Chinese University of Hong Kong & Hong Kong Baptist University[]
- 1/7 I would not recommend anyone to seek work in Hong Kong. With the 2020 National Security Law, an entire political party has been jailed, a new leader "elected" though a "one-man race", newspapers have been shut down, publishers jailed, books removed from the libraries, tv shows cancelled, a national security curriculum introduced in higher education, a patriotic education introduced for young people, hundreds of thousands of Hong Kongers have fled overseas, a shortage of doctors due to doctors fleeing, etc. If you have any warm feelings toward or awareness of human rights, democracy, freedom of speech, and similar values, this is not the place for you.
- 1/31 Just to second the above comments (Do a Google News search for "Hong Kong academia."), and add that Hong Kong Baptist University, in particular, should be avoided. The job announcement mentions “12 full-time” faculty members. What it does not mention is that three of these faculty members are new as of this academic year; at least two current full-time faculty will depart after the current academic year; and seven full-time faculty will have departed from last academic year to the end of this academic year. In fact, 19 full-time faculty (14 "tenured" or "tenure-track") departed the Academy of Music during the previous six years. This included composers, musicologists, and ethnomusicologists from Australia, Canada, Finland, Greece, Hong Kong, Korea, and the USA. Tenure(d) is written in quotes, as there is no true tenure, as defined in the West, in Hong Kong. The Dean of the School of Creative Arts, Johnny Poon, has a record of recruiting overseas academics from top institutions, including ABD graduate students and established academics (tenured in the USA), and then removing them after two or three years for reasons that would lead to lawsuits (for example, when a colleague rejects repeated requests for lunch dates) in places with rule of law.
Juilliard[]
Music History Faculty, Full-Time
- 12/15a: Received instantaneous, automatic rejection message when I submitted my application on 12/14/23. It seems that they are not considering applicants for this role. I would avoid spending your time applying.
- 12/15b: I applied several days ago and the application seemed to go through just fine.
- 12/15a: Did you receive the notification "Candidate not retained" or "Under consideration"? From what I can tell from talking with colleagues, they seem to have an automatic screening process (which is kind of unacceptable in my view: I spent hours working on that material). It is unclear what the screening process is factoring in: the only difference between my colleagues who got automatically rejected and my colleagues who did not was citizenship status. So much for a non-discrimination policy.
- 12/16: International applicant here, had no issues with auto-screening - also applied a few days ago.
- 12/15a: Hmm. So why would they be automatically rejecting applications? If there's some criteria that they're instantly rejecting people on, they should put it in the job advertisement. Anyone have any ideas? This process is already so disrespectful of people's time; it's even worse if no one even glances at your materials.
- 12/16b: Was ready to submit application materials last night (12/15 "deadline day") and was met with the error page stating that "The Oracle Cloud Fusion Applications service you are trying to acess is temporarily unavailable." Gave up for a little while, then returned to the page, finding everything to be back up and running, at about 2:15am. Wondering if there might be some leeway given that there was a technological glitch on the administrative end.
- 12/15a: Ahh. Perhaps it was a technical glitch. Thank you for your help!
Oberlin[]
- 12/15 Maybe this is better reserved for the "talk" page, but it seems that there are so many theory jobs at Oberlin every year. Is this happening due to turnover or expansion?
- 12/16 One of last year's new hires here; not on the committee. it's kind of neither! We used to have 11 tenure-track lines pre-pandemic—so there's been a systemic need for VAPs because of that. We got our 11th line back now that the situation has improved a little (hooray!). The two hires last year were effectively replacing a retirement and a friendly departure (from what I understand, geographical reasons). Definitely get the perspective of people who don't work here anymore, but imo things are generally functional and friendly in our department.
- 12/20 Seconding 12/16. I've been on Oberlin's theory faculty, it should not be read as a sign of turmoil! It's a really wonderful place to work and it's simply a very large department. A normal rate of turnover spread across 11 full-time positions with a wide age distribution necessarily means they'll be searching pretty regularly. People should apply without fear.
Pomona College[]
Pomona College: Visiting Assistant Professor of Music (Composition)
- 1/27 For a one year, temporary [their emphasis] position, they want:
- 1) a letter of application;
- 2) graduate transcripts;
- 3) a curriculum vitae;
- 4) three letters of recommendation [they want these directly from the submitter];
- 5) a statement regarding your approach to teaching music in a liberal-arts setting;
- 6) a statement of plans for professional work;
- 7) links to three examples of previous work such as recordings, performances, and/or scores; and
- 8) a statement addressing your demonstrated ability to mentor a diverse student body.
While most of this is quite standard, it's possible that people would need to coordinate or write 4, 5, and 6 from scratch. Does this just seem like an absurd amount of stuff to request for the first round?
- 1/29 Yes, but unfortunately it's a "prestigious" institution so people will jump through the hoops anyway.
- 3/6 Well, they changed it to require only recommender names, not the actual letters for the initial round. I guess that's a slight improvement.
- 3/7 As someone on a search committee at another institution, I agree that this is an absurd amount of materials for a first round. We are all quite busy and I seriously doubt that any committee member could find the time to read and pay detailed attention to so many documents when going through the initial pool of applicants. Particularly so in the current academic job market, where most searches receive over a hundred applications. Just for the record, we got 150. I wish some institutions were more mindful of the unnecessary additional stress they cause for already strained job seekers.
Texas Tech University[]
In the coming weeks, since a tenured faculty member has recently left, a TT musicology position will very likely be announced in the College of Visual and Performing Arts. I want to strongly caution anyone who is interested in this position to think very carefully about the ethical climate and leadership dynamics of the musicology area before applying.
There are few if any positives of working in this program as long as the chair of the musicology area, Christopher J. Smith, remains the chair as he has for the past twenty plus years. One positive, at least in my experience being in this department for ten years, was realizing how the chair has allowed the program to become a giant stew of unethical ideas. Among them, the simplistic notion that academia is a binary place where everyone is either an oppressor or oppressed. In the case of the musicology area, the oppressor being the chair, whereas the oppressed have been the other tenure track and tenured musicology faculty most of whom have either left or had their line transferred by the Provost to other departments outside of the college entirely.
I recognize that a certain amount of foolishness is expected of academics, but making a parody Twitter account about the director of the School of Music because the chair and those who follow him disagreed with her strategic plan for the School’s future (namely having chairs rotate) is not the same as assaulting a student, nor the same as giving graduate students money to win their favor, nor seeking to expel students who get in his way, nor perpetuating racist glamour projects using state and private foundation funds. It’s also not the same as having so much pull with administration that they're protected from sanctions. It's also not the same has having so much pull to have the dean and the director dismissed. The fact that tenured professors were prohibited from finding their voice to condemn the actions of the chair out of fear of the same retaliation says a lot about who really controls the School of Music.
If, after all of this, you still feel like applying - after all, a tenure track job *is* a tenure track job - please know that you probably won’t get a fair shot. In the past, the chair has openly stated that there is a "preferred candidate," usually one of his friends, and sought to push these people through whether they were qualified or not. You might recall a TT search at Tech failing a few years ago. The previous dean (dismissed), who was aware of the chair's antics, failed the search. Though the chair will very likely **not** be a member of the search committee, due to what I can only anticipate will be anxiety about previous acts of cronyism catching up with him, his wife, who is also a tenured faculty member in the program (and his subordinate), **will** very likely be. This is the same person who, during a search committee meeting for the previous director of the School of Music, said, as it was reported, something to the effect that hiring a woman to be the director would be a bad idea since women are too emotional.
This is an incredibly toxic department to work in.
UC Santa Cruz[]
- 09/07 What is "womanist"? How is it different from feminist, for example? Serious question (from a feminist).
- 9/14 "Womanism" comes from Alice Walker. It's a Black intellectual/activist tradition that addresses racialized gender dynamic of not only women's oppression but also family dynamics. TL;DR You can easily Google this.
- 9/14.2 So this department is asking people to promote the views of a vile anti-semite? Very cool. I guess this is their EEOC-approved way of telling Jews not to bother.
- 9/15 The varieties of hip-hop that are being co-opted by academia these days tend to be anodyne HR-authorized pablum. I doubt great artists such as Ice Spice or Tyga would be viable candidates for this sort of job.
- 9/17 In response to 9/14.2: Two points here. 1) Maybe read the whole ad first? "Womanism" is not a requirement, so, I wouldn't say this department is "asking people to promote the views of a vile anti-semite." 2) As we are all aware, intellectual traditions aren't limited to one person's views; womanism is no exception. Alice Walker was an anti-Semite; however, it's not sensible to extend her views to cover the whole movement.
- 9/19 It's all just woke-speak, as are many of the ads now appearing in academia in the West.
- 9/21 Responding to 9/19: Read the room: this is a job search for a scholar/practitioner of hip hop at UC Santa Cruz. If you're so easily triggered into an anti-intellectual "stop woke" reaction by a detailed description of what they're looking for, I wish you lots of luck on the job market.
- 09/26 Is it anti-intellectual to question our disciplines, especially in relation to institutional power structures? My university is spending tons of money on trainings that would fall under, I suppose, the "woke" rubric, while firing faculty and gutting the classes that help our majority first gen, poc students succeed. Perhaps it is reactionary to suggest that any critique of entrenched ideologies, phrases and approaches within our workplaces is necessarily right wing or itself reactionary. It's great this department is looking to expand its curricular offerings; it's also one notorious for having some of the worst labor practices for contingent faculty in the UC system. There is also rumor of a serial sexual harasser there. In my opinion, we should absolutely question what kinds of language and ideas are acceptable to a system such as this-- if they're so desired, could it be that they're in fact ineffective in advancing the kind of justice they rhetorically champion? Can we at least consider it? Let's not let the online culture war get in the way of our intellectual clarity and our ability to critique our institutions and ourselves.
- 9/27 It is an interesting exercise to review UC Santa Cruz's rubric for evaluating applicants' diversity statements while asking oneself, How would 2Pac have measured up if he had applied for this job? https://apo.ucsc.edu/docs/ucsc-rubrics-c2deistatements.pdf
- 10/1 Late-stage 2pac could probably position himself for the job. Early 2pac wouldn’t dip a toe in this cesspool!
- 9/21 again. Perhaps. How about a current artist such as Bobby Shmurda? Would he make the shortlist for a Zoom interview based on a portfolio consisting of his videos for "Getting Em Back" and "Rats"?
- 10/2 @9/26 All fair points, but sir, this is an academic jobs wiki. Most jobs are going to be at places that have shitty labor practices and also some shitty senior professors grandfathered in/protected by tenure. That's the nature of the profession, and until we have tenure/some kind of seniority/voice with administrations, we are mostly incapable of changing it. So if we want jobs in this profession, we have to figure out some kind of tactical way of remaining in the profession (as shitty as it is right now).
- 9/21 again. So does a demand for DEI statements fall under the category of "shitty labor practices"?
1/9 @10/2: I’d like to form a pact with anyone interested that if/when we are tenured someday, we will make a joint effort to make “tactical” strategies NOT the measure of the academy we deserve. Till then, tactics it is…
University of North Texas[]
Real talk - what is going on in this department? There's Schenkergate, of course, but has anyone noticed that the current chair and previous chair didn't sign the faculty statement supporting their graduate students? Are they only promoting those into leadership roles who refused to take a stand? And how about turnover in musicology? In just the last ten years 1) Ana Alonso-Minutti left and published a ton, 2) Margaret Notley was forced to "retire" (she's said as much on social media) right after publishing a book and while still active on several major editorial boards, 3) Robert Pearson and Benjamin Brand both left musicology as far as I can tell, and 4) Hendrik Schulze took a job in a small town in Austria. Seems like a place people are fleeing. The rumor mill regarding last year's searches is even worse... Can someone at UNT explain?
12/4 Not at UNT, but...the fellow who led last year's (failed) search for the same early music position that they posted this year: https://www.fox4news.com/news/17-charged-in-denton-county-prostitution-sting
12/7
Hello Friend,
While I can't say I appreciate your attempt to ruin my husband's reputation, I would like to point out the fact that you felt the need to post this link says far more about your own character than his. I cannot do much to salvage the moral compass of someone who would try to thwart the career of the kindest, gentlest, and most collegial of men, however, I can give you some insight as to the events that transpired that day, and assure you I feel no shame about what occurred last spring. It has never been a secret.
Some of you are aware that my husband has been in treatment for a benign pituitary tumor. This past March, he was denied a medication refill due to hospital error. During this time, he started to ration his medication so he would not abruptly run out. This is quite dangerous, but we were unaware of that.
Just a few days after he began taking his medication once more, and with a highly dysregulated system, my husband had a profound mental health crisis and attempted suicide. The article you linked has gaping fallacies. It is embarrassing a career researcher heedlessly posted some half-truths without approaching easily available sources.
While we did not expect to be abruptly thrust into the role of The Face of Mental Health in Academia, we are not uncomfortable to have landed here. As many of you know, not just musicology, but academia, has an ableism problem. While progress has been made due to the constant vigilance of heroic individuals, (shout-out to the incredible Music and Disability Studies folks) we have a long way to go. It is up to you what side of the discussion, in favor of inclusion or against it, you all wish to find yourselves on. Choose wisely.
A heartfelt apology can be directed to myfirstname.mylastname@outlook.com
Sincerely, Dayna
03/11 Beyond personal matters, the important question that remains here is: is this a toxic workplace? How should applicants and candidates navigate a department that has been marred by so many long-term problems? A potential hire would greatly benefit from any advice that can be shared on this issue.
===University of Miami: Full-Time Lecturer
- 02/19: a cynical part of wonders if this is how they've chosen to replace the most recent TT person who left. Anyone know if the university plans to hire a TT Assistant Prof in the medium term?
- 02/19: the most recent TT person who left was replaced by another TT professor. This is a brand new full-time lecturer position.
- 02/19: really? Gabrielle Cornish left for Wisconsin less than a year ago. How could that be possible?
- 02/19: Cornish’s TT line was filled via spousal hire. This is a new position.
- 02/20: That's a relief. Thanks for the intel!
- 03/07: That's quite a turnover! I did not even know that Cornish already left. The person she replaced had also left after one year of getting the TT job. This means, counting the latest one, they've had at least four searches one after another in the last five years. One wonders what's going on at the school to prompt several TT faculty to leave almost as soon as they got the job.
- 3/08: I'm not surprised based on what's happening in higher ed here in Florida. I have a feeling most jobs there are going to become stop-gaps to positions in other states. I may be wrong, but at the moment, there is no feeling of job security here.
- 03/11: Sorry that the situation in Florida has become so dire. UoMiami is a private institution though, hopefully faculty there have better job security or at least are safe from any takeover by the state.