This article begins by asking readers to make a modest supposition: HBCUs are, perhaps, one of the last frontiers for sustained feminist praxis-administratively and pedagogically. The authors write that they struggle with the situation, and find it both lamentable and paradoxical, since many HBCUs were originally founded and/or administered by…

Many teachers have known of (or been members of) departments in which all of the potentially successful chairs--after having proven themselves by running subunits or graduate programs--have decided to devote themselves solely to research or teaching, and to leave department administration to whoever is willing to do it or whoever can be talked…

Describes three criteria used by a college administrator to allocate faculty positions. Discusses ways for English departments to enhance their chances for faculty positions. Suggests that departments that can significantly enhance undergraduate education have the best claim on faculty positions. (RS)

Presents 10 concrete strategies for retaining faculty lines, strategies that respond to the new economic realities shaping institutions and at the same time preserve the vital heart of the academy. (RS)

Suggests that successful strategies for retaining faculty lines will vary widely according to local circumstances. Discusses the cases of the University of Oregon and the State University of New York Stony Brook, which suggest that English departments stand to gain if they can demonstrate that adding faculty lines will help overcome the split…

Suggests that English departments have seen their power to shape the identity of their members diminish. Argues that an important part of the preparation of future professors takes place in a master-apprentice setting strengthened by an economic atmosphere that encourages students fearful of getting jobs to identify with those faculty members…

Instead of being encouraged to act in a professional manner, graduate students are continually reminded of their professional inferiority by the English department. (HOD)

Argues that a paradox exists in humanities departments when such departments, which are the custodians and beneficiaries of literacy, fail to concern themselves with reading, writing, and pedagogy. (DF)

Exposes the myth of the department chairperson as omnipotent. Demonstrates that by identifying the common interest of the myriad components of an English department, a chairperson can unify them into a successful, dynamic department by power of the faculty members themselves. (HTH)

Describes the kinds of teaching jobs that most recent doctorates in English attain. Discusses the role of the English professor at regional universities. Considers how it is different from the role of professor at a larger state university or at a smaller private college. (HB)

Recounts the rapid rise and recent decline of the once highly regarded Duke University (North Carolina) English department, characterized by disaffection and defection to other institutions of a large proportion of the faculty, disorganized teaching, and an unsettled curriculum. The perceptions of a number of the faculty involved are presented.…

Offers advice to English department administrators on how to respond to lawsuits both from within and outside the department. (AEA)

Maintains that one of the most difficult problems faced by English department chairpersons arises from the widely divergent theoretical or ideological positions of faculty members. Argues for faculty to stop abusing one another and illustrates departmental discord in an imaginative fiction involving "Roger" and "Rose." (HB)

Develops several perspectives of the discipline of college English teaching that include local, state, regional, and national levels of involvement as well as viewpoints of others outside the discipline. (AEA)

Explores and puts to rest the misconceptions that faculty members from English as well as other disciplines hold about teaching writing. Makes suggestions that may help English teachers who want to establish an institution-wide program of writing gain the cooperation of other departments. (HTH)