Emily,

    I wrestled with exactly the same question as you are now.  The first
thing I would do is start paying regular attention to the Chronicle of
Higher Education's website and look at the jobs available for the two areas
you might chose to get your Ph.D. in.  Professorships are not easy to come
by especially with the current market, humanities Ph.D's (American Studies
and History are the two I am most familiar with) are numerous and jobs few.
Like the museum path, this is just as difficult to get a job in.
    If you are solely interested in teaching you can do that with your MA at
many smaller institutions and community colleges.  You might consider this
as well.  It seems there are many of these jobs available, at least more so
than the straight university jobs.  The university offers one advantage and
that is tenure.
    Another thought is that just because you get a Ph.D. doesn't mean that
you can't still go the museum route.  As a graduate student I once asked a
very influential museum director who was speaking on campus,   what he
suggested to aspiring professionals as the best way to get to where he was
in the profession.  His answer was "a subject matter Ph.D."

I ended up choosing the Ph.D. and now that I have it I am not sorry for a
minute.  But I am also not seriously considering an academic job search.
Why you ask?  A run a way best selling academic book is 5,000 copies.  Some
cross over and get bigger but not many, most are sold to libraries where
they sit on a shelf, getting read by few.  A good, well curated exhibit at a
well run museum will reach that many people in a matter of months.  As a
professor I would have a few students a year who would be delighted to be in
class, as a curator, or as a consultant helping organizations do better,
almost every visitor will come in and be delighted, they will learn
something and they will never forget that day.  That is why I will always
work in this profession.


That being said, I must remind you that I am currently consulting in lieu of
a permanent position.  I voluntarily limited myself to a geographical area
because of my wife and her job.  I wouldn't recommend that to myself again
perhaps.

Thanks to Jeannine Finton for getting my point.  There is no doubt that the
museum profession hurts itself by some of its hiring practices.  To lesser
or greater degrees all professions have their troubles.  Demanding better
from ourselves is the only way to improve.  Maybe I should tell Emily not to
get a doctorate, and instead to volunteer at a University, sooner or later
they will hire her as a professor.

Bill

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