 'burnt out' on philosophy? How does one successfully manage the emotional (instead of motivation) side of getting work done?

[Al]

How should talks appear on a CV? I'm late-junior stage (about to be tenured) so I've given more than a few. Do I just list the most recent? Going back how far? Do I list the most prestigious and somehow indicate that it's a selected list? Do I not list any? For context, the 'talks' section of my CV is currently taking up a little over a page, about the same as my publications. How do other people navigate this?

[PhD Student]

I'm currently a PhD student in my second year at a department that I enjoy. However, I'm seriously considering transferring because of geographical reasons (I want to get married). How to approach this? I heard that it is very difficult to successfully transfer PhD programs (additionally, all universities in the area I want to move to are higher ranked than my current department), and I also want to avoid awkwardness in my current program. I'm very nervous even about asking for letters of recommendation. Any advice?

[big dawg]

Could you address some potential strategies for interviewing at religiously affiliated--specifically Catholic--liberal arts colleges?

My general sense is that the school is less interested in the applicant's particular beliefs or religious affiliations and more in hearing how the candidate is able to incorporate the university's religious values into teaching, research, and service.

This may be right but I can's escape the nagging feeling that there will be some left field question about religion or theology that will throw me off?

Is this a well founded worry?

Thanks!

[anonymous and mostly hopeless marketeer]

This is a bit late but I'm curious whether and how everyone on the market is changing their teaching statements to fit the new realities of teaching. Teaching right now has required significant changes in techniques for most, if not all of us. For example, I'm teaching hybrid, socially distanced classes and my usual activities can't be used. I've tried adapted versions, but honestly, they did not go as well for practical reasons. Should I downplay the in-class activities in my teaching statement? Should we all have paragraphs devoted to hybrid and online teaching generally? What are people doing?

[J]

I'm curious if folks who have been on hiring committees can shed some light on the oft-used concluding question at interviews: "Do you have any questions for us?"

My understanding is that this is, in one sense, a genuine ask: does the candidate have any questions we haven't addressed? But, clearly, it is also a signaling opportunity: what sorts of things does the candidate care about, and what can we glean about them as a colleague, teacher, and philosopher from these questions?

There are obviously terrible answers: "How much is the pay?" "Can I wear jorts to work?" "Are the students there really as bad as I've heard?"

But it's much less clear to me what constitutes a *good* question to ask here. I've heard of folks asking about developing courses, research funding, and extra-curriculars, but these seem overdone now (since we've all been taught from the same playbook, so to speak).

Maybe those who have served on committees could offer some more specific advice/commentary on this. Are there any answers to this question that have really struck you as *good*? What sorts of things make you cringe? What are you tired of hearing? What sorts of things make a candidate stand out here?