Right? Most of my fellow Millenial friends are quite “normal” adults. We all work, some have kids, we pay bills/loans, we buy houses (or move into nicer, waaay less crap apartments). This is a funny response to those silly “adult” things that we begrudgingly do.

Seriously. My committee told me the opposite: expect to work at 2-3 institutions to make ends meet. That’s after making nearly nothing for several years, of course. The expectation is that I’ll get a tenure track job “on my 6th or 7th try.” Screw that. I’m not making below minimum wage for the rest of my life. But…

That would probably be the only way. The sad part is that none of this touches politicians’ lives. In fact, it often helps them spin fear, hate, and guns more often. Our leaders live radically different (wealthier and more sheltered) lives than the rest of us. They just don’t *have* to care.

My program doesn’t allow us to work outside our stipend from the school or else they can revoke it. A few of us still worked, and the professors often reminded us they could technically revoke funding if we didn’t do both jobs well. But people were either independent (like me!) or had families, so we worked in various…

I am right there with you. I’ve scraped together a living while in grad school (a huge privileged, yes), often with 2-3 jobs. When I wasn’t in school, I taught school full time and worked another job at night to make extra money. My parents have never contributed and I’m estranged from them, so any car repair/medical…

YEP. Most of my peers in grad school had their parents subsidizing their degree—I mean, they had a living stipend and, in some cases, a home purchased for them. I took out huge students loans, and the department took it for granted that most lived off their parents, so they cut our stipends and just told us to live…

I don’t know. My parents paid nothing for me (have long been independent and I’m in my late 20s). I don’t think that to have a happy childhood you have to pay your kids’ bills. Sure, most parents don’t want their kids to suffer, but I think there’s some benefit to knowing your kid can take care of themselves and be…

Same here!! Grew up poor and still am bewildered by the purchases friends make. I feel so guilty about the small things I buy myself every once in a while, even as my friends “blow” money on vacations and useless items. On the one hand, I’m glad it made me practical. On the other, I feel weird for all the “normal”…

First, your name is amazing (Little Women!); second, I agree. I was the product of good university degrees and professors, but even 12/14 years ago my teachers encouraged us to think deeply about canonical authors and to reject that they were “the best.” At least in the uni that I teach in the courses are incredibly…

I wonder though if we should qualify how we talk about white men’s writing. It’s easy to lump together institutions like Roth or Franzen who mostly recycle plots of male angst (referring to the former here), but there are plenty of white men who write about incredibly politically poignant things. I’d be hard pressed…