NO. DON’T. Look at other kinds of research, writing, and speaking jobs. I wanted to use the PhD to work for UNESCO but got swept up in other peoples’ dreams for me. Then I wanted to go into law and was told I was betraying other peoples’ dreams for themselves and me, and had no right to hurt them so.
I dislike cognitive dissonance and double binds cause me physical pain. But the alleged university teaching job I have resembles, so far as I am concerned, teaching at an inner city high school and if I am to do that I would rather just do it, and do it at home. And if I am to deal with the poor and disadvantaged in that way, I want to do it as a lawyer and not as a social worker or teacher.
However, in order to convince me to take this university teaching job people had to convince me to commit to literary research and I did. Yet this is not the kind of university teaching job in which one can truly accomplish that. We may be losing access to JSTOR and I do not have the cash to get to a research library every single week, and it is late now.
The greater difficulty of working at this job, though, is that I did not choose it myself, but resigned myself to it based on my feelings of guilt toward the people whose hopes I would betray if I were not an academic, and also to ward off the accusations of “not being serious” that one gets if not willing to “just go anywhere.”
I think I never should have expressed myself to anyone. I did not realize people assume that what one wants is to “be a teacher” and that if one disagrees it is just a “bad mood.” For me it is late but to everyone else, though, I say NO: don’t just take a job, any job. Not if you have interests in life or any desire to develop self respect. Allow yourself to think about what you want and honor it, as opposed to listen to the haranguing of persons who may be second rate or for all you know, actually failed (if still employed and promoted) professors.
I really hope no more graduate students listen to the punitive things that are said: who do you think you are, why do you think you should aspire, on what planet do you deserve. Or have to be subjected to people who believe in true stupidity like “breaking you down to build you up” (by the way: on what planet do they think they have the right to even think of trying anything like that?).
I think the next people should go to graduate school if they have personal or professional reasons to do this. But they should not be required to make up for it by renouncing their career interests, as I often feel I have been coerced to do as a gesture of apology, or in punishment for having had serious interests at all.
I want to be the person I was becoming, before being browbeaten into stopping. I do not want to continue to renounce so much.
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 
I decided last year that I am teaching high school to my undergrads and college to the grads—but at least I mean h.s. and college as they were when I attended, not as high school is now. Accepting that does make some things easier.
Losing J-STOR, that is serious.
I have a colleague who is using abridged and modernized versions of texts in a low senior level survey. I assume one should teach the Roland and Beowulf in translation at that level, but abridged … ? And, Old Spanish just is not a different language the way Old French and Anglo-Saxon are. Still, perhaps I should imitate this colleague.
Here, though, one can actually teach college as it was taught back then in a lot of courses. But, not to General Studies majors, and not to students still doing lower division requirements.
Despite having just posted about how I am not just in a bad mood, perhaps I should say that I am *also* in a bad mood.
No Z. Don’t. Don’t be in a bad mood ’cause you are great.
Thank you, Carlos, that is a great comment to get today.