The Hilarities of the Job Hunt

As I may have mentioned recently, I am in the middle of a half-hearted job hunt. Well, quarter-hearted.

At any rate, many of the job postings are quite hilarious.

One job wants a specialist in literature of "the Restaration period." Um, you mean the RestOration? Now, I am no great speller, but I think that the chair of an ENGLISH department might be able to get all the words in a job posting right.

There's a job in the Upper East Side that pays $38,000 a year. Which, I don't exaggerate, will not cover rent in the smallest, crappiest studio apartment on the Upper East Side.

Some of the job posting are just funny because one can't imagine who could possible fill them: "We are looking for someone who can teach the theory of drama from Aristotle to Ibsen; who can contribute to our departmental conversation on post-colonialism, queer theory, and the genalogies of modernity; subspecialty in either medievalism or 18th century trans-atlanticism preferable."

But the one that I found most striking said, in the place that most postings affirm that they are equal opportunity employers (or sometimes that they aren't: that they give priority to Catholics or whatever), this one said that they hire based on the principle of "impartial love."

Impartial love? Isn't that what singles bars are for?

No, wait. That's impersonal love.

It turns out that this institution was one of the first co-educated colleges in the country and was the first integrated college in the South. Which makes it harder to laugh at what seems like a very strange commitment to "impersonal love."

Harder, but not impossible.