{"id":1194,"date":"2010-12-24T12:44:13","date_gmt":"2010-12-24T12:44:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/edtechandtesol.info\/phd\/?p=1194"},"modified":"2010-12-24T12:44:13","modified_gmt":"2010-12-24T12:44:13","slug":"the-disposable-academic-why-doing-a-phd-is-often-a-waste-of-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/?p=1194","title":{"rendered":"The disposable academic: Why doing a PhD is often a waste of time"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><a href=\"http:\/\/www.economist.com\/node\/17723223\">http:\/\/www.economist.com\/node\/17723223<\/a><\/div>\n<div>\n<p>ON THE evening before All Saints\u2019 Day in 1517, Martin Luther nailed 95 theses to the door of a church in Wittenberg. In those days a thesis was simply a position one wanted to argue. Luther, an Augustinian friar, asserted that Christians could not buy their way to heaven. Today a doctoral thesis is both an idea and an account of a period of original research. Writing one is the aim of the hundreds of thousands of students who embark on a doctorate of philosophy (PhD) every year.<\/p>\n<p>In most countries a PhD is a basic requirement for a career in academia. It is an introduction to the world of independent research\u2014a kind of intellectual masterpiece, created by an apprentice in close collaboration with a supervisor. The requirements to complete one vary enormously between countries, universities and even subjects. Some students will first have to spend two years working on a master\u2019s degree or diploma. Some will receive a stipend; others will pay their own way. Some PhDs involve only research, some require classes and examinations and some require the student to teach undergraduates. A thesis can be dozens of pages in mathematics, or many hundreds in history. As a result, newly minted PhDs can be as young as their early 20s or world-weary forty-somethings.<\/p>\n<p>One thing many PhD students have in common is dissatisfaction &#8230;.<\/p>\n<p>[follow the link for more &#8230;.]<\/p>\n<div><a href=\"http:\/\/www.economist.com\/node\/17723223\">http:\/\/www.economist.com\/node\/17723223<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>http:\/\/www.economist.com\/node\/17723223 ON THE evening before All Saints\u2019 Day in 1517, Martin Luther nailed 95 theses to the door of a church in Wittenberg. In those days a thesis was simply a position one wanted to argue. Luther, an Augustinian friar, asserted that Christians could not buy their way to heaven. Today a doctoral thesis is both an idea and an [&#8230;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":70,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[65,72,162,168,185],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p865eh-jg","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1194"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/70"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1194"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1194\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}