I think the most important question here is whether you can deal with general issues related to being an academic. If your answer is “yes,” the specific thing you want to study is less important, in my opinion (people often drastically change trajectories in their careers, especially after defending).
What are those “general issues”? I feel fairly aware of the status games, is that the main things, or are there other major things to take into account?
My current impressions of academia is that the status games are everywhere, but they’re worse in some places than others. In particular, fields where there’s no general consensus about what “getting it right” looks like, that means scholars can’t be rewarded for getting things right.
Philosophy is one of those disciplines. But even in philosophy, Nick Bostrom somehow manages to get away with Nick Bostrom. Maybe the secret is just to persuade enough of the right people that what you want to do is valuable, so they’ll let you do it, and don’t worry too much about what the rest of the philosophical community thinks of you?
Status games are everywhere. I mostly meant it might be a good idea to talk to grad student friends, or better yet professor friends about what life is like as an academic. Being in academia is in many ways an “unusual” job.
I think the most important question here is whether you can deal with general issues related to being an academic. If your answer is “yes,” the specific thing you want to study is less important, in my opinion (people often drastically change trajectories in their careers, especially after defending).
What are those “general issues”? I feel fairly aware of the status games, is that the main things, or are there other major things to take into account?
My current impressions of academia is that the status games are everywhere, but they’re worse in some places than others. In particular, fields where there’s no general consensus about what “getting it right” looks like, that means scholars can’t be rewarded for getting things right.
Philosophy is one of those disciplines. But even in philosophy, Nick Bostrom somehow manages to get away with Nick Bostrom. Maybe the secret is just to persuade enough of the right people that what you want to do is valuable, so they’ll let you do it, and don’t worry too much about what the rest of the philosophical community thinks of you?
Status games are everywhere. I mostly meant it might be a good idea to talk to grad student friends, or better yet professor friends about what life is like as an academic. Being in academia is in many ways an “unusual” job.