Economy’s Toll on Job Market Is Evident at Historians’ Meeting

by E Wayne Ross on January 5, 2009

Inside Higher Ed: The Depressed History Job Market

One job seeker at the AHA carried this sign last year and brought it back this year — still looking.

NEW YORK — This year’s decline in academic jobs in history may be 15 percent or higher, according to preliminary data presented Sunday at the annual meeting of the American Historical Association. The figures came as no surprise to the graduate students here seeking jobs. Reports abounded of job searches being called off, or of people in interviews being warned of the strong possibility that the openings might not be filled this year. People leaving the job interview area of the meeting were trading stories about which jobs might actually be filled. Job candidates who a year ago had goals of four or five interviews here were thrilled to have one.

The Chronicle: Economy’s Toll on Job Market Is Evident at Historians’ Meeting

A five-year stretch of steady growth in the job market for academic historians is over, the American Historical Association announced at its annual meeting here last weekend.