Have you ever been ghosted in academia? The mentor who no longer replies when you reach out, the collaborators who mysteriously stopped collaborating with you, the search committee that said you were a top candidate and then stopped communicating with you—these are academic ghosts. They are people who are important to your career and suddenly stop responding to you without warning or explanation. What makes academic ghosting different than romantic ghosting? And why does it seem to hurt so much more? Dr. Andrea Andrzejewski joins us to explain:

• The systems in academia that make some forms of ghosting inevitable.
• What to do about it.
• The lingering pain and shame that being ghosted causes.
• Why your ghoster may reappear but they won’t apologize.
• The ethical and financial reasons to address the issues that perpetuate ghosting.

Our guest is: Dr. Alicia Andrzejewski, an assistant professor of English at the College of William & Mary. She is a scholar of early modern literature and culture; queer, feminist, and critical race theory; and the medical humanities. Her work has appeared in Shakespeare Studies, Shakespeare Bulletin, The Chronicle, Literary Hub, American Theater, The Boston Globe, Catapult, and others. Her current book project is Rude-Growing Briars: Queer Pregnancy in Shakespeare’s Plays, which argues for the transgressive force of pregnancy in his oeuvre and expansive ways in which modern people thought about the pregnant body.

Our host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, who is a historian.

Listeners to this episode may also be interested in:

• "The Sad Humiliations of Academic Ghosting," by Alicia Andrzejewski, PhD
• The Field Guide to Graduate School, by Jessica McCrory Calarco
• Candid Advice for New Faculty Members, by Marybeth Gasman
• The Latinx Guide to Graduate School, by Genevieve Negron-Gonzales and Magdalena Barrera
• Who Gets Believed, by Dina Nayeri
• Academic Life episode on Belonging
• Academic Life episode on quitting a PhD program
• Academic Life episode on the long road to the dream job in academia
• Academic Life episode on mistreatment of women of color in academia
• Academic Life episode on dealing with rejection
• Academic Life episode on Preparing for Difficult Conversations
• Academic Life episode on almost leaving academia

Welcome to The Academic Life! Join us here each week to learn from today’s experts inside and outside the academy, and embrace the broad definition of what it truly means to live an academic life.

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