James Smith Lecturer Durham University

PhD 2007 (University of Cambridge, after a BA and MPhil at the University of Sydney) Dissertation topic: The Influence of Bertolt Brecht on British Drama

How did you choose the research topic for your PhD and was future employability as an academic a factor in your choice?

I initially conceptualised my PhD topic as one that extended from my previous dissertations, but over the first year of my PhD candidature the topic went through several major mutations, and I ended up focussing on a quite different question (so the way I approached things may not be a particularly efficient model to emulate!).

There were many factors that shaped this process, and employability was no doubt one – I think I had a growing realisation that the sort of study I initially had in mind was pigeonholing me in quite a narrow area that might be difficult to move beyond post-PhD. But there were other (sometimes contradictory) factors, too – there were certain ways I could have gone that would have made good academic sense, but I realised that I didn't feel any passion for them, and very much in my mind was the fact that, as an international student on a three-year scholarship, I had to focus on something do-able in that time frame. So in the end I settled on a topic when I had identified a broad and interesting question for the field that had been under-researched and presented plenty of archival material to be explored – obviously, a tricky combination to find, but one well worth seeking!

At what point in your PG career did you start trying to publish your work, and how?

Pretty soon after stating my postgrad work I offered to give papers at local conferences and volunteered to write reviews for a couple of journals, which led to several shortish pieces of writing being solicited and accepted. Really, though, it wasn’t until my third year that I submitted and then published something substantial in a journal with wide circulation – and I think that it took that long for my research to develop enough to produce findings of some lasting value.

So I would say that postgrads should by all means keep an eye on publication opportunities from the outset (what conferences are being held, and will they publish their proceedings? Are any relevant special issues of a journal being announced? Are sites like the UPenn Call for Papers soliciting chapters for edited collections in your field?). But, equally, don’t rush your ideas into print as soon as you can and in whatever publication might take them, because I think you will normally be better served with one article in a journal with an established reputation than three articles or chapters in publications that promptly disappear into the ether.

When did you first start making serious job applications and what happened? Was academia your only professional option?

As far as I can remember, it was in my third year when I started tentatively applying for jobs, and by the end of the third year/start of the forth year I was sending off applications (whether for lectureships, junior research fellowships, or fixed-term teaching posts) every week. Predictably, this had (at best) a mixed bag of success: a few applications resulted in requests for further material, but the vast majority disappeared into the application black hole, never to be heard from again (or sometimes a brief bulk email six months down the line, announcing the position had been filled...).

So it was a disheartening process, and redrafting cover letters/research proposals also grew to be time consuming at a time when the pressure was already on to finish the PhD. But, amidst this, I did manage to snag a one year teaching post that covered my fourth year (which opened up a whole new area of stress, but that is another story!), and then a three year post doc following that (after a lectureship I applied for was cancelled and the department suggested that I instead apply to one of their other schemes). So it is possible, but it is a long slog with no guarantee of success at the end – and I realise that I was very fortunate indeed that I was able to string positions together without much of a gap, which meant that I didn't have to pursue other career options.

What were the main challenges you found in your first full time job after life as a research student and post doc?

For this first year in Durham I am both finishing up a British Academy postdoctoral fellowship and starting a lectureship, so I am in the slightly unusual situation of fulfilling two roles at once. The main challenge in this role has been to make sure that I keep the research momentum going to finish the fellowship project while learning the ropes at a new institution. Even with a reduced teaching load, there are always various new things to learn and be involved with when starting a new job, and it is quite easy to be swept up with that and defer finishing a piece of writing until the next day (and then the next day...). So I have had to set myself clear research tasks this year (write a certain number of articles, spend such- and-such dates down in the archives, apply for such-and-such grants) in order to ensure I am on track.