Adjuncts aren’t slaves. I mention this only because I’ve heard people draw the analogy. Nevertheless, adjuncts suffer under the class war the wealthy wage against workers. Thea Hunter’s story highlights the human toll of the class war on adjuncts. But COVID-19 brings it out in new ways.
As people get ready for the fall semester, let’s look at adjuncts and COVID-19.
Class War
Colleges make greater user of adjuncts than they used to. Why? For one, they want to lower the value of a professor’s labor power and deskill the profession. Perhaps more than anything, they want to create an industrial reserve army of academic labor. Adjuncts stand ready to take over for tenure-track professors if they quit or agitate too much on the job.
Admittedly, there’s nothing new here. Much of this is just Marx 101. However, more so than many areas of the economy, many academics think they’re not workers. They should think again.
Adjuncts and COVID-19
COVID-19 bears the story of adjunct labor. A few universities remain closed to in-person courses. Some are adopting a hybrid system. The rest? Many are returning to in-person courses, though it sometimes depends on one’s class status.
There’s a lot to hate about being a tenured professor. It’s tough to switch jobs. The pay ain’t great if you’re in the humanities. Sometimes your colleagues are assholes, and you have to work with them for 20+ years. But the job protection and benefits usually serve as the highlight. Oh, right. And if your university breaks down in-person teaching in the COVID-19 era by class status, you’re likely doing OK.
Who’s not doing OK? For one, graduate student TAs. See, for example, a letter describing the situation at the University of Iowa. Graduate students teach many of the courses that will meet in-person. Probably not a coincidence.
However, there’s one group with even less pull than graduate students: adjuncts. Rarely unionized, always underpaid, often totally without benefits, the adjunct has little individual power to resist being pushed back into the live classroom in the COVID-19 era. Of course, some teach for fun. They’re independently wealthy, have other jobs, etc. But most adjuncts teach for a living. They’re in rougher shape.
Organizing Adjuncts
The situations of adjuncts vary. At the University of Iowa, a group called Faculty Forward organizes them. They’re an SEIU group, and they’ve shown some success. Among other things, they’ve done a sit-in, and they’ve collectively bargained. As a result, they’re on their way. But they’ve got ground to cover. In contrast, other places have more ground to cover.
