APA Newsletters
Fall 1999
Volume 99, Number 1

Newsletter on Philosophy and Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Trangender Issues

Articles

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The Little Faggot Who Could, or, How I Specialized in Gay Studies and Still Found a Job

James Stramel
Santa Monica College

In fall 1999 Santa Monica College offered me a full-time tenure-track position in philosophy. I accepted! This event may be of interest to other philosophers working in gay studies or contemplating it, for it may be the first time a gay person (at least a gay male) whose dissertation was on gay issues has gotten a tenure-track job in philosophy. In this essay, I want to share my experience on the premise that doing so may provide others with some hope that choosing to specialize in gay/lesbian studies is not automatically professional suicide.

Growing up, all I remember wanting to be was the next Perry Mason. As an undergraduate I figured political science would be a good pre-law major, but I did not enjoy my political science courses. At the beginning of my sophomore year I took my first philosophy course and fell in love with the love of wisdom. I was soon taking more philosophy and less poli-sci. I eventually decided to major in philosophy, and I abandoned my goal of a law degree. I graduated from the University of Kansas with honors (a distinction earned by writing and defending a paper on Leibniz, of all things!). And what does one do with a B.A. in philosophy except go on to study more philosophy? And, since my teachers were my main role models, teaching was an attractive career option. So I applied to a smattering of western universities to pursue a graduate degree. I chose to attend the University of Southern California, mainly because they offered me teaching assistantship. I never thought in a million years this simple boy from Kansas (and, yes, my mother’s name is Dorothy, thank you!) would wind up in Los Angeles.

Early on in my graduate work I developed a taste for epistemology and began planning to write my dissertation on theories of epistemic justification even though the department did not have any specialist in the field. My department gave confident assurances that the timing of my degree, at least, was good, as everyone expected the job market to open up toward the end of the 1980s. Alas, no one counted on the recession. In 1986 I arranged to trade my assistantship with a student at the University of Arizona so I could go there for one term to study epistemology with Alvin Goldman, Keith Lehrer and John Pollock. I also had a Plato course with Julia Annas, out of which grew what would become my first published paper (on the Theatetus). The lack of a specialist in my field at U.S.C. proved to be a significant disadvantage, as I worked—and floundered—largely on my own. I was also allowed to struggle not very productively with a set of problems that I now see were too fundamental, difficult and broad in scope for a young philosopher’s dissertation.

By the end of the 1980s I had come out but was not yet intellectually involved with gay/lesbian issues. Then, in 1992, one of those fateful, life-changing events occurred: I read that Simon LeVay was creating the Institute of Gay and Lesbian Education (I.G.L.E.) in West Hollywood. Although ethics was not my field, it seemed to me that the Institute should have a course on moral issues confronting gays and lesbians, so I wrote a course proposal and contacted them. "HomoSexual Ethics" was one of seven courses offered in the Institute’s first semester, and I taught the course several times over the next few years. It was while doing the preparation and gathering a reading list that I discovered Richard Mohr’s work on g/l issues, in particular his provocative discussion of outing. I was struck by the importance and range of issues in gay ethics but also by the relative paucity of work by philosophers in this area.

As one friend said, I put my C.V. into the copier, and it comes out lavender.

I had never been much interested in ethics and had little background in it, but I found myself provoked to work on the outing controversy, which was raging at the time. My epistemology project was not going well and a fellow (heterosexual) graduate student encouraged me to abandon it for a project in gay ethics. I really didn’t expect my committee and department to go for the idea but, to my surprise, all parties were enthusiastically supportive of the change. I wrote up a new dissertation proposal, assembled a new committee, filed the paperwork, and began my new dissertation project on the ethics of disclosure of gay identity: outing, coming out, and forced closetude. Of course, this radical move set me back by two or three years, but I now think that had I continued as before I might well never have completed my doctorate.

At the time I really didn’t think too much about the job-market implications of writing in gay studies. No one warned me of impending disaster, and my excitement about actually having something to say carried me forward. I was also gambling that I might be getting in on the ground floor of an emerging new field. Enthusiasm and a clear, workable dissertation proposal helped the work go well and I graduated from U.S.C. in 1996.

Over the last three years I applied for nearly every job for which I was plausibly qualified. I applied only to tenure-track jobs as I was not willing to leave my home and husband for a temporary position. Much to my dismay, this search produced only three, preliminary interviews. My handlers seemed to think I should do just fine, but I began to wonder whether my choice of specialty was proving an impediment. After all, as one friend said, I put my C.V. into the copier, and it comes out lavender. Many schools, I’m sure, would not be put off by a candidate’s interest or work in gay issues, but there are undoubtedly others who simply would not consider one because of it. I came to the conclusion that I would probably have to teach my way into a job, so I cultivated relationships with various local colleges by being the best parttime instructor I could be. In the early 1990s one of my principal employers had a retirement, so I knew they would eventually hire a replacement. I waited . . . and waited . . . until, finally, they got permission to hire in 1999. And I’m very happy to report that they hired me!

Santa Monica College is an independent, two-year college known mainly for its success in transferring students to the University of California system. It is a liberal and progressive campus serving an extremely diverse population of some 26,000 students. The philosophy department was composed of three full-time members and many part-timers. I began teaching at S.M.C. in 1992 and have been teaching the maximum allowed three courses each term, plus a course or two in summers and winters. While offering my gay ethics course at I.G.L.E. I dropped by a meeting of the gay/lesbian/bi student club to advertise the class. Someone asked whether they could get transfer credit, and this began a discussion with the administration which decided they would much rather have the class taught there at S.M.C. This would mean more work for me when I was trying to finish the dissertation, but I couldn’t say no. My tendency to put the needs and interests of my students before my own is one of the reasons it took so long to complete my Ph.D. The department chair suggested that we take a section of Contemporary Moral Conflicts and make it a special topics course in sexual ethics and gay/lesbian issues. This strategy allowed us to avoid the delays and hassles of getting a new course approved. In short order, I was teaching one section of the course each term.

Then a strange thing happened. When the President of Santa Monica College was in Sacramento for Education Committee meetings, the chair of that committee accosted her, waving a copy of the syllabus from my course. Apparently, some student who had come to my class had forwarded my syllabus to the enemy network. In fact, I even got a call from former Operation Rescue head-cum-radio talk show host Randall Terry who wanted to talk to me about why we were using public money to "teach homosexuality." I declined the invitation. Fortunately, the President is "gay-friendly" and defended the course in terms of academic integrity, and there were no further problems. When I heard about the President’s encounter I proposed a meeting to inform her about the course, and she even paid us a visit in the classroom.

I am convinced that this contact with the President gave me an advantage in the competition for the full-time position. There were, after all, some 130 candidates. Everyone involved knows that I am gay, that I work in gay ethics, and that I do and will teach gay studies in addition to other courses. Rather than being put off by my interest in gay studies, I think the college chose to see my sexuality course as a positive in terms of curriculum development. Since we are a community college there is much less emphasis on one’s research or publications. The focus is on one’s teaching and, in addition to excellent student evaluations, I had the good fortune to be the only philosopher on staff—full or part-time—nominated for a teaching excellence award by the College’s Honor Society. So my situation is unique in some ways, and I have little confidence about what lessons may be drawn from it as to the prospects of future job candidates who choose to work on g/l/b issues. At the very least, my hiring shows that it is possible for philosophers working in gay studies to secure full-time, tenure-track employment. As weak as that claim is, it apparently represents a small advance for the field of philosophy.

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APA Newsletters Fall 1999 Volume 99, Number 1

APA Newsletters
Fall 1999
Volume 99, Number 1