What is the job market like for history professors?

I mean I know everything is tough but I'm at a Thanksgivng party where a college kid keeps asking how he'd do if he made this his goal....I said we'll ask DL. (be gentile...he's only like 20.)

• Extremely tough gigs to get, especially at the good schools, i.e., the ones that still offer tenure instead an employment contract.

• It's a difficult time to be in academia, especially in the humanities. Far too many qualified people vying for a limited number of tenure track jobs. But if it's his dream... don't let a difficult environment dissuade him. SOMEONE gets the jobs... and I'm guessing he's not entering the field because he imagines he'll make easy millions, but because he loves it. So if it's his passion, he should go for it. And DL wants to know: Is he hot?

• I'll be gentile, OP. I don't know any other way...

• It's terrible. Unless he wants to end up flipping burgers, tell him to pick a real major.

• what are "the real majors" nowadays r4?

• R5, Tell him to pick something like Accounting, Computer Programing, Engineering or become an RN if he really wants a job.

• Yeah, r4, if history isn't a "real major" why don't you provide a concise definition. Should we all be ignorant of history and heritage in your sterile, "brave new world"? And OP, it just so happens that I am gentile since I'm not Jewish. tip: leave out the i

  anon

• [quote]Unless he wants to end up flipping burgers, tell him to pick a real major. What an original answer! Did you come up with that hilarious joke all by yourself?

• If he wants to do it, let him do it. But also tell him that scholarship is only 40% of success in the field: 60% is politics. He will have to fight like a tiger for position, reputation, success. If he doesn't heave the heart of a lion, it may crush him. Academe is a snakepit, not a booklined monastery. My fave history professor is William Percy: he has a fabulous website.(see link) He's everything small minded individuals hate: brave, bold, uncompromising. Including helping to underline through his scholarship -- however aggressively unpopular the truth has now become outside the gates of academe amongst both the general public and gays, the critical place of paederasty in the development of western history and culture. If you care about history, the idea that culture wars are still being fought over shit like this is hugely interesting. If I had a trust fund I'd love to be a scholar squirrel, as Gore Vidal termed it. But I need to earn, so I'm not.

  http://www.williamapercy.com

• This thread is useless without nude photos.

• thanks....he's persian so judging by the other thread...I don't think you guys want nude photos!

  op%20

• Paederasty? I think I'll pass, R9, and do please save your predictable indignation for someone else. I was reading Gore Vidal long before you were born.

• Sorry, I'm a jew, OP

• I condole you r13.

• R4, I notice that on news programs, documentaries and the press and media in general, when it comes to analysis of how the government and political system that affects you and me works they don't reach for the computer programmers, nurses or doctors, engineers or even accountants, they call upon those whose backgrounds are in history, politics, government, the law (most lawyers start with bachelor's degrees in history or a related subject before entering law school)and journalism, which often means, yes, those "useless" English/Communications majors. To name just 2 of the renown historians one might see just on television are Doris Kearns Goodwin and Michael Beschloss who among many others have provided insight and analysis above and beyond lock-step, knee-jerk mentality. So remind me again why history isn't a "real" major. It's kind of like acting, there are many people who study it and want to be actors but only a few make it in Hollywood. There are many who have degrees in history who end up as cab drivers or working in a grocery store or something but at least they tried to develop what they had going on upstairs and if they don't get exactly the employment they wanted, they still have some kind of education which is alot more than being a scumbag gangster who writes graffiti all over the place. If life gives you lemons, make lemonade; accentuate the positive. Who are you to denigrate anybody who takes an interest in a discipline such as history?

  anon

• In the USA, history teachers are really more national propaganda salespeople. Not real academics. So how well can you sell the American illusion to the masses?