Chapter 15 considers a fourth prominent worry about tenure, namely, that its reliance on peer evaluation allows faculty to undeservedly protect or reward themselves and their colleagues. The chapter considers this “self-dealing” concern from various angles, showing how it both overestimates the uniqueness of peer evaluation systems and also misunderstands the organizational dynamics of university life.

Chapter 7 discusses the phenomenon of “multihyphenation” as it applies to university faculty. It shows how the traditional tripartite description of faculty duties (“teaching, research, and service”) not only fails to capture the range and the intensity of the demands made of professors but also overlooks the unequal distribution of this work and the degree to which it is demanded but not rewarded.

Chapter 19 uses TTS data to explore how university-employers and faculty-employees framed the disputes between them that ultimately led to a termination of the relationship. The chapter considers the prevalence of Sexual Misconduct narratives, the use of silence and specific counternarratives, and gendered patterns in accusations and responses.

Chapter 10 dispels the myth that tenure-stream academics lead financially carefree lives using a combination of salary and debt statistics and individual stories. It also shows that, in many disciplines, faculty pay a “salary penalty” for choosing academia and that they are expected to provide significant amounts of uncompensated labor without complaint.

Chapter 8 explains how difficult it is to get a tenure-stream faculty position despite years of preparation and thousands of dollars in educational investment. It uses both national statistics and specific examples to illustrate the workings of the academic job market, which is characterized by few, geographically dispersed, institutional employers seeking highly specialized employees. Importantly, this chapter discusses academic hiring as it existed before the 2025 federal funding reductions.

Chapter 22 discusses the phenomenon of reductions-in-force, which are not included in the TTS but which account for a majority of tenured faculty terminations. The chapter explains patterns in RIFs as well as their scale and uses specific examples to show how the impact of RIFs extends beyond the job loss they directly cause.

Chapter 18 introduces the Tenured-Terminations Study data with a detailed explanation of the design choices that inform it. The chapter also revisits and critiques the notion that tenure confers a “job for life” and clarifies why the analogy drawn between faculty tenure and judicial tenure is inapt and dangerous.

Chapter 20 uses a specific insight from the TTS data – that more tenured-terminations occurred at public rather than private universities – to show why tenure is not the root cause of observed problems and why legislative attacks on tenure do not present a solution. It builds on the narrative and counternarrative analysis provided in Chapter 19 as well as the importance of hierarchy and power differentials first discussed in Chapter 13.

Chapter 2 introduces the author as an anthropologist, an employment law scholar, and the child of two professors. It explains how this background informs the method and scope of the book and why it, along with qualitative and quantitative research, provides insight into a range of academic experiences.