So You Want to Get a Ph.D. in Political Science

by John Sides on October 27, 2010 · 18 comments

in Frivolity,Political Science News

[Hat tip to Lee Drutman.]

18 comments

{ 18 comments }

Jacob October 27, 2010 at 12:45 pm: I am so sick of this complaining and the bitter ennui of middle-aged political theorists. Politicians and policy-makers use my research. I know because they tell me so. If policy-makers are not using your research, it is your fault for not doing interesting research.
Alyx October 27, 2010 at 1:25 pm: So, what you’re telling me is that we can all get dream jobs if we destroy that lab at MIT? To Boston!
Sebastian October 27, 2010 at 3:12 pm: I thought that video was neither very funny nor did it reflect a typical PoliSci PhD experience.
Especially the whining about math – that’s just not something people are all that miserable about (and I say that as a mostly qualitative researcher).
Nicholas Warino October 27, 2010 at 3:33 pm: That was biting.

I knew I should have pursued that one degree that guarantees professional success and personal happiness.
David October 27, 2010 at 3:39 pm: Wow. Some of that hit way too close to home. But it was freaking hilarious.
Michael October 27, 2010 at 4:18 pm: Never has a cartoon so completely explained the miseries of my life.
bob October 27, 2010 at 4:39 pm: great work. but the voices for both characters are the same
Chindo October 27, 2010 at 4:39 pm: hilarious.
Of course, replace the words “political science” with any academic discipline, and it would be equally funny.

Okay, maybe not humanities… But I’d say a PHD in English has even more dire prospects of employment.
b. October 27, 2010 at 4:41 pm: I especially liked the part where it veered from being merely not funny into being both bigoted and not funny.
Matt October 27, 2010 at 5:45 pm: Awesome.
a October 27, 2010 at 5:50 pm: Bigoted? Really? What was bigoted about it? No seriously, bigoted?
Tom in Raleigh October 27, 2010 at 6:35 pm: Funny. But not as funny as the one about getting a PhD in English. This Poli Sci vid is funny only if every political scientist is a narrow quantoid who utterly disdains politics as understood in the real world. But I still crack up at my students who want to earn PhDs in Poli Sci because they are “really interested in politics.” Fortunately, after I show them some of my and my colleagues’ work, they run screaming to MA programs in “practical politics” or whatever.
Talleyrand October 27, 2010 at 6:49 pm: Correlation btw being a quant and having a sense of humor? Apparently, r=-1
Lindsey October 27, 2010 at 7:06 pm: in response to bob:
see this one http://bit.ly/b4Wpq9
b. October 27, 2010 at 8:29 pm: re: bigotry, note the comments involving Missouri, mental retardation, and Bible thumping.
Sebastian October 27, 2010 at 10:25 pm: Talleyrand: I don’t think that has anything to do with quant or qual. It’s just not a good parody of political science.
(Even the stuff it gets somewhat right – i.e. trouble getting a job – it gets wrong: There aren’t all that many post-docs in polisci (certainly much less than junior openings every year), very, very few people go “from post-doc to post-doc”.)
cbsy October 28, 2010 at 2:00 pm: Hilarious. May send this to undergrads asking for grad school rec letters as warning!

re: bigoted comment, to quote my favorite swordsman “You keep saying that word. I don’t think that word means what you think that it means.”
livingminimal October 29, 2010 at 11:12 am: This is the result of everyone wanting to be the next Paul Krugman (myself included, mind you)